Largs Viking Chess Congress

[Alex Gillies]

Thanks for the tournament and congratulations to Alex for winning it. Hopefully more people make it next year.

I would recommend having a think about the prizes for next year though. Both Alex and I won all our games, but came away with very different amounts, which was a lot especially as a student. In effect I was never playing for more than a grading prize, and I feel absolutely gutted not to win (even jointly) my first Open.

Fide rating it was good though, hopefully that continues. Apparently even top seeds can win points if they are good enough...

Just off the phone to Gary just as I was pressing send in an email to ask that he check the tiebreak,Gary confirmed tiebreak was wrong , well done Adam on your first open win !

[Gary McPheator]

All affected players notified now, the revised prize winners for the Viking Open:

1st CM Adam Bremner 4.5/5 (£250 & Trophy)
2nd Alex Gillies 4.5/5 (Trophy)
3rd Alan Grant 4/5 (Trophy)
1st Grading Prize (Rank1-4) Alan Grant 4/5 (£100)
2nd Grading Prize (Rank 5-18) Alex Gillies 4.5/5 (£100)
3rd Grading Prize (Rank 20-33) Lukah Connolly Sams 3/5 (£100)

[Gary McPheator]

We have decided to move the Largs Viking Chess Congress to a less congested part of the season. The next one will take place on 23rd-25th of June, which will be held at the same time as the Largs Live Festival.

I am also pleased to announce that there will be an addition to the chess calendar, the Stirling Chess Congress, which will be held 28th-30th of April. Details of both events will follow in the next few weeks.

[Andy Howie]

Excellent!

[Alex Gillies]

Just like to acknowledge and thank Adam for splitting the prize money, when he did not have to.

I used to think and just accept the tie break systems we use are fair. I now have doubts on them. It takes a big differential in prize money to highlight the randomness and unfairness. You can only beat who is in front of you and if you win all your games : by default this inherently favours the higher graded player as they will normally play higher graded opponents. This affects TPR and sonneborne-berger, although the later adds to the randomness as its more about the opponents opponents and/or random last round draws and byes often on the bottom boards.

Where time allows for titles and trophies I favour 5 minute play offs. If anyone also want to play for the prizemoney that's between the players involved. For me I think prizemoney should be shared.

[andyburnett]

Just like to acknowledge and thank Adam for splitting the prize money, when he did not have to.

I used to think and just accept the tie break systems we use are fair. I now have doubts on them. It takes a big differential in prize money to highlight the randomness and unfairness. You can only beat who is in front of you and if you win all your games : by default this inherently favours the higher graded player as they will normally play higher graded opponents. This affects TPR and sonneborne-berger, although the later adds to the randomness as its more about the opponents opponents and/or random last round draws and byes often on the bottom boards.

Where time allows for titles and trophies I favour 5 minute play offs. If anyone also want to play for the prizemoney that's between the players involved. For me I think prizemoney should be shared.

I totally agree. In Czech they always apportion prizemoney according to tie-breaks. 2 years ago I played 3 IM's (all draws) and 1 GM ( a win!) and lost out on 1st place to an IM rated 200 points above me because his first 3 rounds were played against higher (and better scoring) opposition This has happened several times to me over here.

If there must be a tiebreak it should be based on +/- difference between TPR and rating (unless there's a problem with that I haven't spotted?)

[Andrew Greet]

If there must be a tiebreak it should be based on +/- difference between TPR and rating (unless there's a problem with that I haven't spotted?)

What you've suggested, Andy, would be a sensible way (though not the only way) to determine a rating prize; but if you're talking about deciding first prize (or some other 'absolute' prize in a tournament), then it should be all about the absolute performance rather than performance relative to one's rating.

That said, I agree with the overall point that money prizes should generally not be decided via tie-break in the first place - unless it's a play-off where the players have the opportunity to determine their outcome. For most events though, I think that by far the fairest way of doing things is simply to share the prize money in the event of a tie, and only use a tie-breaker for things like trophies and official titles.