Hi Forums,
I have a question.
I have been running casual tournaments (usually 8-12 players) at local restaurants and bars and I was thinking of becoming an USCF affiliate to be able to run rated tournaments.
However, I feel like there are too many distractions at our usual meetups so I was thinking of running the USCF tournaments at my backyard/home.
My yard is big enough to hold 20 players, quiet, and of course access to wifi, bathroom, parking, etc.
Is it possible to do so?
Any pros and cons?
I have my Club TD certification and use VegaChess for the pairings at the moment.
That is a great point and itâs something I will have to talk about with both my players and my family.
But I wanted to make sure itâs possible.
Iâm excited to get my club started with USCF
Thank you for the comment Alex
I appreciate it greatly
I wouldnât necessarily rule out running rated events in your other locations either. Around my area, itâs not at all uncommon for rated events to be held at various restaurants and bars. These are usually smaller groups, and most, but not all, tend to be shorter time controls or blitz.
Why would you want to spoil a nice cookout with a rated chess tournament? Sure, you can do it if you have enough tables and chairs and a backup plan if it rains. I assume you have a large basement or a playroom/TV room. The only impediment I can see is your wifeâs view of having 20 players traipsing through the house, using the bathroom, and making a mess. If she is okay with that, you are golden.
I wouldnât worry about the issue of having someone coming to the event that you donât want to be there. If your wife disapproves of the guy, then he is out. Treat the event as an invitational. You, or rather your wife, gets to choose who is in your house. If he is unhappy with her decision, he can waste his money on an appeal to the USCF. Mama rules trump pretty much all other rules regarding entry to her kingdom, a private home. The USCF will be happy and lucky that you are sending a rating fee as well as going through the trouble of setting up a new affiliate. If the USCF were to stupidly tell you that you have to accept a jerk to your house, you can always go back to doing unrated tournaments.
I was thinking the same thing and some of my players seem to be okay with it.
Honestly, I wasnât sure if people would be okay with playing rated games in an environment filled with minor distractions (Bar Music, crowd noise, etc).
Itâs not something you generally hear about.
I felt alone in thinking of running rated games at a bar haha
I appreciate your response Gneilley
Iâm going to consider the usual locations for Blitz and Quick.
For Regular, I might still considered my house. At least Iâll be home while I monitor the long games.
Iâm too young to have a wife lmao!!
In my case, itâs my mom and you definitely hit the nail on the conversation between my mom and I
But yeah, Iâm going to treat it as an invitational/private.
If someone wants to join then I would need to get to know them first.
I think itâs important to do so with all my players/attendants, regardless of the location.
I have directed hundreds of youth tournaments in private homes. From what I understand, in some nations this is the norm, rather than the exception. But it is essential that these events be private invitationals with strict rules as to cordiality and politeness.
Years ago there was a person who ran tournaments in their basement. These were known in the area as the âBasement Quadsâ. Usually 3 other players were invited to play in a high rated quad. I think that there may have been a time or two where 4 players were invited.
Years ago in Chicago, the No Exit coffeehouse ran non-rated G/10 round robins every Tuesday night, with Beethovenâs nine symphonies (in order, 1 through 9) playing on the stereo for all to hear.
You need to use one of two approved US Chess pairing systems to fall under US chess rules for proper ratings. Either swisssys or WinTD. I use WinTD myself. I run tournaments in students homes all the time. I ran one with 29 youths placing mats
on the floor last month. Went very well.
Do not believe it is possible to upload VegaChess to the main US Chess data base off the TD Affiliate site (which, yes, you do need to created your own personal TD affiliate site as well)
Rob Jones
Senior TD
US Chess
As far as I know, US Chess does not have a list of approved pairing programs. It doesnât matter which pairing program you use and you can do the pairings manually without using a program. What matters is that the pairings follow the pairing rules. WinTD and SwissSys allow easy upload to the TD/Affiliate page so the the tournament can get rated but you can also manually enter tournament results on the website (still getting the lower per-game rating fee and still counting as an on-line submission) or you can print the results and mail them (at a higher fee). Other pairing programs might also have upload capabilities. If you hope to get certified at a higher level than Local TD then you will need to do at least three on-line submissions (more if you want to move above Senior TD).
According to the vegachess site (vegachess.com/ns/node/7), it is capable of producing the 3 DBF files that US Chess uses, but I donât know which version of the files it can produce. The original version of those files does not include color information or have a field to report what program produced those files, but going back to 2015 the only tournaments from programs that I see reported are SwisSys, WinTD, Caissa/Caissachess, plus a few from something called SSCH and something called âHOMEMAILâ. I think the last two of these were programmers interested in writing their own pairings programs before they realized just how much work it was.
The vegachess site does not say if it can read the rating supplement or golden master data files.
It is only simpler if you know and understand the pairing rules. There are a number of TDs at Senior level and higher that do not have the understanding that a Local level pairing TD in the '80s had. Also, uploading the tournament report is easier if you used a program to pair.
Iâve manually paired 400+ player, 7-round sections and a 50-player 7-round section that had team avoidance with 25 of the players on one team. I am quite comfortable doing manual pairings. The ease of tournament report upload and the ease of printing and reprinting wall charts are a couple reasons why I will pair even a 12-player event on the computer. Another is that it was common in the '80s for the pairing TD to spend the entire tournament in the back room either pairing a round, recording the pairings for a round, transcribing results as they came in for the games in a round, or preparing the pairings for the next round (very little down time). If that same TD is also handling floor duties (which may be the case for the OP) then each roundâs pairings (after the first round) will be delayed. In larger events, using a computer allows for the pairing TD to also be the floor TD if the computer is in the playing hall (a tournament with less than 20 players could have pairing cards on a small table in the room as long as the players donât mess with them).
Sure, you can do it if you have enough tables and chairs and a backup plan if it rains. I assume you have a large basement or a playroom/TV room. The only impediment I can see is your wifeâs view of having 20 players traipsing through the house, using the bathroom, and making a mess. If she is okay with that, you are golden.
