Anish Giri lays out a plan

Grandmaster and social media aficionado Anish Giri has a conception on how one might handle an expanded Chess960 (“Freestyle”) universe. Writing on Twitter:

“Pretty sure if chess actually was chess960, the guys with good work ethic and good memory would get a much larger opening advantage than right now. 960 is a lot, but according to my estimate it will take less than a year to get significant opening work done.

“…and then a lot of time will be spent revisiting the positions and trying to make sure they don’t drop out of your memory. Constant repetition of small files. Way more boring than current opening work, but will be worth it.”

That is not to say that he himself necessarily wants to do it. Adding in response to a question on Grandmaster memory, he said “I suspect that for some basic recollection of first moves and basic ideas, I am capable of memorizing 960 positions after a year of regular work. But not sure, it could be that I am overestimating my memory. It would be fun to try, but currently it would be a waste of my time.”

One respondent on Reddit’s r/chess quipped, “To avoid it we should randomize the position of the pawns too.” To be sure, even though the point of the deviant format is to get away from the grind of opening theory, the top players would put in the work required to eke out whatever edge they can.