My October 2026 Chess Review: Rating and Results

Hello, I'm Shingo Suzuki (Suzushin).

This is my monthly chess update for October 2026.
I started my GM challenge on October 2, and now that the month has changed, I'd like to share how my rating and results have turned out.
To give you the conclusion first, it was honestly a slightly disappointing month?

My Rating and Results for October 2026

Here is how my Chess.com Rapid rating changed in October 2026.
The reporting period is October 1?31, 2026.

Here are my results as well.
I played a total of 20 games this month.

Looking at the month as a whole, my wins and losses were even, but my rating fell slightly.
I reached a peak rating of 498, but ended up dropping from there.

What Stood Out in October's Games

A few things came to mind while playing chess last month.

There were several games that looked winnable, but I missed a chance to deliver checkmate and ended up losing instead.
I noticed this during my post-game review, and sure enough, a closer look showed that I could have delivered checkmate.
Mate-in-two positions came up quite a few times, so I really wanted to finish those games off.
Being able to spot checkmate in real time during a game seems to be something I need to work on.

I also lost a game on time despite having an advantage on the board.
I tend to spend too long thinking about each move, even in positions that don't seem particularly critical, so I end up running short of time.
I'd like to get better at choosing my next move quickly and try to make decisions more promptly.

Last month, my rating reached a high of 498.
But it fell from there.
Personally, the 500 barrier feels higher than I expected.
It really brought home how important it is to convert winnable games into wins.

October's Practice and the Challenges I Noticed

In October 2026, I mainly worked through lots of tactics puzzles.
I aimed to solve at least five puzzles every day whenever possible.
In practice, I did skip some days, but on the days I solved puzzles, I often did more than 20.

My original plan was to spend 1.5 hours a day on chess.
But I haven't fully established the habit yet, so there were days when I worked on chess and days when I took a break.
In reality, it may have averaged out to about 30 minutes a day.
For now, I'd like to focus on making actual games and tactics practice a daily habit.

I did manage to keep up my chess lessons on Duolingo every day.
I think the streak system plays a big part: I don't want to break it.
I'm getting through the lessons little by little.

I also used Caltrilo, the chess review app I built.
Mostly, I solved tactics puzzles generated from my own games.
Still, I found those puzzles somewhat difficult.
It made me feel that I need to learn more about chess to find the best moves.

Although I played 20 games last month?
Personally, I wanted to play more.
My goal was one game a day, but my fear of playing against other people made it hard to press the play button.
I'd like to find a way to overcome that and feel more relaxed about starting a game.

My Goals for November

I finished October 2026 with a rating of 455.
It was disappointing to see my rating go down rather than up?

So my first goal for November is to break through the 500 barrier.
To do that, I need to work on my fear of playing against other people while steadily building up wins.
I'll make it a daily habit to solve tactics puzzles, at the very least.
And I'd like to work toward playing one game a day.

I'll keep studying openings so I don't fall behind early in the game.
At the moment, I often play the London System as White and the French Defense as Black, but I'd like to be able to handle games that take a different turn as well.

For tactics, I'll focus on puzzles from my actual games in Caltrilo while practicing finding the best move quickly.
I'd like to set myself a time limit and get used to solving puzzles with limited time.

Losing a game that looked winnable is the most frustrating thing, isn't it?
Going forward, I'll make a conscious effort to reduce that as much as I can.

Wrapping Up

In this article, I looked back at my chess rating and results for October 2026.
Well, to be honest, I thought my rating would climb more, but winning turned out to be harder than I expected.
It seems I still have a lot to learn.

This time, the results were disappointing?
But I hope I'll be able to show some growth in my next update.

I've run into the 500 barrier right at the start.
This month, I'll do my best to get past 500 and keep going beyond it.

It's been a rather slow start, but I'd be grateful if you'd keep following along and cheering me on.
Thank you for your support.