Club TD's

I recently faxed in an application to become a Club TD. I was just wondering if anyone knows what the turnaround time is on that. I know with the move to TN things are probably crazy, and things may have been lost, etc…etc…

I only ask cause its been a few weeks now, and Im quite anxious to start assisting at the Club Tournament level. Thanks

Talking with new directors, the paperwork has taken 4 to 12 weeks. Since the move has been made, email Larry Pond lpond@uschess.org . Just to make sure the paperwork is on the desk, not in a different state.

Thanks for the info. I’ll give it another two weeks then before I start pestering anyone.

The other questions I had were basically in regard to becoming a good TD. Besides going to view other tournaments, and reading the rule book:

Are there specific sections in the rule book that I should focus on?

And what are the most typical violations that players try to get away with?

Furthermore, at the club level, how stringent should I really be?

Oh boy. Where to begin?

First, you really need to understand the pairing system and how to pay prize money. Even if, like most of us, you’ll be using a computer to do pairings, you have to understand when to override the computer, or at least how to justify the pairings. The computer said so isn’t going to cut it. Besides, you’ll frequently run into parents, spouses, or just new players who ask “How do you decide who plays who?” or something similarly ungrammatical. You need to be able to answer that question. Prize money is likewise very important. You don’t want to find out that you’ve made a $100 mistake because players tend not to be very forgiving in that aspect.

Since you can always stop the clock to look up a rule, don’t be afraid to do so. The actual rules of play aren’t so important to memorize, just understand. No player is going to be upset if you take five minutes to come up with the correct ruling, and if you’ve read the posts here, you’ll notice that there can be a great deal of disagreement as to what the correct ruling is.

I rarely notice players trying to “get away with” anything. More often they aren’t sure of the rule.

Even if you’re just a club TD, the players in your events have the right to expect that they will be treated professionally. That means that you have to follow all the rules, whether you like them or not. It’s not fair to have a player have to wait around for 90 minutes, for example, for his opponent to show up when the rulebook says he has to wait for an hour. If you don’t like that rule (or any other) then make sure that you announce the change in pretournament publicity and at the site. If players don’t like it, they won’t show up. Don’t go easy on a player just because you’re a club TD because that isn’t fair to the opponent.

Finally, if you ever need any help just ask here. That’s what this forum is for.

Alex Relyea

In addition to studying the key sections of the rulebook (time control situations and prize distribution probably cause the most rulings), try to find an experienced TD in your area and offer to serve as an assistant TD for some events.

Few TDs will turn down such an offer, and that’s a good way to gain experience.

Make the tournament site as the most positive, make the tournament site positive, to give a positive state of mind. Give the players more then they ever would expect. Give the players room, give them some food, give them a feeling they are taken care of.

Players that feel at home at a tournament site, will have a positive state of mind. Having players meet with a negitive state of mind, will find ways to show malice to each other. Having a minor problem, that could be over looked between the players themselves – with a positive state of mind. If they are in a negitive state of mind, a simple problem will break down were the director is needed to settle a problem. If the director has to make a judgement call, for a problem – the director always comes out the loser.

Have looked and watched boards, if the players are in a positive state of mind, they will over look rules being broken on their own board. With a positive state of mind, the players will work it out between each other. If the players are in a negitive state of mind, they will point out every little problem real or false between each other. If the players are in a negitive state of mind, as a director you are working harder. People have better long term memories, when they are in a negitive state of mind, then a positive state of mind.

Some of the rules most commonly causing disputes are touch move, illegal moves, and annoying behavior.

Touch move is always one of the hardest situations to rule on. I’ve found that in a very large minority of cases I’ve ruled on, that the player was not aware of all three parts of the touch move rule (deliberately touching your piece, releasing your piece, deliberately touching your opponent’s piece) or was not aware that an accidental brush is not considered a deliberate touch (I’ve lost count of the number of times a player tried to claim a touch move because a piece was brushed by the opponent’s elbow while the opponent was making a move). In the majority of the cases both players are honestly describing the situation in mutually contradictory summations, and with experience you may be able to determine that a player may be honestly describing what he thought happened than what actually happened (a hand hovering over a piece is a common cause of one person thinking the hand actually deliberately touched the piece). In a small minority of cases there was a touch move and a player is falsely denying that the touch move actually occurred, and those cases are going to be major headaches. Without a neutral witness you have almost no justification to rule that a piece was deliberately touched and must be moved (or captured if it was the opponent’s piece). In one case, unbeknownst to the players, I was a neutral witness and saw a player pick up a piece move it a few squares and then return it and claim he never touched it. When I forfeited him it was over the ethics clause violation by willfully lying about his actions, not the touch move violation.

As long as there is a scoresheet, illegal moves can be resolved. I’ve noticed that almost all illegal moves are unintentional errors, often being caught by the player making the move. Remember that a move is not considered complete until the clock is hit, so if a player releases a piece in an illegal move and then notices it and corrects it before hitting the clock then there is no need for a 2-minute adjustment to the opponent’s clock. Note the 10 or 2 move limitation on calling an illegal move. Prior to the rulebook being changed to explicitly state you can’t claim an earlier illegal move after a legal checkmate, I used this to resolve a case where one player decided around move 10 that he couldn’t get his scoresheet to match the position on the board. He reset the board and started the game over, while the other player simply accepted that. Since the game went more than 10 moves before he checkmated his opponent I treated the position reset as an illegal move, ruled that it was too late to call it, and explained to the opponent that they must bring such situations to the attention of the director at that time, not after the game is over and done with.
If there is not a valid scoresheet then you may have to do retrograde analysis to help make your decision. I’ve made some decisions over the years where I’ve admitted that I’m not sure exactly what happened so I’m making the best ruling I can in the situation.

Annoying behavior is subjective. Remember first that you are the final arbiter on whether or not behavior is annoying, second that you decide on what to do about it (there are suggestions in the rulebook to help you), and third that if you think behavior truly is intentionally annoying then you need to actually do something. Remember that in general spectators have no special rights and that you can be more forceful in dealing with spectator behavior that a player considers annoying.

Especially when ruling in scholastic games, I’ve found that the emotional level of the players is much calmer if I’ve approached the situation as a chance to teach the players the rules. I’ve often told both players that I think they are telling the truth as they see it, that I don’t think either player is lying, but that what actually happened isn’t always what we think happened. When a player is citing a non-existent rule (such as a 15-move draw rule, a 50-move maximum game duration, etc.) I’ll tell players (at least the first time) that they were misinformed about the rules, as opposed to saying that they are lying to their opponents about the rules (that is almost always the actual case, so I initially give them the benefit of the doubt). If you accuse a player of lying then you obviously upset the player you are accusing and you also end up upsetting the player you are ruling in favor of by making that player think their opponent is a lying scoundrel that they are stuck playing. If a player violates a rule in ignorance, teach the player the rules without hanging the player out to dry. If a player willfully violates the rules then much stronger action is justified.

Tiebreaks (for trophies and other non-divisible prizes), divisible monetary prizes and pairings will generate many questions.

Remember that every tiebreak system is unfair, but the ones recommended are designed to reduce (that’s reduce, not eliminate) that unfairness in a consistent and explainable manner. If you use any tiebreak order other than the preferred order in the rulebook you’ll want to let people know.

Read the rules about prizes. This can be a touchy area.

Read the pairing rules. They are involved and difficult to explain (particularly when you are explaining accelerated pairings and team-pairing constraints to a parent bringing a child to the child’s first tournament), but try to give a decent explanation.

Over the years, particularly with our area’s scholastic tournaments (200-500 kids per tournament), I’ve discovered that it is worthwile to calmly answer questions even when they come from a parent that is somewhat confrontational. You may have to ask them to wait a few minutes because you are in the middle of something else, but as long as you really do talk with them in a timely manner they will usually accept that. If you answer calmly you can reduce the tension level and make it more likely that the questioner will actually listen to your explanation rather than simply try to create a confrontation. Handled properly you often end up creating a substitute explainer who later repeats your answers to other parents that have those same questions. That is why I often tell people that one way you can classify parents is into four groups: parents who know what’s going on and why and who have very few questions (easy to handle and often are willing to explain things to other parents so that you don’t need to answer the questions those parents would otherwise ask you); parents who don’t know what’s going on and insist on finding out (they can eat up some of your time, but as long as they listen to your explanations it is worth talking to them - they often transition to the first group and are sometimes even more proactive in listening for and answering questions other parents have); parents who don’t know what’s going on, dont want to ask questions, and get frustrated and pull their kids from chess (these parents are very easy to deal with because they are virtually invisible, but I don’t want anybody to actually be in this group); parents who want a confrontation (fortunately a very small percentage - if calm conversation doesn’t work and the rules have been properly enforced then remember that your responsibility is to all of the players, not just one complainer)

Remember that you are human and might have made a mistake (I know I’ve made some over the past couple decades), so when somebody is questioning what is going on be willing to take a second look at it and see whether or not your decision was right or wrong, be willing to correct yourself if your decision was wrong, and be willing to stand your ground if your decision was right. You may need to explain the appeals process if you cannot show how your decision was right, which may result in the person questioning your decision feeling that they did take it to a higher level in the proper manner, may result in an erroneous decision of yours being corrected, or may result in a decision being ruled as covered by TD judgement (your sense of judgement might still be questioned on a personal level).

Also remember that the perfectly run tournament does not exist, but as long as you honestly do your best then you are providing a great opportunity for the players. After the first hundred I stopped counting the tournaments I’ve done. I love doing them. They have their headaches and I love it when they’re over, but I do love doing them.

Just by way of confirmation - I recently (8-10 months ago - well before the move to TN) got back into directing and applied for a club TD. It took 3 months or longer - so the wait can be significantly more than is expected. If you have an email address to inquire whether your application made it, use it :slight_smile: It was taking so long I sent in a letter and then still didn;t hear for a long time. I didn’t know about the forums yet or I would have asked. I thought for a while I was turned down, and cou;dn’t understand what in the world I could have POSSIBLY done to earn that fate :slight_smile:

The answers might depend on the scope of the events you intend to direct – scholastic vs open, large vs small, etc.

In small open tournaments, problems with rules violations are likely to be non-existent, or nearly so. Instead, you should worry about how to make pairings properly, how to get rounds started reasonably on time, etc.

For small tournaments, use pairing cards rather than pairing software. You’ll learn MUCH more that way.

Close registration 30-60 minutes before the start of the first round. (If, unfortunately, you are directing a tournament designed by somebody else, this may be outside your control.)

There are various “small” tricks you can use when directing using pairing cards. These tricks, individually, may seem like no big deal, but taken together, they can make a big difference in the efficient running of a tournament. Here are the steps:


  1. Make the pairings.

Some TDs make the mistake of laying all the cards out on the table, so that all are visible simultaneously. Unfortunately, this requires too much table space, if there are more than a handful of players. And it’s poor technique, anyway.

Instead, in the first round, simply arrange all the cards in a single pile, highest-rated on top. Split the pile in half by counting from both ends toward the middle. Put these two piles side by side, with the top-half pile on the left, bottom-half on the right.

Decide (via coin toss or whatever) who gets the white pieces on board 1. Grab the top card from each pile, one with each hand, then put one card on top of the other (the card of the player getting the white pieces goes on top of the card of the player getting the black pieces). This is your first pairing. Put these two cards face down, in a third pile off to one side. Do not write anything on the pairing sheet or pairing cards at this point.

Grab the next card from each pile, and pair them similarly. Remember to alternate colors – if the higher-ranked player had white in the first pairing, then the lower-ranked should have white in the second pairing. Put these cards, again face down, on top of that same third pile off to the side.

Continue in this manner, remembering to alternate colors. The easiest way is just to alternate which of the two cards goes on top of the other – e.g. first pair right on top, second pair left on top, third pair right on top, fourth pair left on top, etc.

In no time you’ll have all the cards in that face-down pile off to one side. This pile of cards is now in “pairing order”.


  1. Write the pairing sheet.

Turn that face-down pile face up, and begin writing the pairings on the pairing sheet. First card has white on board 1. Second card has black on board 1. Third card has white on board 2. Fourth card has black on board 2. Etc. There is no need to “think” here – this is a purely mechanical process. As you write each pairing, turn the corresponding card face down into another pile. That way the cards remain in pairing order after you have written the pairings. Write the pairings only on the pairing sheet, not on the cards, at this point.


  1. Start the round.

Post the pairing sheet, announce that pairings are up, make your opening announcements, and start the games.


  1. Write the pairings on the cards.

After the games have started, retire to the now relatively quiet TD table and write the pairings on the pairing cards. Remember that the cards now come in pairs. If the top card is player number 23 and the second card is player number 1, write “W1” on the top card and “B23” on the second card, to show that player 23 has white against player 1, and player 1 has black against player 23. Put these two cards, together, face down in a pile to the side, so that again the cards will remain in pairing order.


  1. Make the wall chart.

Go through the pile, starting at the top, looking for player number 1 (he’ll be either the first or second card, depending which player has the white pieces). Write this player’s name, rating, ID number, and first-round pairing on the wall chart. Continue through the pile looking for player number 2 (he’ll come up pretty soon, either immediately or with two other cards intervening). Write this player’s wall chart entry. Continue in this manner to the end of the pile. (Keep the cards in pairing order, by putting each card face down to the side as you encounter it.)

You’ll need to go through the pile twice, once for the top-half players, once for the bottom half.


  1. Post the wall chart.

Post the wall chart next to the pairing sheet. This is better than posting them far apart, or in different rooms. Posting them side by side allows the players to look at both simultaneously, and eases the TD’s task of keeping the wall chart up to date as games finish.


Keep steps 1, 2, and 4 separate. Do NOT try to write each pairing on the pairing sheet (or on the cards) as you make that pairing. Additionally, do not combine writing the pairing sheet with writing the cards – this slows things down. There is no need to write anything on the pairing cards until after the round has started.

Well, that’s a start. In subsequent rounds, similar (but not identical) techniques can be used. (More later, if anybody wishes to continue this discussion.)

I never cease to be amazed by how many club, local, and even senior TDs – even some with years of experience – operate less efficiently, by combining steps, or by spreading the cards out all over the table, etc. It gives the operation kind of an amateurish look.

Bill Smythe

Thank you all for your responses. I will definitely keep note of a lot of your suggestions.

Thanks Bill for your pairings procedures. I definitely will try to do most of the pairings by hand (with a local TD supervising) and just get a feel for how its done on paper rather than simply defaulting to WinTD. Most of our tournaments are between 10-20 ppl so I dont think this will be an issue for me, and should actually be really good practice.

One question I had was about this situation ( i thought of it while reading the post from jwiewel). If a player wins by making a false rule claim (for instance the 15 minute draw rule) and the opponent accepts the loss (because he didn’t know any better), you are suggesting I just leave well enough alone, and let the result stand?

I only ask for confirmation, because in some other posts in the forum, i have noticed that TD’s will often let incorrect or false claims go beacause both players agreed that they were lost or it was a drawn postion - even though when looked at, the game is clearly not over or is not a draw.

The “feeling” I get from most posts is that TD’s are not really “pro-active” they are only “reactive” in the sense that if they see a player do something wrong, they are not to act unless it is brought to thier attention by the opposing player. Im wondering if it is out of the question to remind players DURING a match that they are violating a rule, or should I simply let it go, or maybe (which i think might be best) to inform the player(s) after the game after the results are final.

One of the most prime examples of this is the need NOT to record moves when your time is below 5 minutes. Most beginnners do not know this, and I’ve seen them frantically writing moves down and eventually losing on time because of this. The “every one should be fair” side of me wants to tell the player that he doesnt need to do that, but I guess that is unfair to the opponent (even though he knows his opponent doesnt need to record) Is it not a violation of good sportsmanship that the opponent say , "hey, you dont need to record when you are under 5 minutes?"and/or is it okay that the opponent is taking advantage of this fact (which i think is kind of a cheap personally). The same goes for players who don’t notify an opponent that their time is running, because they forgot to hit the clock. Or is this all part of the competitive side of the game?

Also here is another hypothetical. You have a SPECTATOR who shakes his head, or makes a definitive “grumbling” sound watching a game being played, just after a player offers a draw. and it causes the opposing player to realize that he is indeed not in a drawn position. (becasue the player was about to shake hands with the player to “agree to draw” but then saw a spectator shake his head - which caused him to withdraw his hand. How does a TD react to this?

Like I said I’m not even a TD yet, but I’d like to know as much as possible because i don’t want to look stupid when i eventually do run or even assist a tournament and don’t know how to handle a situation.

The directors are reactive then proactive, if being proactive, the powers of a director would be almost unlimited. Think of a director like a judge, if a judge can bring charges and rule against you, there would not be any balance.

Myself as a director, if a witness to a broken rule performed on a active board, will refrain. Only if the player makes a claim, will then make a judgement. Will use variation 11H1 onto myself as a director, in the scope of only being a witness of any illegal actions on the board.

The spirit of variation 11H1, will make the director reactive and a passive witness. With the spirit of variation 11H1, as a director treat myself as equal to a spectator. If a player makes a claim, will have a right to make a judgement. If a player makes a claim, then the spectator can become a witness.

There is also rule 21D, as a director not willing to go past any of the interventions. Directors have very limited rights in and interventions. The new intervention in rule 21D, rule 21D6, collecting fees is new to the 5th edition. Before the 5th edition, directors would not have any intervention of a game just to collect any fee ( fee - registeration, membership).

During an active game, will not have any intervention of any broken rule: when both players are at the board.

In general, TDs should not intervene unless requested to do so by one of the players. If a player makes a false claim and his opponent accepts, that’s not really very much different from a player resigning in a non-losing position because he doesn’t see the saving move, or agreeing to a draw in a winning position because he doesn’t see the winning move.

Again, stay out of it, for the most part. The rules allow one specific exception – if the TD witnesses an illegal move, under certain circumstances, he can intervene. See rules 11H and 11D1.

Whether or not a player should help out his opponent here is legitimately debatable, but the TD should definitely not intervene. In this case I like your idea of informing the player, after the game, that he could have stopped keeping score at the 5-minute mark.

Even for the player, this example is a double-edged sword. I have sometimes reminded my opponent that he need not keep score, but I always do so when my own clock is running, lest I be accused of annoying my opponent on his time. Depending on the experience of the opponent, it may be better for the player to say nothing. Some players like to keep score even in time pressure.

It can be regarded either way, so again the TD should not intervene. As a player, I sometimes remind my opponent to press his clock, but only the first 3 or 4 times he forgets. After that, I figure the only way he’ll learn is the hard way.

You can be much harder on spectators than on players – even to the point of ejecting them for the rest of the day from the tournament room. The difficult problem here is how to arrive at a ruling that will be fair to both players. Rule 20E2 has some advice here.

As I said in my earlier post, in practice you need to worry more about correct pairings, starting the rounds on time, etc, than on rulings. If your first tournament is a small open event, odds are there won’t be any disputes and you won’t have to worry.

Bill Smythe

When you say you ‘faxed in’ the request, are you sure the fax went through and went to the right location?

All USCF correspondence except for Chess Life, TLAs and display ads and correspondence chess entries should go to the TN office:

Mailing address: PO Box 3967, Crossville, TN 38557.

Phone: 931-787-1234
Fax: 931-787-1200

As of April 18th, calls to the old number in NY (562-8350) are being forwarded to the TN number listed above.

Mail (and faxes) sent to NY that need to be handled by the staff in TN are shipped to TN, which takes 2-3 days.

I took note of a couple conditions recently when a TD is supposed to be more proactive.

Early in one round, I noticed one board where the time controls were set with each side having half an hour more than the official time control of the tournament. Intervening early prevents problems down the road with round start times and time forfeit claims.

I think the TD is also supposed to proactively intervene if the player of the White pieces sets up, makes no move on his board, and sets Black’s clock running. The current rule is that he is supposed to make his first move.

If White arrives 30 minutes late and sets up, while Black arrives 31 minutes late to an already set up board, White is not supposed to dock Black for 30 minutes. They’re supposed to split the time dock. I think the TD has some duty to make sure this is done right because Black, while at fault in arriving late, might not know that his opponent was almost equally late.

In two of those examples, the TD is in effect intervening BEFORE any legal moves are made, which does not interfere with a game in progress.

I usually make my start-of-round announcement as follows:

You may begin your games. Players with Black, please start White’s clock. If you have the White pieces and your opponent is not present, you must start your own clock, make your first move, then start Black’s clock.

(For those who didn’t follow the last discussion on this, the primary impetus for that rule change, IMHO, is to make sure move counters are set properly.)

I usually try to make a tour of all boards to make sure the clocks are set properly at the start of the round, because it’s much easier to correct the clocks then. Some of the digital clocks aren’t that easy to tell if they’re set properly, though.

A somewhat more interesting situation is what to do when a board is not set up properly.

I’ve seen this happen on games between B players! While I’m fairly sure they would have caught it in a couple of moves, that’s not as definite when dealing with players rated 500, so I always point it out if the game is within the first 10 moves.

Would use rule 16P, under the statement " … the director should should use judgement in deciding whether to make time adjustments." With the rules of 16O, 16P, 16Q, can give the director the right to correct the erroneously set clock. With the TD tip, could give the non-owner two extra minutes. With a erroneously set clock, the clock was not set in malice, would not add the two extra minutes. If finding out the clock was set in malice, would grant the two extra minutes.

If the player is late for the game, would check on the board to check if the board is set up, and the move was made (if late player is black), and the clock is active. As the late player cannot speak for themselves, will make sure the game was started. If the tournament is small, the director should check all the boards when the round starts. Telling the player to set up the board, make the player press their own clock to make the first move if the player is white, is not much of a problem. If the event is small, the director should be watching board(s) were a clock is running without a player in the tournament hall.