Decline from old age

When Chess players talk about decline in Chess strength due to old age are they referring to great players declining or are they saying all players decline?

Would an average club player see a decline? Or is it just strictly for very good players who are getting too old to play at that level?

I'd say the vast majority of players decline because the mind also naturally declines.

@dillhole said
When Chess players talk about decline in Chess strength due to old age are they referring to great players declining or are they saying all players decline?

Would an average club player see a decline? Or is it just strictly for very good players who are getting too old to play at that level?

Decline no matter the rating?

I don't believe that at all.

Decline from strong Chess yes but lower rated players should be able to maintain that skill I'm sure.

Well I hope so.

I would say that in general, one's potential maximum level of performance declines as one approaches old age. But how many of us have approached our potential maximum at anything? I'm not saying that this is bad, given that attaining one's potential maximum would ordinarily require a concentrated effort to the exclusion of other worthwhile pursuits.

Applying this to chess, I'd imagine that a grandmaster is much closer to his or her potential maximum than a player below 1600 would be. This leaves the grandmaster little ability to compensate for declined performance owing to aging, given that the GM has already acquired a great deal of the knowledge that might have allowed him or her to compensate. In contrast, a player below 1600 presumably is lacking much skill or knowledge, such that acquiring some of it might well enable that player to compensate for a slight decline in performance owing to aging.

@FMDavidHLevin

So you think the decline affects the max potential and not current playing ability?

That might be an advantage I have, being given the impression that I am improving even though I'm in my late 50s simply because I have to learn the basics of not losing (catching mistakes and missed opportunities). Plus, chess is still a mystery to me. I grew up in south Texas in the 70s-80s, where chess was less popular than checkers, in turn less popular than marbles, and marbles was NOWHERE near as popular as American football and baseball past a certain age. I had to look into my high school year books to confirm this. Nothing of the sort to be seen in them.

@stephanie108

Marbles was great. I play for keeps.

@dillhole said
@FMDavidHLevin

So you think the decline affects the max potential and not current playing ability?

@fmdavidhlevin said
a player under 1600 has more scope for compensating for a decline in playing ability than does a GM.

A lot depends on the individual and how active they stay as they get older.
The Laskers, Smyslovs and Korchnois are really exceptions and played at a
high level because, especially in the case of Lasker and Korchnoi, they had too.

Based on me, my friends and other GM’s whose career I followed.
Then 60 was when the decline became noticeable A lot of them gave up rather than
see their ratings plummet. Two over 2000 OTB players I grew up with carried on
playing and finished in the 1400’s. But they loved playing which is the important thing.

I think at our level,(well mine anyway) in correspondence chess there is a balance:-
Yes, we become slower and less alert as we age,particularly if we play while drinking alcohol, but that doesn't really matter that much on here unless you play blitz/short timeout games.
On the other hand I have learned a lot about the game playing here, and from Geoffs' blogs so my game has improved despite getting older.
OTB chess is totally different but if I were to play OTB(I'm not in a club or anything and rarely find anyone to play against) I think having played on here would have improved my game

@greenpawn34

Over 2000 OTB and they ended up around 1400 is very disconcerting. I wouldn't have thought the decline would cause that much of a drop. Good lord.

@Dillhole
https://images.chesscomfiles.com/proxy/d1lalstwiwz2br.cloudfront.net/images_users/tiny_mce/LionChessLtd/phplEBOGv/http/faa68089b7.jpeg

https://images.chesscomfiles.com/proxy/d1lalstwiwz2br.cloudfront.net/images_users/tiny_mce/LionChessLtd/phpZqDLVp/http/64462ad124.jpeg

https://www.chess.com/blog/LionChessLtd/age-vs-elo---your-battle-against-time