blitz ratings in Canadian chess

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  • blitz ratings in Canadian chess

    For sometime now I have been thinking to myself how chess could gain popularity in Canada, and to have the ability to send more Canadians to world championships. If the CFC were to introduce blitz ratings (and we'd refer to active as our rapid section), we could make everyones current active rating there blitz ratings and start hosting blitz tournaments and national championships so we could send winners to world rapid and blitz championships (including juniors)

    I just think this could be a really good way to help promote chess in Canada by using blitz which is growing in popularity throughout Canada

    Thoughts?

  • #2
    From my experience in Montreal, OTB (over-the-board) blitz tournaments have dropped down to near zero. We once had as many as four weekly blitzes (in the 1980's) - now, it's a couple of times a year. Due to this fact - blitz ratings are meaningless since they change so rarely without regular events. The Internet has put an end to OTB blitz tournaments. You would have to find an organizer that's willing to run them at least weekly (with no or little reward for their efforts) , and a good-sized pool of players to make ratings meaningful.

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    • #3
      Originally posted by Hugh Brodie View Post
      From my experience in Montreal, OTB (over-the-board) blitz tournaments have dropped down to near zero. We once had as many as four weekly blitzes (in the 1980's) - now, it's a couple of times a year. Due to this fact - blitz ratings are meaningless since they change so rarely without regular events. The Internet has put an end to OTB blitz tournaments. You would have to find an organizer that's willing to run them at least weekly (with no or little reward for their efforts) , and a good-sized pool of players to make ratings meaningful.
      im thinking that it could be paired with rapid tournaments, I find that a lot of people I talk to want blitz tournaments, yes im unaware of the situation in Quebec but a lot of people I talk see it as a positive idea, maybe as a start, create rapid championships, more people do play rapid


      touching back to the blitz I remember when I was at the Canadian open though(in Quebec City) there was at least 40 to 50 people playing the blitz tournament

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      • #4
        Hi Henry:

        Elevate My Chess is holding a two-tournament, one-day event on Sat., November 24, in Oakville, Ontario.

        The morning and afternoon are a rapid tournament (5 rounds). The evening is a Blitz Tournament (10 rounds - play one opponent with each colour).

        It is an experiment - at this point joint entry is only 20 players......I expect that to rise substantially......but whether the blitz will keep pace with rapid registrations remains to be seen.

        Also, when I was a "Voting Member" (Formerly Governors), I and Fred McKim got a motion passed that combined the then CFC "Active" and "Blitz" Rating Systems into one "Quick" Rating System. The reason this came about was because no organizers were organizing rated Blitz tournaments - the CFC Blitz rating system sat totally unused. By collapsing the two, we allowed for future possible rise in rated blitz tournaments, but they would affect the "Quick" rating. This was considered a good way to deal with Blitz Ratings at the time. The CFC has never changed the Website Rating format to replace the word "Active" with the word "Quick", as should have happened right after the combined system was brought into being. I don't believe the word "Quick" appears anywhere on the CFC Website (Someone correct me if I have missed it).

        Bob A

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        • #5
          Originally posted by Bob Armstrong View Post
          Hi Henry:

          Elevate My Chess is holding a two-tournament, one-day event on Sat., November 24, in Oakville, Ontario.

          The morning and afternoon are a rapid tournament (5 rounds). The evening is a Blitz Tournament (10 rounds - play one opponent with each colour).

          It is an experiment - at this point joint entry is only 20 players......I expect that to rise substantially......but whether the blitz will keep pace with rapid registrations remains to be seen.

          Also, when I was a "Voting Member" (Formerly Governors), I and Fred McKim got a motion passed that combined the then CFC "Active" and "Blitz" Rating Systems into one "Quick" Rating System. The reason this came about was because no organizers were organizing rated Blitz tournaments - the CFC Blitz rating system sat totally unused. By collapsing the two, we allowed for future possible rise in rated blitz tournaments, but they would affect the "Quick" rating. This was considered a good way to deal with Blitz Ratings at the time. The CFC has never changed the Website Rating format to replace the word "Active" with the word "Quick", as should have happened right after the combined system was brought into being. I don't believe the word "Quick" appears anywhere on the CFC Website (Someone correct me if I have missed it).

          Bob A
          but now nobody even rates the blitz tournaments that happen and I see that as a problem
          while I can see why you may have wanted to post on that we never have any "active" championships or quick as you say and I find that in itself is a problem there should be some sort of competitive active championship in Canada so we can send players to those championships

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          • #6
            Originally posted by Henri Hughes View Post

            but now nobody even rates the blitz tournaments that happen and I see that as a problem
            while I can see why you may have wanted to post on that we never have any "active" championships or quick as you say and I find that in itself is a problem there should be some sort of competitive active championship in Canada so we can send players to those championships
            Changing the underlying infrastructure (ie. changing Active to Quick) requires a drupal programmer. Right now we can make changes to the areas of the website that were designed to be changed (mostly lists of things).

            I'm not sure if there is an appetite for CFC Rated Blitz (ie with $1.50 per head). In the Maritimes we have our own Blitz ratings that have been in operation for 30 years. Both Saint John and Charlottetown have 5-10 "rated" tournaments per year. New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island also have annual CFC Quick Chess and (non-CFC) Blitz Championships. I'm not sure if you could gain enough entries at a National event to pay let's say a $1,000 prize (for airfare) for a player to go to the World Rapid & Blitz Championship (there would be no concessions there for National champions).

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            • #7
              Originally posted by Henri Hughes View Post
              If the CFC were to introduce blitz ratings.....

              Thoughts?

              Some number of years ago (early 2000s?) motions were made and passed for the CFC to have a blitz rating. One tournament was rated (at the Canadian Open maybe? memory fails....) and then nothing. In any case, alledgedly the CFC already rates blitz tournaments.

              One problem is the requirement of CFC membership and associated rating costs. It turns out that denying entry to half the local casual players because they are not CFC members and charging money for meaningless ratings is not that popular.

              It also doesn't seem to me that although FIDE has blitz and active ratings that there is any interest in those ratings (or the interest in paying FIDE rating fees for those types of events)

              Another is the sheer number of ratings around. Let see I have / am eligible for CFC regular, CFC active, FQE (do they have active / blitz ratimgs?), FIDE regular, FIDE active, FIDE blitz, USCF regular, USCF active, ICCF (I think ICCF also have a "blitz" rating not to mention various online ratings. Not much point in having another one.

              As Hugh notes, activity matters for having a plausible rating system. You should compare your thoughts about a CFC blitz rating to how well CFC active ratings work -( that is to say they don't work except maybe for the scholastic events) and think about why that is.

              How you are talking about blitz for increasing popularity (accessible for casual players, more suited for the amount of time people have to play chess, yada yada yada) is the same set of arguments people used to talk about active events. Now it's true that active events appeal to different players and can provide a gateway for new players to experience tournament style chess but you need a) organizers willing and able to provide regular events and b) a recognition that many of those people have no interest in the CFC (or FIDE) and organize accordingly.

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              • #8
                Originally posted by Fred McKim View Post

                Changing the underlying infrastructure (ie. changing Active to Quick) requires a drupal programmer. Right now we can make changes to the areas of the website that were designed to be changed (mostly lists of things).

                I'm not sure if there is an appetite for CFC Rated Blitz (ie with $1.50 per head). In the Maritimes we have our own Blitz ratings that have been in operation for 30 years. Both Saint John and Charlottetown have 5-10 "rated" tournaments per year. New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island also have annual CFC Quick Chess and (non-CFC) Blitz Championships. I'm not sure if you could gain enough entries at a National event to pay let's say a $1,000 prize (for airfare) for a player to go to the World Rapid & Blitz Championship (there would be no concessions there for National champions).
                fair point, I feel like at least for rapid then it could be possible to get better funding if we did have those opportunities for players , the funding comes in turn as eventually it would with blitz but we would have to build if up to that, I think it would take a lot of work but could definately possible

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                • #9
                  Originally posted by Roger Patterson View Post


                  Some number of years ago (early 2000s?) motions were made and passed for the CFC to have a blitz rating. One tournament was rated (at the Canadian Open maybe? memory fails....) and then nothing. In any case, alledgedly the CFC already rates blitz tournaments.

                  One problem is the requirement of CFC membership and associated rating costs. It turns out that denying entry to half the local casual players because they are not CFC members and charging money for meaningless ratings is not that popular.

                  It also doesn't seem to me that although FIDE has blitz and active ratings that there is any interest in those ratings (or the interest in paying FIDE rating fees for those types of events)

                  Another is the sheer number of ratings around. Let see I have / am eligible for CFC regular, CFC active, FQE (do they have active / blitz ratimgs?), FIDE regular, FIDE active, FIDE blitz, USCF regular, USCF active, ICCF (I think ICCF also have a "blitz" rating not to mention various online ratings. Not much point in having another one.

                  As Hugh notes, activity matters for having a plausible rating system. You should compare your thoughts about a CFC blitz rating to how well CFC active ratings work -( that is to say they don't work except maybe for the scholastic events) and think about why that is.

                  How you are talking about blitz for increasing popularity (accessible for casual players, more suited for the amount of time people have to play chess, yada yada yada) is the same set of arguments people used to talk about active events. Now it's true that active events appeal to different players and can provide a gateway for new players to experience tournament style chess but you need a) organizers willing and able to provide regular events and b) a recognition that many of those people have no interest in the CFC (or FIDE) and organize accordingly.
                  yes but active events are very informal and we have stuff for causal players im saying that we should have a more defined faster time control national championship

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                  • #10
                    about blitz for increasing popularity

                    My club experience shows that a long time control attracts more people.

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                    • #11
                      Originally posted by Egidijus Zeromskis View Post


                      My club experience shows that a long time control attracts more people.
                      It's not that blitz is not popular. Lots of players like to play blitz games but they are not really willing to pay to play for some reasons.

                      Even when we have entry fee ( Blitz ) of $ 10/$ 15/$ 20 and that is for 10 games ( 5W & 5B) as compared to rapid game which has higher entry fee ( and only 5 games ), more players are opting for rapid tournament than blitz tournament. We have almost 30 players as compared to only 20 players for blitz at the moment. There is only one player who opts ONLY for blitz tournament though

                      Gary

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                      • #12
                        Originally posted by Gary Hua View Post
                        It's not that blitz is not popular. Lots of players like to play blitz games but they are not really willing to [B]pay to play for some reasons.
                        The club has only one fee (membership) for the year. There are much less players on blitz and rapid nights and no additional costs are involved.

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                        • #13
                          I believe the FQE rates blitz events for free - but only 21 of the 191 events rated by the FQE this year have been blitz - and most are small, local club tournaments. I used to rate all the blitz tournaments in Montreal - generating a database of 3500 players over almost a 45-year period. (some archived results are still available at http://canbase.fqechecs.qc.ca/blitze.htm - contact me if you want results dating back to 1970)

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                          • #14
                            oh wow thanks Brodie yea I would like to see those

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                            • #15
                              In the 1970s most of the top players played in the Saturday afternoon blitz at the Central Y. Two filing cabinet trays full of rating cards. In the 1990s it came back at the new Y, then the Dutton Club and continued by Vlad Dobrich in various bars. Dobrich used to publish the ratings here on Chesstalk:

                              https://forum.chesstalk.com/forum/ch...y-blitz-update

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