English Chess Forum

Has there ever been an IM or GM at chess who have become very good maybe reaching expert level for Draughts/Checkers?

1. Pillsbury

2. Nezhmetdinov

Norman Littlewood and Gerard Welling

The other way round, Newell Banks (one of the all time "checkers" greats) was a master strength chessplayer. Any others??

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"Set up your attacks so that when the fire is out, it isn't out!" (H N Pillsbury)

FM Rawle Allicock is a very good draughts player.

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http://westcountrychess.blogspot.com

When Boris Spassky won the USSR chess championships in 1961, his sister, Irena, was the USSR draughts champion.

Hou Yifan started off as a draughts player! http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=6985

Geoff Chandler wrote an excellent article about Richard Jordan: http://www.chessedinburgh.co.uk/chandle ... ChandID=55

Very interesting answers by every one many thanks.This may need to be put in a new topic but does playing draughts help or hinder you at chess?

Surely any decent chess player is going to be a strong draughts player - it is like playing endgames, if you can see ahead and recognise how to force a favourable zugzwang then you are going to be winning most of the time.

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They thought he was dead.
They were dead wrong!

To be fair, I don't think it's quite that simple!

It's the same sort of skills involved, so any top level chess player should (in theory at least) be able to reach a high standard in draughts - if they spent the same amount of time studying draughts as chess. General skills (analytical ability etc.) are transferable between the two, specific knowledge (openings, endgames etc.) isn't.

Checkers has been solved as far as I am aware. Are top level checkers games still competitive or do they always end in book draws?

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We use th name DRAUGHTS for the 8 by 8 version where the pieces cannot move backwards until they become kings.
There is the 10 x 10 game. that is called CHECKERS, as is draughts in the US.
The version where the pieces can move, or at least take, backwards
People from Bahrain showed us a version where the pieces move orthogonally.
I doubt any of the variations has been solved.

It is true that the first variation above is thought to be solved so that a computer can play perfectly. This does not prevent people playing draughts competitively. Compare it with computers undisputably stronger than humans at chess.
When top players play draughts the percentage of draws is very, very high.

Draughts is a purer mathematical game than chess, possibly because the latter is more complicated. If you are winning a chess game after about 3 moves there will be various ways to win, some quicker than others. In draughts sometimes there may be only one winning variations for 20 moves. That appeals to some people.

It is said that there are far more variations and thus choices in GO. Computers don't play that game very well - yet.

Bridge, poker and kriegspiel are all games where there will always be a human element. Computers play the first two pretty well. I did some computer work for computers playing poker as early as 1979. Even then it played quite well. Programing a computer to play kriegspiel would be an interesting exercise. The problem is that it wouldn't be a money-making proposition.

I don't really see that. Possible chess positions are finite.

eg rational numbers aren't generally considered purer than irrational numbers just because there are more of them.

Once quantum computers are able to superpose a few 1000 qubits it won't be long before the starting position is assessed as "white to play and win/draw".

or perhaps white is in zugzwang and black wins.....

Bill Porter >... rational numbers aren't generally purer than irrational(s)... just because there are more of them...<
The rationals and irrationals should the other way round. There's an infinite number of rationals but there's a greater (infinite) number of irrationals.
If you look on a number line the rationals are interspersed with a greater number of irrationals.
Therefore rationals should be 'purer' than irrationals in that sense.
Also, if two irrationals are multiplied or divided a rational results!

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To find a for(u)m that accommodates the mess, that is the task of the artist now. (Samuel Beckett)

I was just quoting the opinions of others. They regarded draughts as purer because it was possible to compute all the possible variations in a position. It is true there is a finite number of chess positions, but the number is very large from the viewpoint of humans.

It is perfectly clear to me that chess is a draw with best play by both sides. This is because of the stalemate rule. Of course I can't prove it. Do away with that and white would haved a bigger advantage. Don't suggest it to Ignatius Leong. He would promptly be calling for the change.

In draughts I have heard it said the second player to move has the advantage.