I played the Southwest Open in Texas last weekend. In both the U1400 and U2000 sections, the majority of players appeared to be under age 18. All 6 of my opponents in U1400 were 10-12 years old. (Three were female, which was a nice change.) I don’t mind playing kids, but playing ALL kids is depressing, since most of them seem to be advancing quickly and thus are underrated. My old brain is not advancing so quickly.
My husband in U2000 also faced only kids, no adults.
I am wondering if this is happening everywhere, of if the Dallas/Fort Worth area is a special area due to the presence of UT Dallas, with plenty of strong players to serve as coaches.
What has been your experience in other areas of the country?
This has been building for a while. Not only do they have the overall numbers, the number of strong young players has been increasing as well.
Players under 20 were in the majority in the Under 2200 section of the 2019 World Open, which is by no means a weak section, and made up nearly 45% of the Open section.
The number of scholastic players at large weekend tournaments has increased sharply over the past decade in Northern California. In most tournaments these days, I face more kids than adults. Sometimes I don’t get paired with anyone over 16 in the master section! In my last Continental Chess Association tournament, a 9 year old girl shared first place with two adults: a GM and a strong IM. I personally played four opponents of average age 11, plus one gentleman in his 50s. (Against which one did I score my only win? Yes, it was a rough weekend for this pawn.)
Frankly, this has become the new normal in California. In the Open or Master section, juniors comprise 65 to 90 percent of the field. In the lower class sections, that statistic increases to 80+ percent. Even teenagers complain about playing too many younger kids!
Where have all the adults gone? Sadly, many have quit playing competitive chess. Their own increasing age coupled with the youth of the (underrated) opposition has become too difficult for them to overcome. However, some continue playing at weeknight chess clubs with a one game per week format. Indeed, the young monsters cannot stay up to 10PM or later on a school evening.
As a coach of many advanced juniors, I admit to contributing to this problem.
NTD and super organizer Wayne Clark joked in the past that he wanted to hold an event where the participants had to have a lease or deed in order to participate–be careful what you wish for.
Here’s a table showing participation in regular-rated events by fiscal year and age group. Age is as of 5/31, so each player is counted only once in any fiscal year:
[code] year count 12/below 13-15 16-19 20-24 25-49 50-64 65/up
The U/13 experts represent about 3% of the active experts in the last FY.
I suspect if I could come up with a reasonable way to select only ‘major’ tournaments (maybe by Grand Prix points?), the percentage of players 12 and under with 2000+ ratings would be a higher percentage of the active player base.
That 3 percent is substantially more active than the remaining 97%, and not just at major tournaments. I would dare say those U/13 experts account for 20% of all games played by experts.
I hate losing to anyone! My problem is that I face those young kids rather frequently. Out of 38 regular rated games since January, 9 have come against U/12 and 28 have come against U/16. This includes four juniors who I have faced twice this year.
After a 25 year hiatus from chess, the age of the opposition and the importance of computers have really changed things.
The only thing I dislike about the kids is that their rating lags so far behind their actual ability. It’s destroying my already paltry rating. I mean really, is an 800 rated player supposed to be well versed in not just opposition, but indirect and distant opposition? Do you expect a 900 to know how to build a bridge with king and rook?
I expect for them to be better in tactics, for sure, but I can’t even old man them in the endgame!
A bigger question may be: Are kids driving adults to abandon playing in tournaments? I have played in tournaments where kids made up 10% or less of the total entrants. I have also played in events where kids made up 75%+. There is some grumbling among older adults that they do not want to play kids because the kids are fidgety, walk around too much, eat at the board, offer draws too frequently, and do annoying things at the board. There are few options besides stop playing. Organizers, naturally, are unwilling to place age restrictions on tournaments, but there are a few who do.
Overall, there probably is not much of a problem. In areas where there are fewer players, the kids tend to play in youth events. Organizers and adults in those areas wish kids would play in more open events to help increase the size of the events. In player dense areas, where more kids play in both youth and open events, it is better for the kids’ development to play up, even if it annoys a few adults. There are some adults who exhibit the same annoying behaviors as kids: walking around too much; talking too loudly before, during, and after games; eat and slurp drinks noisily at the board; and fidget too much. In addition, they are ornery to everyone around them. Some of our players, both young and old need a good dose of chess etiquette lessons, as well as learn to bathe themselves more frequently.
I have had a large number of players contact me asking when the Senior Open will again be in Chicago (or in many cases, when can they enter next year’s Senior Open in Chicago and I’ve had to tell them its in California.)
Of those, MANY have volunteered that they don’t mind playing kids, but they are tired of ALWAYS playing kids, and like the break that an “adult” tournament offers. Several have commented how manners cause some issues - the kids who are coughing or sneezing and touching the pieces – and the adult player feels like they are getting sick.
It’s been an interesting experience. I’ll definitely bid on the Senior again if that’s possible.
Of course there is nothing to stop Mr. Bachler from organizing a “Chicago Senior” or some such with the same conditions as this year except for the title.
The problem isn’t ‘seniors’. As the table posted upthread showed, in 1992 there were about 2500 seniors (age 50 or older) playing in rated events. In FY 2019 there were 2600 over 65 playing in rated events and another 4000 who were between 50 and 64.
The falloff has been in the 25-49 year old group, where numbers have dropped by about half, a decrease of over 6000 adult players, roughly equal to the total number of active senior players. Much of this is due to the ‘Fischer Boom’ era players getting older and a dearth in younger adults playing rated chess, despite huge numbers of scholastic players.
I’m afraid that as an organization of adult chess players, we are paying now for our policy failures over the last 25 or so years. It is probably fixable, it may even be fixed based on the number of strong young players we’re seeing, but there will no quick fix to the turnout problem for adults in the 25-49 age group.
I like seeing the kids and playing them. They are the future. The kids in my are are pretty much all polite. It’s nice watching them rise through the ranks. It doesn’t bother me in the least to have my hat handed to me by a 9 year-old girl.
All we need Mike are for Bill Gates and Warren Buffett to start sponsoring big prize low entry fee chess tournaments that provide additional prizes for a family team. The dad’s will all come back to chess.
