Did you miss Borislav Ivanov?

[M ANSARI]

Not sure if mentioned yet, but there is an official press release on the controversy here: http://www.chess.com/news/official-stat ... story-1152

TLDR: Ivanov agreed to a search in his shoes. Nothing was found. A second search later after a few more rounds was proposed. The second time, he agreed to a full search and frisking. When the officer reached his chest area near the armpits, Ivanov suddenly pulled back and refused to continue. Before Ivanov reacted though, the officer had felt an unusual lump around his chest and so he asked him what was it. Ivanov nervously said "Nothing", then declined to continue the search and promptly forfeited the tournament.

You better read indeed the whole thread before changing the name, as the topic has already been discussed. As said, the Navalmoral are lying, a simple fact is that you can not see a strap from side to side of the chest when a single shirt button is unfastened. Besides, Ivanov had stated beforehand that he would not strip naked.

What would you do, if at 10 different times someone asks you to take off your shoes, your coat, pass a metal detector test, then pass a lie detector test, and then strip naked? I wonder how he is able to put up with all the pressure at all.

Did you miss the part where he claims he beats both Houdini and Rybka ... 10 out of 10 times ... 100% against an entity that is playing over 3200 ELO !!! That alone should be enough to convince you or anyone on this board that this guy is full of crap!

[Lyudmil Tsvetkov]

Did you miss the part where he claims he beats both Houdini and Rybka ... 10 out of 10 times ... 100% against an entity that is playing over 3200 ELO !!! That alone should be enough to convince you or anyone on this board that this guy is full of crap!

That was obviously an emotional statement. When you get unusually good results, and they tell you, 'Hey, you are a weaky, how is it possible that you score that well?', you have to answer something in your defence, and, instead of saying, 'I am able to win the occasional game against Rybka and Houdini' , you suddenly say ' I am winning 10 out of 10', especially if someone is teasing you.

[jhellis3]

As said, the Navalmoral are lying, a simple fact is that you can not see a strap from side to side of the chest when a single shirt button is unfastened.

No, but one can see tape on the center of a persons chest. Now why would that be there?

If he had taken off his shoes the first time, this would be over. Instead he claims he has a problem with it, but later consents to do so...

Then he has a problem with removing his shirt but no problem removing his pants... right.

I will say it is wrong to consistently single this guy out. The proper solution would be to screen a random sampling (or all) of the winners after each round.

[Taner Altinsoy]

Did you miss the part where he claims he beats both Houdini and Rybka ... 10 out of 10 times ... 100% against an entity that is playing over 3200 ELO !!! That alone should be enough to convince you or anyone on this board that this guy is full of crap!

That was obviously an emotional statement. When you get unusually good results, and they tell you, 'Hey, you are a weaky, how is it possible that you score that well?', you have to answer something in your defence, and, instead of saying, 'I am able to win the occasional game against Rybka and Houdini' , you suddenly say ' I am winning 10 out of 10', especially if someone is teasing you.

How do you judge it is "obviously" an emotional stament? It might as well be a genuine try to fool people which fits his current status...

How do you explain him improving 400-500 ( or even more) elo in a matter of months instead of years? IQ injections?

As we have even seen in world championship match in Chennai even the best players in the world are not immune to mistakes. What do you think about him not playing any blunder or forget blunder even a suboptimal move? We have seen statistical analysis of this from a statistician and a chess player and it was close to impossible.

He was not informed a few hours before the test Bulgarian Federation prepared for him he was informed much earlier and he stated he will attend it only to change his mind in the last minute and did not show up.

Here is the link to the mentioned Stats page.
http://en.chessbase.com/post/experts-we ... nce-060613
"Dr. Kenneth Regan: Also as my report says, I cannot imagine the statistical evidence in any case being stronger than for Zadar. As it comes to Ivanov’s performance at the “Old Capital” Open in Veliko Tarnovo, even when the games from the first two rounds are included, I get significant deviations in both the MM and AE tests, and an IPR of 3149 with 97.5% confidence above 2940."

How can you explain a performance rating of 2940 with % 97.4 confidence from a guy who is rating was only around 2000 before he suddenly reached the nirvana and solved chess?

[Laskos]

As Rob rightly noticed, the story is very bizarre, because the accusations are not true.

For me he is quilty regardless of the results of the search.

If the accusations are not true then how do you explain his strange results in tournaments(can you find for me a single example for a player with this type of strange results)

http://ratings.fide.com/individual_calc ... 2013-12-01

You can see that borislav ivanov lost against 2106 player and drew against 2 players with rating below 1900(this is very rare for a player who can score 2.5 out of 3 one month later against strong GM's).

It is not his only strange results

http://ratings.fide.com/individual_calc ... -06-01&t=0

draw against a weak girl with rating 1839 and later winning against significantly stronger players with rating above 2300.

one bad result can happen but look here

http://ratings.fide.com/individual_calc ... -03-01&t=0
His results against players with rating 1950-2100

losing against
Ioannidis, Evgenios with fide rating 1969
draw against Minas, Ioannis with fide rating 1985
draw against Todorov, Yavor with fide rating 2069
losing against Petrov, Vladimir Sergeev with fide rating 1983
losing against Veselinov, Dimcho with fide rating 2094

Of course there are also some wins against weaker players but it is impossible that a player who get this result get earlier 4 wins against GM's
with rating above 2550

see
19th International Tournament Zadar Open 2012 - Group A

http://ratings.fide.com/individual_calc ... -01-01&t=0

You cannot perform above 2550 in 9 games of one tournament in January and
score only 1 out of 5 in another tournament in march(when I ignore some wins against players with rating below 1950) of the same year when you play against players with rating 1950-2100 that means performance below 1900

If I go to 2012 I see again strange results
http://ratings.fide.com/individual_calc ... -12-01&t=0

draws against players with rating 1875 and 2005 and winning against players with rating near 2400

http://ratings.fide.com/individual_calc ... -09-01&t=0

score of 7 out of 8 when the only loss is against the weakest player

in 2011 I find the following strange result

http://ratings.fide.com/individual_calc ... -07-01&t=0

losing only against players that are weaker than 2000 when 2 of them are weaker than 1826
draw against a player with fide rating 2008 and winning against 3 players with fide rating above 2100

Note that I do not claim that everyone of the results is impossible by itself
(at least part of them can happen without cheating even if they are rare)
but the combination of them is clearly practically impossible without cheating and I do not care if the cheating is by computers or by losing part of the games on purpose.

Uri, do you have examples of players banned based on their results?

[Lyudmil Tsvetkov]

No, but one can see tape on the center of a persons chest. Now why would that be there?

If he had taken off his shoes the first time, this would be over. Instead he claims he has a problem with it, but later consents to do so...

Then he has a problem with removing his shirt but no problem removing his pants... right.

I will say it is wrong to consistently single this guy out. The proper solution would be to screen a random sampling (or all) of the winners after each round.

When you make up a story, you usually screw up the details, if the story had been true, the sentence would run like ' and a portion of a strap was seen'. But the statement say 'from side to side' instead'. Bermejo, the retired police officer and tournament organizer, was the only one to see the strap, so it is quite probable that he might not tell the truth; at least no one can confirm what he says, and Ivanov denies the fact.

I think concerning the shoes, stripping, etc., we miss some very important details in interpersonal relations, that only the immediate participants in the events are aware of. I am sure the events involving the conduction of a search are loaded with emotions, at least for the side that is being searched, but also for the persons that suggest it. It all depends on how the search request has been made. For example, if you are asked to take off your shoes, or otherwise you will be expelled, and the persons suggesting this is teasing you in some kind, either with gestures, words or otherwise, your dignity might tell you to refuse to comply. If you are gently adviced to do so, you might comply. The same goes true for undressing. It all depends on how different people have reacted, but we do not know the details. I suppose the particular events have been very nervous and in such conditions everything is possible. Not only that, but I am sure that the persons wanting a search conducted, usually direct competitors to Ivanov for ranking and money, like Dlugy and Guliev, did their best so that Ivanov gets nervous, does not comply, that eventually led to his elimination without play in both cases. Had he complied, he could have won instead and they lost. That was a possibility, and that is why they did him nervous.

[Lyudmil Tsvetkov]

Did you miss the part where he claims he beats both Houdini and Rybka ... 10 out of 10 times ... 100% against an entity that is playing over 3200 ELO !!! That alone should be enough to convince you or anyone on this board that this guy is full of crap!

That was obviously an emotional statement. When you get unusually good results, and they tell you, 'Hey, you are a weaky, how is it possible that you score that well?', you have to answer something in your defence, and, instead of saying, 'I am able to win the occasional game against Rybka and Houdini' , you suddenly say ' I am winning 10 out of 10', especially if someone is teasing you.

How do you judge it is "obviously" an emotional stament? It might as well be a genuine try to fool people which fits his current status...

How do you explain him improving 400-500 ( or even more) elo in a matter of months instead of years? IQ injections?

As we have even seen in world championship match in Chennai even the best players in the world are not immune to mistakes. What do you think about him not playing any blunder or forget blunder even a suboptimal move? We have seen statistical analysis of this from a statistician and a chess player and it was close to impossible.

He was not informed a few hours before the test Bulgarian Federation prepared for him he was informed much earlier and he stated he will attend it only to change his mind in the last minute and did not show up.

Here is the link to the mentioned Stats page.
http://en.chessbase.com/post/experts-we ... nce-060613
"Dr. Kenneth Regan: Also as my report says, I cannot imagine the statistical evidence in any case being stronger than for Zadar. As it comes to Ivanov’s performance at the “Old Capital” Open in Veliko Tarnovo, even when the games from the first two rounds are included, I get significant deviations in both the MM and AE tests, and an IPR of 3149 with 97.5% confidence above 2940."

How can you explain a performance rating of 2940 with % 97.4 confidence from a guy who is rating was only around 2000 before he suddenly reached the nirvana and solved chess?

Hi Taner.

I will not go into details, as it is meaningless. Just a few words:

- who told you his games do not have mistakes? when losing or drawing, he obviously makes mistakes, but even when winning, there are many mistakes in his games.
- you can certainly improve by couple of hundred elo, if you have been talented, did not have access permanently to computer to train with, then you bought one, then you have an excellent software, which shows you things you never saw before; you train a lot, and you quickly improve; people training without a coach improve usually slowly, people with a good coach much faster, and how fast do you improve when you are coached by Houdini or Stockfish, that surpass every human coach, be it Kasparov or Fischer themselves? Why most players training with advanced software do not improve that fast? Very simple, because they are studying all day long theory, and only play very few games with engines. If, instead of studying theory, you play against engines, you might improve astoundingly fast. People simply do not do that.
Kenneth Reagan's research is based on standard conditions, but having a coach that can teach you 10 times faster and more accurate to play chess is not a standard condition. This fact alone changes many variables.

- regarding the BCF lie detector case, I think this is ludicrous. Instead of Mr. Danailov playing some games against Ivanov after a thorough search to judge his level of play, they invented a test that would prove nothing even if a person fails it, as some people are naturally shy and would fail the test even if they say the truth. You just get disurbed by something subconscious, and you suddenly fail the test even if you say the truth. That is why this was the worst thing they could have thought of to handle the situation satisfactorily.

I should say that I do not know Ivanov personally and can not vouch for him, but I am inclined to believe his case.

[jhellis3]

Bermejo, the retired police officer and tournament organizer, was the only one to see the strap, so it is quite probable that he might not tell the truth...

And then gives him 50 euro out of his own pocket... which Ivanov accepts. Makes sense...

I have a bridge for sale if you are interested in buying.

[Henk]

For there is no good proof he is not guilty of cheating.

[M ANSARI]

You guys really ... you cannot be serious. But I guess it is human nature to believe in something no matter what the circumstances are. Here is something equivalent to what some are saying:

A building security guard sees on one of his monitors people wailing and waving their hands up in panic, and then sees smoke and huge flames erupting from a Christmas tree on the edge of the monitor. Yet he does not get alarmed because he cannot see a fire alarm in that sector go off and does not call the fire department or set off the manual override for the fire fighting system. When in court for his inaction and failure to avoid deaths and injuries of people, his excuse is that he did not see an alarm go off and he did not feel the heat of the fire or smell the smoke that was relayed on the monitor ... therefore he decided that the fire and smoke was not happening. I guess that is just how some people's brains function and all the power to them! The same happened with Lance Armstrong, he just kept a straight face and said everyone else is lying ... and quite a few people believed him. He did, after all, pass all those drug tests, so even though more than 20 people gave testimony that they saw him use drugs it was his word against all the rest. He passed the tests (doesn't matter how) so he is clean. I must say though, Ivanov's case is about 1000x more abvious than Armstrong's case.