Ratings Suicide

The ACF June Ratings are out and as I expected, I've slided down horribly in losing 4 games against 1300-1400/unrated opposition and have dropped 70 rating points from 1540 to 1472.

Since my debut in chess last year, my ratings have gone as follows:

1534 -> 1500 -> 1540 -> 1472.

However, I'm not unduly worried. I had expected my rating to fall because my competitive spirit had been lacking the last month.

Heck, I'm not sure if I can ever win it back.

Tomorrow I'm up against rather formidable opponents. The U1800 St George Saints group on their home territory and the last I checked, their lowest ranked player at the last board is 200 points above me. There's nothing to lose now, I guess. :)

December Ratings

I turned up at the Ryde-Eastwood chess club on Wednesday night and had a brief chat with Shane Burgess who duly informed me that the December ACF ratings were out and he was surprised I haven't blogged about it yet. Well, .... errr.... that's because I normally don't put a lot of emphasis on ratings nor do I monitor it closely.

So Shane, this post is for you. ;-)

The last 2 tournaments I took part in have been included.

They were the Ford Memorial Centenary Tournament and the Ryde Eastwood Club Championship Finals.

My rating bumped a bit by 40 points moving from 1500 to 1540.

But that's nothing compared with Shane. Shane's progress was stunning. He shot up 60 points to 1520 (very nice, Shane and stop complaining that you'll have to face tougher opponents next time *wink*).

My brother-in-law Steven's rating rose from 1789 to 1797. Arthur Hunyh rose from 1835 to 1917 (wow!) and Joshua Christiansen remained stable at 1662.

My friend Weng's son, Dylan, is the 2nd most improved player of all of NSW during this 3 month period, getting on the ratings list with an entrant score of 538. Congratulations to Weng and Dylan!

Young Anton Smirnov shot up another 56 points to 1440, showing that he is making good progress.

I've also noticed Anton's analytical skill has improved by leaps and bounds. He is starting to analyse a lot better and his thinking has accelerated.

Yes, I usually lose to him these days in speed chess because my brain malfunctions at higher processing speeds. It like trying to get a Pentium II processor to work at the speed of an Intel i7.

It is just not going to happen. :D

Next Wednesday is the annual Christmas dinner for the Ryde-Eastwood chess club. I've already put my name down with Les and intend to bring my camera along to take some pictures of the event.


Oh, I am most definitely looking forward to it. Yumz...... :)

NSW Players Ratings Distribution Charts

Using the Jun'08 master list available from the Australian Chess Federation website, I decided to do a little investigating.

From the master list, I grabbed the list of all NSW (New South Wales) players. I subsequently removed players who currently do not have a rating and sort them into the distribution curve and got the following graph using a bit of Excel magic.

The distribution curve is pretty much ordinary and only tells us that the 50% mark is around the 1400-1500 region.


However, the more telling is this graph. We can see that the majority of the NSW players are within the 1200-2100 band range. In fact, the uneven distribution (slight asymmetry from the middle ACF 1500-1600 rating range) indicates that there is moderately lighter slant on the right side of the curve, implying that there is a greater proportion of NSW chess players who are stronger in the higher bands than the corresponding opposite band of the 1500-1600 range.

This chart is also being reflected by the number of teams participating in the different grades for the NSW Grade Matches this year.

In the U2100: There are 5 teams
In the U1800: There are 5 teams
In the U1600: There are 9 teams
In the U1400: There are 7 teams

The Grade Matches And The Ratings Game

This week is going to be a tough week for me. I've got a module exam on tonight (and hence, having to miss out the U1400 at Rooty Hill - apologies all round to the rest of the team) so there's no time actually to study chess.

Bill Gletsos has released the June ACF ratings. Moi currently has an unstable rating but that is expected to slide with last week's loss to St George. My brother-in-law Steven is sitting pretty at 1778.

The North Sydney Grizzlies opponents this Tuesday are (updated with June ratings):

Pepping, John M (1521)
Pike, Robert D (1508)
Greenwood, Norman (1496)
Smirnov, Anton (1371)

This means I'm probably scheduled to play either Norman Greenwood or Anton Smirnov on either Board 3 or Board 4.

Norman has always been a problem for me (kind of like Polly's King Kong) and young Anton Smirnov has been progressing rapidly under his father's tutelage - Vladimir Smirnov (2303) . Either way, it's going to be fun.

The rest of the U-1600 Ryde Eastwood team comprises:

Sitompul, Sotarduga (1625)
Hickey, James (1558)
Mikolajczyk, Les (1489)
Chiara, Vince (1410)

and all of them have made improvements. So congratulations to all of them. I just hope I don't disappoint them tomorrow night. *gulp*.