Speedy Tournament started at 09.10 Saturday, October 12, 2002 with 18 players presenting and ready to go.
It was decided that a parallel ratings system be implemented for Speedy Play and everybody started this tournament with a nominal rating of 1200. As can be seen by the results posted below this is quickly changed. Any new players entering the fray in future tournaments will be allotted this rating. It will be open to all comers and have no connection to their conventional rating.
As the day progressed, it became clear that everybody was becoming used to the strict time limit. Because time was of the essence in getting as many games in as possible, a round robin was worked out in advance with 17 games so that everybody played everybody.
A penalty system was introduced where 10 points was deducted for the first minute, 20 for the second, 30 for the third then capped at 30. I quickly learnt that going over time by 4:59 cost me 120 points which saved me brain power on at least three more occasions. One unfortunate player had the dubious distinction of recording 1 point after deductions, but it nonetheless kept the games rolling on time.
We finished about 6pm.
The dynamics of the game changed considerably. I found that in my game against John Barker I was behind quite a bit, and agonising over my play which gave John time to think in my time so that when I played my word and hit the clock he immediately played his word and hit the clock. So I was still placing my new tiles on the rack in my time which kept the pressure up.
What amazed me was that when it was all over and a few of us lingered over pizza, some stalwarts played a few relaxing games of speed scrabble to while away the time.
Challenges were done by either self lookup on the computer, by consensus around the room, or by checking Chambers. The slightest glitch in, for example scoring anomalies, meant that time was advancing without the effort being put in to playing the word, so there was a fair bit of clock stopping which was even more important now.
As far as I can make out, most, if not all, players would certainly come back next time. I would hope to hold another at a similar time next year, and others have indicated that they would be willing to also host it, so perhaps we could make it at least twice a year.
The results I am keying in manually because the Swiss program developed a glitch. Bob Jackman will post normal results when it gets sorted.
Many thanks to those who helped out in set up and in particular George Khamis for cleaning up afterwards. Thanks also to Jan Serisier who donated a magnificent trophy for first prize, and Rod Talbot for donating three great books for Shortest Time, (Victor Tung, 2:52); Highest Losing Score, (Tony Hunt, ???) and Highest Scoring non Bingo (Louise Kobler, ????)
No Player Wins Margin 1 Paul Cleary 16 2570 2 Bob Jackman 14 1694 3 Rod Talbot 13 1105 4 John Barker 13 656 5 Elizabeth Ho 11 72 6 Rene Chelton 10 464 7 Louise Kobler 10 413 8 Jan Serisier 10 337 9 Tony Hunt 10 40 10 Victor Tung 9 253 11 Hanne Marks 7 425 12 Richard Birch 7 -930 13 Barbara Berlin 6 81 14 Jean Balmer 6 -780 15 Sunny Wright 6 -848 16 Liz Jackman 3 -979 17 George Khamis 2 -963 18 Jacquelin Hochmuth 0 ? On the basis of a starting rating of 1200, initial speed ratings would be: 1 1 Paul Cleary 1525 17 2 2 Bob Jackman 1422 17 3 3 Rod Talbot 1370 17 4 4 John Barker 1368 17 5 5 Elizabeth Ho 1275 17 6 6 Jan Serisier 1245 17 7 7 Louise Kobler 1245 17 8 8 Rene Chelton 1245 17 9 9 Tony Hunt 1245 17 10 10 Victor Tung 1215 17 11 11 Hanna Marks 1155 17 12 12 Richard Birch 1155 17 1 13 Barbara Berlin 1125 17 13 14 Jean Balmer 1125 17 14 15 Sunny Wright 1125 17 15 16 Liz Jackman 1035 17 16 17 George Khamis 1005 17 17 18 Jacqueline Hochmuth 945 17