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When I first started playing chess online, not uncommonly, I would run out of time. And as the clock starts to run out, under pressure to make some moves, I would often blunder and lose the game anyway! I still don’t think I’m good at blitz or bullet formats, and I personally enjoy playing games where I do have some luxury to think. I usually play 30 min rapid with no increment, but when I feel like a faster game, I will occasionally play rapid on lichess for 10 min games with 15 second increments. In this following game, my opponent played really quite well in a 10 min game and we were equal all the way deep into the middle game. However, they probably spent too much time per move. At the point they had around 45 seconds left on the clock, I still had around 3 minutes, and they entered what I would call “panic” mode. You’ll see the massive change in their moves.

I still consider myself to be a beginner at the quicker chess formats, but I do have some insights from what I’ve learnt over the year. Firstly, I don’t actually think blitz and bullet are actually good formats for beginners to learn! Part of learning is thinking through your moves, and then after a win or a loss, analysing the game and reflecting on decisions and choices made in the game, compared to alternatives which may have been better. For blitz and bullet, it’s too easy to make a move just because you made a move, and so it’s hard to actually reflect and improve. I think 10 minute games are probably the minimum for learning. From this perspective, you do need to commit to a move! The second insight is that it’s okay to make a bad move and lose the game! It’s just a game and if you learn something afterwards – for instance – why a move was suboptimal, then you can improve. Agonising over a move and running out of time can lead to the series of catastrophic errors seen in this game.

I hope you enjoyed this video, and thanks for watching!

Game on chess.com: https://www.chess.com/analysis/library/3bzJim4cCv

[Event "Rated Rapid game"]
[Site "https://lichess.org/XM91IUWr"]
[Date "2022.02.26"]
[Round "?"]
[White "Kendyman"]
[Black "vitualis"]
[Result "0-1"]
[UTCDate "2022.02.26"]
[UTCTime "12:15:09"]
[WhiteElo "1581"]
[BlackElo "1533"]
[WhiteRatingDiff "-28"]
[BlackRatingDiff "+14"]
[TimeControl "600+5"]
[ECO "A20"]
[Opening "English Opening: King's English Variation"]
[Termination "Time forfeit"]
[Annotator "lichess.org"]

1. c4 e5 {A20 English Opening: King's English Variation} 2. d3 d5 3. cxd5 Qxd5 4. Nc3 Qc6 5. Nf3 Nd7 6. e4 Bb4 7. Bd2 Ne7 8. Qb3 a5 9. a3 Bd6 10. Be2 Nc5 11. Qc4 Be6 12. Qb5 O-O 13. O-O Qd7 14. Qxd7 Bxd7 15. a4 Nb3 16. Rad1 Nxd2 17. Nxd2 c6 18. Nb3 b5 19. d4 b4 20. Na2 Be6 21. Nbc1 b3 22. Nc3 f5 23. Bf3 Bb4 24. d5 cxd5 25. Nxd5 Nxd5 26. exd5 Bd7 27. Nxb3 Bxa4 28. Rd3 e4 29. Re3 exf3 30. Rxf3 Rad8 31. Rd1 g6 32. Rdd3 Bb5 33. Rd1 Be2 34. Rd2 Bxf3 35. gxf3 Bxd2 36. Nxd2 Rxd5 {<br /><br />Game may have continued...} (36... Rxd5 37. Nc4 Rc8 38. Nb6 Rc1+ 39. Kg2 Rb5 40. Na4 {-23.2}) 0-1