Beginner Mistakes and How to Avoid Them: The Opening

These Simple “This or That” Drills Sharpen
Your Inner Detector For Beginner
Mistakes In The Opening

So you can avoid those early blunders — punish the opponent for making one — and net an easily winning position before the game has warmed up!

Ever tried exerting every ounce of brain power in the opening… then proceed to lose a piece?

Played a tense, long game… only to realize you missed an easy win on move 5?

It’s okay. You don’t know what you don’t know.

But as a beginner, you’re also playing with a clean slate. The ideal canvas for developing your worldview of “what to do” and “what NOT to do” in the opening.

Today, Grandmaster Josh Friedel empowers you to take that leap.

Friedel rocks a peak FIDE rating of 2562 Elo — a long list of tournament victories — and decades of coaching experience.

In his first Chessable course, he fine-tunes your inner detector for beginner opening mistakes…

One Multiple Choice
Question At A Time

Here’s how it works:

Instead of presenting you a position, with a million possible continuations…

Friedel directs your attention to the stuff that matters. So that you only need to pick one of two choices — this move or that move, which are highlighted with big blue and red circles.

One of the options is a typical beginner mistake, while the other is the best way to play.

As you progress through the exercise, Friedel explains why one move works and the other fails. Then MoveTrainer® drives the lessons home through scheduled reviews.

Move-by-move explanations build your
intuition for good opening moves and
teach you to punish bad ones

This way, you hone your ability to pick out good opening moves from the bad… without being overwhelmed by irrelevant details.

Friedel serves 60 of these “this or that” drills with over 4.5 hours of video. He’ll show you how to profit from…

✅ Hanging pawns and pieces ripe for picking.

✅ Bad development decisions disguising as “active play.”

Developing with the active …Nc6 seemed sensible,
until Black is hit by d4-d5! gaining space for free
and kicking the knight to edge of the board

✅ And common opening tactics that appear game after game.

The exercises also boost your visualization powers. So you can…

✅ Envision lines of attack and defense to ensure your intended move is safe.

✅ Or plan an exit strategy for that brave piece you sent into enemy territory.

The notes also contain “rules of thumb” to help you find the right move… without the need to check every possibility.

✅ Have fewer active pieces in the opening? Parry attacks before they happen with the classic piece trade in chapter one.

✅ The 2 most critical squares in the opening — and how to milk them to net an extra pawn or deliver mate.

✅ And plenty more actionable takeaways at the end of every exercise.

We’re confident that Friedel can help you reduce opening errors, and exploit the opponent’s for the win.

See for yourself when you sign up.