I see it daily with students. They want to play so well that they end up in time trouble, spend time on fancy ideas and miss the simple things. I was the same as a Grandmaster.
I wanted to play perfectly on every move. Often, I did manage to outplay my opponents. But at a big cost. I got tired, into time trouble and ended up throwing a lot of good positions.
That’s when I started to try to play just a little bit worse, which ironically helped me play much better.
Rapid Mode
Originally I had to come up with that idea because of my brain injury. The headaches and concentration issues forced me to conserve my energy for the few really decisive moments in a game. So before starting a classical game, I reminded myself to play as if it were a Rapid game:
- Focus on calculating short, key lines
- Play good enough moves, not perfect ones
- Stop and deeply calculate only at super critical moments
This worked so well that in the last 1.5 years of my career this became my standard way of playing Classical chess, even when I felt good.
By allowing myself to be imperfect, I finally had the energy to get the absolute key things correct at a very high rate. I also felt much less pressure during every game, because perfection was off the table.
This Is Much More Important Nowadays
For my readers and students, you guys, this is even more important nowadays.
You are further away from perfection.
You have a huge list of things you feel you “should” do.
You often play Rapid or shorter classical games, making it harder to find ideal moves.
It is astonishing how many time trouble issues are resolved just with this adjustment.
What Matters
There’s one way people misapply this advice that I want to finish on. Some students, when I introduce them to the good enough move concept, slowly drift into playing lazily.
They look at a certain move, and without calculating, just say: “yep this looks good enough” and execute it.
That’s going to cause a lot of problems.
Playing good enough moves means lowering your standards, resisting super complex lines you can’t fully calculate anyways. And with the saved up time, you double and triple down on the basics.
Calculating short lines.
Making sure you spot the immediate opponents ideas.
Executing a blunder check.
Once you do that consistently, you’ll realize that it is more than enough to play a good enough game. And that your opponents will still make mistakes, even if you don’t play perfectly.
Try it out.
Keep improving,
GM Noël
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