E-Dvd Fighting For Initiative With Gm Misa Pap

The idea of initiative confuses a lot of beginners. What does it actually mean?

Is it sacrificing a piece and going for a combination? Is it squeezing the life out of your opponent’s position? Is this tactical play or positional?

If you ask a decent coach, he will let you know that initiative is everything in chess.

You might sacrifice a piece. You might grab the critical squares too. You might even have to lose the tempo if needed.

So what does gaining the initiative mean? It means to act and “force” your opponent to react.

Easy to say but extremely hard to implement.

That’s why we bring to you GM Misa Pap’s latest exclusive offering, Fighting for Initiative, where Misa goes over fourteen top-level games to show you in practice what initiative looks like.

In 10 hours, he approaches this complex subject from different perspectives and tries to break it down in a simple, easy-to-understand manner.

If you are a club level player trying to work on your chess skills every day, this training will be of help.

Here’s what you will learn:

• Anand’s 19…f5 wonder. A big thing about initiative is “one you gain it, don’t lose it.” Even a quiet, little move like this as demonstrated by Anand against Aronian in 2015 Tata Steel match is enough. With Misa’s commentary move by move.
• The dark squares around… Let Aronian show you how to take advantage once the f-pawn moves forward around the king. No time to castle even for White. Done right, White’s position collapses even if the other player is Wesley So.
• One mistimed pawn capture. When Karpov, as White, took the d6-pawn in his 1993 Linares match against Kasparov, it gave the initiative to the Black’s central knight… jumping around and wrecking White’s position. Again, no time to castle for White.
• Morphy’s punch combo. That’s what it felt like. Once those “punches” started, it’s almost over for his opponent. In this game, Misa shows how his opponent tried to save a pawn and lost the game instead. Thanks to Morphy’s initiative.