The chess trainer’s patience

Boris Zlotnik, PhD, IM

Spain
In this photo from 1963 appears the first Soviet
world champion M.Botvinnnik, opposite him is the
future world champion A.Karpov.
I also appear on this photograph.
Even a great talent is not always visible. It does
not grow as fast as one should want it.

“Unfortunately Tolya Karpov will never play

well”. Botvinnik.

The first success of Karpov came only in year

1969 (Youth Champion).
We began training with Fabiano Caruana in year 2004
when he had ELO 2180, and ended in year 2007 with
ELO 2530. For a long time he did not have exceptional
results. He simply did not win tournaments.

Karjakin became GM when he was 12.

Wesley So beat him in the sub-10 World

Championship.
A chess trainer must have a much better patience
when he works with chess players with medium chess
abilities.

These chess players are usually characterized by a non-

exact capability of variant calculations, a weak sense of
position and a bad chess memory. Even though these
players may be good students in other subjects –
sometimes the best students in their classes.
In May of this year I began working with a 12 year old
girl with ELO 1618 who had studied chess for 6 years
already.
I devoted to her much more attention that I had
devoted to Fabiano. However, the results of the first
tournaments led me to despair.
However, today she has increased her current ELO in
250 points and I believe that next year she will surpass
ELO 2000. Now, I would like to show some examples of
the evolution of her growth as a chess player.
Only this year Sabrina Vega (another one of my
pupils, who I trained in the 1990s, and who first
participated in the World tournament in 1996)
became vice champion of Europe, for the first
time receiving a medal in the European and
World championships.