Too skilled?

I expirience a bit chelenging game against 1100-1200 in rapid. Some players are really beginners while others play pretty advenced... Can anyone explain this? I remember having 1400 in rapid but now I can barrely achive 1200... Why is there so many skilled players inbetween 1100-1200 right now?

there are really strong players all through the pools for all kinds of reasons(new accts, someone else using an acct, players who play rapid like bullet and have 1200 bullet and 1100-1200rapid, sandbaggers, cheaters, nutcases, slimeballs, good people, etc)

try not to underestimate anyone

play each game like you have to bring your best

if you get outplayed just take it and learn more in analysis after

i have my best runs when i “ignore” my opponent completely- just look at board and play position

i have my worst runs when i get fixated on a number; a rating and assume and presume to know beforehand what will happen or how someone will play based on a number


that said, i have noticed (climbing the rapid pool from 400 to 1200) that the “groups” are fairly consistent and have a sort of “rating group end boss” you need to be able to handle before you start winning at that level most of the time

i remember 800 being a benchmark (lol but it was) i think just learning to castle and get a back rank checkmate and block the most obvious of cave man checkmates from opponent- not all the time but some of the time

800-1000 was more of this with some minimal tactical awareness and, let’s be honest, learning how to defend all of the scholar’s mate variations that get tossed at you (i fell to it so often)

just defending against that “1000 end game boss” with all the queen dancing and bravado and cocky play; developing and defending calmly and finally capitalizing on the catastrophic blunder that is sure to come

1050+ to 1200 are similar in that depending on the day anyone can beat anyone and this bracket has a lot of risers/fallers/brand new accts (1200’s who are really 1500+, 1200’s who are 800 strength; and the same other shenaniganers who are in the other brackets)

and at each benchmark the game just gets a little more solid in all facets

When you first register on the chess site, you can pick a rating (800, 1200, etc). So even a good player might be starting out with a very low rating.

hi

Maybe they improved a lot and were on there way to a better rating range. Sometimes it is not the best day and it feels harder to compete same opponents

Dear Chessfriend,

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I think regardless of what rating you are sometimes losing gets to you. Especially losing to lower rated players. I normally play people 100-200 points higher rated than I and recently I’ve been losing close battles to lower rated players. Sometimes, it just isn’t your day. You can’t win all the time. 9 times out of ten you lose to lower rated players because you just arn’t playing your best because your tired or whatever and mess up when it’s time to check for tactics, or lose due to bad endgame technique, when you know if you where to play that ending again you’d win. The small other part of the time are all the reasons Daxypoo stated. It just so happens that most of the time you don’t perform well because you just arnt playing at your best for whatever reason, or, just made key mistakes, at the wrong times. It’s not always your day. You need to be honest with yourself and admit to not playing your best either because of it being a bad day for you or because of carelessness on your part. I think this whole thread is based on the OP making excuses to why he loses. Yes, sometimes you play against bad apples, but 9 times out of 10, it’s your fault you lost.

1100 to 1500 is the real test of chess... 

In that pool there are as much variety as there are species of bugs on earth. Some have amazing middlegame skills, but get cheesed in the opening too much. Some have great endgame skills. And some are there and play St. George’s defense just to troll while finessing their opponents in the middle and endgame....

I once made a chess tempo account to destroy my opponents with $hity openings, e.g. the Halloween gambit.

Well Ive been playing for years now but I always thought of myself as a beginner. Recently I've realized I'm playing people who are much more skilled than me

I mean that there’s a lot of variety, as people are still in experiment or casual mode.

I’m in 1100 now