The Second Highest Rating Ever
Monday, January 18, 2010 at 6:23PM ...now belongs to Magnus Carlsen, but only unofficially. According to the Live Top List, his current rating is 2813.8, which FIDE would round up to 2814. The highest FIDE rating ever belongs to Garry Kasparov, who achieved an insane 2851 during his miracle year of 1999. Topalov had held the second spot with a 2813 rating achieved in 2006, and still might if Carlsen goes even slightly backward in the remainder of Wijk aan Zee. Even if that happens, however, it's hard to believe that any figure but 2851 has a chance to withstand Carlsen's assault, and I doubt that it's going to survive in the long run either.
The full list of 2700s is here, and it's especially remarkable to see that Bobby Fischer's 2785 peak still puts him at #8. Considering the rating inflation almost everyone believes has occurred in the intervening 28 years, Fischer's feat is even more amazing.
Carlsen
Reader Comments (5)
I assume a comparison has between Fischer's 2785 ELO to current ELOs. Do you have any idea what 2785 in Fischer's era is in current ELO terms?
No.
There is this http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=2354, however the author admits, "Obviously, any comparison between eras is uncertain and depends heavily on how you adjust the rating lists against each other."
Acc. to Live Ratings (http://chess.liverating.org/toplist.php?pid=2900084&compact=1), Topolov also peaked at 2813.8 (May 2009), which I suppose could also be rounded up to 2814.
Topolov isn't very gracious, and his manager IS a jerk, but there's no point diminishing VT's chess achievments.
How am I denigrating his accomplishments? I didn't look up past unofficial ratings, but was basing my remark about Carlsen's achievement on a comparison to official ratings. Since I noted that Carlsen's achievement was also unofficial (in the very first sentence!), the last clause of your comment is inappropriate. The factual point is well taken, though. In fact, if someone is really dedicated to pursuing this, they could go back to examine Kramnik's time at 2809. Maybe during the event when he reached that rating, or early in the next one, he too reached 2813.8 or higher.