Psychology can play a huge role in determining the winner or loser of a chess game. I'd like to mention that in my years of playing chess competitively, I've had numerous opponents that tried to psyche me out.
One of my most memorable incidents of this happening was last year, when I played in a tourney in Indianapolis. It was the second round, and I was playing someone who was much lower rated than me. During the game, my opponent tried to distract me by staring at me. No matter what I did, he would just be constantly staring at me. When I got up to walk around the room, every time I looked back at him he would be just looking at me. Although his strategy of trying to psyche me out failed (I won against him in 30-40 moves), it caused me to miss a very quick win at the beginning that would have ended the game on move 20.
Psychology
Nice blog Danny!
Psychology can play a huge role in determining the winner or loser of a chess game. I'd like to mention that in my years of playing chess competitively, I've had numerous opponents that tried to psyche me out.
One of my most memorable incidents of this happening was last year, when I played in a tourney in Indianapolis. It was the second round, and I was playing someone who was much lower rated than me. During the game, my opponent tried to distract me by staring at me. No matter what I did, he would just be constantly staring at me. When I got up to walk around the room, every time I looked back at him he would be just looking at me. Although his strategy of trying to psyche me out failed (I won against him in 30-40 moves), it caused me to miss a very quick win at the beginning that would have ended the game on move 20.