Stein Aarland - FIDE Master Extraordinaire
Meet Stein Aarland, a chess dynamo who has turned the 64 squares into his personal playground. Holding the prestigious title of FIDE Master, Stein’s journey through the chess universe has been anything but dull. Known in some circles by their username Soloctavian, Stein has battled it out in countless blitz, rapid, bullet, and daily games – proving that whether the clock ticks fast or slow, they’re a formidable force.
Rating Revelations
Starting from a modest blitz rating of about 1400 in 2012, Stein quickly climbed the ranks, breaking through 2600 in blitz by 2021. Bullet and rapid ratings follow a similar tale of steady improvement, with soaring highs beyond 2500 in recent years. Indeed, 2025 is looking bright, with blitz at 2679 and bullet at 2603 – just a whisker away from the elusive 2700 club!
Style & Strategy
Ever the tactician, Stein’s endgame frequency is an impressive nearly 80%, showcasing both patience and precision. Their games tend to be marathons rather than sprints, averaging around 67 moves to victory – a master of grinding down opponents without flashing the panic button (early resignation rate a humble 0.38%). Their comeback prowess is practically legendary with a jaw-dropping 86% comeback rate, and a perfect 100% win rate after losing a piece – because who needs all their soldiers when you’ve got brains and nerve?
Psychological Battleground
While some tilt under pressure, Stein keeps the cool with a tilt factor of just 11, and maintains a solid win rate difference of 46% between rated and casual games. Opponents beware: once Stein locks in, the butterfly nerves stay tucked away.
Famous Foes & Friends
Stein’s most-played opponents include stalwarts like cruz29 and goran_galiot, against whom the battles are fierce and frequent. Interestingly, a few opponents have been lucky with killer win rates against Stein, but the fearless FM keeps on innovating, fighting with unyielding spirit.
Fun Facts
- Longest winning streak: a mighty 14 games in a row – that’s one hot streak!
- Games played: Over 40,000 blitz games alone. That’s more chess than many GM’s will see in a lifetime!
- Prefers tricky, mystery openings – the less the opponent knows, the better.
- Has a reputation for pulling off the impossible, making unrealistic comebacks look routine.
In the grand theatre of chess, Stein Aarland is the actor-director-writer of their own epic story – both formidable and fun, always ready to accept a challenge and bring the game to life.
Positives in Your Recent Bullet Games
Stein, your recent games reveal several strengths that support your solid performance at the bullet time control:
- Opening Preparation: You demonstrate familiarity with a variety of openings, including the Nimzo-Larsen Attack and modern setups. This gives you good early game initiative in many matches.
- Active Piece Play: Your games show consistent attempts to create threats and put pressure on your opponents, especially in the middlegame. Moves like early bishop deployment and well-timed pawn pushes are notable.
- Endgame Resourcefulness: Even under time pressure, you find ways to convert small advantages or hold challenging positions, which is crucial in bullet chess.
- Resilience and Tactical Awareness: Despite facing strong opposition, you maintain tactical composure, as seen in successful defenses and capitalizations on opponent mistakes.
Areas for Improvement
To elevate your bullet play further, focusing on the following areas would be beneficial:
- Time Management: You have occasional declines in clock time, especially seen in critical moves. Enhancing quick, accurate intuition will reduce time pressure in the late middlegame and endgame.
- Opening Variety and Consistency: While you know several openings, streamlining your repertoire to a few that you excel at can improve consistency and deepen your understanding for faster decision-making.
- Defensive Maneuvers: Some of the losses stem from tactical oversights or positional concessions. Sharpening your defensive skills and recognizing opponent threats earlier can avoid these pitfalls.
- Transition Phases: Pay close attention to transitions from opening to middlegame and middlegame to endgame. Improving clarity in these moments can lead to better strategic decisions.
Suggested Focused Training
Given your playing style and recent results, these practice strategies can help maximize your progress:
- Play Thematic Drills: Practice positions from your favored openings such as Nimzo-Larsen Attack and Modern Defense to perfect typical plans and tactical motifs.
- Improve Tactical Pattern Recognition: Use rapid puzzles focusing on pins, forks, and discovered attacks to boost your speed and accuracy under time control.
- Review Losses Thoroughly: Analyze your defeats like the recent game against Shreyan0711 for tactical and strategic lapses, and learn alternative plans.
- Time Management Drills: Practice playing with increment or limited time per move emphasizing quick, reliable decision-making to simulate bullet pressure.
Additional Insights
Your overall win rate adjusted for opponent strength is around 50.3%, and your rating has shown a modest upward trend recently with a +5 increase over the past month and a positive slope in performance. Continued steady improvement combined with sharpening your opening and endgame technique will lead to stronger results.
🆚 Opponent Insights
| Recent Opponents | ||
|---|---|---|
| aplecons | 24W / 36L / 2D | |
| bobsolid | 2W / 9L / 1D | |
| Gerardo Cabellon | 7W / 8L / 0D | |
| juic5r | 1W / 1L / 1D | |
| Nicholas Xie | 10W / 4L / 3D | |
| practicemakesperfect90 | 3W / 2L / 0D | |
| xiaottt5164 | 0W / 2L / 1D | |
| mouseslip-123 | 2W / 4L / 1D | |
| valpab85 | 5W / 7L / 1D | |
| alexc | 1W / 0L / 0D | |
| Most Played Opponents | ||
|---|---|---|
| Goran Galiot | 64W / 37L / 5D | |
| ali shahibzadegan | 38W / 65L / 2D | |
| cruz29 | 50W / 50L / 5D | |
| gusber1 | 52W / 46L / 4D | |
| Pavel Sevostianov | 41W / 49L / 7D | |
Rating
| Year | Bullet | Blitz | Rapid | Daily |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 2604 | 2648 | 2606 | |
| 2024 | 2570 | 2662 | 2527 | |
| 2023 | 2507 | 2506 | 2508 | |
| 2022 | 2486 | 2420 | 823 | |
| 2021 | 2305 | 2607 | 2370 | |
| 2020 | 2500 | 1706 | ||
| 2019 | 2408 | |||
| 2018 | 2350 | |||
| 2017 | 2182 | |||
| 2016 | 2274 | |||
| 2015 | 2239 | |||
| 2014 | 2137 | |||
| 2013 | 2042 | |||
| 2012 | 2158 |
Stats by Year
| Year | White | Black | Moves |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 2433W / 2046L / 319D | 2114W / 2266L / 403D | 79.3 |
| 2024 | 2205W / 1903L / 282D | 1921W / 2140L / 320D | 77.6 |
| 2023 | 2125W / 2071L / 301D | 1827W / 2346L / 321D | 76.0 |
| 2022 | 1232W / 1133L / 143D | 1018W / 1323L / 141D | 74.8 |
| 2021 | 879W / 763L / 118D | 749W / 867L / 127D | 75.2 |
| 2020 | 955W / 855L / 174D | 851W / 986L / 156D | 75.5 |
| 2019 | 1310W / 1063L / 188D | 1124W / 1243L / 227D | 73.7 |
| 2018 | 973W / 840L / 136D | 888W / 919L / 145D | 73.2 |
| 2017 | 702W / 512L / 74D | 577W / 627L / 70D | 72.9 |
| 2016 | 684W / 594L / 68D | 591W / 688L / 81D | 70.6 |
| 2015 | 449W / 422L / 44D | 414W / 468L / 49D | 70.7 |
| 2014 | 413W / 399L / 36D | 370W / 427L / 37D | 68.1 |
| 2013 | 258W / 287L / 24D | 230W / 312L / 18D | 67.6 |
| 2012 | 334W / 279L / 37D | 288W / 334L / 25D | 69.7 |
Openings: Most Played
| Blitz Opening | Games | Wins | Losses | Draws | Win Rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sicilian Defense: Closed | 4420 | 2140 | 2013 | 267 | 48.4% |
| Modern | 3640 | 1663 | 1723 | 254 | 45.7% |
| Sicilian Defense: Accelerated Dragon | 1725 | 828 | 730 | 167 | 48.0% |
| QGD: Ragozin | 1485 | 671 | 711 | 103 | 45.2% |
| Sicilian Defense: Closed, Anti-Sveshnikov Variation, Kharlov-Kramnik Line | 1343 | 651 | 610 | 82 | 48.5% |
| Amazon Attack | 1269 | 586 | 590 | 93 | 46.2% |
| Modern Defense: Pterodactyl Variation | 1260 | 537 | 617 | 106 | 42.6% |
| London System: Poisoned Pawn Variation | 1051 | 475 | 484 | 92 | 45.2% |
| Czech Defense | 997 | 532 | 404 | 61 | 53.4% |
| QGD: 4.Nf3 | 960 | 498 | 398 | 64 | 51.9% |
| Rapid Opening | Games | Wins | Losses | Draws | Win Rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sicilian Defense: Closed | 97 | 54 | 36 | 7 | 55.7% |
| Modern | 85 | 41 | 35 | 9 | 48.2% |
| Modern Defense: Pterodactyl Variation | 42 | 20 | 20 | 2 | 47.6% |
| QGD: Ragozin | 40 | 23 | 16 | 1 | 57.5% |
| Sicilian Defense: Accelerated Dragon | 34 | 17 | 13 | 4 | 50.0% |
| QGD: 4.Nf3 | 32 | 15 | 16 | 1 | 46.9% |
| Sicilian Defense: Closed, Anti-Sveshnikov Variation, Kharlov-Kramnik Line | 30 | 13 | 14 | 3 | 43.3% |
| Catalan Opening: Open Defense | 26 | 13 | 9 | 4 | 50.0% |
| Vienna Gambit, with Max Lange Defense | 23 | 10 | 12 | 1 | 43.5% |
| London System: Poisoned Pawn Variation | 23 | 9 | 11 | 3 | 39.1% |
| Bullet Opening | Games | Wins | Losses | Draws | Win Rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sicilian Defense: Closed | 1099 | 545 | 496 | 58 | 49.6% |
| Modern | 799 | 360 | 400 | 39 | 45.1% |
| Nimzo-Larsen Attack | 483 | 224 | 235 | 24 | 46.4% |
| London System: Poisoned Pawn Variation | 441 | 200 | 220 | 21 | 45.4% |
| Amar Gambit | 427 | 198 | 213 | 16 | 46.4% |
| Caro-Kann Defense | 376 | 165 | 194 | 17 | 43.9% |
| Vienna Gambit, with Max Lange Defense | 320 | 184 | 125 | 11 | 57.5% |
| Benoni Defense: Benoni Gambit Accepted | 305 | 159 | 138 | 8 | 52.1% |
| Amazon Attack | 298 | 135 | 155 | 8 | 45.3% |
| Australian Defense | 281 | 149 | 117 | 15 | 53.0% |
| Daily Opening | Games | Wins | Losses | Draws | Win Rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Barnes Opening: Walkerling | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 100.0% |
| Blackburne Shilling Gambit | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 100.0% |
🔥 Streaks
| Streak | Longest | Current |
|---|---|---|
| Winning | 14 | 1 |
| Losing | 11 | 0 |