Rotating boards were in force, with all boards brought by players anchored to tables one through seven, to avoid the previously experienced confusion caused by moving boards from table to table. Table 1 was especially significant as this carried the board left to the NSW players by Marie Knight who sadly passed away in June. The Marie Knight Memorial Board will continue to occupy table 1 in future NSW tournaments.
We reverted to the old faithful Henry Lawson House, over the road from the recently refurbished Revesby Workers Club. It seems the demolition of this building is being forever postponed, to the extent that plans are afoot to transfer the NSW Championships back to this venue. Moana Nepia, an ex- Australian Champion (check it out on www.scrabble.org.au) made her comeback after four years and was to acquit herself extremely well.
The early leaders were John Foley and Robyn Flynn. Betty Coleman and Raya Wilkinson also enjoyed a stint at the top tables but fell back towards the end of the event. To her credit, Robyn Flynn stayed in contention all the way and was vying for fourth place in the final KOH round. Joan won that game to take fourth, while John Foley beat me in the final game to relegate me to fifth place and take third himself. John is headed to Melbourne in a couple of weeks time, and may play the occasional tournament in that town.
But the main action at the end of the event was between two of Australia's four WSC contestants, John Holgate and Paul Cleary. Going into the last three KOH rounds, John was half a game clear of Paul. After winning the first KOH, John was then one and a half games clear and only needed one more win to take the shield. As it turned out, Paul won the second KOH in a nail-biter, then romped home in the last game courtesy of a series of dream racks to take the title for the third year in a row.
Earlier on a miscalculation in the end game on my part had led me to convert a certain win into a draw against Paul, while QA* (unchallenged) and UY* were seen on the two top tables in the final rounds. The point of this is that the mind plays tricks on you in these types of the event, and sometimes that can be costly.
An innovation tried at this tournament was for players to record their plays of nine letter words or more. Here are the nine-letter (or more) word plays that were declared at this event: (lower case represents the word already on the board)
TENTERinG Joan Rosenthal REWINDerS Cheryl Michler INelEGANT Paul Cleary ReSIDENTs Esther Perrins DIScounted Penny Wells PASTORinG Peter ShawReport from Paul Cleary - VP, organisor, victor
Revesby was again the venue for this year's NSW Winter Masters comp playable by all over 1300 at time of entry. We had a field of 39 after some late withdrawals and were thus able to set up the following prize structure while running to budget (...more or less!)-
1. $300 2. $200 3. $150 4. $100 5. $50 High Word $50 High Game $50 High Ratings Gain $50We got off to a latish start but given that there were only 20 min per side, we soon made good time and could afford some decent breaks for bargain-price meals at the relevant times.
Early readers were John Foley and Robyn Flynn with Paul Cleary on top at the end of day 1 after Round 12 in which he scored the tournament High Game of 628. That game included his High Word, BLaDDE~R~S, for 167, PATRICO (75) PEAVIES (83) and SWEETIES (85).
One unusual thing about this tournament was the fact that 5 games were tied in the earlier rounds - this created quite an interesting situation approaching the KOTH rounds, as a draw effectively nullifies the effect of one's spread (except of course for those on the same number of wins and draws!)
Day 2 saw the final 9 games played, the last 3 of which were King of the Hill. The lead swung a bit on day 2 with John Holgate drawing away to a 1.5 game lead at one stage.1
Going into the KOTH rounds, John Holgate was half a game clear of Paul, so that assuming those 2 players played three games together, whoever won 2 of them would win the comp.
John won the first of these games in a beautiful 455 to 409 game. Paul took the second game 463 to 442 in a cliff-hanger to draw within half a game of John with 1 game to go.
And in the final round, Paul "got the lot" to take out the comp for the third year running.
Some lower probability plays spotted in the tourney:
DATABUS ZOOECIUM HAIDUKS GROOVILY EMBOWER MESTIZA (120 points) BEINNESS TABOOING (140 points)We also had a list for lonnnggg words as a bit of a novelty. Some of the words that made it onto this list were REWINDERS(~ER~) by Cheryl Michler, DIS-COUNTED (Penny Wells), INELEGANT(~EL~) (Paul Cleary), T-ERRORIST (John Holgate) and RESIDENTS(~E~,~S) (Esther Perrins).
Thanks to Liz and Bob Jackman (as always) for their parts in organising this comp and to Pat Rae, Betty Foreman, Cheryl Michler and Joanne Craig and anyone else unintentionally omitted for lending a hand too.
Results after game 21
Rank Player Wins Mar
---------------------------------
1 Paul Cleary 15.5 1095
2 John Holgate 15 1054
3 John Foley 15 406
4 Joan Rosenthal 14 487
5 Bob Jackman 13.5 1339
6 Esther Perrins 13 822
7 Robyn Flynn 13 673
8 Carmel Dodd 13 384
9 Anne Drew 12 852
10 Jean McGiffen 12 789
11 Olga Visser 12 334
12 Matte Dunn 12 -153
13 Joanne Craig 11.5 650
14 Betty Foreman 11.5 -238
15 Moana Nepia 11.5 -337
16 Patricia Mitchell 11 -86
17 Betty Coleman 11 -92
18 Sue Gergelifi 11 -139
19 Jean Noonan 11 -365
20 John Barker 10.5 326
21 Graeme Lock Lee 10 418
22 Karen Richards 10 346
23 Peter Shaw 10 -28
24 Alison Pollard 10 -134
25 Kris Logan 10 -359
26 Cheryl Michler 10 -403
27 Penny Wells 10 -404
28 Gary Pollard 9.5 -510
29 Jan Serisier 9 29
30 Trish Windhurst 9 -55
31 Paul Richards 9 -254
32 Gloria Gallagher 9 -539
33 Nonie English 9 -783
34 Norma Tracey 9 -826
35 Raya Wilkinson 8.5 -931
36 Elizabeth Ho 8 -784
37 Sam Greenberg 8 -826
38 Judy Hay 7 -1063
39 Hanne Marks 6 -674
40 A Bye 0 -21
HIGH GAME: Paul Cleary 628
HIGH WORD: Paul Cleary 167
"BLADDERS"
Stats for Tournament : 2001 WINTER MASTERS
+--------------------------+-----------+---------+-----------+---------------+
| state Name | National | State | Wins | Rating Points |
| | Old New | Old New | Exp Act | Old Change New|
+--------------------------+-----------+---------+-----------+---------------+
+Section: *MASTERS + + + +
+--------------------------------------+---------+-----------+---------------+
| NSW Paul Cleary | 4 3 | 2 1 | 15.7 15.5 | 1883 -3 1880 |
| NSW John Holgate | 7 7 | 3 3 | 13.8 15.0 | 1822 +19 1841 |
| NSW John Foley | 9 8 | 5 4 | 14.3 15.0 | 1783 +14 1797 |
| NSW Joan Rosenthal | 8 9 | 4 5 | 14.5 14.0 | 1790 -9 1781 |
| NSW Bob Jackman | 2 4 | 1 2 | 16.8 13.5 | 1924 -53 1871 |
| NSW Esther Perrins | 11 13 | 7 7 | 13.7 13.0 | 1771 -14 1757 |
| SA Carmel Dodd | 33 21 | 2 2 | 11.8 13.0 | 1660 +23 1683 |
| NSW Robyn Flynn | 52 25 | 16 9 | 8.2 13.0 | 1582 +97 1679 |
| NSW Jean McGiffen | 27 29 | 11 11 | 12.1 12.0 | 1676 -3 1673 |
| QLD Anne Drew | 37 36 | 4 5 | 11.7 12.0 | 1646 +7 1653 |
| QLD Olga Visser | 41 33 | 5 4 | 9.6 12.0 | 1618 +47 1665 |
| TAS Matte Dunn | 57 61 | 2 2 | 12.3 12.0 | 1578 -5 1573 |
| NSW Joanne Craig | 16 26 | 8 10 | 14.8 11.5 | 1744 -67 1677 |
| NSW Moana Nepia | 0 43 | 0 15 | 14.1 11.5 | 1662 -52 1610 |
| NSW Betty Foreman | 158 103 | 46 27 | 6.8 11.5 | 1407 +95 1502 |
| VIC Patricia Mitchell | 59 94 | 30 50 | 13.8 11.0 | 1576 -57 1519 |
| NSW Betty Coleman | 143 105 | 41 28 | 8.2 11.0 | 1440 +57 1497 |
| NSW Sue Gergelifi | 104 66 | 26 18 | 7.4 11.0 | 1496 +72 1568 |
| NSW Jean Noonan | 110 98 | 28 25 | 10.0 11.0 | 1492 +19 1511 |
| NSW John Barker | 19 30 | 9 12 | 12.6 10.5 | 1710 -43 1667 |
| QLD Karen Richards | 78 87 | 8 8 | 10.9 10.0 | 1547 -18 1529 |
| NSW Graeme Lock Lee | 29 45 | 12 16 | 13.0 10.0 | 1669 -61 1608 |
| NSW Peter Shaw | 38 57 | 14 17 | 12.8 10.0 | 1632 -55 1577 |
| NSW Alison Pollard | 98 119 | 25 32 | 11.4 10.0 | 1508 -28 1480 |
| NSW Penny Wells | 207 166 | 53 49 | 7.0 10.0 | 1337 +59 1396 |
| NSW Kris Logan | 124 137 | 34 38 | 11.0 10.0 | 1473 -20 1453 |
| NSW Cheryl Michler | 192 141 | 50 40 | 5.7 10.0 | 1360 +86 1446 |
| NSW Gary Pollard | 217 189 | 55 53 | 7.1 9.5 | 1321 +48 1369 |
| NSW Jan Serisier | 87 142 | 21 41 | 13.2 9.0 | 1529 -84 1445 |
| NSW Trish Windhurst | 111 145 | 29 43 | 11.7 9.0 | 1492 -55 1437 |
| QLD Paul Richards | 103 109 | 9 9 | 9.1 9.0 | 1497 -2 1495 |
| NSW Gloria Gallagher | 128 136 | 36 37 | 9.7 9.0 | 1466 -13 1453 |
| NSW Norma Tracey | 126 157 | 35 47 | 11.9 9.0 | 1467 -58 1409 |
| NSW Nonie English | 264 227 | 65 59 | 5.8 9.0 | 1251 +64 1315 |
| NSW Raya Wilkinson | 230 181 | 58 51 | 4.6 8.5 | 1301 +79 1380 |
| NSW Elizabeth Ho | 205 210 | 52 56 | 8.5 8.0 | 1339 -9 1330 |
| NSW Sam Greenberg | 266 240 | 66 61 | 6.0 8.0 | 1247 +40 1287 |
| NSW Judy Hay | 260 263 | 63 66 | 6.7 7.0 | 1256 +7 1263 |
| NSW Hanne Marks | 141 209 | 40 55 | 11.8 6.0 | 1449 -116
1333 |