Border Challenge 29th & 30th May - 2006


Another great weekend was had in Wagga despite yet another extremely poor turnout from Victoria, with only 11 of the 34 players being from South of the Border ie the Challenge team. Salutations to those that did come to risk their rating points. Thankfully for some, enjoyment of Scrabble and friends within the scene outweighs the desire to maintain one's rating.

Unfortunately in Victoria there is also a prevailing attitude of "I don't want to come unless I can play in the Challenge" meaning that playing the stalwarts that arrive every year from the ACT and Sydney is of no interest to them. This attitude resulted in a loss for Victoria even before the first word was laid down, with NSW expected to win by 30 games calculated purely by ratings.

To make the event more attractive for everybody, the format will be changed for the year's event - thankyou Harry (per Barry Harridge) for the following suggested format. The next Border Challenge will be an Open event thus eliminating the past concept of a set team. For each round, only the results from the top 10 placers in each State will count towards the Challenge. This means that a lower rating player doing well could have many games counting towards the overall result, and conversely a stronger player doing poorly could have few games counting. Everyone attending will then have a chance to contribute to their State's final result.

As the Rankins Springs Outback Open is now scheduled for the usual Border Challenge weekend in 2007, the Border Challenge will be moved to a different weekend, further away from Easter and the Nationals - probably in August. This means that that there will be no more excuses for Victorian players not to attend, other than likely loss of ratings points due the current interstate disparity. Junee and Tumut have been touted as possible alternative venues, but the Wagga RSL has proven to be perfectly suited to our needs so why change?

The Wagga Scrabble Club also supports the event, and deserves to be nurtured. They were instrumental in having Prime TV turn up yesterday to shoot a piece for their news, and I believe footage is going to air during the 6.00pm news on a non-specified day this week.

This year, I had three passengers to and from Wagga. It transpired that two of them, Jan Serisier and Liz had played ten letter words during the course of the event. Jan played INTERLOPER, and Liz extend CUR to make CURTAILING in a bonus play.

At 3pm yesterday we four (with Nonie English as the fourth) played out the inaugural unrated alfresco Snake Gully Cup, under the watchful eye of the dog on the tucker box, five miles from Gundagai. We only had time for two games, and that too was fun,

From Edward Okulicz

The ratings before the Border Challenge predicted a comfortable NSW win (by 30 games) and that's about what happened, with the final margin being 39 games, 80 to 41. NSW were particularly strong in the early rounds, having the challenge sewn up after game 8.

Joanne Craig scored three bonuses in a row: MOULTING, PASTIER and AGENCIES (triple-triple for 149) against Harry Malcolm, but that wasn't the source of her high game of 600 - that was against Norma Fisher. Norma held PATTERN on her rack and tried an eight through an E. Joanne was delighted when it came off as she had been eying that very floater to play UINTAITE, which she did.

My closest calls in my clean-sweep were against Carol Johnsen (who opened with AIRFOiL), Marie D'Rosario (who picked OESTRAL out of the bag directly after DeTRAIN, fortunately it wasn't playable and she tried a false word) and Doug Ristic, who had he not dismissed the (preposterous but valid) OUTLOVED would have beaten me.

There was a flow of about 100 points from Victoria to the NSW/ACT players, particularly to Justin Moyle, who only lost to Carol and Harry. Carol also gave Joanne her only defeat.

Someone will write more later, hopefully. Thanks to the Vics for again turning up to have their rating points sapped from them - I personally think the fact that NSW managed to gain points when the probability curve flatters low-rated players demonstrates that there is an interstate disparity, and some of us will be down in June to grab a few more!

Results after game 11
30.04.2006 NSW vs Victoria Border Challenge Wagga Wagga -- BORDER CHALL

Rank  Player            Wins Mar
---------------------------------
   1   Edward Okulicz      11     1421
   2   Joanne Craig        10     1113
   3   Justin Moyle         9      909
   4   Bob Jackman          8      744
   5   Richard Jeremy       8      469
   6   Jan Serisier         7      618
   7   Rex Shakespeare      7      410
   8   Norma Fisher         7     -290
   9   Susan MacGillivray   6      210
  10   Carol Johnsen        6       15
  11   Geoff Wright         5      -64
  12   John Spaan           5     -129
  13   Margaret Berliner    5     -316
  14   Harry Malcolm        4      -24
  15   John Barker          4     -161
  16   Gwen Lampre          4     -242
  17   Pat Kennedy          4     -728
  18   Doug Ristic          3     -729
  19   Marj Miller          3     -737
  20   Marie D'Rosario      2     -422
  21   Chile Malcolm        2     -692
  22   Cath Catmull         1    -1375
HIGH GAME: Joanne Craig      600
HIGH WORD: Joanne Craig      149
             "AGENCIES"

  Results after game 11
30.04.2006 NSW vs Victoria Border Challenge Wagga Wagga -- OPEN

Rank  Player            Wins Mar
---------------------------------
   1   Anne Schick          9      690
   2   Michael Adler        7.5    365
   3   Tony Kalayzich       7      564
   4   Christine Foot       7      449
   5   Liz Jackman          7      344
   6   Nonie English        7      335
   7   Maree Heynen         6      -33
   8   Heather Sorensen     6      -40
   9   Helen Povey          3.5   -282
  10   Norm Byng            3     -463
  11   George Torr          2    -1016
  12   Peter McKenzie       1     -913
HIGH GAME: Tony Kalayzich    495
HIGH GAME: Liz Jackman       495
HIGH WORD: George Torr           140
             "CONTRITE"

  Stats for Tournament : 30.04.2006 NSW vs Victoria Border Challenge Wagga Wagga

+--------------------------+-----------+---------+-----------+---------------+
| state     Name           | National  | State   |   Wins    | Rating Points |
|                          | Old  New  | Old New | Exp  Act  | Old 
| Change New|
+--------------------------+-----------+---------+-----------+---------------+
+Section: *BORDER CHALL                +         +           +               +
+--------------------------------------+---------+-----------+---------------+
| NSW Edward Okulicz       |    4    2 |   1   1 |  9.5 11.0 | 1803 +23 1826 |
| NSW Joanne Craig         |   17   15 |   7   5 |  8.4 10.0 | 1675 +31 1706 |
| ACT Justin Moyle         |   97   63 |   3   2 |  6.0  9.0 | 1466 +64 1530 |
| NSW Bob Jackman          |   13   14 |   4   4 |  9.0  8.0 | 1731 -19 1712 |
| ACT Richard Jeremy       |   18   19 |   1   1 |  8.4  8.0 | 1672  -8 1664 |
| NSW Jan Serisier         |  132  108 |  32  26 |  5.4  7.0 | 1419 +32 1451 |
| NSW Rex Shakespeare      |  104   89 |  25  21 |  5.9  7.0 | 1457 +23 1480 |
| VIC Norma Fisher         |   43   35 |  19  14 |  5.8  7.0 | 1567 +25 1592 |
| VIC Carol Johnsen        |   77   64 |  40  33 |  5.0  6.0 | 1508 +21 1529 |
| ACT Susan MacGillivray   |  114  113 |   5   5 |  5.7  6.0 | 1441  +7 1448 |
| VIC Geoff Wright         |   27   36 |  12  15 |  6.5  5.0 | 1620 -29 1591 |
| ACT John Spaan           |   78   96 |   2   3 |  6.4  5.0 | 1498 -28 1470 |
| NSW Margaret Berliner    |  268  245 |  60  53 |  3.5  5.0 | 1262 +29 1291 |
| NSW John Barker          |   40   78 |  13  19 |  7.3  4.0 | 1575 -67 1508 |
| VIC Harry Malcolm        |   37   47 |  16  23 |  6.1  4.0 | 1591 -41 1550 |
| VIC Gwen Lampre          |   30   41 |  14  18 |  6.4  4.0 | 1613 -47 1566 |
| VIC Pat Kennedy          |  272  237 | 109  99 |  2.1  4.0 | 1257 +38 1295 |
| VIC Marj Miller          |   82  102 |  42  50 |  4.8  3.0 | 1494 -35 1459 |
| VIC Doug Ristic          |  254  243 | 104 100 |  2.3  3.0 | 1278 +14 1292 |
| VIC Marie D'Rosario      |  121  149 |  56  68 |  4.0  2.0 | 1435 -41 1394 |
| VIC Chile Malcolm        |  273  275 | 110 111 |  2.1  2.0 | 1256  -2 1254 |
| VIC Cath Catmull         |  598  584 | 182 180 |  0.4  1.0 |  904 +13  917 |
+-------------------------------------+---------+-----------+----------------+
+Section: *OPEN                        +         +           +               +
+--------------------------------------+---------+-----------+---------------+
| ACT Anne Schick          |  307  300 |   9   9 |  8.3  9.0 | 1192 +15 1207 |
| ACT Michael Adler        |  308  320 |  10  10 |  8.2  7.5 | 1187 -14 1173 |
| NSW Tony Kalayzich       |  378  384 |  87  88 |  7.4  7.0 | 1116  -8 1108 |
| ACT Christine Foot       |  449  432 |  12  11 |  6.4  7.0 | 1035 +12 1047 |
| NSW Liz Jackman          |  347  361 |  80  82 |  7.7  7.0 | 1142 -14 1128 |
| NSW Nonie English        |  286  299 |  63  66 |  8.8  7.0 | 1244 -37 1207 |
| ACT Heather Sorensen     |  560  536 |  15  15 |  5.2  6.0 |  939 +16  955 |
| NSW Maree Heynen         |  587  562 | 141 133 |  4.9  6.0 |  913 +22  935 |
| NSW Helen Povey          |  931  885 | 232 221 |  2.2  3.5 |  665 +38  703 |
| NSW Norm Byng            |  729  754 | 178 181 |  3.6  3.0 |  805 -19  786 |
| NSW George Torr          | 1077 1052 | 281 275 |  1.4  2.0 |  561 +19  580 |
| NSW Peter McKenzie       |  990 1027 | 255 266 |  1.9  1.0 |  625 -26  599 |
+-------------------------------------+---------+-----------+----------------+