Rumour Mill

THERE seems uncertainty about the venues and dates for next year's Fide world and European senior team championships.

'Twas Ever Thus, you might say, and you would not be far wrong.

However, for what it is worth, I have been told the world senior team championships will be going ahead in Albania in April, but not at the originally advertised site.

The situation is a little more complicated with the European senior team championships, which were scheduled for Rhodes in March, but then switched to the same Greek island, but at an unspecified time in July/August.

Apparently they will now be held in Rome in the summer, but I have no further details.

Dates For Your Diary

ONE of the most frequent chess-related questions I am asked is where to find details about the tournaments I play.

Usually the question comes from people wanting to play in Continental events, but also from foreigners interested in combining a visit to England with playing chess.

My starting point for classical tournaments, ie those with one round a day, is Fide's calendar, where it is a simple matter to click on events for a particular month.

But also very useful are the websites of two central European organisations, CzechTour and ChessOrg.

For English events, which largely consist of five-round weekend tournaments played on Friday evening, Saturday morning, Saturday afternoon, Sunday morning and Sunday afternoon, the English Chess Federation's calendar gives comprehensive coverage, often including events elsewhere in the British Isles and sometimes overseas.

Those looking specifically for senior events, which in many cases are for people aged 50+, can find detailed listings at Tim Harding's Chess Mail calendar.

Must Be Doing Something Right

I STARTED this blog seven years ago, one of the main motivations being the hope that analysing my games to a publishable state would improve my chess.

Back in September 2017 my English Chess Federation grade was 169, which converted to an elo rating of 1968 - my ECF today, with the publication of October's ratings, is also 1968.

My Fide international rating was 1858 - today it is 2013, a rise of 155 points.

My rating at the Fide-recognised International Correspondence Chess Federation was 2267 - today it is 2325, a rise of 58 points.

No doubt the blog is not the only reason I have been able to at least maintain my ratings, but I am sure it is helping.

Recalculated Ratings Available

FIDE'S re-set ratings, which apply from tomorrow, are available here.

All Change!

I TOLD last month how Fide planned to boost the ratings of players rated U2000, using a formula designed to combat what is seen as deflation in the elo system.

Grandmaster Keith Arkell has been complaining about deflation for several years.

Certainly some players, who once were comfortably rated in the 1900s, find themselves struggling to stay in the 1700s.

Some might put this mainly down to ageing, but chess statistical experts think otherwise.

Originally the boost, which I detailed in my blog, was to take place on New Year's Day, but quite a few officials claimed this was too soon.

Accordingly the change will now occur on March 1, along with other anti-deflationary measures, including moving the rating floor from 1000 to 1400, which will mean many weaker players losing their international rating.

Sometimes being close to a subject makes it hard to see what exactly is going on - a bit like being unable to see the wood for the trees.

One person who can take a much more detached view is grandmaster John Nunn, who, although never a Candidate, was rated in the world's top 10.

In other words he was a big fish in a big (chess) pond.

Nunn, as he puts it himself "more or less" retired from playing chess about 20 years ago.

But recently he has started competing in a string of 65+ seniors' events, where once again he is a big fish, albeit in a smaller pond.

To him the most noticeable change in the game in the intervening period has not been a decrease in ratings, but an increase in (legitimate) computer use, including "extensively" among 65+ seniors.

"This has certainly affected the way players tackle the openings," he wrote in December's issue of Chess magazine.

"The practical effect seems to be that players are reluctant to repeat an opening line and they tend to prepare 'one-off' opening variations which they have not played before, solely to evade the pre-game scrutiny of engines."

Another big change over the past two decades, or perhaps even longer, is the vast increase in chess literature.

There was a time when a handful of books might be published in a year; now many more than a handful are published every month.

Faster time limits are another change that is noticeable, along with digital clocks almost totally replacing analogue ones.

Which of these changes is the most significant is arguable, but chess is thriving, at least if the number of international tournaments is anything to go by.

Happy Old Year

I TOLD last month how Fide planned to increase the ratings of every player U2000 on January 1.

It has not happened - but it might happen on March 1.

Fide reckoned the increases were needed to correct deflation in the ratings of most players.

Part of the plan involved removing ratings from every player rated U1400, and this will definitely go ahead on March 1.

The argument from statisticians is that increasing the rating floor, ie the minimum required to join the rating list, is anti-deflationary.

So far so unclear, and it is still not clear whether the main 'correction', ie increasing U2000 players' ratings, will go ahead on March 1.

For the moment the new year is the same as the old year, at least as far as Fide ratings are concerned.

Joe Skielnik points out another rather interesting measure that Fide has approved, and that will presumably also come into effect on March 1.

The Spanish chess federation has proposed scrapping its rating list, and instead only using Fide ratings.

Fide will obviously gain more fees from this, and has in return agreed to recognise all current Spanish ratings as though they were Fide ratings (when the players concerned do not already have a Fide rating).

Could this be the future for ratings in the British Isles?

How To Get Stronger Overnight

THIS blog is averaging 109 views a day.

The number tends to go up when I am playing a tournament, and falls back afterwards.

Most of those views, I would guess, are from players with a Fide rating under 2000.

All such players will see their strength increase on New Year's Day, or, to be more precise, will see their Fide rating increase.

What is happening is that the international chess federation, commonly known by its French acronym Fide, reckons it has detected deflation in the ratings of players U2000.

On January 1 all such players will get a one-off rise using the formula: (2000 - rating) x 0.4.

My rating is 1743, but I lost 7.2 elo at Benidorm, so I would normally expect my new rating on January 1 (ratings come out monthly) to be 1736.

However, using the anti-deflation formula [2000 - 1736 = 264; 264 x 0-4 = 105.6; 1736 + 105.6 = 1841.6] I will boast a rating of 1842.

And, hey presto!, I am suddenly 'improving' at the pace of a junior. Ain't life grand?

Titles

THE international chess federation, known by its French acronym Fide, awards four titles for over-the-board play: grandmaster (GM), international master (IM), Fide master (FM) and, since 2002, candidate master (CM).

To get the GM title you generally need three norms* and have a rating of at least 2500, for the IM title you generally need three norms and a rating of at least 2400, and to get the FM title you generally need to reach a rating of 2300 (no norms).

The Fide-recognised organisation for correspondence chess is the International Correspondence Chess Federation.

It awards five titles for correspondence play: grandmaster, senior international master, international master, master and expert.

The titles are, somewhat inconsistently, abbreviated to GM, SIM, IM, CCM and CCE, the CCs standing for correspondence chess.

As a rough guide, the ICCF title of CCM is equal to the Fide title of FM, but is achieved not by rating but by obtaining two or more norms in tournaments with a total of at least 24 games.

I today completed my first CCM norm, albeit in a tournament which is ongoing and in which I only played eight games.

(My two wins are annotated at https://beauchess.blogspot.com/2020/10/morphing-french-xvi.html and https://beauchess.blogspot.com/2020/11/lockdown-correspondence-chess.html).

MT-Gutiérre/SF4 Board 3, Carlos Flores Gutiérrez Team Tournament SF4 Board 3

							TD Lorenz, Bernhard
Minor category K							1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	CCM	CCE	Score	Wins	SB	RG	Place
1		212116		Spanton, Tim	2260	England 1		½	½	½	½	1	½	½	1	5	4	5	2	14	0	1
2		910125	CCE	Dzenis, Janis (Tukmus)	2252	Latvia	½		½	½	½	½	½	.	½	5		3.5	0	11.25	1	2
3		86216	CCE	Meißner, Rüdiger	2271	Germany 1	½	½		½	.	½	½	½	½	5		3.5	0	10.75	1	3
4		810272		Flew, Nick	2000	Wales 2	½	½	½		0	½	½	½	½	4½	3½	3.5	0	10.75	0	4
5		241683	CCE	Rodolfo Masera, Luca	2290	Italia Azzurra	½	½	.	1		.	.	.	1	5		3	2	9.75	4	5
6		90161	IM	Maurer, Serge	2221	Canada	0	½	½	½	.		½	½	½			3	0	8.5	1	6
7		460338		Kontulainen, Hanne	2192	Finland 2	½	½	½	½	.	½		.	.	5	4	2.5	0	9.25	3	7
8		421093	IM	Nowak, Ireneusz	2275	Poland	½	.	½	½	.	½	.		.			2	0	7.5	4	8
9		884012	CCE	Quanzaah, Emmanuel	2092	Africa	0	½	½	½	0	½	.	.		5		2	0	6.75	2	9

*A norm is a high-rating performance, the exact requirements of which have varied over time and depend on the title being sought.

You're Not As Inactive As You Think

THE world chess federation has redefined what constitutes chess inactivity.
Here is the text of a new announcement at Fide's website:

The lack of rated events due to the coronavirus pandemic could have led, under the existing regulations, to many players being considered as "inactive". As such, they could have been removed from the rating list.

In order to prevent that, the Qualification Commission has made the recommendation to temporarily extend the period required to be considered "inactive" from 12 to 24 months. The exceptional measure, approved by the FIDE Council, has already been applied to November's rating list. This modification will be reverted once the chess activity goes back to pre-pandemic levels of activity and competitions. 

Good News, Bad News: aka Bad Wiessee (final part)

THE bad news is that I lost my last-round game rather horribly, to a 2148 in 32 moves.
The good news is that the tournament will, after all, count for international ratings, or so the arbiter told me (I cannot find Bad Wiessee registered at Fide, but then again the Fide site is saying that the Jersey tournament, which finished on April 7, has still not been submitted for rating purposes).
Anyway, assuming Bad Wiessee is rated, my elo should go up 46.2pts. [Correction 7/5/18: having worked out the numbers myself, the right figure seems to be +42.8 rather than +46.2]
For those a little less rating obsessed, here is a final pic:

View from the front door of the tournament venue, the Hotel Gasthof zur Post