The typical chess club invests a lot of time encouraging players to study openings and memorize opening sequences. In 5th grade I was handed a 12 page list of openings to memorize.
The curious thing is that multiple chess grandmasters have shared that they spent very little time on openings, and instead focused on practicing the end-game. Josh Waitzkin describes this in his book, “The Art of Learning.” Josh and his mentor Bruce Pandolfini drilled every end-game scenario. It’s critical to know how you want the game to end, and steer your opponent in that direction. (Fun fact about Waitzkin: The first master he ever defeated was Edward Frumkin, in a game featuring a remarkable sacrifice of Waitzkin’s queen and rook in exchange for a checkmate six moves later. Waitzkin was only ten years old at the time.)
The problem with studying openings at the expense of endings is that you get fixated on fast results but miss the overall game objectives. You reward speed and conformity rather than concentration and bravery. The reality is that new chess players get some early wins, but once they get to middle and advanced levels they can no longer win. They’ve optimized the wrong part of the real game. The best players evolved way beyond a focus on openings.
Food for leadership thought: Project openings are important but perhaps we spend too much time studying those rather than project endings.
