Shankland

For anyone who is following the berkeley international, you might also know that sam shankland has already two gm norms --- and some other members of chess.com staff --- David Pruess has two norms ,

My question is what is the required score for the berkeley international : http://dotq.org/chess/

to achieve a GM norm?

I'm not really that versed on how the norm system works

I think it's a TPR of >2600

At the halfway point, Shankland is doing well with 4.0/5 against an average opposition of 2424 for a performance rating of 2664.

The second half of the tournament will be more difficult as he will be facing other players also performing well. His round 6 pairing is against GM Anatoly Bykhovsky. This will be the 3rd GM Sam faces so far. He has to face at least 4 GMs in the tournament to make a GM norm. With 4 rounds to go after round 6, if he's scoring well, he should get paired with at least one more GM.

I believe that Sam's draw today with Loek Van Wely earn him the GM norm. According to FIDE rule 1.42f:

Sam has a TPR of 2640 (average opponent rating of 2495, score of 6/9) through round 9 and has played enough titled and foreign players to meet the GM norm requirement. So I think he earns the GM norm on the basis of the first 9 games in the tournament regardless of the outcome of round 9.

Rules here: http://www.fide.com/component/handbook/?view=article&id=58

thanks for that Loomis, if that is so --- then congratulations to the United States newest Gm --- Gm Sam Shankland

Not so fast. If the norm requirements are met Shankland would be a GM in waiting, until anointed by FIDE. That assumes the USCF has 330 euro.

http://www.fide.com/component/handbook/?view=article&id=3

"Application Fees for Titles

11.1 For the application of titles, the following amounts will be charged to the federations of the players concerned, provided these applications are filed at least 60 days before the start of the annual Congress:

(Woman) Grandmaster:330 Euro

(Woman) International Master:165 Euro

(Woman) FIDE Master:70 Euro

(Woman) Candidate Master:50 Euro

International Arbiter:100 Euro

FIDE Arbiter:50 Euro

International Organizer:100 Euro

FIDE Instructor:100 Euro

FIDE Trainer:200 Euro

FIDE Senior Trainer:300 Euro

National Instructor50 Euro

Developmental Instructor50 Euro"

Actually I do not think the federations always pay since some women do not apply for the women's titles. Points to players paying for themselves.

Edit: http://main.uschess.org/content/view/10948/141/

"Headlining the news is US Junior Champ IM Sam Shankland, who (UPDATE) has clinched a GM norm with a ninth round draw against GM Loek Van Wely!"

I stand corrected, but it seems merely on technicality 

so he's actually GM-elect Shankland. either way, still gotta call him a grandmaster.

Congrats!

A fair point. My instructor is an IM-elect, waiting for his federation to get their act together and send in the necessary to FIDE.

Congrats to GM-elect Shankland though!

The norm system is fascinating, and I can only imagine the feeling he had when he reached it. Congratulations to him.

Congratulations, GM-elect Sam Shankland! Please don't retire.

The USCF pays for GM title applications. That won't be a problem. But yeah, some other federations have had, shall we say, "problems" with this condition.

It is true that a player can ignore games played in a tournament, as follows:

-Any games a player has won (in any round), provided this leaves them with the required mix of opponents (at least 50% of opponents are GM/WGM, IM/WIM, or FM/WFM; opponents from a minimum of 2 federations other than that of the applicant; maximum of 60% opponents from one federation; at least 1/3 of opponents are GMs for GM norm: this was changed from the previous rule that only 3 GMs were required total). Why would you ignore games you have won? Because your opponent's rating may be so low that it hurts your average rating of opponents.

[Note the rule change a few years ago that now a title applicant can raise the rating of ONE player to a certain level, rather than TWO, and it's lower than before. In the past, a player could raise the ratings of two opponents to 2250 for norm purposes (even if they were really rated 1900 FIDE or whatever) if they were applying for a GM title, or raise them to 2100 if they were applying for an IM title; now only ONE player can be raised to 2200 for GM title or to 2050 for IM title.]

-Any games played AFTER the required 9-13 rounds (7 or 8 rounds are allowed for certain Continental/World Championship tournaments) have been played (last year FIDE changed the rules and counts norms achieved at events with more than 13 rounds as only a 13-game GM norm). Olympiad, and various World/Continental Championship norms count as 20-game norms.

[In Shankland's case, he can ignore his round 10 game for title purposes and get the 9-game norm, but if the result is favorable to him he would keep the 10-game norm]

-27 games minimum are needed for a title norm. Notice that the rule change about maximum 13-game norms makes it necessary to always achieve 3 title norms, unless the player scores a norm at an Olympiad, Continental, or World Championship-level event.

I think it stems from the fact that Sam is an amazingly good player, and he got cheated at least twice last year out of his final norm due to technicalities with the process.

And it doesn't hurt that he's a contributor to this site, so a lot of us are going to root for him. In particular, his videos of games against GM Lenderman, IM(should be GM) Milman and USCL legend GM Becerra makes me want him to succeed.

One interesting note is that this tournament really fit into one of Shankland's strengths. The time control was Game in 90 minutes with 30 second increment. This is not a common time control and also the fastest allowable for earning FIDE norms. It also happens to be the same time control the United States Chess League uses where Sam just completed a 13 week season against mostly GM competition. That is to say, he may have been better prepped for the time control than anyone else in the tournament. (I don't think this takes away from the accomplishment of a GM norm in any way.) 

 Good points. This time control is common in Europe, but not in the USA (which is usually 40/2).

You should try it. It's not as tough as it seems once you get used to it.

Go Sam!