21-12-2011, 10:11 PM
I agree with Mike's idea of a rating floor for the Euro/World Youth events. These events really are incredibly tough! As well as the factors that Mike mentioned, one huge downside of sending kids that aren't ready to these, that is often overlooked, is that they end up with very low FIDE ratings, which then take several years to catch up. 2 recent examples of this are Andrew McClement and Ian McDonald, who both had to work up from around 1500. And getting in FIDE rated games is not cheap as I'm sure many parents will know. Perhaps something along the lines of U18:2100 U16:2000 U14:1800 U12:1600 U10:1200, and something like 300 points lower for girls. Obviously these can be refined, but I think the bar should be set pretty high. This would also make selections very transparent, and clear to everyone what they need to achieve.
Other tournaments can be found that would be better for those that are below the rating floor. Returning to Calum's idea at the start of the thread, sending squads to tournaments like the British, which has a championship, major open, and age group championships, or big opens in France/Italy/Spain which can be combined with holidays, would be good by providing tough games, and norm hunters would get opportunities, as well as coaching/preparing/analysing games with the juniors.
Other tournaments can be found that would be better for those that are below the rating floor. Returning to Calum's idea at the start of the thread, sending squads to tournaments like the British, which has a championship, major open, and age group championships, or big opens in France/Italy/Spain which can be combined with holidays, would be good by providing tough games, and norm hunters would get opportunities, as well as coaching/preparing/analysing games with the juniors.