I remember starting out in chess a long time ago. I had no opening and I was primarily a tactical player. I had no problem as long as there were some tactical possibilities in the middlegame. I got better and started studying openings and my results improved. Then I noticed something, there were some players that I always had difficulties with. I could never get the type of positions I liked with them.
I knew something was missing from my game.
Then I found Ludek Pachman's books called "Modern Chess Strategy" which is a three volume set and I found the gap in my chess understanding. These books took a lot of effort to understand but it helped me to increase my playing strength.
The link between openings and middlegame - the former determines the latter's pawn structure. By studying the games of masters based on this structures, you will come to a better grasp of how to play these type of structures which occur again and again even from different openings.
The basic middlegame structures can be grouped as follows
1. Isolated Queen Pawn aka IQP
2. Hanging Pawns
3. Doubled pawns
4. Caro-kann formation
5. Slav formation
6. Carlsbad center
7. Stonewall center
8. Closed King's Indian
9. Open King's Indian
10. Grunfeld center
11. French center
12. Benoni Center
13. Benko formation
14. Sicilian Centers
15. Miscellaneous others
So one way of studying the middlegame is to take positions from the above and thoroughly understand how to play them. For this purpose, I am starting a series of classes on Middlegame Strategy. There will be 4-5 sessions cost at RM50 per session. The first session will be on Sunday 20th August 2017.
More details here
Registration form here
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