Once upon a time, the skittles room was for playing skittles, analysis of games, etc. and was a players hangout.
Nowadays, it’s a day care center where families hang out and have picnics. A place where the precious future of US Chess can practice building towers with chess pieces, a necessary part of their game prep it seems. After all, the higher they can build the tower during the game, the more noise it makes when it collapses.
Should their be two rooms? One for skittles, and one for daycare?
As an organizer of chess tournaments, I do not consider the idea of separating skittles and “day care” into different rooms to be a very practical idea. You would have to project how much space is needed for each function, and in the likely event that your projection is erroneous, you would have just wasted space and/or end up with an unreasonably crowded room.
I’ve had more problem with unruly adults over the years than with kids, including their siblings and parents. One adult player caused our organization to be barred from a local site, and the tournament hall was often a mess with McDonalds detritus.
I would have no problems setting up a separate skittles/analysis room, subject to certain conditions, including but not limited to: No food, no bughouse, no card-playing or other non-chess activities, no gambling.
I agree with Mr. Price, though I have none of his shared experiences. I’ve never seen a skittles room that didn’t have at least a corner where players could analyze their game.
There are many more kids now than in the '80s but in the Chicago suburbs even the scholastic events see a lot of the skittles room being used for instruction, analysis and blitz.
I’ve been playing a long long long time, and I’m happy as a lark that there are more kids in the game. Youngsters mean parents and siblings at the tournament site. It’s a pleasure to get used to that. I spend much of the year in Norway and play at a club in Oslo that used to be known as a fuddy-duddy club of superannuated geezers. With the Magnus effect the club has been reborn as the place for youngsters to play, and the number of strong young players has grown tremendously. As I said, it’s a joy to see, and we ought to rejoice in the energy these kids bring to the game, even when they (and their families) may be a bit rambunctious.
