Why is higher Blitz rating harder to get?

First off let me say I am not good at chess. I played for a little while about 4 years ago, got frustrated and rage quit after a bad game but recently have become into it again. I love playing and have fun even though I get beat fairly often and make some pretty funny blunders. I have about 65 games in on 15 minute games which I guess is Rapid Chess. My rating right now is like 1075 and I usually hover around 1050-1120. 15 minutes usually gives me enough time to think through stuff and then I have time left when the game simplifies towards the end game. I'm still not good but I feel like I don't have to rush against the clock with 15 mins.

Blitz is another story. I am straight awful at the 10 minute time control. I have 30-40 games in on blitz. I make really bad blunders. Then a lot of times I start running low on time. Even in games where I'm clearly way ahead I lose sometimes because I'm down to like a minute left. I see some wild moves in the opening and I take too long to try and figure out what's going on and screw up some. So my rating in blitz is in the 600s.

I guess my question or curiosity is why is that extra 5 minutes such a difference? Do other players find the 10 minute time control and under a lot harder too? Do your ratings have that big of a gap in them from rapid to blitz?

Interested to hear other people's responses. I've been back on here for a couple of weeks and everybody I've encountered has been real nice with the very few exceptions and I've been having a lot of fun. Great site and great community here I think. Thanks and looking forward to some responses!

The blitz ratings are lower than rapid because blitz has a stronger pool than rapid.

I actually considered that. I was finding a player rated 700 in blitz was playing like people rated 1000 in rapid. Makes perfect sense.

Blitz is harder because there's less time. Simple as that.

I agree  with Bunker here...

Yeah for sure the smaller timed games are naturally harder and even some good GM's can have trouble getting their FIDE rating in blitz. It takes a certain mindset to be able to quickly recognize the position and have confidence in your plans. Not everyone has the brain speed to process things that fast

 

That is over simplifying. If it is true then the extra difficulty applies to all, and does not explain why the OP finds it more difficult to get a high Blitz rating than to improve his rating at slower speeds.

The full answer is that different players have different strengths and weaknesses and the relative importance of different strengths and weaknesses in your play varies with the time control.

To give a very simple example you might rarely blunder at slow chess, because you can take half a minute or more on every move to be sure it isn't a blunder.  In Blitz you can rarely afford such a luxury, but your sight of the board might not be quick enough to avoid blundering frequently when you only have a few seconds thinking time per move.  Of course bullet is even less forgiving of the player who takes time to get the feel of a position or who panics when they are under time pressure.

A further possibility (already suggested) is the pool of Blitz players could be stronger than the player pools at other speeds, but some research would be needed to prove that.  it is not so simple as just looking at the distribution of ratings, though that is a good place to start.

Well, I don't think blitz is harder, because your opponent also has the same constraints. Obviously you won't play as well with less time, but neither will (s)he. My rapid rating is around 1500 and my blitz around 1200. I still don't understand the disparity unless the rating represents some absolute standard rather than relative standing against other players.

I understand that it's harder because there's less time but I also agree that it's harder for the opponent as well. Seems like a lot of people have a large rating gap between the two.

One of my strengths is that I can visualize very well and calculate pretty much infinitely, seeing the pieces move around on the board in order to find long or crazy combinations with a couple minutes of thought.

 

Does that help me in blitz? Nope.

 

Rapid: 1500

Blitz: 1000/1100

One way to improve blitz performance is with meditation! We are recruiting chess players with elo blitz between 1100 and 1700. Participants will be randomly allocated to 2 groups and will be shown how to focus the mind with meditation. After a number of weeks we will see if meditation improves blitz performance.

If you are interested in participating please let me know. 

 

In just 3 moves, the average position has over a billion possible ways of progressing. Being able to see any line in my head does not help me see which move is the right move!

 

But I am learning to play blindfold chess and can already play full legal games (as shown in my previous forum post though, I still have a piece or two missing, so I'm not going to claim that I can play blindfold chess, just that I'm learning to.), and if you give me an endgame with fewer pieces (I have tested how many, probably 12) I can easily play the position blindfold, so yes I definitely can calculate infinitely as that is required for playing blindfold chess.

In 15 min Rapid games I range around 1200 rating

In 3 min blitz I range around 700-800 rating.

I just started playing blitz because I thought I wasn't able to think quick enough in general and am trying to improve it. But it does make sense it is a harder pool because I find it a bit higher competition.

I only play 5 min blitz at the slowest

10 and 15 minute games are best played over the board in my opinion.

Blitz is harder, but you can improve if you play regularly and analyse every single game. And you should solve thousands of tactics. I am sure I could improve 300 or more points in blitz only doing so, but I do not have the time to invest so much in chess. At the moment I invest more in openings and endgames, which make me probably stronger in rapid, but my blitz rating went down since I stopped training tactics.

It will also help if you realise that playing blitz doesn't mean to play fast without looking at the position. You have to react to your opponent. Let's take the last game you lost: you could grab a pawn without any danger, and even destroy black's pawn structure taking afterward them knight, with a huge game. Keep an eye on the position!

 Carlsen phenomenal at blitz, wins Leuven chess tour

what if rapid rating is less than blitz rating? does it mean that the player always wins by fluke? It definitely means that that player makes lot of dubious moves but I think it also means that such players can capitalize on opponents blunders not on mistakes.