The "Century Club"

[Hugh Brodie]

There has been discussion at http://www.chesshistory.com about the "Century Club":

'V. Korchnoi has played against G. Levenfish (born 1889) and F. Caruana (born 1992), a difference of 103 years. What is the record in this “century club”, with respect to tournament and match games? The greatest difference that I have found, 108 years, concerns O. Bernstein, who played against J. Mortimer (born 1833) at Ostend, 1907 and against F. Kuijpers (born 1941) at Amsterdam, 1961.’

From other posters:

From Eduardo Bauzá Mercére (New York, NY, USA):

‘F. Benkö, who died on 11 January 2010, played against B.H. Villegas (born 1877) at the Torneo Mayor, Buenos Aires, 1938, and against K. Paveto (born 1992) at the Despedida Open, Buenos Aires, 2008, which gives a gap of 115 years.’

Andrew Bull (Cheltenham, England) writes:

‘The subject has also been discussed in item 271 of Tim Krabbé’s Open Chess Diary. The answer depends, of course, on the level of game accepted, but the largest gap suggested (117 years) concerns F. Parr, who played against A.J. Mackenzie (born 1871) at Hastings, 1939-40 and against T. Sharp (born 1988) in the Challengers’ tournament at Hastings, 2002-03.’

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My "gap" stands at at least 100 years - unless I can remember if I played a rated game against someone born earlier than Dudley LeDain (born 1900). I recently played against Olivier-Kenta Chiku-Ratte (born 2000 - maybe 1999).

UPDATE: I played against Peter Avery (born 1896) on May 21, 1973 - see Ottawa Citizen article about him and the 1962 Canadian Open at http://news.google.com/newspapers?ni...g=5217,6062653 . My "gap" is thus at least 104 years.

[Jonathan Berry]

Re: The "Century Club"

For those of us who are lucky enough to still be alive, the important endpoint is the beginning. At the West Vancouver Chess Club in 1966 I played Harold Ostrom, who is mentioned as a promising young lad (of 8?) in an issue of Checkmate (1901?). That would make him about 1892. Although Ostrom appeared impossibly old to 13-year-old me at the time, Mr. Garrett looked old enough to be his dad, and I played him, too! These were club tournament games. The club had about 20 members, of whom only about 2 were between the ages of 17 and 60. About five of us had youth on our side, while quite a few of the older gentlemen had foul-smelling and hand-rolled cigarettes as a counterstroke. I remember one of them would would let loose a rolling mountain of smoke if you began to concentrate.

At the 2009 Grand Pacific I was lucky to draw several players, some of whom seemed young enough to have been born in the 21st century, or at least the very last years of the 20th.

This is IMHO a variant on the Morphy and Kasparov number idea.

[Stephen Wright]

Re: The "Century Club"

Harold Ostrom, b. 21 April 1891

Finding centuries has become easier in the last little while with the rise of scholastic chess. Without looking too far, a couple of B.C. examples:

Gerry Neufahrt has played Leo M. Duval (b. 1888) and John Doknjas (1999?)
Lynn Stringer has played Walter de Havilland (b. 1872) and Josh Renaud (1993?), although I'm not certain of the circumstances of her meeting with de Havilland.

Colin Aykroyd and Mike Kindret might also be good possibilities.

Choices that don't work: Rodolfo Planas (started playing too late), Maurice Pratt and Miervaldis Jursevskis (stopped playing too soon).

[Frank Dixon]

Re: The "Century Club"

Fascinating topic! Perhaps GM Viktor Korchnoi has the record if one considers games against GMs on the endpoints.

My span is 92 years for Master opponents: Maurice Fox (1898-1988) in a simul in Montreal (I lost), and IM Raja Panjwani (born 1990) in numerous games beginning in 2000 (won many from him at the start when he was 9 years old, and none after about 2002, when he reached NM strength and became Kingston champion for the first time!). :) :) :)

IM Bohatyrchuk would be a good starting Canadian player for a long span; he was born in 1892. Probably IM Lawrence Day, who was trained by IM Bohatyrchuk, would have the widest span among Canadians who are alive now, had Lawrence played against any of our young lions recently.

[Jonathan Berry]

Re: The "Century Club"

Tournament wins against IMs (or up) Geza Füster (b 1910) in 1971 to Josh Friedel (b 1986) in 2006 = 76. One hesitates to introduce the win refinement because for many players the number would be undefined. And this concept is just supposed to be for fun, right? Even for the Morphy number, requiring a win just makes the number greater, doesn't make it disappear entirely.

Frank counted a simul game, so why not Correspondence Chess (CC)? Along with the West Vancouver Chess Club, CC is a great source of old guys. In the old BCCCA (which amalgamated with the CCCA about four decades ago), I think that both Hjalmar Christensen and Harry Quarterman, both top players in the organization, were born deep in the 19th century.

[Vlad Rekhson]

Re: The "Century Club"

If someone didn't play anyone born after the early 1990s it seems that they just didn't play chess for a while! The best I could come up with off the top of my head is: Jamil Kassam (2000, I think?) and I can't think of anything too impressive for the oldest, but in an unofficial game I played against someone born in 1911.

[Hugh Brodie]

Re: The "Century Club"

Yes - making it wins against IM's and up does make it more challenging for the everage player. I had an OTB win against a correspondence GM (I think his name was J. Berry :-) ) - but if I recall correctly) I have no other tournament wins against GM/IM players (i.e. they had the title at the times I played them) - so my count would be 0.

[Stephen Wright]

Re: The "Century Club"

You rang, sir?

Christiansen - b. 2 January 1896
Quarterman - d. 12 October 1971 at age 92

The trouble with using titles is it eliminates anyone from consideration who died before 1950, plus some players never manage to obtain them (Elod Macskasy, Lionel Joyner).

[Frank Dixon]

Re: The "Century Club"

If we look at World Champions on the endpoints of the span, and as well as the player generating the span, then perhaps former World Champion GM Mikhail Botvinnik has an unbeatable record. Botvinnik was born in 1911, and played against former World Champion (GM) Emanuel Lasker (born 1868), at Nottingham 1936, and then, in his chess school, trained future World Champion GM Vladimir Kramnik (born 1975).

[Hans Jung]

Re: The "Century Club"

Yes another interesting variation of numbers. Just playing I would count Jack Ronean (1896) or Maurice Fox (1898) to one of several youth born after 2000. Wins against IM's + Geza Fuster (1910) to Nikolay Noritsyn (1991) but I am confident that I will be around to beat an IM born this year! LOL! The widest span I know of would be Jack Ronean who played Blackburne (1842?) and Chuck Clark (1970) but I am sure there is an even wider span out there which could be found with research.

[Hugh Brodie]

Re: The "Century Club"

Another candidate for a solid 100+ number would be Montreal's Arkadiy Gilman (born 1913, I think). He has played players born in the late 1990's (maybe early 2000's). In his early days in Russia/Soviet Union, he might have played some born as early as the 1830's or 1840's. 160 or 170 gap range?