Older Players Playing at Top Level and Improving Older Players

No, I would say that it rather is more information available for lower rated people in a way it is easier to improve, while stronger players don't have much to improve on.

I agree with your point that each rung up the rating ladder requires mastering more information than the same rating interval below it.

That would make motivation an important factor in continuing improvement, which was my point.

That's a good point too. Besides, as a realtive beginner, you're bound to improve almost no matter what you do, because you have so many gaps. When you're stronger, it's more difficult, because first, you may not be able to identify what's wrong in your play, and second, making adjustments to your thought-process may have indesirable side-effects.

I learned the moves at age 8 and lost 100 games in a row to my father

Then at age 9 1/2 started winning from my father.

My first USCF tournament was at age 18 and I ended with an 1800 USCF, low class A, rating and my postal rating was approximately the same.

After that my correspondence rating and over-the-board rating were very close. [this was before chess engines]

At age 21 expert in both. [low expert]

At approximately age 25 played at high expert level in both.

Gradually improved until age 32 where I was playing slightly above 2400 level in both.

At that time, due to health reasons, I had to stop over-the-board but continued correspondence.

It was not until age 49 that I reached my peak at 2500+. After that my results stayed much the same until about age 68 and then started sliding slowly down.

At current age of 74 [with 5 years of dementia], down to about 2200 actual playing level.

So a gradual upswing until age about 50 [my peak] and then a plateau for 18 years and then a gradual decrease.

I suspect this type of graph would be the same for many people?

While there may be some decline in mental capacity and ability to learn as one ages, I suspect that the primary reasons that older individuals, on average, are not able to progress as fast as young chess players are lack of time and relative lack of motivation.  Generally, adults have greater responsibilities and time commitments relative to children.  We have jobs, families to support, etc.  The only responsibility that most children have is to attend school, and in the US at least, primary and secondary education is a joke and not very challenging to even those of slightly above average intelligence.

I know kids who spend 20 or more hours per week (during the school year) on chess or sports or video games or whatever their hobby/passion is.  Few adults can devote 20 hours or even 10 hours per week regularly to study and play chess.  Even retirees have responsibilities, such as home repairs, shopping, taking care of the grandkids, investment planning, etc.  Some retirees may be able to spend 20 hours per week on chess if they prioritize chess as the most important activity in their lives, but this is rare.

Which brings me to my second point.  Young kids are generally more motivated to improve and more ambitious.  Young kids who have some talent/ability will beleive that they someday can be a GM or even the world chess champion, and so they devote all of their time and efforts to improve (until they eventually plateau or burn out -- or achieve GM status).

In contrast, those who take up chess later in life harbor no illusions about becoming the next Magnus Carlson.  Someone who is 70 or 80 is unlikely to set a new life goal to become a GM.  So even if it were possible for such a person to become a GM through full-time study, that person is unlikely to prioritize chess so high as to spend the requisite time to acheive such a level.  More likely, chess will merely be a pleasant recreational activity that one engages in during one's free time.

There's a story, perhaps apocryphal, in which a Nobel Prize scientist explains how he reached his goal.

He draws a line and and labels tick marks at the 0%, 90%, 99% and 100%. Then he says, "It takes as much effort to go from 0-90% as it does from 90-99% and then from 99-100%."

ponz111: Thanks for your story!

From what I read most players start going downhill in their sixties, if not sooner. Good on you to stay golden until 68.

Art Bisguier was born in 1929, peaked at 2492 at the age of 62, declined to 2350, then pulled his rating back up 2400 for his seventieth birthday. He is in his eighties now and still plays occasionally somewhat below 2200.

If Andreas meant that there isn't much quality literature for stronger players to improve upon, then I'd agree.  But I think he meant there are nto many facets of the game to improve upon.  I disagree, if that's what he meant.

From what I've been told, developing technique in, say, rook endings, is tremendously labor intensive, in terms of having to workout all variations to understand each individual rook move.  I've been told that each individual type of situation needs to be studied in depth, and hald the battle is figuring out what is to be learned (or the coach trying to figure out how to explain what it is that he knows).  For this reason, I think the anecdote of the Nobel laureate, presented by ipcress12, is incredibly relevant.  I am just not sure what Andreas intended to mean, Laurent. 

All I meant was that it is easier to learn for lower rated players as they can pick whatever they want and their play will imrpove, as you get better, the ammount of the things you can get better at is more limited, and you have to pick more carefully. Like science, things get more limited, at the same time as more things show up.

Okay, then agree with the first part, but not the second: 1) I agree that there's tons of literature for players to learn from and improve with whenever they are weaker; 2) I disagree that there are less things for stronger players to get better at.

On the second point, I see this isn't the case among the class distinctions, because I have to study so many more facets of the game as I have progressed.  When I was a USCF 1000 player, it was easy: just study a few basic tactical motifs, endings like K vs K & P, and little else.  At 1300, I had to read about minor piece endings of at least 3 or 4 kinds, many more combination types with basic tactical motifs (and more advance tactical ideas like interference), and traps to watch out for in openings.  Now, I'm studying master games (an absolute must), breaking them down into different parts, learning openings, studying all kinds of endgames that are irrelevant for USCF players rated 1600-1800, strategic plans for tabiya's, and so on.  In the part of the game I'm most advanced in, endings, I have a coach devoted to just that aspect of the game, and we endlessly analyze IM and GM endings to figure out proper techniques in various endings.  I simply don't see how there is less to learn for stronger players.  In fact, I think this was a major limiting aspect for players in the pre-computer (and hyper-commercial) age.  I think the major difference between Capablanca and Alekhine, on the one hand, and Carlsen and Caruana, on the other, is the ability for the later two to consume more of the endless information that the former would have needed to become stronger.  More programs exist to develop tactical ability faster, endings can be analyzed more quickly (and accurately), and there are even some super-strong coaches developing literature for IMs (and GMs) to progress them along more quickly, such as Dvoretsky.

It is an obvious thing that you have missed, with less material to work with, the ability to find new instructional things are lower.

Btw, TLDR

skotheim2: Reading your posts is like chewing on tin foil.

I don't think your position and Milliern's contradict each other but are different ways of presenting "less" and "more" in the context of chess knowledge.

However, you are not reading Milliern carefully or even completely.

I am tired, so I only came halfway. (home from school)

BTW, I've remembered the source of the Nobel Prize story: Joshua Lederberg, winner of the 1958 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.

Lederberg told that story while a friend of mine was doing a documentary on him. My friend is a bright fellow, but he said Lederberg was working from an entirely different level.

Vishy and Korchnoi both started out at extremely young ages and were identified as chess prodigies.

Which really means nothing since there are a lot of prodigies that never make it close to the top, but that + hard work = success...

They also enjoy playing which helps quite a bit when you enjoy your job.

Your oversight is that "number of things capable of studying" and "number of study materials" are very different things.

When I started playing there were few sources where you could learn other than from books.

Now there are at least 100 times the sources.

This makes a big difference...

Rolf Wetzell wrote a book, "Master At Any Age," about his successful ascent to 2200 after he was forty. He had been an 1800 player in his teens and twenties, but could never get past that.

In the book he describes the techniques he used and the discipline he needed to reach master at, as I recall, 52.

It's an inspiring story but it's hard to know how it translates to even older players.

His techniques seem decent enough, though I tend to assume that learning techniques work like a placebo. What's important is that the person using it believes in it, and is focused on a goal.

Keep in mind Wetzell was an MIT engineering grad, so he brought considerable intelligence to the project.

Oddly enough, I noticed a Rolf Wetzell game at the end of "Mayhem in the Morra." Wetzell lost to a Morra Reversed:  1.c4 e5  2.g3 d5  3.cxd5 c6!

ipcress12 wrote:From what I read most players start going downhill in their sixties, if not sooner. Good on you to stay golden until 68.

I am 77 and in Dec 4, I will be 78.

I have no problems mentally, I don't think, but I for the first time I am trying to raise my chess rating and play patienly, I have disliked positional chess and i'm stuying the D4 opennings. The rating is the only way I can judge how I am doing. On January 1st I was 1554 and my posted goal is to reach 1600 by Jan 1st. 2016. I was not being greedy.

I have slipped my bowling average because of my age. I am also working on that trying to get closer to 200 average. Bowling is also a mental game not just flinging a bowling ball willy nilly. I have changed my delivery in comparison to the lane condition and I am working on my arsenal to be able to bowl better.

In bowling being young and being able to execute with speed is a major asset and it sounds like age is my problem in chess. I participate against many many young players that I trained in bowling. I can still coach them but the hardest thing is to coach myself.  I will find out by the end of the year. I have posted my goals for this year on my forum.

http://www.chess.com/forum/view/community/2015-chess-new-years-resolutions-or-goals

Chess wise I am currantly at 1637 and have to work on Keeping it there or increasing it higher. Wish me luck.

Thanks for the kind thought.