U2200 or U2000

I've been battling with this question all week and I want some advice on it.

I'm registered to play in the National Chess Congress next weekend in Philadelphia, and I'm currently signed up for the U2200. My rating is 1841.

I have a terrible record against experts in my chess career, and I was hoping to play a good deal of them in this tournament to try to gain experience and maybe win a game or two. But...

I worry it will be too much. As it stands I'm right at the bottom of my section and I think I may lose all my games. 

If I switch to U2000, I will be slightly below the middle of the pack, and I'm confident I will do well, but I'm not sure if U2200 will be a better opportunity for me to play stronger players. I'll also be under more pressure to get good results in the U2000 section, and the last time I went to Philadelphia to play chess, I played in the Philadelphia Open U2000 and had by far the most embarrassing tournament performance of my life, losing five games in a row. I think I'm better than I was then, as I've done a lot of training and studied quite a bit, but that just goes to show that U2000 could be difficult also. 

The other option is to do U2000 now and play U2200 at the Eastern Open in December or something, which may be a little easier since the sections for that tournament go Open-U22-U19 instead of U20.

I am very conflicted so any advice would be appreciated.

It's been said you can tell who the winner of a competition will be by observing who is the happiest to be there.

To draw a parallel with your question, I remind you that to preform well you can't be too result oriented. Ideally you want the results, but at the same time you want it to simply be a joy to play, and you can play for the sake of playing.

Why will you make an effort to travel and compete against stronger players? Why do you play tournaments at all? Remind yourself of your core motivation for playing chess. Losing every game wouldn't be fun for anyone, but if it happened to you (again) will you be sorry you went?

What if you played fearlessly and pushed a strong opponent all the way to the end only to lose in time trouble for example? What if you played timidly, and after mutual blunders you won or drew on move 20? How would you look back on those games a year later? Results are probably not your only personal measure of performance.

All this to say, I think either section is fine, but either way do some introspection and clearly decide what your motivation and goals are. If you can do that I think the choice will be much easier, and in the end it may not even seem so important.

I would play up, but if consecutive losses and a poor tournament result will dampen your psyche or motivation then play U2000 where you will still play tough competition but probably have a better result. Unless you are trying to win money always play up in my opinion. It'll just help your game so much more when you get home and examine your tournament games to find your mistakes and work on minimizing them.

I consider some of my best tournaments to be events when I play well against strong opposition, regardless of my overall score. But I have never played in a U2200 section. I have done okay at three U2100 sections (Baltimore Open, Atlantic Open, and especially Washington Chess Congress) but this section should be a lot stronger than those because in those tournaments I was usually playing 1900s rather than 2000s or 2100s

It's better to do U2000 in NCC and lose all of your games in December! jk jk just play like yoself and ull do fine

In my opinion, you really need to be good at beating lower/equal players and slowly working your way up through the stronger opposition. By going to the U2000 you get to play equal and 1900's but going to the U2200 means you will skip that range, losing what I think to be more important experience. So overall, in my opinion I think you should go to the U2000 section.

P.S. Good luck and I hope you do well no mater which section you choose.

Not exactly free, it is $120 entrance fee, lol. 120/6=$20/game

Your stats page on uschess.org indicates you should play the under 2000 section as you have a horrible record against players over 2000 . 

That's why I wanted to play U2200- if I play up maybe it will help me break that trend

When I was in the mid-1800s I was also beaten up by experts, occasionally making a draw but the worst was 1900 players. I think for a while I was simply psyched out.

But I took every opportunity t face players in that range and eventually I overcame it and eventually became a 1900 player.

Then I took my 1960 rating to a major tournament and played in the U2400 section. I scored +2-3=3 and upped my rating by 100 points and for the first time achieved an Expert rating.

The thing is that when you're playing up by 300 points, you really don't have anything to lose. The pressure is always on your opponent. 

If you generally do well against 1800-1900 players you can go U2000 and you have a chance to have a good score and that would be satisfying. 

But if you play up to U2200, relax and embrace the experience. But as others have said, don't be too results oriented. Try to play as well as you can and if you lose, learn from it. If you are working at improving, eventually you will break through.

Ultimately, your decision will be about why you are playing in the tournament.

Good luck ...

Never play up.

Win the U2000, then you can play in the U2200.

+1

You have to learn how to beat patzerts 9 times out of 10.

Just bomb to 1799 and win. +2 Nice post!

Sahil which post are you supporting?

U2000

If you may, it sounds like you are running away out of fear to losing to someone within your rating. Does a loss against an expert feel significantly less bad to a loss against a 1900?

If you want to be a master you have to beat u2000 consistently. It's better to deal with the problem now rather than later

my own lol

It all depends on your goals, but generally I recommend:

Play up in small tournaments

Play your rating level in big tournaments.

You'll get plenty of competition in your own section.

If you are seriously considering the U2200 section, you should consider the Open section instead. At least you'll have the chance of playing titled players.

play u2000

gotta beat the patzers first

Agree with Smyslov fan. If you are going to play up, play in the open and take your beatings. That being said, in either open or u2200 you most likely will be playing other people playing up by round 3. 

I think you should play u2000 and play to win it. There should be plenty of talent in that pool to make it worth your while by round 3.