I’m in the process of starting a once-weekly club for rated play, along with other activities (simuls, lectures, etc). In my mind I’m modeling it on the club of my youth, which was Harold Stenzel’s Nassau Chess Club. Has anyone recently tried to start such a club, and if so, do you have any recommendations for me? Best and worst practices?
For those who wonder: space has been offered nearly free of charge, so that’s not a huge issue.
The usual recommendation is to send in rating reports about once a month for events that last longer than about 6 weeks.
The big challenge with one-game-a-week events is often pairing issues, especially accomodating players who can’t make it to the club every week.
So if I run, say, a six week club championship, I’d send in preliminary rating reports mid-event?
I probably wouldn’t for a six week event, I would probably send an eight week event in in two parts.
There is no way to combine the two reports, though, so it might be difficult for someone to see the progression of the entire event, and bonus points would be awarded separately for the first and second parts.
We used to hold the Lincoln City Championship as a 4 or 5 week Swiss preliminary that was used to pair up round robin final sections, with the top section being for the city championship title and trophy.
There are clubs that meet less frequently than once a week that have held tournaments that ran for as long as 9 months before sending in a rating report, which is an awfully long time for those early games to wait to be rated.
Blitz at G/8 d2 and Quick at G/15 d3 are popular at our Tuesday night Chess Club and paired as Quads or Hexes giving players 3, 4, or 5 games vs different players.
In an old club I was involved with, we used to run a rated tournament a month with other activities like 5 minute tournaments, inter- and intra- club matches, simuls, lectures, etc. in the off weeks. The tournaments which the players liked were Game 30 with two games per week for two weeks. Cheap entry fee, mostly to just cover the rating fee. It fit in with the time frame we were allowed to use the site.
I would pre-program in breaks from the cycles, both to give the TD(s) relief and keep it from becoming a grind for the players. Declare weeks or a month off when you can be away or just another player or participant.
(This is from someone who burned out at having to be at club to direct weekly for about a year and a half - while helping direct / directing scholastics and opens on top of that. While I certainly expect to help with monthly events again, I will never let myself get worn down like that again.)
Mike how would the bonus points vary between a 4 round event and an 8 round event??
Rob Jones
There’s no simple answer to that question. As long as someone doesn’t face any opponent more than twice, both a 4 round (or two of them representing rounds 1-4 and 5-8) and an 8 round section would be eligible for bonuses. In fact, if A plays B three times, in rounds 1, 3 and 8, then the 8 round version would not be eligible for bonuses but the rounds 1-4 and 5-8 versions both would.
Beyond that, it is difficult to say what might happen, because it will depend on the exact circumstances. The Ratings Estimator should be close, but it is probably possible to create situations in which the Ratings Estimator would predict a bonus but the actual ratings program does not award one, or vice versa.