Ranking Scheme

[Oor Wullie]

I hear a lot of talk on the board about A/B/C... ranked fencers. Can anyone explain what this ranking scheme is, and how it works in America?

Over here, we don't really have anything like that. There is a BF scheme which a fencer can follow, but no-one I know seems to use it.

Cheers,
Oor Wullie.

[Lumberg]

The USFA has a ranking system that lets a fencer who does well at tournaments to go up in ranking. A fencer starts off as unrated. Then it goes, E, D, C, B, and top fencers are A rated.
Particular tournaments sometimes filter who is allowed to compete at certain events depending on their ranking. For example, some tournaments only allow unrated, E or D rated fencers and others don't allow anyone with less than a B rating.
You maintain your rating the following year but you need to re-earn that rating or your rating can drop.

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Lumberg.
"...ahhh, we have sort of a problem here... yeah, you apparently didn't put one of the new cover sheets on your TPS report"

[BarryTice]

Oor Wullie --

The USFA website has a chart that shows what a member must do to earn a specific rating. You can view it at http://www.USFencing.org/Documents/R...sMan/Class.asp

The rating, as Lumberg indicated, is matched with the year it was earned. If I were to earn a B rating this year (not very likely...), I would have a B-01. If, next year, I were to win another B-level tournament, my B01 would become a B-02.

According to the USFA Operations Manual:
"A fencer drops one level of major classificaiton [e.g. "A"] if that fencer fails, during a period of four years, to re-achieve the results necessary to earn that major classification. ... For example, a fencer classified as "B85" was reclassified as "C89" at the start of the 1989-1990 fencing season. The minor classification [the year associated with the rating] changes at the same time to indicate that the new classification was achieved in the calendar year 1989. A fencer who loses an "E" classification as a result of the application of this rule becomes Unclassified."

Does this clear things up?

-- b.r.t.

[Oor Wullie]

Cheers folks, that clears it up a bit, although it does seem a little complex!

[DarkTransient]

I like the scheme used by US Chess Federation the best.
USFA's classification scheme is wayyyy~ lammer comparing to their rating system.

[Purple Fencer]

Transient;

National actually explored the Chess system, but found out it was wildly complicated considering the sheet numbers of fncers at any one event. it's one thing if it ws used in the Wyoming division, which has maybe 30 people TOTAL. That's less than our Div I men;s foiul quals in SoCal. No WAY it'd work out here, not to mention New England and New Jersy, whicah are even larger.

Give me the letter ratings any day...less strain on th brain. I'll save THAT headache for when I'f fencing foil... then crossing over into epee!

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Sam Signorelli -- I'll be mellow when I'm
DEAD!

[DarkTransient]

I don't see how USCF's number rating system isn't suitable for a large group of people. I actively compete in both fencing and chess and I know for fact that in general there are significantly more chess players than there are fencers in any tournament. I suspect the rating system you were talking about is not the same thing USCF uses.

[This message has been edited by DarkTransient (edited 03-06-2001).]

[darius]

No, they actually explored using the exact same rating system that US Chess uses...

Personally, while I think it's a superior system, (having played competitive chess in high school) I don't think it's worth the time and effort to change systems.

darius

[BarryTice]

On a similar note, this came up at the Wright Memorial Tournament in Birmingham, Alabama, this weekend.

It used to be accepted that if you earned a rating in one weapon, you were awarded a rating two letters lower in the other two weapons. Thus, an A01 in epeé would automatically be a C01 in saber, even if the fencer had never touched a saber.

According to the current operations manual (Revision 2000.09, page 44), this is no longer the case. "The classification of a fencer in one weapon has no affect upon his or her classification in another weapon...."

-- b.r.t.

[Peach]

Yup, which is why I don't have a rating in foil or epee. However, people who earned their ratings the old way are grandfathered.

[edew]

Yup, since it's impossible to determine whether they rightfully earned it or got pulled in via the two-letters down rule. (I rightfully earned my C in epee, but I should be a passable E sabre fencer.)

As for the chess system, it was decided not to use it for the USFA because at the end, that system isn't going to appreciably improve fencing. Basically, it's like grading on a scale of 1 to 5 (A through F) versus a scale of 0 to 100 (like most exams). Having a particular grading system doesn't make students better learners or better test takers. So why bother?

Also, I personally don't like the zero-sum concept inherent in the chess system. Why would I go to any tournament where I might be the highest seed and know that at best, I can only keep my rating, and can't possibly go up, but possibly go down? The current system with the four-year drop off is more effective in making me stick in the sport (I had an A95 before I made it turn into an A99.) If the points system is always cumulative, with a time-dependent point decay, then that's a better deal.

Lastly, since there is no perfect system -- no system will be completely accurate or precisely predictable -- we might as well create a system which makes fencing more marketable, rather than chase the chimera of having a more "accurate" system. By being more marketable, we can sell fencing to the newspapers and such with a clearer way for them to grasp what great versus good versus mediocre versus bad fencers mean.

Of all the existing and not-yet-existing ranking system, I don't think the chess system is a great one, in terms of marketability. I mean, just look at how popular chess is in the media. Aside from a chess corner in the comics section (or the Living Arts section of the NY Times), there is usually no feature articles on chess. Certainly very little in the local papers. So why follow a bad example?

[DarkTransient]

edew
First of all I am fairly centrain that there are more chess players than there are fencers(even in the US where chess is relatively unpopular) Second, I want to say it is not true that chess doesn't get any media attention. Remember when Kasparov was defeated by Deep Blue? It was on the HEADLINE EVERYWHERE. And just the fact that usually any medium size chess tournament would have a total prize of one hundred thoudsand dollars or so shows that there are more people willing to sponsor chess games than fencing.
Also I want to make it clear about your concert of the chess rating system. You said "Why would I go to any tournament where I might be the highest seed and know that at best, I can only keep my rating, and can't possibly go up, but possibly go down? "
That is not the case. Your chess rating is adjusted based on each game you play. If you win a game, your rating will increase according to the difference between your rating and your opponent's rating; you will gain some points even if your opponent has a rating lower than yours. The bigger the diffence the lesser the gain. And vise versa if you defeat someone who has a rating much higher than you, you will gain a lot of points. The bigger the difference hte greater the gain. This makes a difference, because in the current USFA system it doesn't matter who you happen to fence with in the tournament and what's the outcome of it; if you don't go on and win the tournament you might as well just have not been in that tournament.

[edew]

Your mention of the size of chess vs fencing is exactly my point: given that chess is so much popular (in terms of people participating in it) than fencing, notice how little coverage it gets. Kasparov vs Deep Blue is clearly an aberration. It would be equivalent to pitting Golubitsky against some robot machine. Irrelevant to the rest of fencing (or chess).

The point is: how many people, just ordinary people, know whether a 1000 ranking in chess is high or low? On the other hand, telling someone that Joe Schmoe is a "grand master" in chess would indicate that Joe is very good in the game. That's all.

Another point concerning fencing vs chess is that one game of chess is a pretty good game. For some people, playing one game is plenty of work and is quite rewarding. Fencing doesn't work that way. Fencing, at least in the way most competitions are structured, require that you compete against many people, each of which have very little impact on your overall game. It may be that with a 4-0 record in the pool and you know you're going up, you might ease up against the next guy, with winning or losing not much an issue. Or, if you know that this opponent is pretty weak, but if he wins, will go up while someone else who's strong isn't, well, you might not want to fence too hard. At the Greenville SC NAC, two fencers from my club were in the same pool (the second-day pools). Fencer A was clearly not going up. Fencer B needed to beat Fencer A to go up. Instead, Fencer A beat Fencer B, thereby both got knocked out. Well, for a teammate, given the circumstances, Fencer A might have fenced a bit more sloppily. I don't think there is a parallel in chess.

[mangofever]

thank's barry for trying to clear this up for all of us. i'm going to copy/piste the web site for future reference.
but I still don't get it entirely
i still don't understand it completely, but so far i understand that:
an unrated fencer can enter a competition
he or she can fence a certain amount of people and make points, if he or she gets enough points and or enough victories, they can earn a Letter grade. Theoretically then someone could earn any letter at any time.

[BarryTice]

mangofever --

The points scored or number of victories don't actually mean anything, per se, in earning the rating. It's all about your final place in the event, and how any other rated fencers did there as well.

Example: If your club holds an event, even if only unrated fencers compete, if there are betwen 6 and 14 fencers, the winner of the tournament will earn an E. This is true even if all 14 fencers have been fencing for less than a month and the winner won only because he or she wasn't quite as bad as everyone else or because he or she was slightly more lucky than every else.

In a six-person event, a fencer could conceivably lose five matches in the pools 5-0 (for a -25 indicator), and then win the three DE bouts 15-14. The fencer would have 3 wins and 5 losses on the day. He would have scored 45 touches and would have had 67 touches scored against him, for a -22 indicator. And still, he would earn an E, because he placed first in the event. (Even worse, if all 3 DE bouts ran out of time with the score 1-0, ....)

Conceivably, the second-place finisher might have won all five pool bouts 5-0, and have stomped her first opponent in the DEs 15-0. Losing 15-14 in the final bout puts that fencer with 6 victories and 1 loss on the day, having scored 54 touches and with only 15 touches received, for a +39 indicator. Still, that fencer earns no rating because he or she didn't come in first place.

What's more, if you have 15 or more fencers in the group, the winner will earn a D instead of an E. The second-place finisher earns an E, and the two fencers tied for third both earn E's.

If this kind of thing happens a few times, you can end up with 4 D-rated fencers with negligable ability. And in a 15-person event, as long as the 4 D-rated fencers end up in the final 8, the winner gets a C. With an isolated club of 15 equally bad fencers, holding two tournaments a week, everyone could conceivably earn a C in a 10-week period. (Without the presence of some B-rated fencers, you must attend an event with at least 64 fencers to get a B.)

Is this unfair? Maybe. But in the real world, this level of isolation doesn't happen. Realistically, other fencers from other clubs would come to the events and, assuming that someone somewhere has some talent, would start winning on a regular basis. These things have a way of leveling themselves.

As far as any fencer earning any letter at any time, that's not quite true. The top rating you can earn at a given event depends on how many fencers of what ability level enter the tournament, and where they place.

For example, at the Birmingham Fencing Club's tournament this weekend, the open Foil event was a B1 event. That meant that we had at least 2 B's (or better), at least 2 C's (or better), and at least 2 D's (or better) entered. (This would be the case if we had 6 A's. Actually, I think we had 1 A, 3 B's, and some C's.) Also, in the top eight, we had to have 2 B's (or better) and 2 C's (or better). (We had the A, 2 B's, and a C, if I remember correctly.)

That means that our first-place finisher earned a B. (Our first-place finisher already had an A, so no rating was earned.) Our second-place finisher and the two fencers tied for third earned C's. (Two already had B's, so no rating was earned. The third already had a C, so that fencer's rating was renewed to a C01.) Fourth through sixth places earned D's (if they weren't already rated higher; in our case, our No. 6 had been unrated so he picked up his D). Seventh through ninth places earned E's (though all those fencers already had higher ratings, so none were earned or renewed in our case).

If I, an unrated fencer, had competed (which I didn't, because I'm an epeéist), on the off chance I had finished in the top 9 places, I would have earned a rating. Had I finished first, I would be a B. But it would not have been possible for me to earn an A at the event, even if I had won all pool bouts 5-0 and all DEs 15-0.

Does this clear things up a bit more, or am I just making things more murky?
-- b.r.t.

[mangofever]

this is very interesting. thanks i at least know the way things are done. now to explain how scoring is kept. i'm really terrible with details. at events i get so caught up in the action, i can't keep score, or time things, i get very revved up, and if i had a timer in my hand, it would go on continuously, the ref would yell, and i would stand there and gape - wow - did you see that.....Eventually I'll get it. In my next lifetime I expect to be better at this. And also, it seems that they changed the lights and I wasn't around for the transition. Also, this will be difficult in my area, so far there aren't very many female fencers, about 5 at the most, the rest are all men, and most of the men have a rating. I participated in an event for unrated fencers, but one participant was highly rated in another weapon. What's you take on this.


[This message has been edited by mangofever (edited 03-07-2001).]

[This message has been edited by mangofever (edited 03-07-2001).]

[BarryTice]

mangofever --

Rating in one weapon doesn't necessarily imply skill in another. But it sure doesn't seem to hurt!

There is no requirement that events be single-gender (or mixed, for that matter) for a rating to be earned. I assume by your reply that you are female, and that there aren't enough other females around for anyone to be earning a rating with a female-only event. So what you need to do is work on your skills until you can beat the guys, or travel to other tournaments in other areas.

If you'd be more comfortable, look for unrated tournaments or rating-restricted events. If there are highly-skilled, unrated fencers entering these, they will quickly earn ratings and not be qualified to attend the next one!

Like anything else worth having, you're going to have to work for it, or remain in the unrated masses (like me).

[mangofever]

i'm not really very concerned about a rating but i like to know how the system works i never understood it before. it's very complicated.
a lot depends on your instructor. fortunetly, we have some out there who enjoy watching their students fence and log all their points and make sure things are okay for them. it takes a long time to be "at home" with this stuff.
Chess was lifted out of oblivion by Bobbie Fisher, the first American Grand Master. After Bobbie EVERYBODY played chess. I started playing chess in the 7th grade, I borrowed books from the library and tried to memorize strategies, 4 horse opening, the blah blah blah opening, and the BROOKLYN OPENING: CHOPPED LIVER, taught to me by my brother. Now you have to see chopped liver happening, if not your dead in less than 7 moves. But here's the real deal folks, it takes a LOT of brain power to do well in both fencing, and chess. In the past "gentlemen" and "ladies" of leisure, had the time to invest in such undertakings. The Victorian era, was probably the last era in which MANY MANY people could enjoy fencing, ballroom dancing, chess, writing, poetry readings, chamber music, and a little watercolor.

[This message has been edited by mangofever (edited 03-08-2001).]

hey guys

one thing if i may say, don't get too hung up about ratings. I'm a "U", and i can beat "E" "D" "C" and even a couple of "B" rankers. If you get to hung up about ratings, you forget the sport of fencing. Granted, you want to ultimately get your "A", but if you make that your only goal, you won't fence well. Just fence the best you can and it will eventually come

gman



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Pain is only weakness leaving the body.

[mangofever]

i agree, competition is good, but i like the sport of it all best. i think my competitions will be limited to two or three per year, at least for the next 2 years of fencing. maybe as i become more skilled i'll think of entering more competitions, i think entering is sort of addictive.