Currently, my club and most Saturday events that I attend in my area all supply boards, not clocks. Personally, I don’t like this option as I prefer my set over the sets that are provided but I believe that even though Black has the option to choose equipment if the event provides sets, those are preferred over Black’s preference.
Now on club nights, just about everyone will play on my personal set with one or two exceptions. I think I got lucky against them once and they point to be different set being the case. [Now my set fully meets the USCF requirements.]
Maybe I’m in the minority, but I prefer my personal set to the bulk cheap sets that many clubs purchase due to cost restrictions.
39A. Choice of equipment.
If the organizer of the tournament provides equipment conforming to the following standards, the players should expect that the organizer or TD would require the use of that equipment. If the organizer does not provide one or more elements of equipment, the players should agree on any that meets the standards or, failing such agreement, play with Black’s choice if it meets the standards. If Black does not provide standard equipment and White does, Black does not have the right to delay the start of the game to search for alternative equipment. The director is the final arbiter of whether the equipment in question is standard. See also 42, Chess Clocks; 42C, Standard clocks; and 42D, Delay clock preferable in sudden death.
TD TIP: Players of the black pieces sometimes misunderstand this rule when they want to use an analog clock on a game with sudden death time controls. If any part of a game is composed of a sudden death time control a properly set delay clock is preferred equipment and supersedes Black’s choice in cases where White has such a clock and Black does not (42D).
39A1. Black player late.
If Black is late for the start of a round, White makes the choice of equipment. Unless announced or posted otherwise, White also may choose which side of the board the clock is on and which side of the board to sit on. Black may not object unless White’s equipment is non-standard or White has not complied with any special announced or posted stipulations (16L), in which case Black’s clock continues to run. Again, the final decision is up to the director in questionable cases.
Let’s say that you’re one of the top players who never shows up with a board, pieces or clock. Now let’s assume that you are playing in a top section which happens to be FIDE rated so FIDE rules are utilized. You are in a long game and most all games around you are over. You look at your board as you are deep into the end game and realize that you are about to promote a pawn and need a queen. With FIDE rules you cannot simply turn a rook upside down, you must use a queen. But there are none nearby! If only you had brought your own set…
Of course this is not going to happen in events where the organizer provides the sets. So I applaud the organizers who do so. Players come empty handed at their own peril.
A player may stop the clocks only in order to seek the arbiter’s assistance, for example when promotion has taken place and the piece required
is not available.
In fact, a careful reading of the Laws of Chess would allow the arbiter to rule that when the player places an upside down rook on the promotion square, the pawn has been promoted to a rook. There is no explicit requirement that the base of the promotion piece must touch the promotion square, and there is no explicit rule that an upside down rook is to be interpreted as a queen.
It is true that, per FLC 4.4.d, an arbiter can rule that an inverted rook that touches the promotion square can simply be ruled a rook. In a FIDE-rated master section, I always advise players before the first round to get an arbiter if a queen is not available.
Where this rule can be a bit tough is in amateur sections of FIDE-rated events held in the US, where the players are likely not be as familiar with the FLC, and USCF rules do allow for inverted rooks to represent queens. In that case (which is less uncommon than it used to be), I am willing to give some latitude.
None of this should be an issue. The organizer should provide all the equipment. This is not normal in most USA events, but it is everywhere else in the world.
I have noticed more organizers providing equipment than years past, but still, the U.S. is far behind other countries in this regard.
Asking/requiring participants to provide equipment is beyond odd to me.
Why would you be speechless? Tim’s speaking from experience - and his matches mine. There isn’t much sponsorship money here, so providing clocks is a luxury that most organizers can’t afford.
Of course Ben Finegold is right. The organizer of any serious tournament in Europe (and by extension, most of the World) provides the equipment, including clocks. Every year, I see 2 or 3 reports from foreign professional players who comment about this “feature” of American events. The Europeans laugh at us!
The irony is that there is plenty of money in American tournaments. Indeed, no European open can match the prize fund of World Open. Alas, that’s the key: the money flows to the prize winners, forcing American organizers to cut corners elsewhere.
It is an economic decision that many American organizers make. Note that I wrote “many” but not “all”. For example, boards and pieces are set up at National Open and most events in the San Francisco Bay Area. Some tournaments even supply fancy pieces for the top boards.
Wait…the costs of purchasing, shipping, hauling, setting up, securing and replacing equipment would be borne by the players? Maybe it’s not such a horrific injustice.
So, without sponsorship, the solution is to (a) go out of pocket to cover equipment costs, (b) raise entry fees to cover equipment costs (especially clocks), with no prize hike, (c) reduce prizes, with the same entry fees, or (d) have players bring their own equipment. If you’re an organizer who runs tournaments a few times a year, or runs tournaments in a single place, or even in a limited geographic area, choices (a), (b) and (c) are more feasible - though, if you don’t want to take a financial bath, perhaps not.
It is absolutely an economic decision. Couldn’t agree more. And those who claim US organizers are failing in this regard have likely never had to make that decision while organizing events in the US.
The larger the organizer’s schedule and coverage area, the more impractical it is to set up equipment. This is a concept I had to explain to some new friends in London last year. When they asked why some US tournaments didn’t provide equipment, and pointed to e2e4 (a great operation, BTW) as an example of how to do something like that nationwide, I pointed out that the only comparable organizers to e2e4 in this country (USCF and CCA) have to cover 2-3 times the annual events that e2e4 does, in a country that’s six times the size, with fields that are up to 3-4 times as large as anything e2e4 does. Anyone who thinks that could easily be done, step up and put your money behind it.
Is it really that onerous for (99% of) chess players to bring their own set and clock, or that crazy to expect them to do so? Because there is actual sponsorship money in golf, if a professional golfer showed up at a tournament without his clubs he would be quickly provided (gratis) the pick of the pro shop, just for the free advertising that would provide. But he’d also be looked on as a flake who doesn’t have his act together. Of course a regional or local chess tournament is not the PGA. It is closer to a rec softball league, yet I’m not aware of leagues that are expected to provide gloves to all the players.
I started providing boards and pieces to my church basement tournaments because I saw the setting up of boards and removing them at the end of the rounds to be a major source of noise, disruption, and delay. For a very small price, I could significantly improve player experience.
I noticed that at the Thinker’s Challenge series in Detroit, they provide sets for 150 players. At my local scholastic, unrated, we provided sets and clocks for 76 players.
I don’t know what it’s like at the big money tournaments, though. Do they have higher equipment standards? I provide basic, unweighted plastic for all boards except board 1. Board 1 gets wooden boards. The scholastic provided the simplest clock available. (The analog black clocks with the white faces.) Obviously, delay clocks would be somewhat more expensive. Also, with more time between rounds, the extra time required for setup and takedown would make the disruption less. And maybe there’s more room between tables? That way a person removing the pieces from the board next to yours after their game finishes would be less disruptive.
In short, I don’t think providing equipment is a significant burden on the player, but having to set it up and take it down can be a problem during the tournament depending on the physical factors of the rooms and the timing of the rounds. I think tournaments where sets are provided often work better.
Others have touched on this, but I wonder from the perspective of how many 300 player tournaments are held elsewhere in the world? 500? 5000? (And where all equipment, including clock, is supplied for tournaments of such size?)
Board/sets = $4 per player… doable. Clocks = $15 per player (if buying in quantity.) Not so doable. (And let’s say one insists upon DGT’s for FIDE rated play… $30 per player? $40?) Half that for every additional tournament you run of the same size, sure (batteries notwithstanding,) if you can survive long enough.
The economics don’t work out for the majority of United States chess. Otherwise we’d be doing it.
Tim,
There is more to chess in the US than the CCA. Just because something doesn’t work for the CCA doesn’t mean that it is impossible.
For example, in Maryland we provide sets for all players and clocks for the top two sections. This includes 20 wood boards and pieces and 5 DGT boards. For the Washington International we provide all the equipment. It’s a pain to get them to and from the site but I believe that a good tournament experience requires more than just posting a pairing list (on time), and then writing prize checks.
Mike Regan
PS Note that most large tournaments can’t even get the pairings posted on time. As a TD, that’s my minimum requirement for a good tournament. Not even trying to start rounds on time is beyond my comprehension.