So I was writing about my goals for chess earlier and I just hit 1500 at CTS after doing all the mates-in-one in the Polgar book in one sitting a couple times. Of course, this just means that my next big goal is 1550 and my next minor goal is 1510. NOTE: no correlation to real ratings. I noticed some web-logging discussion of correlations of CTS ratings to real ratings, such as Mousetrapper's anecdotal data, but I would discourage such speculations. I mean, yes, the people rated over 2000 on CTS are pretty intense, and even people rated 1700 are fairly intense, but I highly doubt that I'd be at even 1500 in real ratings at the moment, much less 1500+200 or 1500+300 as some people's discussion seems to suggest! It's a number to note and not take much stock of. The only real numbers that matter are the ones involved when you crush the ego of your opponent. There is some value to CTS ratings: they measure one narrowly-defined set of skills which might be valuable to have and having a higher score is better than having a lower score.
EDIT: 1530 would put me in the top third of active players, so I'll take a week off and shoot for that.
3 comments:
Wow! Good luck.
Out of curiosity, which Polgár book are you thinking of, the one with Bruce?
I like the new name, it's very appropriate for at least this web-log. Yes, the brick with 5334 problems, it probably would've been even better without Bruce's intro. I think it would be marvellous to find the Middlegames and Endgames books, but they haven't been reprinted, much less redone for cheap like the first one. The Endgames book can be found used for like $70, but I'm not made of money.
So many things, so little time! My French is so rusty, I can barely even remember how to do bike stunts, and yesterday I swam laps for the first time in *gulp* six years. Ah, life.
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