how far an amateur can go?

i think that 2150-2200 is the highest rating which a real chess amateur can reach.

only at tactics trainer can reach 2300... what do you think?

thank you!

You mean chess.com ratings? With enough time on your hands, 2300 is doable on this site- for anyone.

yes, here, on chess.com! thank you for your opinion!

the rating is very varying, depends on chess site...

2300 would be real great for an amateur :))

What do you see as a amateur?

Is that someone who doesn't play chess at a club? Is it someone who chess isn't their work? (in that case their are several grandmasters amateur) And if you take the first defenition, what about (grand)masters who stopped playing chess, and what about a average person who was before at a club?

So, I think it is very different with each defenition...

There are very few professionals on the site.  I personally am approaching 2300 and am an amateur and will be for a long time to come.  I suppose it's a matter of definition but it takes an extremely strong player to make a decent living off of chess.

I would estimate my USCF rating to be near 1800 and I'm hoping to gain a master title fairly soon.

I would of course still be an amateur, however if I ever manage to make the International Master title I would attempt to make my living off of it by teaching at schools and giving private lessons.

That's a far fetched idea though, and even if it's possible it's a few years off.

i've heard from GM Becerra at his chess academy that any club player could reach the status of GM with 1 year of solid dedication

How many people can dedicate eight hours a day to chess for a year? Very few.

 This does not sound realistic at all. Perhaps the average-talented player with a great deal of dedication could reach NM level, eventually.

i see an amateur like this: only 3 - 4 chess books + passion + 200 games/year. I think that is not enough... to reach 2200-2300! :(

probably all with rating > 2300 sometime had a strong-strong relation with chess ... in schools, clubs, tournaments, teacher of chess and so on ... good for them!

am i right?

by club player he doesn't mean a typical 1500 uscf player

GM Becerra may be looking for students when he says that.

rofl. i won't even contest that statement...

8 hours a day for chess is the kind of time children with "driving" parents have. Not adults who have to worry about a paycheck and other distractions like "life".

This also explains why the bar for hitting GM at a young age keeps getting lower.

I prefer to use the "burn coefficient" as a metric to see how far an amateur can go => Namely => IF a player of reasonable intelligence gets burned so hard with mistakes (we're talking caveman sticking his finger into a fire for the first time) that he NEVER EVER makes the same mistake twice, he will probably turn out to be a Federation-rated (not chess.com of course!) expert-level player after 500-1000 serious + slow games. I suspect a lot of the strong players are Type A / OCD enough to exhibit this "easily burned" behavior.

The rest of us asbestos-skinned knuckleheads can only dream. :)

 I don't belive that it's possible.

'Any' club player cannot, some may be able to but if they do so then they probably were already talented enough as it is to eventually get to that level.

...to answer the original question:  how long is a piece of string?

Any player can become a grandmaster... it just takes a lot of time and effort which is why we are not.

That GM who said any club player could reach the status of GM with 1 year of solid dedication is right. But you would need to have a dedicated GM teacher who will teach you 8 - 10 hours a day....

Nonsense. A solid year of tactical/calculational practice wouldn't get the club player anywhere near GM level, apart from all the other things a GM has to know.

Would it sound too rude if I say that it's bullshit?

Hi Natalia, it does sound a little rude but it's funny.