New Chess Club Tournaments

Chess Clubs
1

We have recently formed a chess club, of which I am a board member, in Wisconsin. Our club is an affiliate of the USCF, so we are authorized to run USCF-rated tournaments. But, the problem is, that we have players of many different skill levels, from absolute beginners who are yet to become USCF members to a C and B players. This would have probably been fine, if it were not for the fact that not many players are in each skill level. For example, we have about ten beginners (non-USCF members and USCF rated below 600), one E player, one D player, one C player, and one B player. An Expert player visits us frequently as well. As one can probably imagine, we have conflicting interests when deciding to run tournaments. What is the ideal, or closest to ideal, type of tournament we can organize for this club? As time goes on, we hope to get more members of all skill levels so we can more easily organize tournaments. But, for now, what is best for our club?

2

You could try some quads to start, listing the players by approximate rating strength high to low, and grouping each of four into there own mini round robin. Maybe play 3 Action games in an evening, or something like that.

3

That is what we deduced to be the best start, so we are having one G/30 quad tournament and one G/15 quad tournament that will, totally, take up the next four meetings. But, assuming we do not get many new members, what do we do after these? The same format can get quite monotonous after conducting it two times.

B.T.W. our club has two meetings per month.

4

You might try running some unrated handicap speed tournaments.

Each player starts with 10 minutes, but you add one minute of time to the lower rated player and subtract one minute of time from the higher rated player for each X points of rating difference between the players. (I usually use 1 minute for each 100 points, but sometimes 1 minute for each 50 points is better.)

Worst case is 1 minute vs 19 minutes.

5

I’ll ask about this idea to my fellow board members and we’ll take a decision. About unrateds: if the player is unrated, how much time should we subtract, if any at all?

6

Here’s a system that works for our club, play two sets of Quads: the first arrays the players by rating and then pairs the first quad with #s 1, 5, 9 and 13; the second with #s 2, 6, 10 and 14;the third with #s 3, 7, 11 and 15; the fourth with 4, 8, 12 and 16. The next set is paired by top 4 results ; then next highest results; etc. This gives beginners a chance to play stronger players in the first set of quads. When the number of players is not 16, but even, a hex can be used, but only play the first rounds. Lots of fun at our nightly meeting and at G/10 can be run off in less than 3 hours.

7

@CoachBob: I will discuss this; thanks!

8

USCF uses 1300 as the starting rating for unrated adults, unless another club member has played enough games against that person to have a better idea of his or her playing strength, that’s as good a starting point as any, I guess.

9

We ran a successful combination RBO/open this past summer. In one section, unrated players and players rated under 1200 played a 5/SS, G/30. In the other, players 1200 and over played a 4/SS, G/45. (We repeated the formula this month, but bad scheduling undermined turnout in both sections.) What we’re looking for now are ways to make our own tournaments more attractive to higher-level players; since there aren’t many in our neck of the woods, somehow we have to get them to want to drive an hour and a half (at least) to participate in our events.

10

@Anjiaoshi: This could have been done in our club, too, but each of our meetings is only two hours long, and although I am open to widening that time frame, others have rather tighter schedules, forbidding us from making each meeting longer. Also, there are not many players, so I think Swiss tournaments will have to wait. Thanks for the input, though.

11

Our meetings are only 2½ hours long. Except for our recent club championship, which we stretched over three consecutive weeks, we don’t run our rated events during club meeting times. We do them on Saturdays.

12

Rule 28A states that “Some directors prefer to assign an arbitrary rating of 1200 or 1300, for pairing purposes only, to all unrated players.” I gather that the argument for using 1200 rather than the USCF starting rating of 1300 is that people who are new to tournament play (which is presumably the case for unrated players) are likely to do more poorly than average due to their lack of experience playing in tournaments.

Bob

13

The Hampton Roads Chess Club is like yours except we can go late if necessary. Frequently I am at our site at 6:45, start tournaments at 7:30 due to our traffic problems and try to get out by about 10:15. See my site for a schedule and our time controls. I am a strong believer in running rated events on club nights. I think it is the best long term solution to keeping interest. I also believe in varying time controls and event length.
http://main.uschess.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=14964&st=0&sk=t&sd=a

Some other ideas I use for pairings so the weaker players don’t get beat up too often are the following:

  1. Occasionally use accelerated pairings for the first two rounds.

  2. Try an octal. The main problem with this is for multiple week events where someone does not show up. Also depends upon your club numbers for success. Also makes late entries a problem.

  3. 1x or 2x a year, I have a match tournament. Take entries and pair 1-2, 3-4, 5-6 and so on. Take the unrateds if any and pair against the lowest rated or use judgment if you have some idea of their strength.

  4. Run an occasional 2 section event. Section break based on your typical turnout to balance the strengths.

I also run occasional blitz events ($5 EF cash prizes). Because I have players who don’t enjoy blitz, I also run a 2 round G/30 on that night. It seems to have damaged the blitz turnout so you may want to think about the alternate G/30.

I don’t have club membership. Expenses are paid from nightly entry fees. As most events don’t have prizes, I charge $2 for a one night event and and additional $1 for each additional week. Over the year, this gives me sufficient funds to purchase the affiliate, update SwissSys, pay for the paper and laser cartridge and coffee supply donations to the Synagogue which gives us free coffee in addition to the free site.

We have an extra room where my wife and I give free lessons early in the evening for kids and interested adults. Casual chess players are always welcome and are free. I have a group of strong players who come and play unrated blitz most evenings. As noted, they get more fun beating up each other rather than playing rated games against weaker players.

Regards, Ernie

14

Sorry, copied the wrong URL Try http://mysite.verizon.net/eschlich/ and take the Hampton Roads Chess Club - Norfolk link below the 2nd green bar.

15

Thanks for the information. Many of us have been trying to persuade the club to open up its timeframe for each meeting, but to no avail. As a result, we have very limited options. We are in favor, however, for varied time controls and rated events on club nights. Some of your suggestions work and some don’t. I shall give feedback on each of your suggestions.

  1. Accelerated pairings are something we could try for Swiss events. I shall ask about this, but our attendance now just does not permit us to do decent Swiss events. We are planning on a club championship in the near future, and if we get more participants, I can speak about this.

  2. I don’t think octals will work for us. In fact, we are in the middle of a quad right now, but the attendance permitted only three quads, and most players did not show up for the second round. If this is the case with quads, I think octals can get quite messy.

  3. A match of even two games can get quite cumbersome for us, as many players are unavailable for even two consecutive meetings.

  4. Doing quads themselves are resulting in two to three sections only. I think this is our 2- or 3-section event. :slight_smile:

  5. We are trying to vary our events. Our current quad is G/30, but it takes three meetings to complete (over a month for our schedule), and many players don’t show up for all three games. So, our Chief TD is considering quick-rated chess that can be completed in one night. Although I am tolerant about this for a limited number of meetings, I am against having this as our main format (probably because I am significantly weaker while playing fast).

We always have an unrated section, no matter what the event, for the numerous novices at our club. Also, there is a skittles room where casual players just play chess and not enter our tournaments.

Again, thanks for the detailed information.

Regards