new here

Hello

i recently joined the program, so i hope it will help me to reach 2,000 (2,300 is way to high) from my actual 1800
i just felt a bit overwelmed by the amount of info.
any ideas how to start, just read everything from top to bottom, o read the intro things, see one or two annotated games and take a look at the exercises and stuff?
finally to the ppl who have finished or are finishing the course
did it help?
regards

Chris

Hello, welcome here.

Regarding how to deal with the course, i invite you to read a few topics in Month 1 forum, especially this one
https://icsdiscussion.forumotion.net/ics-month-one-f3/getting-started-at-ics-how-are-you-going-through-the-material-t5.htm

We have not yet made a full retrospective about members improvement, but as far as i read on the forum most of us made a +100, +200 elo for people starting the course in the range 1600 - 1900.

It all depends how much time you will succeed to dedicate to chess after a few months of ICS... and how you are commited to give up your bad habits the first 2 months...

Mainly ICS deals with strategy, and thinking process, so you will experience a curve of progression like a big saw, because you need to adjust to new concepts, and blunder on tactical, then you will reconsider doing some tacticals, and loose on strategy, etc...

For most of us, the rythm of the curse is quite high (if you intend to apply all concepts right on the board as soon as you read them), also there is a lot of exercises which take a lot of time to complete.

Considering my personnal case, i will say that my elo progression is not as fast as i intended when joining, but my play is definitely more solid now, and when i make mistakes, i'm able to see why.
I started average 1600 (min 1500, max 1700) and now it's more 1750 (min 1630, max 1830) on 15 min games ICC.

Welcome to the site. I second everything HangingKing said.

My advice: don't overdose too quickly. Slow and steady. You'll see most of us comment a whole lot the first few months, but people start to lose steam and motivation. The first month is really an appetizer, to show you what you will be learning.

Also, DO NOT feel bad if you can't do everything. If you have to put off the tactics modules until the end, for instance, that would be fine even though you will feel guilty about it. I would suggest spending less time than you want to at first, as then you will stay hungry.

I spent too much time at first, especially on month one, which really as I said is just an appetizer.

I think I will write something about this and sticky it in the month one discussion forum, or perhaps the general forum. Sometime in the next week or so. I'll need to think about it some more.

Thanks for the replies guys and the link to the thread how to deal with the course

guess we all get into it as we seem best
my xp so far has been to read the stuff in the night when the kids are asleep and do the exercises (2 per session) while doing my 30 mins workout (eliptical bike) that way wife can't say i'm spending too much time on chess
besides i've personally found that i can reach a great concentration while doing physical excerices, anybody else tried it?

As i side note, is problem 1 of the test right? i haven't seen the solution yet, but it seems that being a pawn and piece down withouth compensation is enough to forget about to do list, consequences and such

regards

Chris

Sounds like a good thread for Month 1, or the errata thread