Bridgescore+ - Chattanooga Regional - July 11-17, 2016

This report is being written as the tournament is run.

The goal is to have the local TDs run the events using Bridgescore+ (BS+), and to start to use District 7 hardware. D7 has been running off my hardware for 2+ years.

Monday, July 11, 2016

I set up my hardware and the latest BS+ for the first KO, but didn't touch the keyboard after that. Goal is to get more TDs trained in the software. First KO was 41 teams. There were no team MP corrections. All assignments were up at 1:01:10, 70 seconds after the end closed. Brackets of 12, 13, 16. Smaller regionals have more established teams than larger ones so there are fewer problems with teams not knowing the team total MPs.

Swiss at 7pm. 20 teams. We did not use Bridgemates as D7 does not have enough Bridgemates for evening Swiss. Used BS+ to run the event including using its matching algorthm.

Hard not to write about amusing incidents. The hotel room had a drop screen that was controlled from a touch screen panel on the wall. One of the players leaned on it and turned the lights in the room off. The computers are still powering the screens so we had a dark room except for the projector. One of the D7 board members tried to put the lights back on, but he is in the dark. He turned the music on, then turned the music up, then hit the button to move the screen up into the wall. Lasted 3 minutes. Players had a little disco going on. Fortunately (?) everything got fixed. I did not include the 3 minute interlude in the timing.

Good thing with the Swiss is that there is no need for a rack, or a Jeffrey Chart so setup for a TD is easier.

Tuesday, July 12, 2016

The goal is to stop relying on my equipment for the KO starts.

DIC and a TD ran BS+ off the Internet using D7 projectors and D7 equipment. This includes D7 projectors and D7 computers. Did not use any of my equipment. 33 tables. Bracket sizes: 9, 14, 10. All assignments up at 9:02:15 (going from BS+ log file). I was not involved in any way.

Same thing happened for the 1pm KO. 37 teams. 9, 12, 16.

D7 had been using an older version of the software online (from September 2014).

I put a more recent version of the software on the Internet for D7 usage. This was the version used for the rest of the week.

No evening Swiss.

Wednesday, July 13, 2016

The goal is to stop relying on my equipment for the KO starts.

DIC and a TD ran BS+ off the Internet using D7 projectors and D7 equipment. This includes D7 projectors and D7 computers. 33 tables. Bracket sizes: 9, 14, 10. All assignments up at 9:02:15 (going from BS+ log file). I was not involved in any way.

Same thing happened for the 1pm KO. 37 teams. 9, 12, 16.

D7 had been using an older version of the software online (from September 2014).

I put a more recent version of the software on the Internet for D7 usage. This was the version used for the rest of the week.

Ran evening Swiss. 18 tables. D7 did not have enough Bridgemates so we used 12 of mine. Tables 1-6 were all run with Bridgemates. No problems.

Thursday, July 14, 2016

Two session A/X Swiss. Ran first day with Bridgescore+. I was out of town for the second day.

Afternoon KO. 32 teams. 12, 9, 11. This is one of the reasons that DIC must have the ability to use common sense in bracketing. With some pro teams, 2 brackets of 16 teams would have several teams feeling that they were unlikely to win in bracket 1. Similarly, the lower teams in bracket 2 would not be happy playing against teams that average more masterpoints per player than their entire team. Creating 3 brackets is at DIC discretion. Bracket 1 ranged from 3,258/4 MPS to 130,000/5 MPs. Bracket 2 ranged from 6,310/4 MPS to 5,735/4 MPs. Bracket 3 ranged from 1,179/4 MPS to 2,647/4 MPs.

I was told that the ACBL rule (I have not seen it anywhere) is that the number of brackets cannot be more than two than the minimum number of legal brackets. For example, with 96 teams you have 6 brackets of 16. A DIC can make this a 7 bracket event, but cannot make it an 8 bracket event.

Friday, July 15, 2016

Saturday, July 16, 2016

One session A/B/C Swiss. Ran with Bridgemates. 15 tables.

Saturday morning compact KO. 23 tables. TDs started it - I was not there.

Sunday, July 16, 2016

Two session A/X Swiss. Six 8 board matches. 14 tables. Ran with Bridgemates.

Was the first time that some of the pro teams had played in a Swiss with Bridgescore+ and Bridgemates. Some of the pro teams are used to finishing early, seeing the time on the clock and "knowing" that it typically takes 5-10 minutes to turn each round. With Bridgescore+ as soon as we get the last score in, we have the assignments posted usually within 10-15 seconds for the next round. One team was almost assessed a late penalty as they decided to grab an early lunch and was not expecting such a fast turn around. There is a timer on the screen - but it's finished, the next round is normally posted very quickly. Bridgescore+ has its own matching algorithm so there is no need to rely on ACBLscore for any data.

With the Bridgemates we could tell which are the slow tables. Decision on what to do with the slow table is up to the DIC, not me. The slow pair (there was one) was identified in the first round and remained slow for all 6 matches.

General

The assigned D7 contact for not able to work any of the Swiss events so was not able to see how the Swiss worked.

Pre-registration

Not used.

Camera (videos)

Not used.