We’ve all been there. You’re staring at the board, your heart is racing, and you have that nagging feeling that there’s a brilliant move hidden in plain sight. You spend five minutes calculating a complex 10-move sequence that ends in a glorious checkmate... only to realize, two seconds after moving, that your opponent can just take your Queen for free. In the chess world, we call this "tunnel vision." In the heat of battle, our brains love to skip the basics and jump straight to the "hero moves." If you want to stop hanging pieces and start punishing your opponents, you need a mental circuit breaker. Enter the CCT Method . What is the CCT Method? CCT is a simple, three-step mental checklist you should run every single time it is your turn to move. It stands for: C hecks C aptures T hreats It sounds elementary, but even Grandmasters use this framework to ensure they haven't missed a " forcing move "—a move that requires an immediate, specific respo...
“Only the player with the initiative has the right to attack”(Wilhelm Steinitz)