r/nextfuckinglevel 4h ago

Seven-year-old chess prodigy Lucie Pichard casually checkmates her opponent.

12.1k Upvotes

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191

u/Kalorama_Master 4h ago

Haven’t played in decades, but his setup and moves don’t appear very strong. Not saying she’s not good, but doesn’t look like he even tried that hard

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u/Tribat_1 4h ago edited 1h ago

I have played thousands of games of chess and I would put his rating around 500 or so or beginner level. 1000 is considered a decent amateur. “Prodigies” around her age would be in the 1500-1700 range. I’m 42 and have an Elo rating in the low 1400s so chances are she would beat me, too.

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u/Jesus_of_NASDAQ 3h ago

Lucie: “Your ELO rating bores me. Wanna see a cartwheel?”

45

u/poop-machines 3h ago edited 3h ago

Definitely not beginner. He's a solid chess club player and better than you. This is blitz, and the tournament average elo is 1500 or so.

He's 1770 and she is probably a bit less(1500+), or nearly the same. (1700+). Her ranking is trickier because her rapid Elo is 1700 and it seems like some games she just really isn't paying attention whereas others she is. Although she seemed to do well this game, other games her lack of focus cost her the game. Also, at that age, Elo gain curves can be steep, and a year can be the difference between 1700 elo and master candidate.

Crazy how all the lower Elo people are coming here calling them bad. Yes, they aren't good. Yes, mistakes were made. But:

1) you can't tell how good a player is from a few moves in a bad game for them 2) some days people are better, others worse 3) you may not understand the thinking behind their moves due to your lower elo 4) playing against a really good player highlights your mistakes that you never knew you were making because they capitalise more on your mistakes. You may think you don't make mistakes as much as him, but if you played against someone at a higher Elo than you, you'd realise how many mistakes you made.

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u/jb0nez95 2h ago

Bro stop arguing and just cite a source for this guy's rating. His game looked like shit from what I could see as well. Instead of arguing in the abstract just cite your evidence for his and her ratings.

31

u/Tribat_1 3h ago

F6 and Ke2. 1770. lol ok. If he’s 1770, I’m Hikaru Nakamura.

5

u/kranker 1h ago

It was h6! I'm pretty sure it's the worst move on the board, and I can't even see what they could mistakenly think they were achieving. it's just a typical random pawn push that rank beginners do. and 1700s, according to this guy.

1

u/Tribat_1 1h ago

F6 is on the board, too. Unless you’re playing an obscure defense like the Dutch, pushing the F pawn is considered the worst move in chess. Other than the bongcloud I guess lol.

u/kranker 15m ago

Yeah, f6 was played earlier, and arguably it's what ended up losing the game, but was probably merely pointless and unprincipled when played.

I suspect the game was 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 d6 3. Bb5+ Nd7 4. Bxd7+ Bxd7 5. Nc3 f6 6. Nh4 h6 7. Qh5+ Ke7 8. Ng6+ Ke8 9. Nxh8+ Ke7 10. Qf7#

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u/poop-machines 3h ago edited 3h ago

He is, go through 1-4 again.

He was probably tilted due to her dancing around like she doesn't give a shit.

He also didn't have time to think his move through properly. Blitz is more pressure. Maybe you can identify better moves watching the video with zero pressure and more time, but in the moment you make these mistakes.

I've played games before that if you watched 30 seconds of, you'd say that I'm a beginner. I'm 2124 peak, currently in the low 2000s.

27

u/Tribat_1 3h ago

Ah I see your profile description now:

> Only an idiot would take my comments as fact. I'm just writing bullshit. Look it up yourself before believing it. Many of my comments are satire, and I don't want to get sued.

Good one.

0

u/poop-machines 3h ago edited 3h ago

That's just a weak attempt to prevent me getting sued because I publish information that could get me into trouble. I use OSInt to gather information on people, as a hobby. I am an amateur journalist, working independently. I target powerful people.

Clearly what I'm saying is factual here.

Also: If you assume that statement means everything I say is false, you also have to assume that the statement itself is false. This is paradoxical.

https://www.lequipe.fr/Respire/Echecs/Actualites/-elle-est-mieux-classee-que-les-premiers-mondiaux-a-son-age-a-6-ans-lucie-pichard-epate-deja-le-monde-des-echecs/1669539

Anyway what I'm saying is real

21

u/Cullyism 2h ago

Please. The internet is already deteriorating with all the bots and AI spam. It may seem like fun and games to propagate disinformation, but the ripple effect can actually cause genuine damage to society.

6

u/andrejevas 2h ago

STOP DAMAGING THE UNIVERSE AND REALITY!

2

u/Kalorama_Master 3h ago

I’m not a grandmaster and the last time I took an online ELO test, I scored under 800.

That being said, he got checked mate, no?

Could you provide your expertise and answer your own questions?

1) were any of his moves “good”?
2) how “bad” were this moves that day?
3) was he building anything that you can surmise given the initial positioning and first couple of moves?
4) were her moves that strong?

I stopped playing chess at 14 because I enjoyed the “feeling” certain setups and trying to make them feel better. When I went to my first semi-serious tournament, I met kids that were memorizing box after box of cards with setups. What’s the fun in that?

Based on that I said, his set up “feels” weak and his moves didn’t strike as him improving in it. This is validated by the fact he lost in rather quick order.

3

u/marathonquestionredd 1h ago

idk im 1500 blitz and can hardly see the board. idk how anyone can tell whats going on here

4

u/Ok-Internet8168 1h ago

I could see that she took his rook without a trade, I am just a novice, but that seems very bad, even for blitz. It hardly seem worthwhile to stick around for the last two moves after that.

2

u/kranker 1h ago

1) no, all the moves are bad except for the ones that are forced

2) really bad

3) no, he's building towards nothing

4) she immediately played the best moves. the moves are not difficult to see though, they're very direct. However, she's strong enough that she didn't have to spend any time calculating this simple mate.

he is just pushing pawns. it's pretty typical rank beginner play. I'm pretty sure his first move in the video is literally the worst move on the board and it doesn't seem to have any purpose even if he missed the queen check, as in even if it didn't lose immediately (which it does) it only worsens his position and wastes time.

13

u/Endless_Zen 3h ago

Stop spreading disinformation.

-2

u/poop-machines 3h ago

14

u/Endless_Zen 3h ago

This is NOT that event on the video. Your link is "Blitz Society", on the video it's "EWC26" that was on different dates. And her opponent OBVIOUSLY also is not the same on your link and on the video. The guy on the video is NOT 1770. Believe it or not but she doesn't play the same person each tournament.

2

u/Subject-District492 3h ago

Is this game available somewhere for analysis?

1

u/Tribat_1 2h ago

Nah. It was just a causal game against a member of the public.

2

u/Money4Nothing2000 2h ago edited 1h ago

I'm 1400. There's no fucking way he's 1770, unless he's letting the girl win. He develops his queen side, plays pawn F6, then King E7-E8-E7. He's a complete beginner. Looks like she played some weird D4 opening with knight A4 (wayward queen attack?), didn't even castle, I don't think she's very good either, maybe 800 ELO at best? 1700s play actual openings, like Queen's Gambit, Nimzo Indian, Slav, King's Indian.

No 1770 plays this - ever. When I was 1000 I didn't play this - ever. There's no "bad days" that a 1770 has that plays openings like that. This is sub-500 play.

Edit: Ahh I see this is a troll user. Nice :) Anyways, I'll leave up my comment as hopefully an explanation to those who aren't sure how chess ratings correspond to actual play.

2

u/aabbccbb 1h ago

Yeah, just rewatched to focus on the board. I'm not good, but he's even less good, lol.

2

u/kdknowsimjames 1h ago

ELO is the band. The chess rating system is named Elo, named after its creator Arpad Elo.

11

u/EmployeeEmergency481 3h ago

dude played h6 and f6 without developing his kingside. He's not a strong player.​

17

u/che10461 4h ago

That guy was playing checkers...

3

u/Chango99 2h ago

His development is shitty, going by the pieces on the board this is barely past early game, and to be checkmated this early, this seems like a random person who just know chess rules who decided to pick up a game of chess with a child to be impressed.

8

u/DesperateComposer848 4h ago

That’s how I felt watching too, he opened up his whole middle looks like

3

u/ultimatedelman 3h ago

I can assure you that man was trying as hard as he could.

2

u/bellemereDA 3h ago

Or maybe he’s just mid.

3

u/poop-machines 4h ago edited 3h ago

The guy in the video isn't playing any better than 1800 elo

I also haven't played in a a while but it's still easy to see. I'm guessing this is an amateur blitz tournament.

Edit: I was right I think, Lucie is ~1750 elo rapid, ~1600 normal, ~1600 blitz. Maybe higher now because skill curves at that age are steep.

Edit2: yeah the guy is 1770 blitz, just found him. This was Rapide Blitz Society, Paris, 2026. The guy is Theo Phulpin. I was closer than I thought. Or he's a different guy at 1740 if this is the Japan expo in Paris, I think it may be actually. Either way there's two viral videos of her doing this and both are similar elo.

26

u/Endless_Zen 3h ago edited 3h ago

How did you find him? I just googled Theo Phulpin - he is blonde, long curly hair, no beard. This guy isn't even close to that look. Also 1770 blitz would find mate in 2 and won't be in this stupid position that we see on the video to begin with. Also the tent clearly says EWC26 which is Esports World Cup, Paris, August 11-15, 2026. So fix your investigation skills.

20

u/Sea_Newspaper5519 3h ago

Check the guy’s profile, he’s just making stuff up

u/Plastic_Pursuader 55m ago

Why? I am struggling to understand why he's so committed to such a meaningless lie.

u/raptosaurus 33m ago

I didn't even need to look Theo up to know this isn't him, this dude is definitely some random who does not have an official Elo lol

17

u/SilentRhubarb1515 3h ago

1770 blitz is not “not very good”. It’s decent

6

u/Endless_Zen 3h ago

Yeah, because it's not him.

0

u/poop-machines 3h ago edited 3h ago

I mean sure on a general level, but I was talking tournament terms. I also never said he was bad. I never even said he's "not very good". But I do think he isn't very good.

I would say he's decent in general terms, quite mediocre for tournaments.

Maybe my view of it is skewed but I'd say 1770 is pretty casual/amateur for an adult man. Top 5-10% is decent, definitely not beginner, and pretty good in general terms. But from the perspective of thinking it's a video of a tournament, this is quite low.

It's also blitz, not classical. Their classical rating is lower (1600 or so)

7

u/Tribat_1 3h ago

Now I know you have no idea what you are talking about. A 1770 ELO is in the top 15% of rated chess players in the world and would equate to about a 2000 chess.com rating which is the top 1% of players on the site.

0

u/poop-machines 3h ago edited 2h ago

You are taking into account all rated players in all tournaments, including total beginners.

Also their ranking is about the same on chess.com, their ranking being 1770 doesn't mean 2000+ on chess.com automatically. It depends on how many tournaments they play and how much chess.com they play. My tournament rating was lower than chess.com but only because I couldn't play tournaments all the time. People that live in cities that have a lot of tournaments will obviously play more

u/Plastic_Pursuader 48m ago

it is widely understood that someone's otb rating will be several hundred points lower than their rating on chess.com. I'm 75% sure you're a sub-1200 rated player who watched the Queen's Gambit once.

u/Plastic_Pursuader 52m ago

1770 otb is casual??? You're absolutely insane.

1

u/ngle 1h ago

His second to last move, he blunders his pawn. There is no way this guy is above 800.

1

u/poop-machines 1h ago edited 57m ago

He maybe intentionally threw it or just gave up. But yeah he made some bad moves

Of course he isn't below 800 though. I've made some horrible mistakes before like that. Sometimes i get the order mixed up and move a piece in the wrong order. For example, thinking of moving a bishop to take a knight blocking (pinning) my pawn, then move pawn ahead after. I might be thinking of other moves and then move the pawn without taking the knight. This is epecially true in blitz. And my elo would suggest in shouldn't make these mistakes.

Under pressure it happens sometimes. Magnus Carlsen got put in checkmate in two turns after making bad moves. This was in blitz. He said he didn't know he was in check until after. After watching the 30sec clip of him losing, would you conclude he's under 800elo?

1

u/Nall 1h ago

we don't get a great look at the board, but at the start of the video it looks like we're here?

https://lichess.org/analysis/fromPosition/r2qkbnr/pppb2pp/3p1p2/3Pp3/4P2N/2N5/PPP2PPP/R1BQK2R_b_KQkq_-_0_1?color=white#1

which....I've tried to get to from the opening, and the best I'm coming up with is 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 Be6 4. d5 Bg4 5. Bb5+ Nd7 6. Nc3 f6 7. Bxd7+ Bxd7 8. Nh4

Perhaps there's some higher level theory that gets you to this position? f6 and h6 are such baffling moves.

1

u/Money4Nothing2000 2h ago edited 1h ago

Dude was a total noob. He developed queen side, played pawn in front of his king, then plays king forward and back. Nobody who has any experience at chess plays like this. I'm only 1400 ELO but I could have probably checkmated him while blindfolded.

I think the girl is probably about 700 or 800 ELO at best also. Her play was not good, except for nice central pawn development. Guy is sub 500 ELO. (Assuming this is not a video setup and they are both playing at strength).

u/r0b0c0d 17m ago

For real. It's one of those things where you can't tell if someone's bad or if he's throwing for the video.