I have a question regarding the US Open.
If I play in the traditional schedule it says one round a day but what time does the rounds start each day ?
Jon Burgess
All rounds in the traditional schedule are at 7pm, except for round 9 which is at 3pm.
The last time I played in the US Open was 2004 in Ft. Lauderdale. I played in the Matinee schedule. As I recall all games started at 1pm each day until the sections merged on round six. Not being a late night person I enjoyed playing my games during the day.
The round times aren’t very clear from the flyer on the website, are they? I’ll suggest that page be updated.
The TLA was clearer, which is where I went first.
We’re trying to get someone (probably Diane Reese) to input online TLAs for upcoming national events. Hopefully the data structure that the online TLA area uses will produce flyers that answer questions such as these.
The TLA had that information added just in the last few days. Leaving the round times indeterminate for a while was probably Bill Goichberg’s idea, a temporary expedient while he prepared to violate a clear directive from the Delegates.
In response to the last round of the 2000 U.S. Open being scheduled at 2:00 PM, conflicting with the Delegates Meeting, I sponsored ADM 01-89 to forbid this practice in 2001:
“No round of the U.S. Open may be scheduled to conflict with the Delegates Meeting.”
This motion was passed by the Delegates and has appeared in the list of “Delegate Motions of Continuing Interest” ever since. Nevertherless, an attempt was made to schedule the last round of the 2005 U.S. Open at 2:00 PM. I complained to the office and the Executive Board and was told that while he was serving as Executive Director, Bill Goichberg, having full knowledge of the Delegate motion, nevertheless ORDERED the office to set the round at 2:00 PM. After some animated e-mail discussion, the EB decided to return the round time to 7:00 PM.
At the Delegates Meeting that summer, Bill Goichberg tried to get ADM 01-89 rescinded. He sponsored ADM 05-21:
“When the final round of the U.S. Open ends on a Sunday, the final round shall begin no later than 3:00 PM, and the Delegates Meeting shall conclude in time to avoid a conflict with this schedule.”
This motion was defeated, so ADM 01-89 remained in effect. Having lost at the ballot box, Bill apparently now seeks once again to ignore the will of the Delegates.
It is not good enough for our USCF President to claim that he is certain the Delegates Meeting will be over before 3:00 PM, thus avoiding a conflict. By tradition, the time set aside for the Delegates Meeting has been between 9:00 AM and 5:00 PM, on two successive days. I have been a Delegate for 23 years and in all that time, while the meeting has occasionally finished early, there has NEVER been any way to predict that in advance.
I will be contacting the EB and the office about this matter. I post this information here so that all may understand what is going on.
– Hal Terrie
I believe that Parkinson’s Law ** applies to Delegates Meetings. If it is scheduled to go to 5PM on Sunday it will usually adjourn somewhere around 4:55.
On the other hand, when the goal all along has been to end the meeting by 1PM or 3PM (or whatever) on Sunday, we’ve usually been able to do so, and important (and not-so-important) matters still seem to get a reasonably full airing.
This year’s Delegates Meeting will be Bill Goichberg’s first as USCF President, so it will be an interesting learning experience for him as well as for the Delegates.
** Parkinson’s Law: Work expands so as to completely consume the amount of time available for its completion.
That has not been my observation at all. At best, this idea will result in more motions being referred to the Executive Board, as time runs out for the Delegates to discuss them. Suspicious minds might conclude that this is a power grab by the Executive Board.
The official explanation of course will be that a 7:00 PM round start will reduce entries from those who absolutely, positively have to be at work Monday morning. I don’t buy that but, even if it is true, it doesn’t matter. Bill Goichberg sponsored a motion and explained this reasoning. His motion was DEFEATED. The Delegates have spoken on this matter and he must abide by their will, whether he agrees with it or not.
– Hal Terrie
Hal, check the minutes of the Delegates Meetings, there has not been a meeting in which it was necessary to refer a block of motions to the Board without any consideration by the Delegates because we ran out of time for quite a few years.
The original TLA submitted by Diane Reese did not list the starting times of the rounds; I asked that this error be corrected.
The delegates meeting this year will adjourn by 1:30 pm. This will not make 3 1/2 hours less available than usual, because those 3 1/2 hours included a lunch break of at least 1 1/2 hours. I am confident that I can minimize the wasting of time at the meeting so that we have at least the usual amount of it for deliberation.
Having the last round at 3 pm rather than 7 pm will enable many players to play without having to take off from work Monday or spend an extra night at the hotel. I can’t see how this can fail to promote entries. There’s a reason why you never see a weekend Swiss with a last round beginning Sunday at 7 pm; most of them start 2 pm to 4 pm.
The 3 pm start does not violate the delegate mandate because it will not conflict with the meeting. There is no delegate mandate saying the meeting must last until 5 pm.
Last year the delegates did not vote to prohibit having an earlier last round start; they simply rejected having an early start mandated. In the debate a common view expressed was that an early start was already possible and didn’t require a motion, and that it would be better to allow flexibility.
Bill Goichberg
The only players likely to have their Monday plans affected by a 3PM start time versus a 7PM start time are those within about 4-5 hours of driving time, or around 250 miles. Those who live withiin about 100 miles probably aren’t affected much by a 3PM versus 7PM start time, since they’ll be home an hour or two after their game ends anyway.
Everyone else is going to have to fly, and a 3PM versus 7PM start time might not make much difference in terms of flight availability, even this year in Chicago. (A 3PM start time probably means that only flights leaving after 8PM can be taken, what with the time to get to the airport and through check-in.)
Looking at the last 7 US Opens, which averaged around 470 players, 47 players played in at least 5 of them, so they’re probably not affected by the last round start time.
Here’s a count of the number of participants who lived more than 100 miles but less than 250 miles from the site of the last 7 US Opens:
2005 Arizona 30
2004 Florida 15
2003 S. Cal 16
2002 New Jersey 66
2001 Mass. 102
2000 Minnesota 32
1999 Nevada 59
There are around 1000 current adult members who live within 25 miles of the site of the 2006 US Open, another 720 who live within 26-100 miles and around 1700 who live more than 100 miles away but less than 250 miles away.
For the 2001 US Open, which had the best recent turnout of ‘somewhat local’ players, there were over 2800 adult USCF members who lived 101-250 miles from Framingham, and less than 4% of them played in the event.
I wonder if high gas prices are likely to be more of an impact on those ‘somewhat local’ players than the last round start time, even though the round trip cost of driving is likely to be less than a tank of gas for those players, or under $40.
I live a little bit further, and I plan to drive back Sunday night if possible. I am a fairly typical driver, and there are several large cities that are about the same distance from Chicago that I am (or a little closer). I think I can make the drive in less than 5 hours:
St. Louis
Louisville,
Cincinnati,
Columbus, and
Detroit are the biggest ones that I noticed at first glance.
All of these are beyond 250 miles, but at less than I would estimate to be a 5 hour drive.
Having the round start as LATE as 3PM makes it a little tough on me. The earlier the better as far as I’m concerned.
Don’t forget about tacking on another hour to most of those cities. It’s going to be a rough Monday morning for me, but having the US Open come within 150 miles of my house is going to be worth falling asleep at work.