Age

Carlsen is WC?

Man, I must be getting old to have missed it.

Umm, 2010 minus 1996 = 14 but whatever

Also, Carlsen is 19 (how long ago did you compose this?) and maybe is world champ in your universe

OK, I'm 4 times as old as you (what does that make me, like 53 or something?) and already am peeved without losing to you, it's the grumpy old men syndrome

Sounds like mr. grumpty gus needs to get to sleepy time!

Older players get annoyed because when I young player wins they get very cocky and precocious.  They tend to think they are pretty hot stuff in everything after a few wins. Besides it reminds us older guys of the time that we were young and cocky.

Common sense would dictate that it's talent, and experience that will determine the better player. I know anybody regardless of age would beat me, because I've never played. Only an idiot would think it just depends on age. Are there any people on here who really believe that? Carlsen will be twenty in November. I just looked it up.

Because to be brutally honest, an 11-year-old GM is less likely than an 18-year old GM. There may be outliers, but they're the exception rather than the rule.

EDIT to respond to woodshover's post: Sure, age isn't the only factor, but it certainly is a factor. It can be outweighed by other factors such as natural talent and coaching since a young age, but statistically speaking, the performance of the average 11-year-old should be worse than that of the average 18-year old. (Well, I think. Does anyone have any sort of statistics showing at what age chess ratings apparently peak?)

(Though if I was challenged to a game by an 11-year-old I'd play with all due caution until I'd had a chance to assess his/her skill...my ego is too large for me to risk it by acting cocky against someone who might just trash me. :P)

Your profile says your birthday is on March 12 1996. Wouldn't that make you 14?

Re Peak age:

In the mid-90s a friend gave me a printout of ages and averages for USCF players (which I've misplaced--probably permanently).

The peak age for USCF players in general was 40-42 as I recall, and the average rating was 1720 or so.

Those would be serious hobbyists, not your average guy who picks up the game for a year or two with serious intentions.

 An 11 year old hasn't had the same amount of time to train as an 18 year old. I would think that in most cases, (disregarding natural talent) if an adult trained for a certain amount of time, and a kid trained in the same way for the same amount of time, their playing ability would be about the same.

If someone trained from age 8-18 they would learn much more than from 38-48, that's obvious.  Also kids have a lot more free time during the day.  If an adult has a coach and a kid has a coach you can bet the kid has a lot more time to devote to study.  I know some local teens who study a minimum of 4 hours a day.  For an adult with a job + family that's impossible.

I don't know if it was Capa or someone else who said it, that in your 30s is when your ability peaks.

To the OP, the age doesn't bother me, the attitude does.  If a 45 year old behaves poorly or an 11 year old behaves poorly, I wont like them the same.  In general though you're going to find more kids behaving like... well kids, than you will adults, but just passing you in the playing hall I wouldn't assume you're easy or rude.

Somewhere in the (early) nineties, I played in a tournament (15 or 20 min/game) against Erwin l'Ami (b.1985, now GM, elo 2628). He was then just  a 3 ft snotty boy, as described above. (An acompanying adult remarked that he was in a group too low for him.) In the group, where he just could look over the table, he was constantly looking at other chess boards, except his own. But winning everything. I am "proud" to say, my game was the only one where he thought any longer than a second a move.

I am quite sure he did not do it on purpose to look arrogant, but was really far ahead of any one of us in this group. So he was what we now call multitasking. I agree that "young" can be cocky in "old" people's view, but sometimes these children have a good reason. And sometimes youngsters are really arrogant bastards, as are elderly (I know more of the latter kind).

As on skill and age, I think this is a good example. In about 15 years his elo has risen about a 1000, mine about 200. Training (taking time to practice, and thus age)  and talent combine to achive skill, but with a different result for the talented and the untalented.

This is just my opinion.

There are some groups on chess.com that are reliant on your age to enter, which I try and stay away from.

At the place I help run some people tell me I'm younger than I am which I take as a complement and thats not to say that I'm in my mid twenty's (20's) now.

Obioiously I'm not going to tell you my age for that bit of info you'll need to look at my profile and figure it out for yourself.

So I hope I've inspired you to keep your age close to you and write your best memories or compliments here that you've got from fellow chess players on this thread so you can share the good times.

Whatever you do don't focus on the bad times.

I'm sorry but if your perfectly constructed original post was actually written by an 11 year old then you are a truly special youngster and I'm a monkey's uncle. 

Are you really 11?  Some others have commented about your age actually being 14. I can imagine a 14 year old writing such a beautifully constructed original post, but it would be a very rare exception even in that case. 

What's the story?

Well I dunno what the original post means either.

I will say this though, you must be a certain age to start on chess.com and I don't think its 11 y.o.

playing against younger players is difficult they are venrable to playing rash moves and the bad thing as the more experianced player is waiting for it and it not happening then you panic and balls it up toally older players fault

Obviously children haven't developed resilience as much as adults. It something that gradually improves. I remember when I competed in my first tournament I cried after every game that I lost. But that's not to say that kids aren't taught resilience, in my primary school we had four 'R's from which we should model our behaviour. Respect, Relationships, Responsibility and Resilience. Of course having resilience as a policy didn't work out too well, the teachers would always be completely unfair and say that they were developing our resilience.