This is not quite correct either. 1p is of course generally much stronger than an arbitrary amateur dan (even some (many? most?) 9d amateurs) and you can advance up the pro ranks quickly by winning certain games, but you can see the histograms yourself that while there&#x27;s a clump of 9ps everywhere but China there&#x27;s still a distribution. <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;senseis.xmp.net&#x2F;?ProfessionalRankHistograms" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;senseis.xmp.net&#x2F;?ProfessionalRankHistograms</a> Another problem is you don&#x27;t lose your 9p rank once you earn it. It would be nice if there was an international Elo system tracking all the 9ps of various countries to rank them properly... Maybe someone&#x27;s tried to calculate rankings independently? Still, I think it&#x27;s pretty uncontroversial that someone who&#x27;s been a lower-rank pro for longer than a few years is going to be significantly weaker than their higher-rank peers.