German Rating Conversion

Running Chess Tournaments
1

Greetings,

I’ve made my decision in this unlikely to ever happen again scenario - so no need for feedback on this - just wasn’t sure where to put it otherwise.

The 6th edition of USCF’s Official Rules of Chess outlines details on converting ratings from the German rating system, the Ingo system. This edition is from 2014, but wikipedia indicated that the Germans started using a new system, DWZ, in 1992. If this is true - I suggest that the part on the Ingo system be removed or an entry for DWZ be added.

A player who wishes to play in one of my tournaments submitted a DWZ rating and suggested his equivalent USCF rating be 190 points higher. I am not sure where this number came from. I was not able to find online any converter or any reasonable looking approximation of the delta between DMZ and USCF. I suppose I could have tried to find a sampling of DWZ players whom also have FIDE ratings and converted their averages to USCF to use as a guestimate. Under guidelines in the USCF rulebook, I used “most other countries not mentioned here” and added 200.

Now, any adjustment I made that would be >120 would put him in the uppermost prize category and any adjustment between 145 and 216 would put him in the same pairing position (although the exact number I assigned might have some impact down the road when evaluating an transposition or interchange). Based on those ranges, I believe 200 was reasonable.

2

CCA’s table for converting DWZ ratings is posted here.

3

oh [insert mumbled expletive], I did mean to mention that I found CCA’s conversion table.

Thanks for adding that though - as it at least demonstrates an approach.

But… I don’t know what the basis for that data is. I can certainly understand why CCA would be protectionist. I am not taking in lots of $$, so I dont have a big motivation to assume the same stance .

4

Since the player himself almost begged for a 190-point adjustment, and since anything 121 or over would put him in the uppermost prize category anyway, adding 200 certainly seems like a decent idea to me.

Bill Smythe