Nuanced artificial adjustments

Brighton 2011 – Day 3

Dodgy claims for breakfast

The rulings started early today: a claim from yesterday appeared in the bulletin and caused much discussion over breakfast. It concerned the issue of whether a statement that “I have winners in spades and clubs” (say) means I will (try to) cash my spades and then my clubs, or whether (in adjudicating such a claim) the TD must allow that you might play on clubs before the spades. I got dragged in late in the day to advise the bulletin staff editor on a responding article to appear tomorrow.

Extending Law 12C2

I gave an artificial adjustment today that I thought extended Law 12C2 with some additional nuances; but a colleague said: “you do realise that is illegal.” A table had run out of time and I stopped them from playing the last board of a round. I had seen the (slow) play of an earlier board, and thought that both sides were to blame. But I could believe that the slowness before that had been the fault of one side only. I could have awarded 50%/50% or 40%/60% for the unplayed board but I decided on 45%/55% in favour of the side that were slow only on one board.

Law 12C2(a) offers the following adjustments:

• average minus (at most 40%): directly at fault;
• average (50%): partly at fault;
• average plus (at least 60%): no way at fault.

I thought my adjustment could be seen as extending this list:

• average semi-minus (45%): mainly at fault;
• average semi-plus (55%): slightly at fault.

I doubt it will catch on.

Junior Teach-in reminiscences

I had two separate conversations about the Junior Teach-in that E attended: the ex-juniors who were juniors then felt old when reminded that it was ten years ago (and E is now 18, awaiting A-level results).

I directed the Saturday evening pairs at that Junior Teach-in, and I have never forgotten the stress of trying to get each move called, even though there was no real pressure from anyone else. Although this evening's events at Brighton were also not “high-pressure”, there was still pressure that they run to time. Once you have fast players who want to play the next round, and slow players who want to finish the last round, the TD will always have his work cut out to keep everyone happy (or at least, not too put out).