GM Frode Urkedal

Hi, I am a grandmaster from Norway, born in 1993. I have played chess since I was 7 years old and hands down, it's the best game I have ever played. I am a quite tactical player I love initiative and attacking(who doesn't ?). The later years I have gotten a bit more positional, torturing your opponents in a position with an everlasting advantage is fun too(sadistic indeed). I am also a huge opening nerd and have many new ideas to bring to the table. It's important that my openings are objectively sound, and I will try to crush any opening that I deem not (like KID, Benko, Benoni, Dutch, Philidor, Modern defence and so on).

I started to play chess at my school when I was 7. According to my chess teacher I was not the best at the beginning, but when I was like 9 I started playing tournaments. I remember playing chess with myself on a magnetic chessboard quite a bit so I think I was a bit obsessed :). At the age of 10,11,12,13, I won the Norwegian championships miniputt(u11) lilleputt(u13), kadett(u 16) and junior(u20) and have played in the Elite group since then.

Norwegian champion 2012, 2014. I have Played the chessOlympiad for Norway since 2010. And gotten a 5th place with my team in 2016 in Baku
GM 2016, best performances: 2016 Manacor(Last GM norm 2715 performance), Nordic champion 2019(2732 performance), 2020 Fagernes(2718 performance).
Strongest player beaten: Ivanchuck 2744 (www.chessbomb.com/arena/2014-olympiad/02-Urkedal_Frode-Ivanchuk_Vassily)

I have experience teaching players of all ages. I have thaught at schools, for my club, other clubs, the chess federation and chess coaching companies like Wallace Chess. I have been a coach for European and world youth championship many times. Right now I am one of the coaches for Flere Mot Sjakk Toppen(the youth national team), and also a mentor for some of the players.

I wascoaching the Elite team of my club for 20 years (SK 1911). In 2019/2020 we won both the Norwegian championship for teams(2019) and the Norwegian "champions league"(2019/2020) against tough odds. 1911 is both Norwegian league champions and Norwegian champions for the time being.

In late April 2021 I changed club to Offerspill and will probably do some coaching here too.
I am a certified FIDE trainer.

I am a strong tactical player with a lot of knowledge I am willing to share. I don't like to hide my opening secrets, I like to share so we all can get closer to chess enlightenment. I will break down how I think into easy digestable parts depending on your playing strength.

In my private sessions I will usually look through the students games before the first lesson to get a picture of strength and weaknesses. I will also ask what the student wants to learn, goals and visions. what they think are their weaknesses. Getting better at chess is not a quick fix it takes time and effort. Perhaps the easiest way to get better at chess is to play a lot and analyze your games. So unless you are a very strong player already (and even then) you should do this. I will help the student giving my perspective and guide them into making better desicions on the chessboard. I also prepare positions from games, often my own or prepare openings and more.