Today’s spotlight: Arthur Kogan and OLALACHESS
SPRAGGETT ON CHESS
Marital status:
Married since 25 of July 2003! (with women international master Plachkinova-Kogan Tatiana).I am a father of wonderful girl called Carolina born on 9.12.2004
I worked also as a second of Vlad Tkachiev that two times played world quarter final matches…and a coach of the Dutch national women team, (between them WGM Peng one of the best world women players for years who was 3th place in last european champ .She won gold medal on 1board in the European Team championship 2007 and she is 10 times dutch women champion.) and coach of Italian national women team since Torino olimpiade 2006!
I have chess training groups in Holland,Spain and France…
TB: You call your training method Olalachess. Not a bad name probably because you live in Spain but what does it mean?
Arthur Kogan doing his thing on YOUTUBE !
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A good friend of mine, grandmaster Arthur Kogan is one of the very best chess trainers and coaches in the world today. A very gifted individual, Arthur has worked with some of the elite grandmasters. Living in Tarragona, Spain for the better part of the past decade, Arthur has set up what is probably the most successful chess school in the Iberian peninsula: Olala Chess Academy.
Grandmaster Arthur Kogan
FOUNDER OF THE OLALA CHESS ACADEMY
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My name is Arthur Kogan and I have been a chess player for more than 25 years!
I have been an International grandmaster for many years. Chess is both a job and a passion, the greatest combination possible.I love chess and trully believe that it is not only a great game, but a great “tool” and “excuse” to travel around the world meeting interesting people.
I have also been a trainer for many years and I feel honored to share my chess knowledge with others so they can experience the joy that chess has given me.
I am very proud of all my chess students. Many of them already have the GM title but, more than anything else, I am most proud to be a father of a very sweet baby called Carolina (2 years old already!) and a husband of a sweet wife called Tatiana (a Chess Woman International Master, but mainly a great mother!).
OLALA is a famous expression that, I guess, is original from France. I was lucky to live there for a few years (and I still have many French friends!) and somehow I liked so much to hear very often this ‘OLALA’ and to discover that it is used for many different situations with different meanings, all depends on the way or tone you pronounce it!In this case I mainly use the ‘OLALA’ to describe an especial chess style, that I tried to follow during the years in my chess games and also tried to pass to my chess students and chess friends!
When I speak about ‘OLALACHESS’, or ‘OLALA chess style’ I mean to describe a new way developed by me based on a POSITIVE WAY OF THINKING ABOUT CHESS that search for harmony, and the search of pleasure in our games!
So when in one game or position we see something beautiful or amazing (and we almost have no words to describe our surprise or happiness) it can make us say in one simple word: ‘OLALA!!!’I guess it also means ‘wowww’ in other languages. So I would say that one of the main ideas of this new site is first of all to smile, and then to transmit this ‘OLALA CHESS’ knowledge all around the world to people that really love chess and is motivated to improve and have more fun in their games!
It is true that we have more fun when we win but, we should never forget that chess is only a game and by losing one bad game we might ‘win’ a good friend!
‘OLALACHESS’ is the new future chess style: my main aim is to help others to take more care of each of their chess pieces, so each one will ‘smile’! and then, to be able to make all pieces work together in harmony, so we can make nice combinations and really enjoy the magic of this great game called CHESS!
So let’s OLALA everybody! Come and visit my site where you can see some OLALA inspiring games for free and get the chance to subscribe for OLALACHESS lessons from me and from many other OLALACHESS experts! Be ready for something very especial and original, since I always think we should respect and study the past, but at the same time we must try to be creative and try to find new ways to make us enjoy more whatever we do!
Keep smiling and give love to your family, friends, nature or anybody you meet! It’s for free but feels great, feels OLALA!
Guys, just don’t forget that there is nothing that love and a good sense of humor cannot beat!
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WHO AM I?
Place of birth & birth date: Chernovci,Ukraine-January 29,1974
Current residence: Tarragona,Spain
But I spent more than 20 years in Israel ( I immigrated from Ukraine when I was 2 years old!) ,and I had the luck to stay 3 years in France (Cannes, Tulouse and Paris) 1 year in Prague ,8 months in Switzerland, half year in Ljubliana (Slovenia) and Budapest…
And many other great places around the world!
Marital status:
Married since 25 of July 2003! (with women international master Plachkinova-Kogan Tatiana).I am a father of wonderful girl called Carolina born on 9.12.2004
My chess style:
Playing for harmony to make all the pieces smile! ( positionally and tactically ..) Especially with aggressive , tactical , inventive and creative chess!
Favorite Openings:
I like many openings .I’ve tried practically most of them .But I’ve used above all ,with big success: Sicilian (Taimanov) Sozin Attack with white,Rossolimo (with both colors!) and a s black the Volga Gambit ,Nimzo, and the Scandinav defense. (often I made it to be an attack:-))
Chess heroes that influenced me the most:
World Champions GM’s Alechin ,Fischer, Smyslov and Tal…ok, also Kasparov!
When did I achieve my final GM norm:
1998
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MY TRAINING EXPERIENCE
I am working as a professional trainer (next for being one of the most active chess players in the world!) since many years ( more than 15!)…between my chess students I had European champion under 20 (now GM De Vrougt (Holland)),the European Champion(2008) U18 Xavi Villa world champion under 16 (now already GM Gershon) ,French women champion and (WGM Marrie Sebag).
The champion of Italy Elena Sedina,Gm’s Thal Abergel and Nataf some of the stongest players of France,Manuel Palacios and Gavril Draghici-few times champions of Spain of chess for Blind(ONCE) …and many more!
WGM Marie Sebag
The champion of Italy Elena Sedina,Gm’s Thal Abergel and Nataf some of the stongest players of France,Manuel Palacios and Gavril Draghici-few times champions of Spain of chess for Blind(ONCE) …and many more!
super-gm Vlad Tkachiev
I worked also as a second of Vlad Tkachiev that two times played world quarter final matches…and a coach of the Dutch national women team, (between them WGM Peng one of the best world women players for years who was 3th place in last european champ .She won gold medal on 1board in the European Team championship 2007 and she is 10 times dutch women champion.) and coach of Italian national women team since Torino olimpiade 2006!
WGM Peng
I have students of any age and chess level. I train many young chess talents and during my chess career I’ve developed my own chess teaching system (OLALACHESS) based on my experience .This system ,for example ,helped to one of my oldest students (64 years old) to win the first tournament he played in his life after only about 20hours of training.
Languages:
I speak (by order of level!) Hebrew, Russion, English, Spanish and some French ,Arabian, Bulgarian, Serbian….
My lessons approach:
I believe in a personal approach, discussing with the student his goals, weaknesses, strengths…
Giving him important tips and advices how to improve and enjoy more with his chess as quick as possible;
Having a deep look at recent games of him;
Showing and explaining important classical games and typical chess positions.; (Russian teaching system)
Teaching how to play with a harmony!
Why I would enjoy being your Instructor:
I love chess and I like to teach and share my love and passion to the game! I like to help people to improve and enjoy more their chess games!
I cooperate with many chess magazines like Jaque, Europechec(France) y Escac (catalan),SOS (Holand),Chessbase.
Arthur with WGM Lanho from the Ukraine, now working for Europechecs
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Part of an interview with Arthur Kogan
TB: You call your training method Olalachess. Not a bad name probably because you live in Spain but what does it mean?
AK: The main idea is to create active chess with it. To play positive, to be in harmony with your pieces. First of all my training is mental training. My student has to trust his potential.
TB: Is that really that important? What happened to good moves?
AK: It is clear to me that it is important. I can prove it in a way. With that I mean that the results of a lot of my students improved after I gave them mental training. Systems to handle fear for instance.
A lot of very strong players in the present and past play a lot of draws just because they are so afraid to lose. They remember how they felt when they lost and they fear that emotion most of all. As a consequence they tend to offer a draw in a lot of good and even winning positions. Needless to say this approach does not lead to the maximum result.
TB: How do you know how to handle fear?
AK: I took a lot of psychology courses on several universities.
TB: But psychology alone does not win chess games. How to improve the strength of your students further?
AK: By teaching them how to make their pieces smile.
TB: My pieces never smile… Well I really dont know, I usually sit behind them.
AK: Mine do! I see chess as a mirror of life. A lot of things that work in life also work in a game of chess. An active piece is happy, a passive one, an undeveloped one usually is not. Furthermore the pieces have to work in harmony like the different members of a society. Tactics usually don’t work when you still have a lot of undeveloped pieces. And I believe strongly in the importance of details. Sometimes one wins because he or she noticed a tiny little detail in a certain position. Or because he or she took care of a little detail in life.
TB: Can you give an example?
AK: There was this German guy who had more than enough knowledge to become international master. But he just did not make his norms. I got the impression that his lack of concentration was his main problem so I advised him to pick up running, excercising. After that he became an IM easily. I did not need a board to teach him that…
TB: And that proves…
AK: That every person can achieve and maybe has something to achieve in life. Well it doesnot prove anything of course. It just makes it a little bit more likely. If you believe in yourself and work hard enough anything
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Arthur Kogan doing his thing on YOUTUBE !
Describing what olalachess is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fgc79pQzAgA
Lessons (part 1):n http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZGje68gjo4A
Lessons (part 2): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iFrhQ39dheM
Lessons (part 3):http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pWT56Q1cFGs
Lessons (part 4) :http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=39Hh7v4KoEw
A very instructive article written by Arthur Kogan (from his Olala chess site!)
Getting Rid Of Yesterday: Start Your Day Fresh
”Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Do this often enough, and you’ll gradually build a better future for yourself.
Getting Rid Of Yesterday: Start Your Day Fresh
”Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Sometimes we start a day with the previous day still in mind. We think about the mistakes we made in the previous day, how things went wrong, and how we felt bad about it. No wonder it becomes difficult to focus on the current day.
And since we cannot fully focus on the day, our performance may drop and things may once again go wrong. This pattern could repeat again and again, where the burden from the previous day is taken to the current day and make it bad, which will then be a burden for the following day. The chain may be hard to break and your overall performance may drop, not to mention the difficulty to have a peaceful mind.
So it’s important leave the previous day behind. Always start your new day fresh, without thinking about yesterday. That way you will be able to fully concentrate, do your best, and improve your performance.
Here are some steps you can take that will help you do that:
1. Take time to evaluate your day
At the end of a day, take some time to think about it. Don’t wait until the next day. You should finish dealing with your day before the next morning comes.
The purpose of this thinking time is not to regret how bad your day was, how things went wrong, or how people treated you negatively. This won’t do you any good to improve your life. Instead, the purpose of this thinking time is to extract lessons which you can bring to the following day.
2. Ask the right questions to extract lessons
To extract lessons, you need to ask the right questions. There are basically two questions you should ask:
1. What have you done well?
There should be some things you have done well. What are they and how did you do them? What can you do to make sure that you can continue doing them well or even better?
2. What have you done wrong?
Usually there are things that do not go as expected. What are they and why did they happen? What can you do to improve yourself and avoid making the same mistakes in the future?
3. Make a commitment to apply the lessons
After you extract the lessons, you should make a commitment to apply them. To do so, find some actionable things you can do to incorporate the lessons you learned into your lifestyle. Next, remind yourself to do them. You may write them down if you want to.
4. “Close” your day
After you have spent time thinking about your day and extracting lessons, make a decision to “close” the day. Think of it as closing the door on a day that’s gone. You are done with it; don’t think about it anymore. Put that day behind you so you can start the next new day afresh.
Here are some things you should remember to make it easier to “close” a day:
* The day is over; there’s nothing you can do about it. You can’t change the past no matter how hard you try.
* Instead of thinking about something you can’t change, focus instead on the things you can change, and that is the present.
* Getting into the right mindset to focus on what you can change will make it easier to “close” your day.
5. Bring only the lessons to the next day and nothing else
After you “close” a day, you should not bring anything out of it to the next day except the lessons you extract. These lessons deal with things you can do something about. They deal with the present, not the past. Instead of thinking about the past, focus on applying the lessons to the present. That way you will be able to start your day fresh without the burden of yesterday.
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SPRAGGETT ON CHESS