Blindfold chess: how it actually works

The common assumption is that a blindfold player sees a picture of the board, like a photograph. In fact a different mechanism is at work: the position is held not as an image but as a set of meaningful relations - which piece defends what, which lines are open, where the weaknesses are.

That is why a strong player reproduces a position from a real game easily and struggles with pieces scattered at random. There is no meaning in a random arrangement, and meaning is what gets remembered.

Even if you never play a whole game blindfold, elements of the skill pay off over the board.

• Calculation. Calculating five moves ahead is blindfold play: the position at the end of the line is not on the board, only in your head.
• Fewer errors inside a line. The classic amateur mistake is «losing» a piece halfway through a variation, having forgotten it already moved.
• Knowing the coordinates. Automatically knowing the colour of f3 and where a bishop on c1 points speeds up how you read a position.
• Working with notation. Reading a game from a book or a scoresheet stops being an ordeal.

In other words, blindfold training is direct calculation training - simply in its hardest form.

A realistic pace is a few minutes a day. The first two exercises produce results within a couple of weeks; a full blindfold game is a matter of months, and that is normal.

An intermediate option people forget: play on a board with no pieces, looking at the empty squares. The coordinates are visible, the position is in your head, and it is noticeably easier than full blindfold play.

Blindfold simultaneous displays are a genre of their own, more than a century old.

A curious detail of the 2016 record: Gareyev pedalled an exercise bike throughout - the physical effort helped him hold concentration for almost twenty hours.

At amateur level a display on three to five boards is already impressive, and it is perfectly reachable for a strong club player with some preparation.

As a spectacle it works better than an ordinary simul: the audience watches not the games but the person who is not watching them.

• Three or four boards, no more. Enough for an amateur setting, with minimal risk of it falling apart.
• A caller is essential. One person announcing the player's moves aloud and repeating the replies. Without them the show becomes an indistinct hum.
• Number the boards. The player addresses each board by number, and everyone should be able to see which is which.
• A demonstration board for the audience. Or a projector - otherwise the room cannot follow what is happening.
• Silence in the playing area. A hint called out ruins not a game but the whole performance.
• A time limit. Agree it in advance: blindfold play tires the performer several times faster than normal.

It works well as the finale of an evening: the tournament is over, the prizes are handed out, and the last twenty minutes are a show people talk about afterwards - a chess party format.

A historical belief held that blindfold play damages the mind - at some periods and in some countries mass blindfold displays were even restricted. There is no support for it: no link between blindfold chess and health problems has been demonstrated.

What is true is the fatigue. A display over dozens of boards runs for hours and demands unbroken concentration, so the load compares with a marathon. For a game on two or three boards, or for a few minutes of exercises a day, there is no reason for concern.