Universal Rating System - URS

Victory at the 2020 Tata Steel Masters has seen GM Fabiano Caruana narrow the gap considerably at the top of the February URS rating list. The top 5 rated players now consist of Magnus Carlsen, Hikaru Nakamura, Ding Liren, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave and Fabiano Caruana and these 5 players have started to open a sizeable gap at the top of the standings. They are the only players to currently command a URS rating over 2790 while GM Wesley So from the USA is the only other player with a rating above 2780.

Amongst the top ladies, GM Ju Wenjun has kept her place as World number 2 after retaining her Woman’s World Champion title in a closely fought match against GM Aleksandra Goryachkina. The top performer among the emerging juniors at Tata Steel was GM Vincent Keymer from Germany and he has improved his ranking by over 100 places after a strong showing in the Challengers section in Wijk aan Zee.

The majority of the other participants at the Tata event performed close to their rating expectations and this has resulted in a fairly stable month at the top of the standings. The results from the Gibraltar Masters tournament did not make the final cut-off for inclusion in the February rating list and will be rated as part of the March list.

The updated standings as February 1, 2020 are now published and can be accessed as usual from http://universalrating.com/ratings.php.

The month of June has seen changes at the top of the URS rating list following the inclusion of results from two major events. The Cote dÍvoire Rapid & Blitz and FIDE Grand Prix in Moscow were the most important events that have impacted the ratings of the top players this month.

World Champion Magnus Carlsen increased his lead at the top of the table even further after winning the Cote d’Ivoire Rapid and Blitz. GM Hikaru Nakamura and GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave both justified their seedings in Abidjan and both have consolidated their positions as number 2 and 3 respectively after they finished tied for second place behind Magnus in Abidjan.

Only slightly further down the list, GM Ian Nepomniachtchi has now recorded a career high URS™ ranking of number 6 after winning the Moscow Grand Prix. This was despite a relatively disappointing performance in Abidjan only the week before. GM Alexander Grischuk, the man he defeated in the final, has also returned to the top 10 while Polish GM Radoslaw Wojtaszek improved to number 26. Falling out of the top 10 is GM Sergey Karjakin who had a tough time in Abidjan while also suffering a first round defeat in Moscow. Sergei is now ranked at number 12 which is the lowest he has been rated since the inception of the URS™ ratings lists in January 2018.

The June ratings are now published and can be accessed as usual at http://universalrating.com/ratings.php