The Rating Of Chess Players, Past & Present [Hardcover]

Arpad E Elo (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 3, 1978

One of the most extraordinary books ever written about chess and chessplayers, this authoritative study goes well beyond a lucid explanation of how today's chessmasters and tournament players are rated. Twenty years' research and practice produce a wealth of thought-provoking and hitherto unpublished material on the nature and development of high-level talent: Just what constitutes an “exceptional performance” at the chessboard? Can you really profit from chess lessons? What is the lifetime pattern of Grandmaster development? Where are the masters born? Does your child have master potential? The step-by-step rating system exposition should enable any reader to become an expert on it. For some it may suggest fresh approaches to performance measurement and handicapping in bowling, bridge, golf and elsewhere. 43 charts, diagrams and maps supplement the text. How and why are chessmasters statistically remarkable? How much will your rating rise if you work with the devotion of a Steinitz? At what age should study begin? What toll does age take, and when does it begin? Development of the performance data, covering hundreds of years and thousands of players, has revealed a fresh and exciting version of chess history. One of the many tables identifies 500 all-time chess greats, with personal data and top lifetime performance ratings. Just what does government assistance do for chess? What is the Soviet secret? What can we learn from the Icelanders? Why did the small city of Plovdiv produce three Grandmasters in only ten years? Who are the untitled dead? Did Euwe take the championship from Alekhine on a fluke? How would Fischer fare against Morphy in a ten-wins match? “1t was inevitable that this fascinating story be written”, asserts FIDE President Max Euwe, who introduces the book and recognizes the major part played by ratings in today's burgeoning international activity. Although this is the definitive ratings work, with statistics alone sufficient to place it in every reference library, it was written by a gentle scientist for pleasurable reading - for the enjoyment of the truths, the questions, and the opportunities it reveals.

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Arpad Elo developed the chess rating systems that are used to rate all chess players in the world today. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 230 pages
• Publisher: Arco Pub.; 1st edition (July 3, 1978)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0668047216
• ISBN-13: 978-0668047210
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,220,714 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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22 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Ratings wisdom from the horse's mouth, May 3, 2000

By 

Bill Smythe (Chicago) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Rating Of Chess Players, Past & Present (Hardcover)

This work was written in 1978 by the Old Man himself, Arpad Elo. Chess players remember Elo as the cantankerous professor of physics from Marquette University, and as the inventor of the rating systems used by the United States Chess Federation (USCF) and the International Chess Federation (FIDE). Who better to explain the mathematics behind the rating system which, according to a letter Elo wrote to Chess Life several years ago, "is, after all, MY system". The explanations are semi-technical, but understandable by anybody with a mathematical inclination, regardless of their education in that field. There is even a chapter in which ratings are calculated retroactively, for grandmasters of bygone days. The book was written B.K. (before Kasparov), so of course Bobby Fischer comes out on top, with a rating of about 2780. His closest competitors are Lasker, Capablanca, and Botvinnik, each of whom peaked at about 2720. The average rating of tournament players in the U.S., by the way, is about 1500, several classes below the stars. Interesting reading.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The inventor's view, September 18, 2009

By 

Manuel Lopez Michelone "morsa" (Mexico) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Rating of Chess Players, Past and Present (Paperback)

Arpad Elo was a physicist who passed most of his life in the USA. He invented the rating system, the method to measure the strenght of chess level of the players. The Elo (rating) system, was incorporated by the International Chess Federation (FIDE), at the end of the seventies and now the rating of the players is the first measure that FIDE uses to classify the chess players.

Elo, in his book, defines the rating system, the formulas, the statistics and mathematics around it. He also analyse the performance of the best players of his time (and also the old players like Alekhine, Capablanca, Lasker), and make some points around the validity of the system. As usual with someone with mathematics preparation, Elo is very strict in his ideas and makes a good evaluation of the rating system in a whole.

In fact, he predicted the final result between Spassky and Fischer match (1972) exactly, using his formulas for that. I think this result validates correctly the good behaviour of the rating system

The only problem with the book is that it is not a very actual one. I mean, Elo talks about the first stage of the FIDE rating where there were no more than 300 players ranked. Right now the FIDE rating list has about 80,000 players classified.

On the other hand, Elo never predicted a phenomena is seeing today: rating inflation. Jeff Sonas, a mathematician who loves chess statistics has not also a good explanation to this problem.

In any case, Elo book is a must for who is interested in the mathematics of the Elo rating system.