Scholarly Research: Vera Menchik Is the First Female 2700 Club Member — A Mathematical and Statistical Demonstration
Bill Wall has a webpage on the wayback machine about Vera Menchik: Click this link.
According to this page, her peak historical rating would be around 2390 in 1931. Really? That’s not even an IM (International Master: ratings go from 2400–2499 and 2500+ is a Grandmaster).
On Chessmetrics (a rating system by Jeff Sonas), he has her at 2535 in 1929, which is just above a GM. During 1931, he has her between 2460 and 2470 throughout the year — at least this is an IM rating. Click this link.
I asked on Quora if Vera Menchik was a 2700 player: Click this link. The feedback I got was a resounding NO!! I guess Elo himself (the guy that developed the Elo rating system) calculated her to be 2350. He was referred to as Dr. Elo to give this figure authority. So, I will use this as her rating in the first diagram below to show that it cannot be this.
I was inspired to write this article on Medium by Vera Menchik. She won the Women’s World Chess Championship a bunch of times. The only one I can get any ratings info on is the 1939 Women’s Chess Championship. Vera won that one convincingly with a score of 17 wins and 2 draws for 18/19. The next nearest competitor was pretty far behind. I…
