British Go Tournaments and the European Rating List

The European Go Federation maintains a rating list of European Go players on the European Go Database. This list depends on its maintainer receiving tournament results. He has provided a page of instructions which describes how to get results to him. However, organisers of British tournaments need not carry out these instructions themselves. They should send the results to the Tournament Results officer both for sending on to the European Go Federation and for conversion for the results section of the BGA web site.

Three classes of tournament are recognised - times shown are minimums:

There is also class D for national and international tournaments played online.

The EGF Ratings Commission reserves the right to adjust the class of a tournament if it considers it necessary. The class of an event should be stated before it is held. The organiser of a tournament may downgrade its class if she feels that this is appropriate, for example if new tournament systems or rules are being tested. Events that do not meet the specifications mentioned above are not recognized as classified EGF tournaments.

The class of a tournament determines the weight which the European Rating List assigns to the results. This is in the ratio A:B:C::4:3:2. Thus a six-round class A tournament has the same total effect on the Rating List as two four-round class B tournaments or three four-round class C tournaments.

The BGA page of forthcoming tournaments shows the class of each tournament with the symbols A, B and C. This is based on how the tournament was classed the previous year, from the time limits if these have been stated, and from advice from the maintainer of the European Rating List.

If a tournament does not have an indication of tournament class, it indicates that the tournament is unclassified, and the results will not be used for the European Rating List. This may be because it does not satisfy the criteria: non-standard rules or time limits too short, or it may be because the results have in the past not been passed on.

You are advised to set your time limits as you set fit and not be too influenced by the rating class rules. Most players will enter events whatever the category.