should beginners study endgames?

I was speaking with a well known GM a few days ago and he said that he always taught his students the game from the end to the beginning.  One reason he stated is because end game technique is concrete and will help your all around chess while opening theory is constantly changing.

In "Silman's Complete Endgame Course", rook endgames (Lucena Position/Philidor Position) are to be studied when one is a Class C player (1400-1599). What's the probability of a beginner playing in a R+P vs. R+P endgame? I'm in one right now and it's insanely challenging!

Josh Waitzkin said in his Chess game (the game was on one aimed at improving the purchaser's skill) Chessmaster10 that when he was young and a beginner, that he practised the endgame all of the time.

From what I can see, Waitzkin maybe spent to much time practising the endgame, but it's important to spend 25% of your practise time studying the endgame, and the other 75% on the middlegame and opening.

Yep.

 Please don't accuse me of making stuff up as I go along.

What I meant was a begginer (such as myself) should practise tactics, strategy etc as well as the opening and middlegame within the first 75%. Which shows there's a lot to practise, and one would probably need that percentage of the time to get through all of it. Then, obviously, practise the endgame in the last 25%.

Statistics based on numbers are hard enough to believe, these numbers truly are being pulled out of the air.

Easy tigers...

 I wasn't going on statistics, I was going on my opinion.

definitely yes , end games tricks are the keyes of winning if you reached an ending equal with your opponent

Of course that's what you meant, it's exactly what you said. I believe he asked "why?".

Look here I'll mimic your post.

"It's important for beginners (such as myself) to practice tactics, strategy, as well as opening and middlegames 50% of the time.

There's a lot to practice there, but you need to dedicate another 50% of your time to endgames (for unspecified reasons)".

Are you losing a lot of rook endgames? Yes? Ok practice them.
Are you losing a pawn regularly while playing the Advance French? Yeh? Ok you might need to study that.
Are you having trouble coming up with a suitable plan in the middlegame? Really? Alright you should work on that.

Study what you need to study, don't just spend arbitrary percentiles of time "working" on your endgame.

If you are losing in the openings or middlegame it doesnt make much sense to study endings to me, does it to you ? Yes, you should know the elementary mates, and these are endings. However, beyond that I would say you dont NEED to study complex endings until you are reaching them a lot in your games.

+1

We need to define what we are talking about when we say "endings" here so we are all on the same page. I believe beginners should study basic endings but leave the more complex stuff until you are actualy getting into a lot of endings. I didnt study endings much until I was about 1800 USCF simply because most of my games were decided by the ending. If you look at beginners games today the few that do get to endings one side or the other already has a big advantage. I dont often see beginners games that have reached even endings.

If you are reaching endings 2 pawns up ( you won that material in the middlegame or opening I presume ) and failing to convert to a win then yes, you should study endings.

Every chess game has an opening phase , not every chess game has a middlegame phase and not every chess game reaches an ending.

People at ALL levels should study the endgame. Grandmasters aren't perfect, and the endgame is THE most important part of the game. Beginners especially should study the endgame, when you study the endgame, you also learn the potential of the pieces. 

One very good reason that beginners should study endings (although I'm with Reb in believing they should be kept basic): many endings feature a clear difference between a winning move, drawing move, losing move. Learning a few such positions well may facilitate developing the proper attitude, seeking correct play. Seek truth and Caissa will reward you.

I remember from when I was a 1400/1500 player that whenever an equal material ending did show up, they were often agreed drawn immediately! I think all I knew in those days was something about opposition in K+p vs K, and something I heard about a "building a bridge" maneuver once...

If you teach a 1200 player something more about endgame basics than what I knew back then, and also teach them to always play on in endgames because chances do show up -- I think that'll gain them some points every now and then. Not often, but more than from learning some more theory in the Najdorf, and they'll have to learn those lessons at some point anyway.

This may be an example of a teach-what-you-can-teach strategy. While the middlegames might be the most important for beginners practically, they are also the most complex and the most resistent to being taught (or learned from books). So beginners are then taught the endgames because this can at least be taught.

I prefer to study the endgame instead of openings. I have learned all the basic endgame checkmates (K,Q),(K,R,R), (K,P),(K,R),etc and the harder ones as well as (K, N, B), (K, B, B). I play to eventually achieve an endgame that I have studied.