Logistics of Social Distancing at a Tournament

Running Chess Tournaments
1

I thought it would be good to start discussing this. Whether it is implemented or not, consideration of the potential parameters is a good idea.

There are many possible topics - the display of pairings, for example. But let’s start with the most basic - setting up the board.

COVID-19 issues arise most prominently when within 6 feet of another person for 15 minutes or more. Regulations will be designed to prevent this.

In a normal chess game, players are typically 2.5’ to 3’ apart during the game across the board, and perhaps less than a foot apart side-to-side or back-to-back in a tight setting.

We assume that tournaments will generally require more sanitation, hand washing, removal of players that appear sick or that are running a temperature, and masks to be worn for the event, often with one mask change required (and perhaps two suggested) during the day.

Anything we do to address this, other than using well-spaced tables that are six feet wide (and thus requiring each player to use a pick stick to move the pieces) will likely require additional rules to address the situation.

So let’s consider alternatives to see if any work.

[size=125]Potential Changes[/size]
The first and most likely potential change is to only allow the player on-the-move to sit at the board, and require the player off-the-move to social distance. This may work if the site is sufficiently spacious and if boards and tables are sufficiently far apart.

However, it has the potential to be excessively entertaining in a time scramble .

So perhaps the adjustment for this is to release the requirement when the player has less than 5 (or a lesser number) or fewer minutes left on their clock.

Another approach is to adopt a methodology sometimes used for blind players, and allow two boards. From a health perspective, players would not be touching each other’s pieces, and this offers a theoretical additional degree of safety. This could be structured on one six-foot table, 30 inches wide placing the players on opposite sides of the table and at each end; the players would be about 6.5 feet apart Again, clock use is an issue.

A third approach is to place a board in the middle of the 6-foot table and players at either end with the clock next to it. Whether or not there is an easy way to view the board is unclear. Players would have to stand during time pressure.

[size=115]Other Tournament Issues[/size]
Scoresheets and results become another issue. I can’t imagine anyone will want to collect paper scoresheets for a while, unless there is a reasonable quick drying spray that can be used when turning them in.

ENDs may have found their place since they can share scoresheets and results without touching. Tournaments may set up a “results and scoresheet email” where players can email the result with an attachment of a scoresheet photo or pdf taken with a cell phone or sent from an END. ENDs could also send a pgn file.

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Pairings - we may need to post pairings and use standards to direct a line and tell players to take a photo of your pairing and then immediately move on, along with posting online. Certainly, crowding round pairings and results will no longer be allowable. Perhaps this is an area where US Chess can assist by providing affiliates an easy and cost-efficient way to post pairings and results for affiliates that don’t already have this. Results that can be “clicked online” would be great.

2

Someone else mentioned the need to sanitize pieces before the tournament starts, and possibly after each round. This sounds like a logistical nightmare to me, but one of my co-workers said it’s possible to sterilize things with a UV wand, and if that’s true, this would be a relatively quick and painless way to disinfect pieces during a tournament. I can’t imagine wiping each and every piece individually with sanitizer, and if that were required, I’m not sure I would want to be a TD anymore.

As for pairings, another option would be to post them online. I believe larger tournaments like the US open already do this. Both this and Kevin’s method are problematic for lo-tech types like me, though. My phone can take pictures (just barely), but as far as I know, I have no way to zoom in sufficiently to read a pairing. And if my phone can do internet at all (I don’t think it can), readability would again be a major issue. I have always just looked at the pairing sheet to get my pairing, and this has occasionally caused problems. For the first round of the blitz event at the 2013 US Open, for example, there were over 100 players crowding around a single pairing sheet, and by the time I could get close enough to read it, they were already announcing “Start your clocks!” For subsequent rounds, they posted the pairings in two places.

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Yes, multiple postings help, online was mentioned. Get in line after the first 98 take a picture and move on. Or get an inexpensive smart phone upgrade. Most carriers have a smartphone for under $60.

4

I will continue to resist “smart phones” for as long as I can, since they seem to have turned just about everyone I know or see into mindless zombies. I hardly ever see anyone anymore who doesn’t have his or her eyes glued to a “smart phone” 24/7. I don’t want that to be me. The only time I ever take my phone out of my pocket is to answer it when it rings (or, more often, to not answer it if I don’t recognize the number), or occasionally to check the time, since I don’t wear a watch anymore. I might use it to call someone else once or twice a week. It’s nothing but a phone that also happens to keep time, and that’s the way I like it. There are enough distractions in life already – I don’t need another one.

5

Another attempt to sneak ENDs into tournament play, this time in the midst of a parody.

There have been several suggestions of how to set up tables with limits on the number of boards or players per table, spacing in rows, and how to set up pairing sheets for the players to view. Ideas and innovations will be explored in the first events that start up, most of them likely small events. Government restrictions are already being relaxed in many states for a variety of businesses, sports, entertainment, and other activities. Allowable group sizes are likely to morph quickly from under 50 to unlimited massing of people to accommodate sports that use outdoor stadiums or indoor arenas. Those decisions will be economic and political in nature much more than rational and technical. For chess, on the local level it is possible to make adjustments in the use of space to be compliant with official and unofficial distancing standards that will become part of the culture, at least temporarily. For larger events, it may be more difficult and expensive to make those adjustments. Hotels make money from renting out ballrooms and are unlikely to provide more space for an event that tries to spread out contestants at the same rates. Large scale Grand Prix tournament chess will become more expensive. Maybe they will be unable to be held for a while.

Wearing masks is not very comfortable, but may become the norm for a couple of years. The doctors say that this keeps droplets from traveling 6 to 12 feet when a person sneezes or coughs. There is still some risk having a number of people in the same room or in an open area who may have flu or COVID-19 even with mask wearing. Is that risk enough to keep people from playing in tournament? We will see once things open up. It is probably not going to keep people away from attending the Alabama-Auburn or Ohio State-Michigan football games in the fall. The only thing that will stop such congregations is if there is a second or third wave of the virus spread later in the year which causes governors of affected states to close things down again. It is not clear that everyone will listen.

Not everyone has smartphones. It is easier to do non-technical things like having several sets of pairings, both normal and alphabetical, spread out over a larger area to avoid the normal crowding. This can also be done in posting wall charts. In small events it is possible to call out pairings and board numbers and send players to their boards. That is pretty old school but workable for both open and scholastic events. Larger events can try out more techy methods using phones, smartboards, and projectors to post pairing online or on a wall. There is an expense for doing that and alternatives will have to be ready if the tech methods are glitchy or fail. That sometimes happens when trying to post pairings in advance for phone users.

It is really hard to get around having two players sitting approximately three feet away from each other playing a tournament game. Shields are expensive and awkward. Walking away from the board and waiting for the opponent to move, the way Akiba Rubinstein used to do, is also awkward. In time trouble we are often even closer together, hunched over the board with hands hovering, ready to strike. The crowd surrounding such games press in for a view of the bloodletting. It would take a real change in culture to end that behavior. No, we are probably just stuck with mask wearing and hope that players will listen to TDs concerning distancing.

As for cleaning pieces, I already know players who clean their sets between rounds, especially after playing kids. They complain the kids hands are always sticky, put fingers or pieces in their mouths, or eat candy and other junk food at the board. Of course, I have seen adults do that, too. Organizers who provide boards, sets, and clocks will probably have to clean clock buttons, at the very least, between rounds. That might be a good thing for players who bring their own equipment to use at tournaments to consider going forward.

6

“Allowable group sizes are likely to morph quickly from under 50 to unlimited massing of people to accommodate sports that use outdoor stadiums or indoor arenas”

Maybe - the WH own guidelines for events in phase 2 of reopening still call for gathering of less than 250 and only if social distancing can be maintained.

And that number drops to 10 for high risk individuals.

Any high risk individuals at your chess tournaments?

Phase 2 is for minimal to moderate threat of a resurgence - that will exist until there is at least an effective treatment - and likely until there is a vaccine.

Crowds surrounding boards? Nope. Can’t be doing that.

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The present administration in Washington, DC, among its mixed messaging to the states, is already suggesting that 20 states are ready to jump to Phase II. Of course, the administration is also suggesting that people use drugs that have not been successfully tested. In its latest flurry of miracle cures, the administration has put forth the idea of ingesting or injecting disinfectants and using ultraviolet light inside the body to protect from or cure the virus. It is alarming what goes for federal policy and the consistent push to relax restrictions recommended by the CDC. Politics trumps science.

Even as the northeast is starting the slow downward path in deaths, hospitalizations, and confirmed virus cases, the dangers still persist. The numbers and hotspots have shifted to the Midwest and South. I see that the Castle Chess Camp tournament has been cancelled. With the cancelling of the Chicago Open, will more midwestern Grand Prix tournaments in May and June be soon to follow? Can the National Open avoid cancellation as numbers surge in California and surrounding states? If the World Open is cancelled, it would not be surprising to see a washout of a lot of other events. Eastern PA and NU have a long way to go in bringing the numbers down low enough to warrant opening the economies for activity. Political pressure is being exerted on the PA governor to open up parts of the state. He has set a tentative date of May 8.

In my area, things are pretty much shut down. There is a high proportion of people who are in high threat categories in Pittsburgh and surrounding counties. The Pittsburgh Chess Club is trying to have online tournaments with chess.com. Other events are cancelled until further notice. It is not clear how the Pittsburgh Chess League is going to go forward. The rest of the season has been cancelled. It is in limbo for next year’s season starting in September or October. Scholastic events are not being held as the schools are closed for the rest of the term. There is still so much unknown about the virus that it is difficult to do any type of planning, whether it be best case or worst case. A scheduling calendar does not mean much when you have little idea what sites, if any, are going to be available given government restrictions.

BTW, I recently went to a grocery while wearing a bandana as a mask, one of the suggestions if you did not have a real medical mask. The employees were alarmed. I had to take the mask off. They were then relieved.

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  1. The post wasn’t a parody. The “laugh” was solely at the line involving excess time pressure entertainment.

  2. The line about ENDs is real. ENDs allow scorekeeping records while maintaining social distancing.

Mask wearing is insufficient. That was part of the point of the post. Mask wearing essentially allows close quarters during mutual time pressure.

Organizers will likely need to stop providing equipment for awhile.

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I am pessimistic that we will ever fully return to “normal” OTB chess as we have come to know and love it. I definitely don’t see that happening any time soon. At present, I am signed on to direct the Wisconsin State G/60 championship on July 12, but I will be astounded if that tournament actually takes place. The Masters golf tournament and the Tour de France have already been postponed, and I will be surprised if either of them happens at all this year. I am skeptical as to Major League Baseball playing at all this year, and I wouldn’t place any bets on NFL football either. I think games, sports, concerts, plays, movies, etc. – public forms of recreation in general – may not resume until next year, and we can’t even be sure about that. We may have already entered a “brave new world” that we’ll all just have to get used to.

There was a time when cigarette smoking was so common and taken for granted that people did it everywhere – even at the board during chess games. In my first year of college (1973-1974), we were allowed to smoke in the classroom, and some of the professors did so as well. If you went into a bar or tavern, it was practically guaranteed that a majority of the people would be smoking. Now, it’s hard to find places (even outdoors) where smoking is allowed (for which I am grateful, since I am no longer a smoker). People in general, and smokers in particular, have just had to adjust to a “new normal”. This pandemic may be the occasion for another such shift. Some social behaviors that we used to do without thinking may permanently become taboo. That may even turn out to be a good thing (as I think the relative social non-acceptability of smoking is a good thing), but most of us are likely to find things pretty uncomfortable for the next few years.

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??? I can maintain exactly the same amount of social distancing while keeping score the old fashioned way (with paper and pencil) as you can with an END. If you’re referring to the practice of turning in scoresheets, that is not universal. At the vast majority of tournaments that I’ve played, it has not been required. I fill out my scoresheet, and then I take it home with me.

I’m not sure that really solves anything (other than simplifying the logistics for the TD/organizer). Now I have to wonder whether or not my opponent has sufficiently sanitized his board/pieces/clock (or my opponent has to wonder that about me), or I have to watch him do it. If he claims that he already did it and refuses to re-do it in my presence, we have a potential dispute. This kind of thing is going to be an issue regardless of who provides the equipment.

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I’m not sure of the issue here. I simply noted that ENDs allow social distancing in terms of turning in results and scoresheets. These are true statements and an advantage over regular scoresheets. I also noted that this can be essentially replicated by taking a photo of the scoresheet and turning it in. I didn’t claim scoresheets must always be turned in. Perhaps you’re lost because I’m responding to Tom’s comment about my initial comment.

This isn’t an issue that people should start getting in knots over. It’s just a truthful summary comment.

It simplify things because if the organizer provides the sets, realistically two new people may be handling the set each round, while if a player provides the set, realistically ONE new player is handling the set each round. Thus, transfer is decreased.

You have that issue either way. Organizers aren’t going to be able to sanitize a bunch of sets between rounds, the players will have to do it.

Organizers will need to provide wipes and allow/require players the opportunity to sanitize pieces and clock buttons before each round. 2-3 wipes per player at the begining of each round wiping down each side will get it done quickly. The good organizer will, prior to round one, demonstrate the level of cleaning they expect.

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Microwaving can be dangerous.

I couldn’t find any studies on coronaviruses, but microwaving at 600W for at least two minutes inactivated the bulk of similar RNA viruses.

However, the heat generated by microwaving occurs as hydrogen bonds are disrupted. So, without testing, it could be that microwaves pass through plastic pieces with no harm. But depending what is in the plastic, or the glue at the bottom, microwaving could release dangerous vapers.

Weighted pieces are typically weighted with lead. Its possible that the lead could become sufficiently hot to cause the pieces to melt, or expel dangerous vapors, or perhaps burn

Keep in mind that even peeled grapes in a microwave will provide a nice light show due to the magnesium in grapes.

An END can be safely manipulated with a capacitive pointer, and I hope for this thread to stay on topic.

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Noted.

Another possible (not guaranteed) option given for food was heating in an oven to 167 F for 30 minutes, but that would seem likely to have the same vapor issue with chess pieces.

If only there was a simplistic solution that actually worked.

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UV lighting is a possibility. But UVC is dangerous, UVB will likely take too long between rounds. There is recent work on new ways and narrower bands of UVC which is promising, but the technology isn’t there yet. UVB could be helpful if the goal is to add another layer, but not insure that it’s killed everything. There aren’t enough tests on COVID-19 yet to know for sure how it reacts to UVB.

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The issue of players sitting across the board from each other seems to be a lot more significant than the scoresheets. Maintaining a six foot social distance would require (throwing out some numbers to start with) tables 30 inches wide, another five feet on each side of the table for each player to avoid risk when the opponent reached across the board, and another three feet per player to have space from the player behind that is also standing away from the table (18.5 feet per row). If you go with six foot long tables and from one row to the next you stagger the one placement per table between the middle and end of the table then that final three feet per player can be dropped to 2.5 feet (five feet away back to back and three feet away side to side) and the rows can be every 17.5 feet and contain one board per six feet of table length (more than 100 square feet per board or maybe 1100 players in the Gaylord Opryland Delta Ballroom that has generally held more than twice that with room left over).
Maybe shorter (cheaper to rent?) tables could be used with social distancing aisles enforced by having painters tape connecting the tables of a row.

As far as the allowable time in close proximity goes I’m not sure where the 15-minute threshold came from, but that would only cover mutual time pressure with a five second delay. A thirty second increment can see a very long stretch of mutual time pressure. A five second delay can see one player being under five minutes for a very long time while the other player has plenty of time to spend, so allowing the time-pressure player to remain at the board would require the other player to analyze away from the board to maintain social distancing.
One option might be to require social distancing even in severe time pressure and adding 10-15 seconds to the delay to allow that social distancing to occur (maybe not including that increase when trying to figure out the applicable rating system). There would need to be strict enforcement of stepping back after hitting the clock. That is a still very rough idea with very obvious problems related to ADA issues and blitz events. As long as we are talking about ADA issues, one very very thin silver lining of such wide spacing is that every board becomes wheelchair accessible and there is also room for an additional board for a blind person to use (though it may need to be on a wheeled cart so it can be pulled back from the table to allow analysis while the opponent is seated at the board).

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It’s also worth noting that the six-foot guideline is for everyday behavior. Sitting across from each other, facing each other, for six hours, would probably requires a greater distance to be as effective.

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I’ve created a new topic, Electronic Notation Devices and Social Distancing, for discussion of whether the use of electronic notation devices can help enforce social distancing at tournaments.

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Yes, you’re beginning to get the point of the discussion. The 15-minute threshold comes from CDC recommendations.

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The CDC guideline is not to be within 6 feet of anyone for 15 minutes, because exposure likely occurs within that period. Ideally, it’s to not be within 6 feet of anyone, but the risk of infection goes up with close contact over an extended period.

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No.

In-person chess is just not going to happen until we’re past this, whenever that is.