There are hundreds, thousands of websites even that answer the commonly thought of questions in Chess: openings, tricks, tactics. In fact, if you just type in chess on google you get around 364 million results. However, in this universe of answers, still some things are left unexplained. We’ve tried to compile here some chess facts for some of the lesser known answers.
Is Chess a Sport?
When we think of sports we think about team games, we think football, Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi. We think of Athletes that have honed their bodies to the utmost extremes of physiology. If we remove the team element of sport we can also consider games like tennis with legends like Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer.
Chess is different in this sense because its athletes have honed their minds to the greatest extreme. Magnus Carlsen the current world chess champion has an IQ of 190, the average is 100. An IQ of 190 puts Carlsen amongst Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawking – Even beating some of them! It’s clear that the individuals that play chess are in terms of intellect, far above average people. In the same way, the athletes of conventional sports are far fitter and stronger than the average person too.
On top of this, Chess shares the competitive aspect of sport. FIDE the international chess federation acts as the governing body of international chess competition. They organise tournaments around the world and even have player rankings like you would see in Tennis for example.
Above all, the factor that supports the pro-sport sentiment best is the fact that the International Olympic Committee has recognized it as a sport. While it’s not classified as an Olympic sport there are several popular sports that fall short of Olympic standards, Cricket is a great example.
Why is Chess so Hard?
There is inherent competition in Chess. It’s you versus your opponent, with no teammates to back you up. There is a certain amount of pressure in the sport that most people just can’t handle and that’s when blunders happen. If you add the timed element to chess it becomes even harder.
Another reason that Chess is so complicated is that small actions can have big consequences. Often times a piece you moved several turns ago might find itself out of position. Sometimes one piece being captured can ruin your whole defensive line. If it was defending another piece suddenly that piece has no cover too and so a domino effect ensues.
Lastly, Chess is unforgiving. At the beginning of the game, everything is – for the most part – balanced. You have the same number of pieces, the same number of options as your opponent. Similar to the point above, one mistake will throw the balance out. If you blunder your queen, its almost always game over. Smaller pieces like a knight, or bishop can be recovered, but the moment you’ve lost that piece, you’re on the back foot. A good opponent will be able to capitalise and you will lose. In the same vein, your opponent can make mistakes, by capitalising on them, you might be able to snatch victory. It’s a two way street!
What is a Good Chess Rating?
As discussed earlier, FIDE determines global chess rankings thought their international tournaments. Most players are ranked by the ELO system. When you win, your ranking goes up. When you lose it goes down. Simple – Right? Actually it’s not so simple, an expert chess player will beat an amateur almost every time. However, the expert’s points would not always go up because the ranking is weighted to determine who you’re playing. It’s done on the % chance that one player will beat another. To make it short, a good player must beat another good player to improve rankings. A bad player will improve rankings if they beat a good player, but if a good player beats a bad player, their rating will barley change at all. Chess.com has an excellent article on this that goes into more detail. I’ll link it here.
When you achieve a certain number of points you achieve a player category. They are as follows.
- Grandmasters: >= 2500
- International Masters: 2400 to 2500
- FIDE Master: 2300 to 2400
- FIDE National Master/Candidate Master: 2200 to 2300
- Expert/National Candidate Master: 2000 to 2200
- Class A player: 1800 to 1999
- Class B player: 1600 to 1799
- Class C player: 1400 to 1599
- Class D player: 1200 to 1399
- Class E Player: 1000 to 1199
What is a good Chess rating is a hard question to answer as it varies from person to person. 1500 is a good starting point, they’re clearly competent and have a good grasp of tactics. Anything above this is very good and anything above 2000 is an expert.
Remember, some people dedicate their whole lives to chess. You won’t become a Grandmaster overnight!
Why are Russians So Good at Chess?
Russia and the former Soviet Union has a legacy of great chess players. From 1948 to 1990 17/18 of world chess champions were Russian. The nation also has the most individuals with Multiple Championships under their belt with 5/10. The past accomplishments of the nation has raised the bar of excellence for chess playing in the country.
But, this success did not come from nowhere. The Soviets put a significant amount of resources into chess culture. Matches are often televised, chess puzzles are in every newspaper and a huge number chess clubs allow grass roots development. It was more than just a game in the USSR, it was life.
Chess Facts: What Have We Learnt?
Chess is one of the oldest board games in existence, yet, every day, we still find some questions unanswered. The aim today was to provide some chess facts and teach bot you and ourselves something new. We’ve discussed in detail the competitive aspects of the game and how Russia became one of the greatest chess playing nations of all time, despite not inventing it. We hoped you’ve learnt as much as we have when we did the research for this article.
