|
18th May 2010
60 Entries, 11 Tournaments, 42 Players, £2196 Prize Fund,
Nicky Check wins Jackpot.
Claire O'Toole en route to winning Round Robin Rourno 1.
|
|
42 players made
an excellent turnout and The Canalside Bar has never had more
games of bg played at the same time. It were right cozy this
evening but not overly so.
We had Swiss 1 running by 6.30pm and Swiss 2 took off just prior
to 7.00pm. This gave me a clear floor for the 15 players
interested in an 8 player Knockout for at least £25. Via a Camden
Auction the, so to speak, Men were sorted from the lads and we had
our 8 £110 players within 5 minutes. Next we did an 8 player
£30er. We had 4 non-doubling cube players so they kicked off a 2
pointer no-cube Round Robin while another 3 kicked off what would
start as a 5 pointer Round Robin but might develop into Swiss if
numbers increased to 8. At 7.30pm and we had 39 players active, 40
is a better number, so at 7.45pm Richard Biddle joined the 3
player Round Robin 2.
Claire O'Toole has been coming to Camden for about a year now but
has rarely been brave enough to play in a tournament preferring
instead to play head to heads against spare players. But this
evening she played in the 1st Round Robin. Donna has also been on
the fringe and last week tried out a Swiss. We also had two
Georgie brothers, Steve and Richard who are not doubling cube
players so they too joined the neat little 4 player Round Robin.
Who would win?
Jackpot 1 featured some of the usual suspects with Lawrence Powell
coming along for the first time this year. Bennet and Broomfield
were noticeable by their absence though at least John Broomfield
had an excuse having won the
One to One Charity Tournament a
couple of days before. 3 x 7 point matches to play between 7.15
and 11.00pm should be perfectably achievable though I do reserve
the right to put clocks on matches if the schedule is looking in
jeopardy. To cut what was a long story short Nicky Check and
Lawrence took 2 hours to play their 1st Rounder by which time
Michael Michael was the waiting finalist. Nicky & Lawrence did in
truth have some serious backgames going on and the match remained
tight all the way through to 6-6 so they do have some defence.
However and even so 2 hours is just too long. By common consensus
and free admission by Nicky it's Nicky that has for some reason
slowed down his game of late. I clocked the Round 2 match (Nicky
versus Catalin) and the Final (Nicky versus Michael) which Nicky
won at 11.30pm. But the 1st round match had left Michael waiting 2
hours to play the final which is just not acceptable. I informed
Nicky that in future I'll be putting him on a clock from his 1st
match. Nicky has taken this with good grace, full understanding as
to the reasons and is fully ok with this. Cheers Nicky.
Jackpot 2 was a nice blend of regulars, not so regulars, 1st
timers and included old friends from Manchester out of which it
was Mike George and Graham Read that became our finalists with
Graham progressing to the winners slot.
Swiss 1 & 2 bumbled along as they do with some matches taking a
short time but others taking longer. There's not a lot I can do
about these match time differences unless I start imposing clocks
on Swiss matches but I think that would be over the top. Instead I
suggest that waiting players either play casual games (not
matches) or hit the bar. This evenings Swiss winners were Lewis
Potter and Oisin Mac Conamhna.
With so many players in-situ this evening we filled a further 5
Mini-Jackpots the winners of which were: Edward Leighton, Ali
Shimiri, Simon Morecroft, Mick Patron and Ali Shimiri again.
In Round Robin 1 our 4 contestants had played their way though
their matches between cigarette breaks, drinking and their
laughter. We'll not mention Steve's results, Donna won 1 out of 3,
Richard Sams won 2 out of 3 and Claire O'Toole did herself proud
by winning 3 out of 3. Bravo Claire, you are this evenings' Round
Robin 1 Champion. However Claire had not entered to Optional Pool
so this was share between Richard and Donna. Bet Claire enters the
pool next time! Round Robin 2 was a success too with Richard
Biddle just piping Alan Beckerson to 1st place.
|