How To Analyze Your Games: A ChessDojo Guide

“Chess is the art of analysis” - 6th World Chess Champion Mikhail Botvinnik

Game analysis is almost universally recommended by chess coaches worldwide, but when it comes to analyzing one’s own games, many chess players don’t know where to start or what a good annotation even looks like. Others often neglect the task, not wanting to face their mistakes post-mortem.

Aimed at players of all levels, How To Analyze Your Games is a guide to reviewing and annotating one’s chess games, an absolutely crucial task for the development of any ambitious chess player.

The book contains a collection of model game examples from players of every level, along with a straightforward guide to doing your own game analysis. The idea is to provide real examples of what good annotations look like, hopefully bringing inspiration and motivation for readers to begin to do the work themselves.

Featuring students of the Dojo Training Program with ratings ranging from 0-2400, the book is broken up into four parts (0-1000, 1000-1500, 1500-2000, 2000+), with every chapter consisting of five model annotated games of players within a 100-point rating cohort (1100-1200, 1600-1700, etc.) starting from 0-300 and going all the way up to 2400-2500.

The book also contains three instructional chapters, written by Dojo senseis GM Jesse Kraai, IM David Pruess, and IM Kostya Kavutskiy:

– How to Analyze Your Games by GM Jesse Kraai: GM Jesse Kraai explains the process of reflecting on and analyzing one’s games.

– David’s Advice For A Reluctant Analyst by IM David Pruess: Advice for newer players or those who have never analyzed their games before, and are intimidated by the prospect.

– Using Engines by IM Kostya Kavutskiy: A technical breakdown on how to most effectively use computers and chess engines for game analysis.

If you’re a chess player looking to get serious about your game, learning to analyze your games is an absolute must!