My Chess History

I've wrote a lot of posts about working out, but I not much about the nerdy part of being a nerdy-jock. That may be because I am more of a jock than a nerd, and know more about working out than..... nerdy stuff.

I guess one thing that makes me nerdy is the game of chess. I love chess. I started playing about 8-10 years ago. I never really cared about chess back then, it was just a thing my dad taught me so that I played once in awhile. I had almost no logic then. All I wanted to do is use my rooks to destroy the other player. My dad had at least some strategy and beat me every time. I got frustrated with that and decided to play my siblings. They all beat me, but Colleen and I were pretty even, and I soon became better than her. After getting frustrated with losing to Shannon, Abbey and Tim I tried playing Dad again. I lost most of the games, but was starting to get a basic idea how to play. After a couple years of playing like that I kind of gave up and didn't play much. I just took time off of chess and worked on school, sports and other easier games. I also got some more logic in my head through math (which I loved).

I then started playing again and was pretty even with my dad. We played after supper many times and eventually I started beating him more than he was beating me. Soon after that I was beating everyone in my family relatively easily. I then started challenging my friends in chess. The two friends I challenged most were Tucker and Richard. Tucker slowly became easier to beat and then I stopped playing with him and mainly did sports with him. Richard was still a challenge. He was very good with his knights and queens, while I was good with my bishops, pawns and rooks. There was a time when we both became busier and we couldn't play as much. During that time I played elders and our pastor in our church. I usually lost because I was still quite ignorant in the game. They taught me alot, and I applied it. I then started playing Richard again and was winning more games than losing against him. After practicing with him and beating him almost every time I challenged the elders again. I lasted much longer, but still lost.

So now I had people I was better than, and people who were much better than me. So I then looked into online chess. I played off and on there. It improved my game for sure. I also read a little about chess and then went back to the elders in my church. I lost and won games then. After about a year of going back and forth, I ended up winning almost every game.

We later moved to a different church and I played the leaders in that church as well. I ended up beating them as well. So now no one I knew was challenging me very much... but then I my uncle came to visit. He showed me up. He moved at almost twice my speed and played better. I lost games to him all the time. He then went back down after his visit with us and I was determined to beat him.

I played online a lot and learned quite a bit. One of the reasons I got so good was because in 8th grade I got some pretty bad shin splints and didn't even want to walk. So I played online chess all the time, and sometimes read about chess.

After a year or two I met a guy who was really good at chess. He ran a chess club in Lewiston and I played with him alot. I went to a local tournament with him and I was pretty darn nervous so I played quite badly and lost games I should have won. After awhile the chess club kind of fell apart and we went to a different chess club with MUCH better players. Like one of the players can 'own' another player who could 'own' me. Around this time I was helping Shannon babysit some kids. One of the kids was extremely smart for his age. I played him (and still do). I usually win, but he improved tremendously over a short time. He then started going to the chess club with me and Eric (the guy that I was going to the chess club with before). Eric ended up not coming much more and I only went with Mitchell (the guy I helped babysit) until that chess club faded out.

With in the past year or so my uncle came to visit again. This time I was a well trained chess player. I won 3 out of 4 games. I had finally become slightly better than him. I was satisfied with that and started playing less and less. Just recently I started playing again and realized I was getting rusty. Now that I shook off most of that rust I'm playing online again and loving it.

There were many other people I played that challenged me or I helped them with their chess skills, but I didn't really feel like mentioning every chess game I've played.