While clicking on some links in Spragget’s articles I noticed FIDE’s online titles. I had heard something about such a thing a few years ago, but never paid any attention to it. Today I discovered there really is such a thing as official FIDE titles for server play. I didn’t read all the details but it appears that if you play enough blitz games and pay a fee you get a title, depending on your rating.
These Arena titles are nothing more than catering to some players' desire to boost their ego by having a title. Supposedly FIDE uses cutting edge anti-cheating procedures...we’ve heard that before! In the past some online sites have made the same claim, but either they didn’t work or they were eventually ignored if for no other reason than to keep from banning half the membership.
In any case, Arena titles are for amateurs rated between 1100 and 2000 and these titles can be achieved online by the members of FIDE Online Arena and obtained by direct online payment without any application from the player's National Federation. The titles are: Arena Grand Master (AGM), Arena International Master (AIM), Arena FIDE Master (AFM) and Arena Candidate Master (ACM).
To date there are only four GMs and here’s the impressive list: Jose August Correa of Brazil who has and OTB rating of 1833; Valeri Lilov of Bulgaria rated 2167; Lok Chin Tsang of Hong Kong with an OTB rating of 1308 and Nestor Josue Valdez Torres of Costa Rica who is rated 1855 OTB.
All this is as ridiculous as when When Garry Kasparov split with FIDE and organized his 1993 World Championship match with Nigel Short and FIDE staged their own championships and gave us the following World Champions...at least they were real GMs:
* Anatoly Karpov (1993-1999) who had been the real world champion from 1975 to 1985.
* Alexander Khalifman (1999-2000)
* Viswanathan Anand (2000-2002) who was to become a real world champion from 2007 through 2013.
* Ruslan Ponomariov (2002-2004)
* Rustam Kasimdzhanov (2004-2005)
* Veselin Topalov (2005-2006)
The following game shows how real correspondence GMs played before computers. It was played in the 2nd World Correspondence Championship. When Botvinnik annotated it for the book on Ragozin’s games he devoted six pages to it. The game with it’s material imbalance (Ragozin has R+B+N vs a Q+R) is quite interesting and a quick play through left the impression that Bergraser was badly outplayed. But, as is often the case, a closer examination revealed that it wasn’t a one sided thumping administered by a GM to a mere IM; there was a lot more to it than that and, in fact, Bergraser only made one serious mistake and it cost him the game.
Viacheslav V. Ragozin (October 8, 1908 – March 11, 1962, 53 years old) was born in St. Petersburg. He was awarded the GM title in 1950 and the Correspondence GM title in 1959 after he won the 2nd World Correspondence Championship which lasted from 1956 to 1959. The first World Correspondence Champion, C.J.S. Purdy of Australia, didn’t compete; he learned his lesson from the first one...it took way too much time and effort!
For many years Ragozin was the sparring partner of Mikhail Botvinnik and contributed significantly to his successes. He worked actively for FIDE, edited Shakhmaty v SSSR magazine and wrote an excellent book on the first Botvinnik - Tal Match in 1960. He died in Moscow while compiling Izbrannye Partii Ragozina, a collection of his own games. The book was completed by his friends under the editorship of M. Beilin and finally published in 1964.
Ragozin’s opponent was Volf Bergraser (January 4, 1904 - November 13, 1986, 82 years old) who was born in Romania, but emigrated to France. He was awarded the Correspondence IM title in 1959 and his Correspondence GM title was awarded in in 1981 when he was 77 years old! He was the French OTB champion in 1957 and 1966.
Sounds rather snobbish about Arena Titles. Looks like thise with over the board titles look down their noses at those with Arena titles
ReplyDeleteThose Arena Titles are a good idea from FIDE.
ReplyDelete