GRADING

BCF News SCCU home page

updated 27.8.05
BCF GRADING
ANOTHER GRADING UPDATE
rjh 27.8.05
The Grading List appeared on the BCF website on 22nd July, as you know. It was updated four days ago, and now appears in its definitive revised form. In this form it is official for BCF competitions throughout the season. The printed book, based on exactly the same data, went to the printer at the same time and should be ready for distribution at the start of September.
     There's a lot to be said for a printed book. It outdoes an electronic list in permanence as well as portability. There are other differences. The book gives Juniors' ages and the website list doesn't. Wiser heads than mine will tell you why. It also includes a number of people who have declined to appear in the online list. But the online list is more versatile. It permits searches by player or club or county, and gives other information which there isn't room for in the printed book. Go there, if you haven't.
     How is the Revised List different from the July one?
Approximately 660 players have grades which have changed since the provisional July list, and a further 50 or so have grades which did not appear there at all. Set this against a total published list of something over 12,200 players. Last year's start-September revisions only had 286 names in. What's happened, that the 2005 corrections should be so much more numerous than the 2004 ones?
     Two things have. For one thing, feedback from the July website (not there last year) has led to numerous corrections we would not otherwise have had. For another, last year's grading was limited by the requirement to have a printed list out in time for the British. Late 2003-4 results received afterwards were resolutely excluded from the revised list. This year, with the printed list still fluid, late 2004-5 events have been accepted up until mid August. Their organisers have been lined up against a wall, but their results are in. We are talking about one major congress and a number of smaller events.
     Some Stats
Taken from the Introduction to the printed list. Grading is down on last year. The shortfall is in Rapidplay, and specifically Junior Rapidplay which is down by about 50%. This was not unexpected after the introduction of Junior Game Fee in September 2004. Junior Standardplay grading has if anything gone up.
     The 2004 figures are from the unrevised July list. (Except one, I think, which will be why it doesn't quite add up in one place.)

Halfgames graded
Players active
Players published

2004
303056
19054
12812

2005
272457
16426
12237

STANDARD
Halfgames graded
Players active
Players published
A grades
B grades
C grades
D grades
E grades

206664
  13976
  10435
    1841 (131)
    1589 (119)
    2482 (115)
    2693 (106)
    1830 (  98)

208369
  13810
  10608
    1859 (129)
    1558 (121)
    2473 (115)
    2606 (105)
    2112 (  97)

RAPID
Halfgames graded
Players active
Players published
A grades
B grades
C grades
D grades
E grades

  96058
    8429
    4515
      596 (  84)
      328 (  80)
      593 (  94)
    1662 (  70)
    1336 (  56)

  64088
    5483
    3677
      418 (  86)
      232 (  89)
      525 (  95)
    1451 (  73)
    1051 (  67)

Figures in brackets are means. "Players active" means players with at least one graded game in the most recent season.

GRADING UPDATE
rjh 9.7.05
These are getting few and far between.
     Two innovations are worth mentioning.
(1) Website publication. You knew already. But, for the first time, the Grading List will appear on the BCF website. No firm date is fixed, but certainly in July well before the start of the British. This list will be complete and official, but provisional. A definitive corrected version will appear about a month later, and only at this point will the List be produced in book form. Corrections are not expected to be too numerous, because considerable checking has already been done. The definitive list will be used throughout the season for BCF events (though allowance may always be made for gross miscarriages of grading justice discovered later!). It will also be used throughout in SCCU events.
     The printed List can be ordered from the BCF Office. The price is the same as last year: £15 plus £2 post & packaging. (But no reductions for Direct Members.)
(2) Negative grades. These have been a continuing problem in recent years. No one ever had a negative grade published; they have always been printed as "1". But a young and inexperienced junior might easily work out at minus 40 or 50, and until now these negative grades, though hidden, have always been used in the following year's calculations. This wasn't a secret. It's announced in black and white in the 2004 List. But it has never seemed very fair, to your Webmaster. Opponents have been in the dark about how many points they were scoring, and the junior himself has been saddled with a negative grade which could be very hard to get rid of no matter how much he improved.
     Not any more. From now on, negative grades will be published as "0". But they will not be used in any way in next year's calculations. Negative juniors - and adults for that matter, because there are some - will be treated as new players. They start 2005-6 with a clean sheet, and their last-year games and grades will not be counted.

GRADING UPDATE
rjh 1.9.04
(1) Amendments List appears today. It is an official BCF list (286 names) of corrected grades. If you have ordered it by post you should be getting it shortly. If you have bought a BCF List and not asked for the Amendments, rectify your omission by contacting the BCF Office office@bcf.org.uk and asking for a copy by email. There's no charge.
     286 names is really not many, considering all the ways there are for mistakes to happen. We thought of listing the ways, but your copy will do that when you get it. The amended List will be official for BCF competitions and also for SCCU Counties Championship matches, and we wouldn't be a bit surprised if an SCCU extract from it appeared on this Site fairly soon.
(2) County Match Grading (National Stage). We've been meaning to say this for ages, because it often gives rise to queries. The 2004 Prelims and Quarter-finals did not go into the 2004 List despite having been played before the 31st-May cutoff date. This was not an error, but a consequence of a rather strange BCF rule which has just been abolished. Until a few weeks ago, the rule was that Prelims and QFs went into the following year's grading. The 2003 ones dutifully went into the 2004 List, and the 2004 ones did not. They will go into 2005. But in future the cutoff date will be respected, and matches will be graded in the season they're played in.