Shadowing Practice: Martin vs A Literal Fly. Who Wins? - Learn English Speaking with Video
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Ladies and gentlemen, if you know anything about chess, you know MartinBot on chess .com.
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If you have no idea what I'm talking about, now you know about Martin from chess .com.
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Very friendly guy, legendary chess bot, builds your confidence.
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Well, in this video today, I am pairing the MartinBot against the fruit fly.
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And I know what you're thinking.
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Gotham, you have really run out of content.
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You're not wrong.
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You see, here in September of 2026, we have fascinating technological developments.
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And one of them is mapping out the neural network of a fruit fly.
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And based on that neural network, zapping it with occasional dopamine boosts and seeing if it can make good decisions on a chessboard.
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That's the intro.
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I'm pairing Martin against the fruit fly, and the results are just really...
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Anyway, I'm going to show you two games.
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A game where the fly had the white pieces, and a game where Martin had the white pieces.
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This is a fly.
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You can play the fly.
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I will link it in the description.
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The game starts with e4.
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The game starts with e4.
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The fly responds knight c6.
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In case you don't know, this is called the Nimsevich defense, named after Aaron Nimsevich.
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Martin plays d4, two pawns in the center if you can put them as very good.
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If knight takes, then the queen takes.
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If you're watching this as a strong chess player, cover your eyes.
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If you're watching this not as a strong chess player, cover your eyes.
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The fly plays knight to e5.
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The fly has up to this point only used about 100 ,000 neurons.
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I don't know how many it has.
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Clearly for this move, it's not using all of them.
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Now the thing about Martin is He is completely incapable of playing a normal chess game Right?
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Now the zagbot, the new bot on chess .com Can't beat anybody
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But Martin takes the knight And the fly gives away another knight Again,
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keep in mind This is a machine Programmed to make decisions Based on the neurotransmission Of a literal
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Basically microscopic fruit fly Martin plays a fascinating move here If I gave you all the guesses in the world, you would never be able to figure it out.
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Martin plays bishop to e2, a strong move, developing his light -squared bishop to control some diagonal space.
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And the fly captures on e4.
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It actually spots a free pawn.
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This man has blundered a pawn to an insect.
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Is it an insect?
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Anyway, Martin has many moves at his disposal, but he chooses the powerful pawn to c4, which is a move that I don't know accomplishes what,
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but it takes a little bit of space in the center.
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Black responds f6.
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Comfortable, nice move.
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Opening up the king a little bit to a check maybe, but it's not a checkmate just yet, and that is exactly what happens.
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We have bishop to h5 check, and the fly plays the only legal move blocking.
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This is not a threat because if the queen takes, it's checkmate, and Martin just simply can't handle that, and in this position plays bishop takes g6.
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Pawn takes g6, and now black is up a bishop, and yet despite that, is not even in an advantageous situation because of the move queen g4,
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the top move of stockfish, which even this buffoon Martin manages to find.
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And the threat is not just the knight, it's queen takes pawn checkmate.
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Now, I'm expecting that a fly will not defend checkmate. because it's a fly.
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Also, the fly often likes to capture stuff, because that, I guess, sets off the dopamine.
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I could not believe it when the move king f7 appeared, because now, boys and girls, we are in for a battle.
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This is going to be a real game.
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You thought this was just going to be over in nine moves?
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I did.
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Martin takes the knight, though.
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Very nice move.
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The better move there was to block with the knight.
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because if the bishop takes it to trade and then you defend yourself, and if you attack the knight, oopsies, and here comes a counterattacking weapon.
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Very nice move.
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Now, king f7, queen takes, the fly plays c6, very powerful.
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And here, folks, Martin really shows you what he's made of.
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He shows you his capabilities in the game of chess, and he plays queen takes g6 check.
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Queen takes g6 is the move that a three -year -old plays
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while setting up the board and learning how the pieces move for the very first time. And frankly, nobody else.
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You cannot play queen takes g6.
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That is not a good move because the king can actually take the queen.
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And that's what the fly does.
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Martin the chess bot is losing to a fruit fly.
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And I'm actually getting pretty excited because the fruit fly,
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it likes to capture things and clearly has been programmed that checks and captures are good, right?
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So it's probably going to lead an attack at some point.
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Martin now plays the powerful king to f1, which is like beyond stupid.
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Now, of course, you should just take, bring out your bishop, bring out your queen, get to the king and win the game.
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Alternatively, of course, you can lose your rook in one move.
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And despite playing this powerful rook sacrifice, which achieves absolutely nothing, black is still completely winning because black is up a queen.
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Now, what you shouldn't do in this position is proceed to move your king.
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The more time you waste, right?
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The more pieces you lose, the more time you waste, the higher chance that Martin gets back into the game.
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But we don't really have to worry about that because now knight c3 is played by Martin.
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The fly captures on e5, maintaining a two -point material advantage with a very active king.
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And now Martin diarheas all over himself, which is really difficult.
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Because when you defecate, it goes out that way.
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Like, I don't know how you do it onto yourself.
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Martin diarheated on himself while doing, I don't know, stretching.
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And plays rook to h6, which is just, it's just so stupid.
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I don't know who programmed this thing, but rook h6 is unfathomably dumb.
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And the fly, which works on dopamine, took the rook, and it got even better.
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Because here, Martin didn't take back.
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I thought that he was programmed to recapture in certain situations.
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He plays knight to a4, and the fly takes the bishop.
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Martin is down seven points to a fruit fly.
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All the fruit fly has to do is bring the queen out, bring the bishop out, bring the rook out.
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Winning this is quite simple because a rook and two knights cannot do damage to a king, especially when the king has a ton of space around and the protection of his other pieces.
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Rook b8 on the board.
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Mysterious move, but at least not a blunder.
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Martin said at this point, you are playing quite well.
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Did my kids coach you?
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Knight to f3 played, and if you didn't think this was bad enough, The fly here plays queen f8.
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The fly is playing a fantastic game.
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Like, really.
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Martin goes knight d4 check.
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Are you kidding me?
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He loses another piece.
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He's down 10 points.
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He has no pieces left.
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I don't know how he's expecting to win this game.
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Now he plays rook d1 and attacks the pawn.
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Which the fly doesn't even defend and is just going for a direct attack against the king.
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This is unbelievable.
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I mean, this man is actually going to lose to a fly.
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I thought, okay, we would have a fun, silly game back and forth, and then that would be the end of it.
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No?
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No, absolutely not.
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B4.
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Okay, again, Qh1, then take the pawn, or even Qh1 and take the rook, right?
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Then you play up, bring the bishop, bring this rook, bring the pawns forward, like, you're super chilling.
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Unfortunately, the fly's good run ran out, and it played queen to d2.
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And this is when I was like, oh no. Because Martin is either going to take the queen or get mated.
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And I think he's programmed to avoid getting mated.
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He takes, and now Martin has to play an end game against the fruit fly, man.
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So now we have b6, powerful move.
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And Martin plays king to e1, running the king along the first rank.
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The fly responds, rook to b7, completely unexplainable.
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g3, and now d6 moving upon and now Martin plays g4 check and loses the pawn.
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He's slowly losing the remainder of his pieces.
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Martin only has six pieces remaining to do anything with.
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Rook takes d4 as a check.
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King to f5.
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Martin goes here.
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This man is unstoppable.
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This man cannot be denied.
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He loses the rook.
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It is all he has.
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That's all he has.
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He loses the rook.
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But the fly doesn't take.
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The fly does not capture.
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Oh my goodness.
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Knight back to c3.
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Not only does the fly not take the rook a second time, the fly runs away with the king.
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I don't know why.
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The knight reroutes, and now the fly blunders its bishop to the rook.
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It could have taken for two turns.
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Rook takes g4, and now white is winning because white has an extra knight in a rook endgame.
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Rook h4 check, king to g7, rook h2 back, and the fly has blundered askew,
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rook to h7, but Martin pushes another pawn because he believes in giving everybody an equitable chance to participate in the game.
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a6.
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So does the fly.
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Rook h7 is still on the board, but it's not being played.
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Rook h7 is on the board, but it's not getting played.
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It gets played.
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King 2e8, and now Martin has to take the rook and then eat all the pawns, but Martin goes here.
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The king goes back.
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Martin...
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Now you don't take the knight, but if you go Kg7, the rook is hanging and the knight is hanging, and Martin is back to drawing a fruit fly in a game of chess.
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But we have pawn takes f4 first, which is a mistake, because now there's Rh7, there's Kg8, and Martin has captured the rook.
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And that, folks, is the conclusion of the game.
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Because now Martin is simply going to eat all of the pawns.
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It's going to take him a little bit of time.
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He plays chess while wearing a helmet.
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C3.
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In fact, the fly gets this close to making a new queen.
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And you know, Martin is susceptible.
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He has some blind spots as they pertain to queen promotions.
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Rook to C4.
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Now you got to defend this with B3.
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If B3 was played, there was a chance.
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B3, Rook C6, B2.
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Black wins.
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Be very, very careful allowing two pawns to walk together like this.
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So we have C1, Queen.
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Rook C1.
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And now Martin is going to clean up.
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b5, all he's got to do is take the pawns.
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He's not taking the pawns.
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He fakes a draw.
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Pawn takes a4, rook c8.
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Okay, he's going to stop the...
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He's going to take...
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Okay, now that's over.
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And yeah, that's the last pawn, rook a6.
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All right, Martin, stop messing around.
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Give a couple of checks.
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And the final pawn for the fruit fly survives the battle.
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and Martin is now losing yet again.
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The fly fought for 12 seconds here and played this move.
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I'm not exaggerating.
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I don't lie for content.
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Check, check.
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And Maren decides that wasn't good enough, so he just hangs the rook.
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There is still a chance White can win this game if the pawn actually queens.
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Because if for whatever reason it doesn't get taken, Maren goes f4, king, f7, f5.
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And in this position, the fly disconnected from the server.
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The game never concluded.
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I'm not even joking.
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I'm assuming it would have probably taken the pawn because of its dopamine, but I have no evidence.
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I couldn't reconnect to the board.
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Maybe it's because other people were playing, but I couldn't find a move here.
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Now, I don't know what we rule this, but I don't think it's a win for Martin.
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Martin cannot defeat a fly at chess.
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He can't.
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Now, I'm going to show you the next game
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because I felt it was only fair that the fly also got to play with the white pieces.
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Oh, this is such garbage.
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Like, how bad is this bot?
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Now, okay, next game, d3, powerful first move.
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Knight c5, now we have a riveting opening.
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I've never seen this opening before d3, e5, knight c3, bishop c5.
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The fly kicks off its dopamine receptors and plays the knight to e4.
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Now, that's not a bad move, but it's a very short -sighted move, right?
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It targets the bishop on c5, but if the bishop moves, the knight is just in the way.
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Like I've been saying, you don't want to lead the position with the knights.
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You want to kind of lead the position with the pawns.
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That's really the way.
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Now, Martin goes here.
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And I was like, oh, okay, they're just going to make a draw.
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But it doesn't.
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It plays c3.
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Riveting, fascinating little move.
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I love how, to me, a chess master of, you know, who has played for 20 years, this position looks utterly stupid, and I immediately know how to take advantage of all of this.
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But, like, to an untrained eye, this might look completely fine.
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b5 is garbage.
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Terrible move.
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That's going to be a long -term weakness.
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You're going to have some problems here.
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You didn't play in the center, but anyway, it's not losing.
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A5, also garbage, but fine. But fine.
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And now d4.
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The fly has an opening advantage against Martin.
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Incredible.
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D5 played.
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Okay.
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D5 played.
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All right.
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And now you've got to move the knight because it's hanging, but obviously the fly operates on dopamine and knight g3 doesn't give it any sort of mental stimulation.
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So it takes the pawn on e5 and blunders the knight.
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But we've been here before.
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Maren's move here, truly incredible.
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Queen d7, simply operating on a wavelength none of us can really imagine fully.
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And now bishop takes b5.
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Everybody knows the saying in chess, when you have a hanging knight, it's good to hang a bishop too.
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That might be a new one for you.
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I've never actually uttered those words.
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And now you can take the bishop or the knight.
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Now, of course, if you took the knight, you'd lose your queen.
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But Martin goes here.
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And here, white should save the bishop and then take back the pawn in the middle.
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That would be the best thing to do.
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But instead, we have bishop takes c6.
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Okay, knight takes c6, and another blunder of a piece.
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So the fly in this game off to a rough start.
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Martin is going to pick up some material here.
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Queen d8 back, and the fly must have just not had enough sugar water to kick off this last game, because here it plays knight f6 check.
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It didn't play this badly in the previous game.
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Martin captures on f6, okay?
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And the fly, for some reason, goes here.
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I don't know how this move gave it dopamine, but maybe it saw that there was a hanging knight.
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Martin, absolutely ruthless.
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Sometimes Martin wakes up and he's just an absolute unit.
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I mean, a bunch of you watching this right now can't beat Martin.
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That's what the statistics say.
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That's actually kind of incredible.
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Now, the fly is catastrophically lost.
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Bishop to g4, queen to d1 like you can just put it out of its misery instantly.
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But there is this move g3, okay?
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And now, again, bishop g4 threatens mate.
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Knight takes e5, brings in another piece.
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Or you can do the martin and go here.
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And that move, that's a bad move because he loses the queen.
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Now, he is still completely winning because he has a piece advantage or two -piece advantage.
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He has a bishop and a knight extra, But white has a bunch more pawns.
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Now, of course, he should play knight takes pawn.
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That is the best move.
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It brings the knight in closer.
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And then since white has a bunch of dark squared pawns, there's light squared weaknesses to exploit.
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But the king moves to d8.
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Okay, white is still completely lost because despite the material disadvantage, like despite black wasting time, you can't offset the fact that you're down a catastrophic amount of material.
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Rook b1, rook b1, make a move that makes no sense because you are a fruit fly.
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You don't know how to play chess.
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that was that was fire that's for the ogs that song is like five years old on this channel
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if you are a new fan you have no idea what
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i'm talking about go look up the song rook b1
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and i expect to see comments on
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that video like who who who came here from the gotham
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video in 2026 i know how youtube works okay king c7
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powerful stuff here martin developing his bishop into a pawn
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and also moving his king this is not how you win
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a game like to win a game you need to take your opponent's pieces, and then when your opponent is on the other side of the board, you have to go into their position to get the king.
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Like, otherwise, you can just move around, but you're not going to win.
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E6, powerful, mysterious.
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Rook to B8 played by Martin, lining up an attack on this pawn, which the fly actually protects.
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Now, of course, I am waiting for the explosion in this game.
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At some point, Martin's going to lose all his pieces.
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Pawn takes E6.
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He's still not doing it.
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Four -point advantage here.
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Now, I would still beat Martin in this position.
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The way I would do it is.
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I would play knight e2, I would castle, I would go attack his weaknesses, and I would wait for him to make a mistake.
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Of course, you can also just give up a rook in one move.
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That's certainly a strategy, because you know Martin's going to respond with bishop to b4, losing his own piece in one move.
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That is actually what happened in the game.
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The fly did not capture that bishop.
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Its rook also stayed hanging, and the king went back to c8.
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I cannot explain any of these moves to you.
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I can simply show them to you, and you can choose to do with these moves what you would like, like, uh, laugh, uh, cry, send this to a friend, shove them up your, you know, like, whatever.
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Uh, knight back to g1.
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Again, I don't really know.
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This rook has been hanging for, like, three moves, and finally it gets taken.
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So the fly only has three pieces remaining.
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Somehow Martin has more than that.
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I don't know how that happened.
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I'm still expecting him to start losing all of them, but the fly's really not doing itself any favors in this game, because the moves are easy.
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It loses another pawn, and now Martin plays rook b5, which is a move that I completely cannot explain.
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Knight to f3, it would have been better to go knight e2 to attack the bishop.
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I don't even know what I'm analyzing here.
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Bishop to b4 back, and again, you got to maybe get a little counterplay.
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Okay, and Martin has lost a rook.
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This is very good.
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It's been a very long time since Martin made a mistake.
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The fly takes the knight instead.
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That's absolutely fine.
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Rook b8, and there we go.
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That was a four -point comeback right there.
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Now, we are still down five points of material.
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You You know it's pretty bad when the material
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that you've just captured from your opponent is still less than the number of material you're still down.
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I'm just saying.
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You really messed up there.
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Rook b6.
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Unfortunately here, the good shriek of the fly comes to a conclusion.
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It plays bishop 2a3.
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But it's still in luck because Martin pops off with h5.
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So the bishop is not being taken.
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Rook 2e1.
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The fly is insisting on losing material.
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Martin is still not taking.
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There is still a window of opportunity here for the fly to fly out and maybe escape this experiment.
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Knight to f5, suddenly Martin becomes sentient and captures the rook.
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And now this is where I'm sounding the alarm.
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I'm not sure the fly is going to be able to make a comeback.
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Knight d6, okay, maybe, maybe, maybe, but it loses another piece.
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It loses another piece.
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Now bishop takes is the only way, and the fly is just off its game.
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We got to get back in the gym.
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This is just not working out.
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Martin with a crushing 14 -point material advantage.
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The fly absolutely dead set on not playing a single logical move for the past 20 turns.
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Pawn to g5.
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It loses the bishop.
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Bishop takes a2.
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Discover check.
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King c1.
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Bishop takes a3.
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Check.
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King c2.
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Rook c6.
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Check.
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King d2.
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Bishop e7.
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Met.
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King e1.
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I'm waiting.
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Maybe.
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I'm patiently waiting for the pawn to make it through and maybe take the rook.
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That is typically how he loses.
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Bishop to b4 check.
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The king goes to d1.
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The bishop goes to e6.
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This is the final opportunity for the fly. But it goes e4.
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And by a total miracle,
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Martin delivers a checkmate and defeats the fruit fly in the match of the century.
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One and a half to half.
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And if you made it this far in this video, I just want to ask you, what is wrong with you?
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This video has 375 sentences and 3689 words to shadow. The speech runs for 20:48. The speaker talks at a natural 177 words per minute, close to everyday conversation. Only 80% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is demanding.
Key vocabulary in this video
15 less common words from the video, with pronunciation and meaning:
- knight /ˈnaɪ̯t/ (noun) — An armored and mounted warrior of the Middle Ages.
- bishop /ˈbɪʃəp/ (noun) — An overseer of congregations: either any such overseer, generally speaking, or (in Eastern Orthodoxy, Catholicism, Anglicanism, etc.) an official in the church…
- pawn /ˈpɔːn/ (noun) — The most numerous chess piece, or a similar piece in a similar game. In chess, each side starts with eight; moves are only forward, and attacks are only…
- chess /t͡ʃɛs/ (noun) — A board game for two players, each beginning with sixteen chess pieces moving according to fixed rules across a chessboard with the objective to checkmate the…
- capture /ˈkæp.(t)ʃɚ/ (verb) — To take control of; to seize by force or stratagem.
- defend /dɪˈfɪnd/ (verb) — To ward off attacks against (something or someone).
- weakness /ˈwik.nɪs/ (noun) — The condition of being weak.
- garbage /ˈɡɑɹ.bɪd͡ʒ/ (noun) — Food waste material of any kind.
- conclusion /kənˈkluːʒən/ (noun) — The end, finish, close or last part of something.
- folk /foʊk/ (noun) — People, persons.
- opponent /əˈpəʊ.nənt/ (noun) — One who opposes another; one who works or takes a position against someone or something; one who attempts to stop the progress of someone or something.
- mysterious /mɪˈstɪɹi.əs/ (adjective) — Of unknown origin.
- insect /ˈɪn.sɛkt/ (noun) — An arthropod (in the Insecta class) characterized by six legs, up to four wings, and a chitinous exoskeleton.
- neural /ˈnʊɹəl/ (adjective) — Of, or relating to the nerves, neurons or the nervous system.
- server /ˈsɝvɚ/ (noun) — A program that provides services to other programs or devices, either in the same computer or over a computer network.
Phrasal verbs you will hear
- bring out (verb) — To elicit, evoke, or emphasize (a particular quality).
- kick off (verb) — To make the first kick in a game or part of a game.
- take back (verb) — To retract or withdraw (an earlier statement).
- talk about (verb) — Used to draw attention to the speaker's characterization of someone or something.
- wait for (verb) — To wait until the specified event occurs.
- bring in (verb) — To move something indoors, or into an area.
- clean up (verb) — To make an area or a thing clean; to pick up a mess; to tidy.
- do in (verb) — To kill or end; to defeat.
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 71 contractions and reduced forms, such as don't, I'm, you're. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “th” sounds: threaten /ˈθɹɛt.n̩/, ruthless /ˈɹuːθləs/, wavelength /ˈweɪvˌlɛŋ(k)θ/
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: bishop /ˈbɪʃəp/, capture /ˈkæp.(t)ʃɚ/, conclusion /kənˈkluːʒən/, promotion /pɹəˈmoʊʃn̩/, explosion /ɛkˈsploʊ.ʒən/
- Long words — get the stress right: mysterious /mɪˈstɪɹi.əs/, participate /pɑːˈtɪs.ɪ.peɪt/, experiment /ɪkˈspɛɹ.ə.mənt/, legendary /ˈlɛd͡ʒ.ənˌdɛɹ.i/, occasional /əˈkeɪʒ(ə)nəl/
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Start at 0.75× speed, shadow it sentence by sentence, then go back to normal speed once it feels easy.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like knight, bishop, pawn.
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Present perfect continuous have/has been + -ing — an action that started earlier and is still going on | I've been saying · has been hanging |
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | have really run · has blundered · has been programmed |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | is called · has been programmed · is played |
| Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing | himself, which is · first, which is |
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.