Grandmaster Preparation: Strategic Play

Strategic Play - GM Preparation

Part of Jacob Aagaard’s award-winning Grandmaster Preparation series, this volume tackles what he considers the hardest area of all: strategic play, the handling of complex positions where the right path is not a matter of calculation or familiar patterns but of deep, original thinking.

This is the most demanding kind of chess training. The games and exercises here deliberately go beyond the skills drilled elsewhere in the series — beyond pattern recognition, calculation, and routine positional assessment — into positions so rich that you must genuinely think for yourself to find the way. Aagaard provides the conceptual tools and then sets you to work on tough, carefully chosen material.

As throughout the series, the emphasis is on active solving rather than passive reading: you wrestle with the positions the way a professional preparing for a tournament would, and the detailed solutions show how a strong player navigates the complexity.

Genuinely difficult, and aimed at strong, ambitious players — experts, masters, and aspiring masters — who want to develop the deepest layer of chess understanding. Not a first improvement book, but a superb one for those ready to be stretched.

This ebook is a part of Bundle: Grandmaster Preparation