WIM Silvia Raluca Sgircea

I am Women International from Romania, FIDE Trainer and active player. I have played my first official tournament at the age of 6 and have continued to play ever since.

I learned chess from my father when I was 3 years old and played my first official tournament when I was 6. I still try to play as many tournaments as I can, mostly in Europe. I have one Woman Grandmaster norm and the highest rating I have reached is 2302.
My most notable results are:
European Champion U10
4th place in the European Championship U12
Multiple medalist in the European Rapid & Blitz Championships, in various age categories
Multiple medalist in the National Classical, Rapid, Blitz and Problem Solving Championships

I have been teaching for over 15 years, both online and in person. I work with players of all ages and my lessons are customized, depending on the student's strength and needs. I will go over your games and understand which parts of your game you need to work on and will include this in our trainings.
In the past few years I have specialized in training students under 1500 rating. I will help you build strong fundamentals that will improve your level.
My lessons focus mainly on developing your chess understanding. We will work on fundamentals, in all phases of the game. I will help you understand how to think during a game and what to focus on in order to make better moves.
I have obtained the FIDE Trainer title in 2016.

In 2017 I did commentary in Spanish together with IM David Martinez of the Individual Spanish Championship.

Part of the Chess24 Spain commentary team and Press Officer for the Barbados Olympic team in 2018 Chess Olympiad (Batumi)
Have been working as part of the chess24 team, doing live and interactive training sessions that you can find on their YouTube channel. I have 3 series together with my student - Great Games in the Benoni, Great Games in the NimzoIndian and Deadly King Hunts. You can also find them in my playlists on my YT Channel.

Official commentator for the 2021 European Women's Championship & European Junior Hybrid Championship.

Openings with white: 1.d4 structures, the Maroczy
Openings with black: the Accelerated Dragon, the Marocy Structure, Queen's Gambit Accepted.

I like teaching positional concepts and focus on understanding and improving the basics.

My lessons vary depending on the student's strength and needs. I usually go through their games in order to identify the most common mistakes they make and then decide on a suitable teaching plan for each of them. I use examples from famous games of strong players, classical games, but also interesting positions from my own games.

If you would like your game analyzed, but not a live class, send it to me and I will annotate it for you. I will also include short training advice in the comments. Annotations can be sent either in pgn format only (with variation and words included) or 10 mins video format, where I go over the game and analyze it.