The International Correspondence Chess Federation (ICCF) and computers…

In other words, why do we play computer vs. computer?

I know that it seems odd to talk about correspondence chess in the age of the internet. After all, once upon a time, chess players (myself included) would send postcards with moves on them to other chess players. That in and of itself also seems a bit odd…. until you realize what correspondence chess (or postal chess) was meant to do. In the pre-personal computer days, correspondence chess was a way to play people and be able to study positions deeply, or be able to play chess when there wasn’t much time or local chess clubs nearby. It was also a way to try different ideas in the opening. The internet has certainly changed things — but in the old days, people would participate in tournaments that were run by organizations such as the US Chess Federation or other international organizations. I played by mail during my undergraduate and master’s programs, which really was the best way for me to continue in the chess community. I did stop for many years, like many other adults. Comprehensive exams, coaching forensics, getting married and having a kid… it’s the same old story told by many adult chess players. ^[1]Well, probably not the coaching forensics part.

I picked up chess again more seriously several years after Joshua was born. I went to my first in-person tournament in many years back in 2018, and managed to somehow get a 1619 provisional rating, which has only plummeted in the years afterward. ^[2] Darn those fast-thinking kids! Funny: I gained back 54 rating points at the US Senior Open in 2019. While soccer and other sports have taken me away again from in-person tournaments, I still long to go back and recover those rating points and more. I also went back to US Chess Federation (USCF) correspondence chess, raising my rating to 1532 before a slight drop to 1518, where it is today. ^[3]Very much COVID related — I was way too busy trying to figure out how to put classes online to play. My last games were in 2020. To put those numbers in perspective: amazingly, my over the board rating is somewhere around the 70th percentile, and I’m a low class “B” player in correspondence (the second category out of four; again, probably close to the 50th percentile).

That’s the background into the real story: ICCF correspondence chess. Unlike the USCF, which forbids computer usage in correspondence chess, the ICCF permits players to use any kind of computer technology to help make their moves. I decided to try one of their tournaments, which I was in the middle of when I first started this post.^[4]Again, another post that has sit in my draft posts for a really long time. This tournament started in May 2024 and ended a few months later. I’m now on my second tournament. The games follow one of three basic models:

• Those who lose because they had to drop out. I don’t say anything about those players – life happens, and I’ve had to do it before myself.
• Those who aren’t using computers
• Those who use Stockfish or another program to help with their moves.

For this tournament, I decided to follow the third path: I used Chessbase and its openings databases to help me with openings I tend to use as white or black, and then hopefully steer myself into respectable middlegames and endgames. And for the most part (we won’t count the game that I entered a wrong move accidentally and as a result, I lost that game.), that strategy is working out. I already have several draws and two wins from those who had to drop out. Meanwhile, my ICCF rating, which started at an 1800, ended up at a 1995 after this tournament. But what have I proven in terms of my ability? That I (mostly) know how to enter moves from Stockfish?

Apparently, the truly senior correspondence masters believe that they can steer the games in directions that are helpful, but it takes a lot of thought, and apparently, two different servers capable of calculating more than 90 million positions a second. ^[5]I just checked my laptop and how fast it’s analyzing a postion — it only is doing 2.3 million positions a second. This is on a Macbook Pro M3 Max, using 7 CPU cores and 64 gig of memory, … Continue reading Then again, since I haven’t yet retired, nor have I the time to analyze as well as GM Jon Edwards does, that won’t be me. Check the link to see how hard Edwards worked for one draw. And in the last correspondence final, there were 47 consecutive draws, and a +2 (2 wins with no losses) was enough to win the tournament.

So what’s the point? Perhaps the tl;dr version is simply this: if I want to do respectably, I have to use the computer. But if anything, I’m learning more about positions that I otherwise wouldn’t even consider playing in my own over-the-board games with the hope that someday I’ll be confident enough to expand my own repertoire.