English Chess Forum

Hello.
How can I acquire physical fitness for a competition?
Is there any particular food/exercise that I would need?

Thanks in advance

Less food (probably) and more exercise

I guess more endurance style than explosive - so walking not sprints. Mind you I can walk crazy distances at high speed quite happily but have trouble maintaining concentration for long games, so I dunno.

Don't stuff your face with food, get down the gym, simples

It is not so much about consume less food but the right kind of foods.

Most athletes and sports people consume much more than you might imagine (especially protein) but they exercise frequently and train frequently.
They consume carbs and then burn them off.

I went from 14.5 stone to 11 stone by

Starting the day with a decent breakfast: missing out breakfast is a mistake.
Not snacking
Not eating late in the evening
Cutting out all / most take-aways
Cutting out most alcholol and bar snacks
Drinking much more water and not getting dehydrated
Playing / training table tennis at least three times a week

If you eat less food then the body will lay down fat as it believes you are fasting.

J.

maybe I introduced my problem wrongly. I don't want to lose weight; I am quite skinny (some 45 kg) and have become skinnier after fasting 30 days. I can see some of my blood vessels, So I need both to put on weight and develop muscle strength.

soheil_hooshdaran wrote:maybe I introduced my problem wrongly...

Plus ça change...

Soheil Hooshdaran wrote:
Maybe I introduced my problem wrongly.

Look up website " How to gain weight naturally".

I don't mean just "weight". As a chess player I am more concerned about physical strength sufficient for a 9-11 4-6 hour tournament sessions.
In the last rated event, I won the first 3-4 games, but lost 4 games in a row. Maybe that was just by accident, but it can indicate that I got fatigued.

If we all knew what to eat to make us win games, we would all be eating it !

The question of surviving long tournaments is a fairly valid one though.

Physical fitness does factor into that a bit but it clearly isn't that crucial, as one glance at some of the people playing (and doing well in!) in weekend tournaments in the UK will clearly demonstrate.....

Mental stamina seems to be much more important and a bit tangential. Also switching off between rounds, sleeping etc. You train that by, well, playing a few more tournaments I guess.

Physical fitness is of course well worth doing on general principles