You don’t have to win every round. You have to still be standing when the round you care about comes.

Spending everything on every round means arriving at the one that matters with nothing left. Most contests are long, and the people who win the important ones are usually not the ones who won the most exchanges along the way; they are the ones who were still in reasonable shape when the important one came.

Name the round you actually care about this season or this term. Then let yourself be ordinary in the small ones that do not feed it. Saving energy is a decision you make in advance, not something left over.