what
@Gutzh and
@Hurluberlu2 both say is true, but there is a wonderful irony about not worrying about rating: it lets you concentrate on the chess!
consider this, and i speak from personal experience:
- as a teenager, i was, in australia, an underrated junior, rated ~1200 where i was perhaps 1400-1500 in strength, though i can;t be certain for sure, as i rarely played anyone that wasn't an underrated junior in tournaments;
- as a 20-something-er, i rarely played a rated tournament, and only achieved a rating ~1400 ACF;
- it's a commonly known (in australia) fact that tournament players were underrated at the time i was a teenager, due mainly to the small pool of players playing tournaments in australia at the time, so that when i went to europe not long before i turned 30, i played a single tournament where i had a performance rating in excess of 2100;
- subsequent tournaments in europe had me consistently performing around that mark in europe, only to, when i came back to australia, perform around 1700 ACF in the few tournaments i played on my return.
so which number is correct?
once i stopped caring about that number, playing online here and other places, well, the results can be seen for themselves. at 50, i'm a lot slower than when i was a teenager, and it takes a little longer to see moves, which affects my quick play, and will eventually affect my long play as well, but for now, not caring about that number because my experience is that it's basically meaningless depending on where you were brought up, has led me to be around mid tier (to take the jrpg analogy of tiers) in faster time controls, yet a tier (maybe bordering on s tier? i don't think so, but who knows? and more to the point, who cares?) in longer time controls. i am living proof that rating means little, as can be evidenced by the wild variation in my otb results between australia and europe, as well as my onlie results between time controls. i play to enjoy the game.
those that know my play here, and have played the torunaments i play, will know what i'm about to say. forget about the number.
good luck and have fun