22c6 Clarification

Running Chess Tournaments
1

Scholastic K-3 U600 5SS G/40. Round 2 Pairings Posted - Players in room. Parent notifies TD that his son has the bye for round two (WinTD 4.0) but wanted to know if this was correct since he had a requested bye for round 3. TD checked and found that he wasn’t aware of bye until it was just mentioned. (only player in 40 to request a bye)

TD consults with second TD and concurs that this player (lowest rated player) should get the bye.

Players ends up in 3rd place with 3.5

However:
22C6 States:

What should have been done?

a) Re-do the pairings?
b) Award a 1/2 point bye instead of Full Point?
c) Keep the pairings and allow the Full Point bye

2

“A” is correct. There is no possible justification for “b”. The only argument for “c” would be if redoing the pairings would result in an unacceptable delay in starting the round, but it’s hard to see how that could be the case if you are using a computer for 40 players.

3

For the second round, or any round after the second round, it should be the lowest rated player with the lowest point score. As the lowest rated player after the 4th round could have a 4-0. You would not give a full point bye to a 4-0 because the player is the lowest rated player. If the lowest rated player is 0-4, then you could give the player a bye. If he was the lowest rated player, without asking for a bye, he would have gotten a bye in the first round.

a)Re-do the pairings?

Since the player did asked for a half point bye in round 3, the pairings are in error. If the player did play in round 2, then had an 0-2 as the lowest rated player, would have gotten a bye in round 3.

Since not knowing who had a bye in the first round, it would be the lowest rated player. Players that are new or unr will not get a forced bye as its important to get new or unr a rating out of the event. If the lowest rated player is 0-1, and the second lowest rated player is 0-1 also. If it is save to say both players would lose the second game, it only would change the bye one round difference. As the player did ask for a 3rd round bye, only change the bye from the person having the bye in the 3rd round, to having the bye in the 2nd round.

If the second lowest rated player, did go 0-1, 0-2 and 0-3. The second lowest rated player, just change having the bye from the 2nd round to the 4th round. As the pairing was not changed, and only if the second lowest player was 0-3 for the 4th round pairings.

Taking what could have been, its’ only in theory as I have not looked at the crosstables. Even if I did, making a claim of who should have had a bye and who should not would not be fair. As the TD should use the official ratings not the web ratings. Second the web rating can be higher or lower then the official rating, making a claim on pre-rating would not help.

If the player is the lowest rated player, and was not given a bye in the first round. As the player asked for a bye in round 3, then the TD did not give the player a bye in round 1, as the player asked for a round 3 bye. It looks like the TD forgotten the requested bye in round 3, for the pairings in round 2. As the TD did recall the requested bye in round 1, as he did not give the bye to the lowest rated player during round 1. As the bye was requested for round 3.

4

Yes in fact he was the lowest rated player with the lowest point score after round 1. (only rated player with 0) Overall lowest rated player was given bye in first round.

We were about 30 seconds from the scheduled start of the second round when this was brought to our attention.

5

The final score for the player involved was: L, 1B, 1/2 B, W, W = 3.5

22C6 applies
The correct thing to do was: A
redo the pairings
(or not allow the 1/2 bye in round 3, since you had no record of it.)

Redo the pairings would not take more than 30 seconds.
You would disturb at most one board (rather than making the whole section wait)
All players in the zero point group (but this one) were unrated, ranking of the unrated players is entirely arbitrary.
Pick any other game (I would pick the game on the last board, and pick the player “ranked” higher if colors work), pair this player with the person who is due the appropriate color, and give the opponent the bye. Fix the pairing in the program during the round.

6

No one is bigger on starting the rounds on time than I, but redoing the pairings for a tournament such as you describe would have taken no more than five minutes. The pairings were wrong and should have been corrected.

7

Questions:

  1. When the pairings were made for round 2, was the TD staff aware that the player had requested a round 3 bye?

  2. Was the round 3 bye entered into the computer before pairings were made for round 2?

  3. Does your particular pairing program respect this rule, i.e. would it avoid giving a player a full-point bye if a future half-point bye is already in his record?

Bill Smythe

8

A final option is just to swich the lowest rated player on the bottom board with the player getting the 2nd rd bye. Odds are that if the event continues to have an odd number of players, that player will get a bye later anyhow. This does not delay the event and can be done even after starting the other players games.

An important consideration in my opinion is that the child requesting a 3rd round bye not have to miss two games. Almost all of our young players want to play and this should weigh into the TDs decision.
Regards, Ernie

9

I agree with Ernie. Changes don’t come any easier than that one.

10

The odds would be the player would go 0-2 into the third round. It would just substitute the players having a bye in round 2 and round 3, if it was switched. Since the player was not switched in round 2, and then went 0-3 into the 4th round – would have gotten a bye in round 4 then round 2.