Diving into the black unknown

Running Chess Tournaments
1

I am a patzer who has taken upon himself to start a chess club at our early college high school due to the interest of several of my students. One thing led to another, and I have agreed (with no subtle coaxing from my principal) to host a chess tournament for the district. And, since we are going to do this for the district, wouldn’t it be great to invite schools from the neighboring district as well?

So…in April, we will be hosting our first scholastic chess tournament. It will not be USCF rated, although that is the goal for future years. I’ve searched in the local area for qualified TD’s who might be able to assist me, but haven’t been able to find anyone. I have met a nice gentleman who has the requisite 26 rated games, but hasn’t certified. He is going to assist me as the Game Hall TD (if there is any such thing) to help adjudicate gameplay, but for all purposes, I’m pretty much on my own for organizing the format and administration of the tournament. Therefore, I would appreciate some kind, patient assistance as I am working through the steps here.

What I have done to educate myself is I have read the literature provided by USCF under the Scholastic Chess section, bought and have read several times the USCF Rules 6th edition, bought WIN-TD and have used it to pair and record games in our after-school club to get a hang of the process, and have scoured the internet for anything I can find to assist me.

The basic format I am looking at:

o 5 rounds at G/30.
–Allows for the use of analog clocks and is a better predictor of when games will be over (I anticipate games over well before that

o Swiss Pairing
–Initial pairing is random and not using any ratings as very few players in the area will have one

o Combined Individual/Team categories.
–Three sections of K-4, 5-8, and 9-12. This marries up with the grade break-point of the schools in the area (combining the intermediate and middle schools into the second section)

o Awards to Section 1st and 2nd place winners, Grade level winners (who were not 1st/2nd place section winners), 1st and 2nd Team winners by section, and Good Sportsmanship medals for all other participants who demonstrate good sportsmanship and play at least 4 rounds. Those players who do not register by the early registration (2 weeks prior) are eligible for place awards, but not good sportsmanship awards (This allows me to more accurately order the number of awards.

o One requested 1/2-point bye is allowed for those who register by the early registration date.

Here’s my questions (more to certainly follow)

  1. Does the basic format above make sense?
  2. Should I allow last round 1/2 point byes?
  3. How should I enforce 5-12 grade players who do not annotate their games? USCF rules awards time to the opposing player. Quite frankly, I would rather take time away from the non-annotating player to provide certainty in when rounds complete. Either way, what is the proper time penalty? I believe the rules for those who are not capable of scoring is a 5% penalty. That would be 90 seconds in a G/30 game. What is the equitable penalty? I believe that some tournaments use 5 minutes. If both players are not annotating, do both players lose time?
  4. Rules question…the rule book makes a difference between a sudden-death and non-sudden-death game. A G/30 game, where there is a loss on time is a sudden-death game, right?
  5. If I do not have enough clocks and players do not have their own (which I would imagine less than 10 percent will), how do I resolve this? My intent is to spur the interest in chess, not to penalize those students who have not purchased a clock (our district is a low-social economic status district).

I apologize for the long preamble to this post. But I would appreciate any assistance you can provide. Yes, I know it would be better to find and pay for a certified TD, but that is not practicable at this point.

Thanks again.

2

You don’t have to have 26 games to become a certified club TD, you do have to have an established rating to move up to local TD (or higher.)

What part of Texas are you in? Have you checked with the Texas Chess Association? Do you have access to the TD/Affiliate Support Area to look for TDs in Texas or nearby states? (It won’t always tell you what part of the state they live in, though, due to privacy concerns.)

Depending on how many people you’re expecting, having a few assistants to help with things like posting pairings and maintaining order is helpful, even if they’re not certified TDs.

With young inexperienced players, few games will last the full 60 minutes. What I usually tried to do when I have many more players than clocks was to watch games closely and start putting clocks on them after 30-40 minutes, just splitting the time equally.

3

Mr. Rueschhoff,

I currently chair the Tournament Director Certification Committee. Please PM me your email address and I can answer all your (basic) questions and more.

Alex Relyea

4

Sure, but only if requested a round or two ahead of time, say before the start of round 3. The same deadline should apply to rescinding a previously requested last-round bye.

I agree. 5 minutes off the clock for not keeping score. Remember, though, that when a player’s time drops below 5 minutes, he is no longer required to keep score.

True, but so is 40/60 SD/30, where only the final control is sudden death. Some rules are different for the initial (non sudden death) control than for the final (sudden death) control.

Just start most games (the games where neither player has a clock) without clocks. If a game without a clock threatens to run overtime, slap a clock on it, splitting the elapsed time (since the start of the round) equally between the two players. Be sure, though, that you leave each player with at least 5 minutes.

Bill Smythe

5

PM sent. Thanks

6
7
8

Expect few if any of the players to have clocks (at this point). We usually hope that the school teams might have some, but particularly newer ones won’t.

You have two constraints: the number of clocks and the number of floor TD’s available to put clocks on games. At G/30, most games will be done in under a half hour. At that point, take a quick look at the remaining games. With some, it will be fairly clear that the game won’t (or at least shouldn’t) last that long—one player will be way, way, ahead and it will just be a question of whether that player can bring the game to a finish. There will be others where the game is still complicated (often with the players playing at a deliberate pace). I usually like to put clocks on the games where time might be an issue with 10 minutes per player (thus put them on with 20 minutes left in the session), so you want to have the clocks set for 10 minutes per side in advance. Triage the games based upon the number of clocks you have and remember that it will probably take a minute or so per game to interrupt the players, insert the clock, explain what’s happening and restart the game. What I will do is to go up to the game, ask the players to stop, tell them that we need to put a clock on the game to make sure it ends on time, note that each has 10 minutes and that 10 minutes is a lot of time so they should concentrate on playing good chess, but to make sure they hit their button after each move. If the clock can be on either side (given the room setup), ask Black on which side she wants the clock. Find out who’s on move. Wish good luck and start the appropriate clock.

9

It’s helpful to have a pre-event player meeting where you explain what clocks are and how to use them, and let them know that you will start putting clocks on games with about 20 minutes left in the round.

10

The game will be brought to a finish. The question is will it be by checkmate or by stalemate, five fold repetition, or the 75 (50) move rule. If neither player has any pawns and the weaker player has no material, then you can deputize practically any spectator and ask him to count moves. Otherwise it might require some minimal chess knowledge.

Alex Relyea

11

For your first event, I wouldn’t be too concerned about scorekeeping.

But if you want to incentivize scorekeeping, have a prize that only those who have a reasonably accurate scoresheet are eligible for. A tournament quality plastic set and vinyl board makes a great prize and isn’t all that expensive.

One of the HS teams that came to our state championships one year had their home economics class make cloth bags with drawstrings to store sets (and clocks) in. They brought extras and were selling them for about $5 each, and ran out.

12

Yes, but that’s besides the point I was trying to make. The lopsided game isn’t one that is likely to need a clock—it may need some other type of intervention as you mention, but that will be later on after the games that need clocks have been handled.

13

Agree.
In this area I’ve found that you can almost always get by with clocks for 15% of the boards (if you have multiple sections with different finishing times then that becomes 15% of the boards in the section with the largest number of players that don’t already have clocks). The serious players that will spend their time often have clocks of their own and the less serious players finish quickly. The games to watch out for are often those where somebody inexperienced at keeping score is faithfully writing down every move.

Some TDs put down clocks with no delay but I prefer to keep the delay and let the players know about it.

14

wait, what? five-fold repetition?

…scot…

15

I think he’s referring to the fact that this sort of rookie probably doesn’t understand this rule and won’t call it, but when it gets to five the TD can call it.

16

I have a couple of questions. Is this event going to run on a school day or a weekend? When do you plan to start the first round? Are you taking entries on site on game day or are you only having advanced entry and a cutoff date?

The reason that I asked is because you may have problems arise that are difficult to control. I have run a number of non-USCF rated tournaments with 80+ players for an education Intermediate Unit. We settled on a team vs. team format for the given schools rather than an individual/team format as simpler to run and easier to explain to the schools and the personnel who are engaged to run the event. Since we were dealing with kids and schools that had little experience, it was better to not complicate it too much at first. Our goals were educating the kids in following the format we devised and fun. We established early on that the schools must send in all of their data, including ratings, if any, far in advance on the entry form that was created. Most of the important organizing work is done weeks or months in advance. Minor changes on rosters on game day are easily dealt with. The schools liked the team vs. team format since it mirrored the sports rivalries of the region’s communities.

Since our tournament was during a school day, we had to fix our starting times and round times with some wiggle room for long games, lunch for the kids that was provided by a sponsor, and a hard end time because the kids had to be on buses back to their schools. We settled on four games rather than five because there was no way to start a tournament at 9 am and finish at 1:45 pm and do all of the things we wanted to do as far as instruction. One of the early problems was having a school or two show up late because of distance to the event site and traffic. We had only a little time to wait for them because of the hard end time we had to deal with. Taking entries on site on game day would have introduced additional problems, so we decided against that. A tournament on a weekend would be ideal, but the IU nixed that because the site was closed on weekends. Our planning ended up being year round because booking the site had to be done a year to 18 months in advance to secure the playing rooms; the IU is that busy providing conference space and educational opportunities for kids and teachers. Because of the size of the available rooms, we settled on a maximum of twenty teams and 80 players plus some alternates. Fortunately, we were able provide 40 sets and boards so that the schools, which varied in socioeconomic status, did not have to bring anything with them. I provided twenty+ sets and boards, and the IU purchased sets, boards, trophies, and chess books to give to the schools to accommodate the kids and the chess programs. The kids usually ooh and aah when they see all of the sets lined up and color coded cards with match and board indicators so that they know where to go. We also have match scoring sheets for them to fill out each round which show the color on each board for both teams. The kids, even the youngest ones, learn the system pretty fast.

At first, the IU wasn’t sure what it got itself into. There were fears we would not run things on time or not finish on time. We spent a session considering all sorts of problems and what if’s in order to anticipate what might go wrong. A couple of individuals were trained to help me with the work I do in directing a tournament. I spend time every event getting the administrators to relax, that everything will work like clockwork. The administration has secured sponsors and a foundation to provide lunch and T-shirts for the kids. We have a player who is a master, like me, to provide instruction and go over games between rounds on demo boards I provide while I work on pairings and making sure the wallcharts are complete. To keep the kids who are done busy, we have puzzles and other activities to do. There are sheets for the kids to fill out at the end to give us feedback about the event and what they liked or did not like about it. At the end we give out team trophies to the top three teams and Board prize medals. We also give out a number of books to the schools on chess, chess instruction, and academic research on chess. The IU has made videos concerning the project to amplify the educational aspects of chess. Also, as part of our mission, we provide instructional materials to the schools long before the event on rules of the competition, information on writing down the moves if the kids wish to do that, and some instructive material on openings and endgames so that the kids know something about chess before they come to the event.

My suggestion is that before the tournament you run a number of simulations on your software based on the format you choose to see what problems might arise in doing pairings and the speed with which you can get things done so that you can avoid delays in posting pairings. (I use pairing cards and pre-filled wallcharts with all of the players’ names, their schools, and teacher/sponsors.) Also, provide to the schools information on the times and format. Do not go too much into the weeds of the Rulebook. The kids likely will know very little about rules, notation, or even how to play the game. Keep it simple and instructional. Don’t worry about the quality of play or whether your event conforms to all of the niceties of a USCF rated event. You may come up with even better ways to run your event than we did or the folks who run chess events in your region. Remember, focus on fun and instruction rather than punishing kids for making mistakes. Sometimes you will have hands raised asking what to do about having both Kings in check by multiple pieces or see a game with a lone King vs a lone Queen. As long as the kids learn how to conduct themselves properly with sportsmanship and learned how to deal with the format, you will be successful. Good luck!

17

Occasionally you’ll see a lopsided game where the player with the weaker position moves slower and slower.

18

I will typically (gently) suggest resignation—a player like that is often relieved that they don’t have to keep defending a hopeless position.

19

Yes, not to mention isn’t likely to have a reasonably accurate scoresheet.

Alex Relyea

20

Wow. Thanks for such an involved and complete reply. I snipped your post because I have a stupidly long reply. I’ll address your questions the best I can.

Our tournament is going to be on a Saturday. I am planning on tournament check-in at 8:00, a welcome ceremony (to orient players, coaches, and parents to the facility and where things are) at 8:40 with the first round at 9:00.

We are having early registration with the early registration ending two weeks prior to the tournament. I am doing this so I have time to ensure I have enough awards ordered. I will allow late registration up to the beginning of the tournament, but they will not be eligible for the “good sportsmanship award” (which is essentially a participation award with strings attached–must play at least 4 rounds and play under good sportsmanship.) I am making it clear that late entries may be turned away if we are unable to accommodate with space.

As for the combined versus team vs team discussion. I purchased WinTD software that does this pretty easily (unless there are some pitfalls that I haven’t discovered yet.) I’ve been in contact with each of the school chess sponsors and have explained that essentially the team standings will be based upon each team’s four top-performing players. No one has objected or had questions. Are there pitfalls ahead with this that I haven’t thought of?

As for early submittal of ratings, I have decided–since this is not a rated tournament–to forgo asking for ratings at all. We are not running this as a rated tournament and I felt that introducing the request for ratings would spur more questions from non-rated students (and their parents) than I wanted to field.

Part of the reason that I have an early registration is so that I can enter everyone’s information early. I’m looking at initially putting everyone’s data into Excel (it is a format that I am very comfortable with, the night before the tournament I will save it as a .csl, and then import the data into WinTD. I have discovered that I can use the “sp” column to denote the section for each student and have tested this a few times.

At the “check-in table”, I will have entry forms for late registration. I will pre-mark these with “LATE REGISTRATION” so that we know these need to be entered into WinTD.

Are there minefields in the path of such a course of action as described above?

As for “long games”…you are speaking of an experience that I don’t understand through my inexperience. If we are playing G/30, I am not anticipating a round that starts at 9:00 to have any games that run much more than 75-80 minutes at the most. Where is the error in my thinking? I’m sure, based upon your comment, that there is one, but I don’t see where.

Where I see delays is with late registration and late check-in. I am announcing that entrants who check-in after 8:40 will have to forfeit their first round. This should allow for me to have the pairings being posted when I begin our welcome orientation and then send the kids to the Game Hall at 8:50 for a start at 9:00. (I anticipate we will start a few minutes early).

It’s the elementary school kids that scare me. To compensate for wayward children, I’m planning on a few built-in provisions.

First, I am color-coding each section. Elementary will be red, Middle School will be White, and High School will be Blue. In addition to using the 101, 201, and 301 table board numbers, the table numbers will be printed on these colors.

Postings and standings will be posted under signs in these colors. Additionally, I am preparing name tags that are color coded and have the names pre-printed along with their section.

I will have student volunteers who will be my “guides” who will be armed with the pairings for that round. They will be assist students in finding their board as well as verifying that Johnny is at the right board and sitting in front of the right color pieces.

We will have pre-printed scoresheets that my volunteers will set at each table with the board and round number already on them. When students finish a round, they will exit and go to the table that is right outside the cafeteria/Game Hall. I will have volunteers there to take each player’s score sheets, make sure that the result on each matches, and then record onto a separate 3x5 card the result. The 3x5 card and both scoresheets will be paper-clipped and one of my volunteers will take it to administration section where the entries will be put into Win-TD. At the administration section, the results of all three documents will be confirmed and entered into the computer. When the results entered are double checked, the score sheets will be filed under the team so that coaches can take home all score sheets or distribute them to their players. The 3x5 card will be put into a binder that is–yup, color coded. I am purchasing some 3x5 photo holders that will allow me to view four cards on each side of the insert. I will document dividers between each round. This should give me an easy way to organize and refer back to game results if there is an issue.

I’m trying to dummy-proof this as well as I can. Where am I erring?

With current tables, I can comfortably seat 42 games. If I have more than that, there are some tables that are too big that I can fold up and bring some additional 6-foot tables in. I estimate that I can then put another 10 games into the cafeteria. This allows me to run 52 games of 104 players. Any more than that, then I have to either limit further entries, move games a bit closer together (probably my elementary section which will probably have few players taking notation), or open an adjoining classroom and having one of the sections play in there. Right now, I will make a decision on that if I have that problem later.

As for testing my software, I’m already ahead of you. I’ve scored a mock tournament three times now (Fred Flintstone is REALLY GOOD!). I’ve tested printing. I’ve decided to print first to pdf and then print to the printer. I found I can control what I’ve completed for a round easier that way (using a filename format that easily identifies each file by round and section).

The only issue I’m having is that WinTD crashes when I go execute an award report. But, I think if I run an x-chart, I can determine my top-in grade and section leader easily enough by printing one off and highlighting my grade winners.

Now, Steinbeck wrote of the best laid plans of mice and men…what am I missing? I’m sure it’s quite a bit.

Thanks again for your kind post. It has made me rethink what I’m planning.