Nigel Short wishes Gerry Walsh 'Merry Xmas & Begone!'

[Paul McKeown]

Stewart,

Thank you - it is good to see that some senior officials within the ECF are happy to communicate their thoughts and plans to the general chess public.

Whilst I agree with much of what you have written, I can't agree with some of it. Nevertheless, it is must be born in mind that it is you who is doing the onerous spade work and I'm keenly aware that that certainly means that you have earned (over many decades) a considerable degree of latitude. I shall give some specific comments later when I have the time.

One specific point I am pleased to hear is that you are reversing some of the "dumbing down" that has gradually slipped into the standards accepted for entry into the British.

Best Regards,
Paul McKeown

[Ben Purton]

What of current qualifiers as listed by Neville Does not deserve to be there? The weakest players on paper have come from Major Open.... Maybe all these 2150's that get nominated in is the issue, because the Major Open gets weaker every year. That might the problem.

Ben

[Stewart Reuben]

Anybody who has qualified for the British Championship by scoring well in an event or having the required rating deserves to be there by definition. It is not the player's fault if the level has been set too low.
The problem has arisen with the 'reserve list'. Anybody who had not qualified could apply for a place. Where players had qualified from a tournament, but did not take up their place, this then could go to an applicant. Such players are usually weaker and belonged in the Major Open.
In my opinion these were virtually 'grace and favour' places. It was impossible to know that a player had not taken up his place until after the penalty fee date. This was much too late for some people to make such a late decision to play. The new rules are much stricter. A player may have been on the same score as a qualifier, but the latter qualified by tie breaks, but the qualifier does not play. Then the place is awarded to the next player who did not qualify due to, what I regard as, spurious tiebreaks.
This reserve system had the advantage that more players could get into the British Championship by paying a large entry fee. That had obvious commercial advantages.
I have devised a new qualification route from the 4NCL. Anybody eligible who achieves a 2350 or higher Tournament Performance Rating against at least 7 rated opponents qualifies.
Since this is the first year of a revised system it may not work perfectly.
Stewart Reuben

[Stewart Reuben]

Earlier in thus now much-tangled thread there was material about k factors and FIDE Ratings. I have copied a couple of the notes below.
Nigel Short wrote:
With an increasing frequency of appearance of rating lists, I fully understand that there is a sound mathematical argument for increasing the K factor - although whether it should it be to 12, 15, 20, or 30 is anybody's guess.


Nigel is absolutely correct - so what should the K factor be increased to?

In my opinion, you have to understand what the factor is seeking to achieve before you can answer this. I believe that its purpose is to control how quickly a players rating converges with his current playing strength. Put it another way - how many games should a player have to player at a given playing level before his rating is equal to that level? Answer that question, and you can work out what K should be.

So, if a player rated 2400 starts playing at 2500 level how many games should he have to play before he is rated 2500?
Sean
******************************************************************************************
Readers may not know that FIDE have changed the regulations quite substantially.
Below 2400 k=30. 2400 and higher k=20. We wanted to have statistically data but this was never forthcoming, so we made the changes anyway. The system is certainly simpler than before. The object was to make the rating changes more dynamic. k=30 the rating changes over in 25 games. k=20 it is 38. That calculation is simply 750/k.
If wse were to have a more sophisticated system, then the rate of change should not depend on the age of the player. It should depend on the rate at which his rating goes up or down.
Unlike the Laws of Chess, I have yet to publish the changes in the Rating and title regulations as I do not have clean copies of either. That is due to the fact the Dr Dirk de Ridder, Chairman of the Titles and Ratings Committee has been too busy.
With k=10 it would take 100/1.4 = 71 games to go from 2400 to 2500 in one period. It is virtually impossible to play such a large number of games in one 2 month rating period, so that a player would go up part way after one list and that would make it more difficult to go to the next level. Thus he plays 35 games and reaches 2449. He continues to play at 2500 and plays another 35 games. He would now reach 2474. He now plays a further 35 games and reaches 2484. Another period goes by and he reaches 2491. He is extremely persistent and plays another rating period. up he goes to 2495. Another spurt and it is 2499. He finally makes it after 245 games.
With k=20 it takes 35 games in one period. If a player just plays 20 games each period, then he gets to 2480 the first time and again takes inordinatedly long to reach 2500.
If he played say 50 games starting at 2400, but playing consistently at 2500, he would reach 2540 without ever having played above 2500. That issue may need addressing particularly for k=30. But k=20 and 38 games is a very large number to play in 60 days.
I am sure you can easily see that, if you are stronger than your published rating and want it to go up, you should play a great deal of chess in the rating period.
Stewart Reuben

[Keith Arkell]

Hi Stewart,

This is excellent news!

You describe very well the problems faced by a player(especially eg a young rapidly improving player)who wants to quickly bring their playing strength and ELO rating into alignment.76 games in 6 months was just about manageable for a k-factor 10 player,but when FIDE increased the output of rating lists to one every 3 months,it became necesary to play 25.3 games/month to avoid always having to play catch up.
From July '09 onwards a k-factor 20 player will know that after playing in a couple of 9 round Internationals per month for a couple of months he/she will emerge with a rating that accurately reflects his/her playing strength for that period.

O dear,I'm getting sucked into contributing to forums.I should be studying chess!

[benedgell]

Going back to the point about the British. I think it's good that there are a lot of qualifying places up for grabs through congresses etc, as it does make entering congresses a more attractive proposition for players graded around the 170-190 mark, who might be too strong for grading prizes, but not quite strong enough to win one of the top prizes on many occassions. The problem is that with a lot of these 170- 190 strength players qualifying for the British, it does tend to leave very few players around this strength entering the major open. For most people who might intend to take a couple of weeks off to play in a tournament around the summer, the major open just doesnt compete in terms of cost, strength of opposition, or attractiveness of venue with a lot of foreign opens (Parnubice springs to mind as one example)

[Matt Harrison]

Surely an answer might be to allow qualified players below 2350 to enter the Major Open and then make the Major Open sufficiently attractive to encourage some of these players to opt for competing to win the Major Open instead of just playing in the main event. Good prize money and norm possibilities are obvious attractions. This would improve the Major Open, make the bottom half of the main event stronger, and lead to more highly graded players gaining entries to the Championships from the previous year's Major Open. Clearly improving players (like strong juniors) would probably still prefer to enter the championships.

[Roger de Coverly]

Surely an answer might be to allow qualified players below 2350 to enter the Major Open

lead to more highly graded players gaining entries to the Championships from the previous year's Major Open

The logic of missing out on the 2009 British to play in the 2009 Major Open in order to qualify for the 2010 British somewhat escapes me. In fact a plausible reason for declining a British invite in favour of the Major Open is to win some prize money in the Major Open. This does happen, if there's an odd number in the British, the highest rated player in the Major Open is offered the place - they don't always take it.

the major open just doesnt compete

The ECF seems to have totally lost interest in trying to promote the British (meaning the whole event) in general and the Major Open in particular as an international chess event. European players may even find Torquay and similar somewhere completely outside their normal chess experience.

[Ben Purton]

Sadly The Major Open will not compete with the Czech tournaments as well as numerous other tournaments which are cheaper and so much stronger.

That's just because most people would rather stay in a nice hotel for £30 a night rather than fawlty towers.

Ben

[Stewart Reuben]

The Major Open used to attract a reasonable number of foreigners. Now, as said by others, it cannot compete with events which have grown up around the world in imitation of the Lloyds Bank Masters. Thus it is only of interest to foreigners who want to play in a tournament where they can hope to get a high score. Such players tend to be weaker mature players.
The only solutions I have thought of require money. Thus higher prizes for under 2350s, as in Gibraltar or the World Open. Or IM invitees to enable there to be an IM norm. Rating prizes restricted to adults is another possibility. Nothing then that £5000 couldn't solve.
2004 was reasonably successful when it was the Centenary and World Major (Intermediate) Championship, but FIDE had no appetite for that for 2009.
Mature rated players who want to protect their ratings do not want to play against juniors. They correctly perceive such players will be underrated.
It is not too late for 2009. Manuel Weeks and I will be working on the entry form shortly. Any ideas?
Stewart Reuben

[Paul McKeown]

Stewart,

I don't know about 2009, but has the venue for 2012 been set, yet?

If not, I would suggest London, to coincide with the Olympics. Time still to catch a nice. juicy, fat sponsor. £100,000 ought to allow a very high quality round robin for the championship and a masters tournament, both running alongside strong amateur tournaments, including the Major Open, junior and senior events.

I believe that if you explain that the very cream of British chess will be competing against each other - and no kiddies or club players amongst them - and outline their highly creditable achievements in international chess (cue Messrs. Speelman, Short, Nunn, Adams, togged up in their finest, suited and booted...), then a sponsor might see that he would be supporting something worthwhile.

And with a creditable major sponsor, HMG or local government might even be prepared to cough up, too. And no doubt, if a major sponsor was prepared to support a major event in this way, moneyed people from within the chess world would also be prepared to open their wallets too, to put the icing on the cake.

No doubt a pipe dream, but, I think it's what a lot of the chess public in Britain would like to see.

Best regards,
Paul McKeown.

[Paul McKeown]

In a determined bid to make myself unpopular, could I kick against the pricks and suggest that the presence of large numbers of kids in the championship, actually helps reinforce the Clapham Omnibus view that chess isn't something that grown ups should take seriously?

[Ben Purton]

In My personal view. Excluding Paul's idea which is something I would support(however you cant clash it because congestion nightmare especially hotel prices).


The best venues are: Brighton- this has the seaside and the nightlife. So its got the best mix, its not as tacky as Scarbrough, Blackpool and even Torquey has its fair share of rubbish.

Why not try a non seaside town? I know people like it for holidays....but do they? Your playing chess 2pm-8pm so basically they like drinking in evening or preparing in the morning, not much time for sandcastles unless your a junior and most juniors play anywhere.

Ben

[Paul McKeown]

The moment chess loses its mystique, its power as a metaphor for intellectual endeavour on the frontier between the human and the divine, then it loses its draw for sponsors. Who after all would want to be associated with nerdy juvenilia?

[David Shepherd]

British major open - how about removing the word major - removing the upper grade limit and having a minimum grade limit (i.e. Open championship: open to all over a certain grade excluding those entitled to play in the main British Championship event)