Is it easy to become a Grandmaster?

What is required of a chess player to obtain the Grandmaster title? Is it possible for anyone with enough willpower to achieve this title? The President of the United States, Calvin Coolidge, once said: “Nothing in the world can replace persistence … Only persistence and perseverance are omnipotent!” Is the experienced politician right? Perhaps chess players need more than that: a natural talent, a high IQ, and constant practice. Robert Howard, Professor of Psychology at the University of Queensland (Australia), tried to answer the above questions in his article.

What is necessary to obtain the Grandmaster title?

Grandmaster is the highest title in the hierarchy of the International Chess Federation. Only those who have the title of World Champion are highly respected in the professional community. The history of the first Grandmasters is rather confusing. Frank Marshall, the strongest chess player in the USA in the beginning of the 20th century, is often credited with the romantic story of how the title appeared. Chess historian Edward Winter refuted this dubious theory and discovered that it appeared in the press in 1940. An alternative theory states that the term “grandmaster” was first used by a correspondent of Bell’s Life newspaper. In one of the articles, the author referred to “Lewis’s last Grand Master”.

It is known that for many decades the Grandmaster title remained informal. At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries the top two dozen players in the world were recognized by the chess community as international Grandmasters. This title was formalized in 1950. FIDE awarded the Grandmaster title to twenty-seven active chess players. For the next 20 years, this title went to a select few players for their success in Candidates matches or for outstanding services in popularising chess.

Since 1972 FIDE had been using a system for evaluating the practical strength of chess players based on the Elo rating. Later on the International Chess Federation introduced the criteria according to which chess players were awarded the title of grandmaster: winning the title of world champion for youth or adults, receiving 2,500 rating points and meeting the qualification requirements. The title of International Grandmaster became a lifelong title – FIDE only revoked it three times from players due to various violations.

In 1950 the International Chess Federation established the title of Honorary Grandmaster. It is awarded to chess players who have passed the peak of their career, but have made a significant contribution to the development of the chess movement. According to open sources, from 1977 to 2003, three dozen players were awarded the title.

Some sports observers claim that over five decades the value of the Grandmaster title has decreased considerably – it is easy to obtain. Journalists often refer to the fact that the total number of Grandmasters has increased dramatically, and that the Elo rating does not reflect the real strength of chess players. In 1971 only one chess player in the world had a rating above 2700 – Robert Fischer (2740). In October 2020 there were 38 chess players on the FIDE men’s rating list who passed that threshold. Three of them scored more than 2,800 rating points. But we should not forget that in recent decades the number of international tournaments has increased. The number of players on the FIDE rating list also increased proportionally. A computer analysis of games played by the best masters of the past and the current generation proves the superiority of the latter. Modern players are indeed stronger than their colleagues of fifty years ago.