FIDE November Ratings: Wesley So Enters Top 10
The November FIDE Rating list sees two big changes for Wesley So. Not only has the Filipino grandmaster switched federations to the USA, he also entered the top 10 for the first time.
The new rating list sees few changes at the top. Magnus Carlsen didn't play, and so his 2863 rating didn't change. After his huge gain last month, Fabiano Caruana dropped five points (and another 10 in the live list, by the way) but he's still comfortably the world number two.
Levon Aronian and Alexander Grischuk switched places four and five in the FIDE list, but that is old news after the latter defeated Ernesto Inarkiev in Moscow yesterday. If he does well at the Petrosian Memorial Grischuk may have a 2800 rating on the next list.
Wesley So won $100,000 at the first Millionaire Chess tournament and by gaining seven rating points, and he is now the world number 10 player. Because Shakhriyar Mamedyarov did well in Tashkent, that might be different on the next list, though.
Leinier Dominguez of Cuba played badly at the Baku Grand Prix and dropped no fewer than 25 points and when from #15 to #24. Ernesto Inarkiev won the Baku Open and scored 2.0/2 in the Bundesliga to climb from #75 to #50.
U.S. GM Ray Robson gained 23 points after good results at the Millionaire Chess SPICE Cup tournaments. With a rating of 2651, he is a few points shy of entering the world's top 100 — he jumped from #151 to #104. Wei Yi of China (now at 2649) went from 124 to 106.
Two players in the top 1,000 made huge jumps: Lu Shanglei (China) went from #513 to #350 in the rankings and Alexander Predke (Russia) went from #659 to #466.
November 2014 FIDE Ratings | Top 30
| Rank | Old rank | Name | Fed | Title | Rating | Old rating | Games |
| 1 | 1 | Carlsen, Magnus | NOR | GM | 2863 | 2863 | 0 |
| 2 | 2 | Caruana, Fabiano | ITA | GM | 2839 -5 | 2844 | 11 |
| 3 | 3 | Topalov, Veselin | BUL | GM | 2800 | 2800 | 0 |
| 4 | 5 | Aronian, Levon | ARM | GM | 2797 +4 | 2793 | 6 |
| 5 | 4 | Grischuk, Alexander | RUS | GM | 2795 -2 | 2797 | 11 |
| 6 | 6 | Anand, Viswanathan | IND | GM | 2792 +7 | 2785 | 6 |
| 7 | 7 | Giri, Anish | NED | GM | 2776 +8 | 2768 | 6 |
| 8 | 8 | Karjakin, Sergey | RUS | GM | 2770 +3 | 2767 | 11 |
| 9 | 9 | Nakamura, Hikaru | USA | GM | 2767 +3 | 2764 | 11 |
| 10 | 14 | So, Wesley | USA | GM | 2762 +7 | 2755 | 7 |
| 11 | 11 | Kramnik, Vladimir | RUS | GM | 2760 | 2760 | 0 |
| 12 | 16 | Gelfand, Boris | ISR | GM | 2759 +11 | 2748 | 11 |
| 13 | 10 | Mamedyarov, Shakhriyar | AZE | GM | 2757 -7 | 2764 | 11 |
| 14 | 13 | Vachier-Lagrave, Maxime | FRA | GM | 2751 -6 | 2757 | 9 |
| 15 | 12 | Adams, Michael | ENG | GM | 2745 -13 | 2758 | 9 |
| 16 | 17 | Jakovenko, Dmitry | RUS | GM | 2745 -2 | 2747 | 2 |
| 17 | 18 | Wojtaszek, Radoslaw | POL | GM | 2744 +2 | 2742 | 2 |
| 18 | 20 | Svidler, Peter | RUS | GM | 2743 +11 | 2732 | 13 |
| 19 | 19 | Vitiugov, Nikita | RUS | GM | 2738 | 2738 | 0 |
| 20 | 21 | Leko, Peter | HUN | GM | 2731 | 2731 | 0 |
| 21 | 25 | Radjabov, Teimour | AZE | GM | 2730 +4 | 2726 | 11 |
| 22 | 22 | Ding, Liren | CHN | GM | 2730 | 2730 | 0 |
| 23 | 31 | Navara, David | CZE | GM | 2727 +9 | 2718 | 11 |
| 24 | 15 | Dominguez Perez, Leinier | CUB | GM | 2726 -25 | 2751 | 11 |
| 25 | 24 | Ivanchuk, Vassily | UKR | GM | 2726 | 2726 | 0 |
| 26 | 23 | Harikrishna, P. | IND | GM | 2725 -2 | 2727 | 2 |
| 27 | 26 | Morozevich, Alexander | RUS | GM | 2724 | 2724 | 0 |
| 28 | 32 | Jobava, Baadur | GEO | GM | 2722 +5 | 2717 | 13 |
| 29 | 38 | Li, Chao | CHN | GM | 2722 +11 | 2711 | 11 |
| 30 | 41 | Naiditsch, Arkadij | GER | GM | 2719 +9 | 2710 | 10 |
In the women's list there have been few changes, because almost the whole top 10 didn't play. Judit Polgar has retired but remains the number one, but with that 2-point distance to Hou Yifan the question is: for how long?
Below these two players the differences aren't big; Valentina Gunina lost eight points in four games and dropped out of the top 10 because of that.
Two players didn't do well in their recent tournaments: Harika Dronavalli of India dropped 23 points at the PokerStars Isle of Man tournament and the Chigorin Memorial in St. Petersburg, while Bela Khotenashvili of Georgia lost 19 points in the national league.
November 2014 FIDE Ratings | Women, Top 30
| Rank | Old rank | Name | Fed | Title | Rating | Old rating | Games |
| 1 | 1 | Polgar, Judit | HUN | GM | 2675 | 2675 | 0 |
| 2 | 2 | Hou, Yifan | CHN | GM | 2673 | 2673 | 0 |
| 3 | 3 | Ju, Wenjun | CHN | WGM | 2582 | 2582 | 0 |
| 4 | 4 | Koneru, Humpy | IND | GM | 2581 | 2581 | 0 |
| 5 | 5 | Dzagnidze, Nana | GEO | GM | 2570 | 2570 | 0 |
| 6 | 6 | Muzychuk, Anna | UKR | GM | 2545 -3 | 2548 | 2 |
| 7 | 7 | Kosteniuk, Alexandra | RUS | GM | 2541 -1 | 2542 | 9 |
| 8 | 9 | Lagno, Kateryna | RUS | GM | 2530 | 2530 | 0 |
| 9 | 11 | Muzychuk, Mariya | UKR | IM | 2529 +3 | 2526 | 2 |
| 10 | 12 | Cmilyte, Viktorija | LTU | GM | 2525 | 2525 | 0 |
| 11 | 8 | Gunina, Valentina | RUS | GM | 2522 -8 | 2530 | 4 |
| 12 | 14 | Kosintseva, Nadezhda | RUS | GM | 2517 | 2517 | 0 |
| 13 | 15 | Stefanova, Antoaneta | BUL | GM | 2517 | 2517 | 0 |
| 14 | 17 | Zhao, Xue | CHN | GM | 2514 +4 | 2510 | 2 |
| 15 | 16 | Cramling, Pia | SWE | GM | 2512 | 2512 | 0 |
| 16 | 10 | Harika, Dronavalli | IND | GM | 2505 -23 | 2528 | 18 |
| 17 | 13 | Khotenashvili, Bela | GEO | GM | 2504 -19 | 2523 | 7 |
| 18 | 18 | Ushenina, Anna | UKR | GM | 2494 | 2494 | 0 |
| 19 | 19 | Ruan, Lufei | CHN | WGM | 2491 | 2491 | 0 |
| 20 | 20 | Danielian, Elina | ARM | GM | 2487 | 2487 | 0 |
| 21 | 23 | Javakhishvili, Lela | GEO | IM | 2486 +5 | 2481 | 7 |
| 22 | 21 | Kosintseva, Tatiana | RUS | GM | 2483 | 2483 | 0 |
| 23 | 22 | Sebag, Marie | FRA | GM | 2482 | 2482 | 0 |
| 24 | 26 | Paehtz, Elisabeth | GER | IM | 2480 +3 | 2477 | 13 |
| 25 | 25 | Hoang, Thanh Trang | HUN | GM | 2480 +2 | 2478 | 1 |
| 26 | 24 | Pogonina, Natalija | RUS | WGM | 2480 | 2480 | 0 |
| 27 | 27 | Zatonskih, Anna | USA | IM | 2476 -1 | 2477 | 3 |
| 28 | 28 | Shen, Yang | CHN | IM | 2475 | 2475 | 0 |
| 29 | 29 | Melia, Salome | GEO | IM | 2473 +1 | 2472 | 7 |
| 30 | 30 | Galliamova, Alisa | RUS | IM | 2471 | 2471 | 0 |
Chess.com Blitz & Bullet
Let's move on to our very own lists for Blitz and Bullet chess, because it's also quite interesting to see which top players are (regularly) playing on our site, and topping the standings, isn't it? The following lists only includes players who have been active on the site recently.
Hikaru Nakamura is confirming his status as an active, and one of the strongest -- if not the strongest -- online blitz and bullet player in the world. On our site he is topping both lists with a wide margin: 80 points ahead of #2 FM Andrey Kalinichev of Russia in the blitz list, and 99 points ahead of #2 IM Siddharth Ravichandran of India in the bullet list.
You can spot top GM Baadur Jobava of Georgia as #4 in the Blitz list — he won the first Titled Tuesday tournament last week.
Chess.com Live Chess | Blitz, 5 November 2014 (Top 20)
| # | Name | Rating | Win | Loss | Draw |
| 1 | GM Hikaru | 2787 | 150 (88%) | 15 (9%) | 6 (4%) |
| 2 | FM Kulinarist | 2707 | 567 (92%) | 31 (5%) | 20 (3%) |
| 3 | GM Tamirn | 2706 | 14 (93%) | 0 (0%) | 1 (7%) |
| 4 | GM LexySexy | 2685 | 9 (90%) | 1 (10%) | 0 (0%) |
| 5 | GM FabianoCaruana | 2654 | 207 (82%) | 28 (11%) | 18 (7%) |
| 6 | GM LyonBeast | 2642 | 47 (84%) | 7 (13%) | 2 (4%) |
| 7 | GM erwinlami | 2621 | 405 (74%) | 95 (17%) | 46 (8%) |
| 8 | GM Duhless | 2620 | 59 (69%) | 21 (24%) | 6 (7%) |
| 9 | GM VerdeNotte | 2599 | 28 (68%) | 10 (24%) | 3 (7%) |
| 10 | GM JackSnipe | 2594 | 31 (70%) | 5 (11%) | 8 (18%) |
| 11 | IM Yaacovn | 2593 | 880 (56%) | 559 (36%) | 124 (8%) |
| 12 | GM Nouki | 2592 | 355 (68%) | 141 (27%) | 23 (4%) |
| 13 | GM thegormacle | 2588 | 313 (70%) | 106 (24%) | 30 (7%) |
| 14 | IM ChessTrener | 2581 | 1120 (54%) | 783 (38%) | 182 (9%) |
| 15 | GM Janosik | 2578 | 122 (70%) | 43 (25%) | 10 (6%) |
| 16 | NM TheTruth | 2571 | 1199 (98%) | 20 (2%) | 3 (0%) |
| 17 | GM Contora | 2568 | 291 (62%) | 121 (26%) | 55 (12%) |
| 18 | GM BartoszSocko | 2563 | 29 (69%) | 11 (26%) | 2 (5%) |
| 19 | GM Dlugy | 2559 | 463 (64%) | 214 (29%) | 52 (7%) |
| 20 | GM CaptainJames | 2556 | 82 (72%) | 24 (21%) | 8 (7%) |
Bullet is a special form of chess, and clearly a speciality for some. Nakamura himself has stated that he doesn't know if he's the strongest blitz player, but he feels he is the strongest bullet player in the world. In the top 20 below you will see that #2 IM Siddharth Ravichandran of India and #3 IM Marc Esserman of USA are not even in the Blitz top 20!
Chess.com Live Chess | Bullet, 5 November 2014 (Top 20)
| # | Name | Rating | Win | Loss | Draw |
| 1 | GM Hikaru | 3103 | 1132 (90%) | 88 (7%) | 42 (3%) |
| 2 | IM brute4ever | 3004 | 1174 (85%) | 174 (13%) | 26 (2%) |
| 3 | IM MEsserman | 2873 | 5598 (60%) | 3336 (36%) | 412 (4%) |
| 4 | GM LyonBeast | 2835 | 274 (86%) | 27 (9%) | 16 (5%) |
| 5 | Dakota-Dixon | 2830 | 1400 (86%) | 200 (12%) | 28 (2%) |
| 6 | magnetic_chess | 2805 | 43 (48%) | 46 (52%) | 0 (0%) |
| 7 | GM erichansen | 2800 | 653 (68%) | 265 (28%) | 40 (4%) |
| 8 | IM BeastfromBaku | 2751 | 456 (73%) | 129 (21%) | 39 (6%) |
| 9 | GM Tamirn | 2743 | 464 (68%) | 178 (26%) | 43 (6%) |
| 10 | IM TigerLilov | 2743 | 159 (63%) | 87 (34%) | 7 (3%) |
| 11 | NM matein28 | 2737 | 120 (77%) | 26 (17%) | 9 (6%) |
| 12 | FM Kulinarist | 2711 | 3958 (72%) | 1256 (23%) | 302 (5%) |
| 13 | FM wonderfultime | 2702 | 650 (52%) | 522 (42%) | 70 (6%) |
| 14 | mary_cc | 2702 | 313 (65%) | 157 (33%) | 13 (3%) |
| 15 | GM FabianoCaruana | 2685 | 533 (82%) | 87 (13%) | 32 (5%) |
| 16 | GM GeorgMeier | 2682 | 607 (60%) | 324 (32%) | 77 (8%) |
| 17 | GM Duhless | 2680 | 29 (81%) | 7 (19%) | 0 (0%) |
| 18 | GM Janosik | 2677 | 5846 (72%) | 2025 (25%) | 283 (3%) |
| 19 | GM LittlePeasant | 2669 | 653 (59%) | 388 (35%) | 75 (7%) |
| 20 | IM penguingm1 | 2664 | 2093 (60%) | 1220 (35%) | 197 (6%) |
Peter Doggers joined a chess club a month before turning 15 and still plays for it. He used to be an active tournament player and holds two IM norms. Peter has a Master of Arts degree in Dutch Language & Literature. He briefly worked at New in Chess, then as a Dutch teacher and then in a project for improving safety and security in Amsterdam schools. Between 2007 and 2013 Peter was running ChessVibes, a major source for chess news and videos acquired by Chess.com in October 2013. As our Director News & Events, Peter writes many of our news reports. In the summer of 2022, The Guardian’s Leonard Barden described him as “widely regarded as the world’s best chess journalist.”
Peter's first book The Chess Revolution is out now!
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