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I'd made a number of trips to the venue before the weekend.
Detailed planning was a must. On my last trip only 3 days
before the event I was proudly told about and shown the new tables
in what would be the B-G Room of the YHA - they had changed
the small rectangular tables for large 6 seater round tables.
Wonderful for groups eating together, useless for backgammon
matches. The whole weekend schedule, which was already tight,
could come tumbling down and falter in chaos as matches
wouldn't
get played within the allotted time.
I'd already booked 15 tables in The Spice Island Pub &
Restaurant across the road for "spill over matches".
I enquired if I could have 34 tables instead. The Manageress's
eyes lit up. We could have the whole of the upstairs (the restaurant)
of The Spice Island. 38 tables - mostly rectangular and a few
rounds. We were back on track.
This year I'd decided to invite another online backgammon organization
to join us. I selected IBA. Their philosophy seemed much the
same as mine and I liked their professional approach. As it
happened their Director Joy would be in England in November
and was more than pleased to join up. The mailing and posting
of the event went out to my mailing lists and the IBA mailing
list at the same time.
As in previous years prizes would not be cash prizes - they
would come from our 13 sponsors: BIBA, Playmaker-world, Snowie,
GammonVillage, Grant Boards, Carlton Books, Chris Bray, Chris
Lloyd, The Fox Reformed, David Naylor, Anni Glassware,
TrueMoneygames and the GLH cab company. Many of them had
sponsored in previous years and many of them increased their
sponsorship this year. It delights me to see these companies
willing to give incentive to players that are coming into the
game.
The weekend kicked off officially at 7.00 p.m. on the Friday
with drinks downstairs in The Spice Island though a good few
players, most of whom had arrived by free (sponsored) GLH
cabs, had been keeping the seats warm, drinking some beers and
playing some games since mid afternoon. More cabs arrived at
8.30 p.m. with Fox Reformed players and we had dinner
upstairs. Starting the weekend with about 40 players having
time to meet each other set the tone - social first,
backgammon second.
At 10.00 p.m. we moved to the YHA where two tournament
started. There were about 25 regular IBA players with us so
there was to be an IBA Knockout Tournament. Entry was free as
long as players had registered on the IBA website. We had a 39
player entry. We also kicked off the (free) In-Housers Tric
Trac Tourno. This was a 24 player entry. Both tournaments
would take all weekend to play out and both contributed
towards Champ o Champs points. Players retired at about
midnightish - we had a long day tomorrow and a lot of
backgammon to play.
Play resumed at 9.00 o'clock on Saturday - IBA Knockout
matches and In-Housers TTT matches. At 11.00 o'clock Dod
Davies was to give a seminar in the B-G Room. It kicked off 15
minutes late and was well received by the players - Dod
concentrated on second moves. First moves have already been
well documented on the web, but second moves have not. The
display board didn't work as well as it might have done. Next
year I'll have a large magnetic board instead.
There were to be 3 types of betting over the weekend. The idea
was that first time live tournament players would witness
various forms of betting that can happen at backgammon
tournaments. So we would have an auction in the Singles
Knockout Tournament, a sweep in the Doubles Knockout
Tournament and 2 pools in the Swiss Tournament.
Will Richardson was our auctioneer. All players had been spilt
into 8 teams, each headed by a strong player. The auction
happened in the B-G Room rather than in the Pub which would
have infringed upon British Licensing Laws.
The Singles Knockout Tournament started about 30 minutes late. This was not good news because this would delay the boat trip. The plan was that the 4 finals (Main, Consolation, Last Chance and Suicide) would happen on board the boat.
It might sound as if the standard of play was going to be
mediocre. No so at all. We had with us
Paul Lamford (twice British Champion) Geoff Oliver
(ex British Champion), Dod Davies, Al Hogg
(European Finalist 2002), Alex Naylor, John
Broomfield, Alan Beckerson, Uldis Lapikens, Tom
Duggan, various Monte Carlo World Championship
players, MSO players and a good few more. All came
on the understanding that this was a learning
curve for new live players and all were happy to
impart their considerable combined knowledge.
Due to time constraints and to give the lesser
players a standing chance the Main of the Knockout
was 5 pointers, the Consolation 3 pointers, the
Last Chance 3 pointers and Suicide 1 pointers. In
my calculations of how long matches would take to
play I now realise that I omitted to take into
consideration how much players would chat between matches. As much as I tried to hurry them
along we just could not catch up with Old Father
Time. The boat would not wait, the tide was
turning and Blackfriars Bridge would be closed to
all river traffic at 4.45 p.m. So at 3.30 p.m.
players were ushered outside to where a fleet of
cab would be waiting to take them the 3/4 of a
mile to where our boat was waiting. The Tournament
was about 3/4 played. Players seemed unperturbed
by this - they wanted to see the fireworks !
The boat could carry 49 passengers - the remaining
players went all the way by cab. I didn't go on
the boat trip - instead I used the time to catch
up, tidy up and re-set things for the evening
session. This was the first year we had
added the boat trip (in previous years players had
gone by cab). It was a great hit and will
certainly be on the schedule next year. Some
matches happened on the boat though I gather most
players were happy to view some of the sights
of London - Tower Bridge, The
Tower of London, St Paul's Cathedral, Shakespeare's
Globe Theatre and the Tate Modern Museum.
I was
somewhat alarmed when a player phoned me to let me
know the fireworks barge was on fire - our boat
was just 50 yards away - but I was later informed
that this was a mock fire - I suppose if your
regular job is to be a
pyromaniac in charge of a few thousand pounds
worth of fireworks sooner or later your weird
sense of humour is going to reveal itself!
After the fireworks the Captain
kindly cruised further up river so players could
see the Houses of Parliament and Big Ben. The
players returned to The Spice Island at 6.00 p.m.
fresh faced and enthusing about the boat trip and
the fireworks.
6.00 p.m. - 7.30 p.m. was supposed to be a free
period so players could shower, eat and relax
before the evening. But Singles Knockout matches
were still to be played. "I gotta eat - I'm
famished, I've been drinking beer, had some fresh
air and I'm starving" seemed to be the
general view. So they did. What could I say or do?
O.k. So we're going to really over-run I thought.
But they are enjoying themselves so let them be I
decided.
At 7.30 p.m. Claude Earl Jones did his play
"Cowboy". Yes, this was a backgammon
weekend - but a backgammon weekend with
differences! CJ is an American actor and an IBA
player. He'd offered to fit Act 1 of his play into
the schedule. It was well received and I heard a
good amount of laughter emitting from the B-G Room
where it took place.
At 8.00 p.m. I finally had just about all players
back. At last we continued with the Singles
Knockout. Meanwhile other players were also ready
for the Doubles Knockout to start. Seeing as this
would be a buy back-in Knockout format we kicked
that off too. It might sound like we were in total
disarray but surprisingly enough we weren't. Those
players that were waiting for matches could squeeze
in their In-Houser Tric Trac Tourno matches and
IBA Knockout matches. The Chouette Corner also
kicked in. Others were eating and chatting on the
balcony on The Spice Island under a full
moon.
At some stage during the evening a dice had been
thrown with a bit too much gusto and tumbled over
the interior balcony to the bar below. The Barman,
cool as a cucumber, picked it up, raised his head
and shouted "It's a 5" as he threw it
back upstairs.
We had the Naylors with us - David, Alex and Lolly. David had
a beautiful display of his leather boards and was also showing
players his new travel board.
It's a work of art. The wooden
walls fold down with an inlaid hinge mechanism and includes a
centre bar and platform for hit checkers, the leather is David's usual high standard, the
checkers are smooth to play with and the whole thing folds
down into a draw-cord bag. A limited number of them will be on
the market soon. As the maker of Backpacker Backgammon Boards
I'm thrilled to see this luxury version of a travel board come
onto the market. David has quietly been working on this for a
number of months now and I'm honoured that he chose to launch
it at this event. Click
here for more details from David.
Slowly Final results filtered through. Alex Naylor
continued his excellent year (Intermediate flight Main Winner
Sanremo 2003, Intermediate flight Last Chance Winner European
Championships 2003) and won the Singles Main Knockout his opponent (Chris
aka buggalugs2u) having made one serious blunder
that was punished ruthlessly. Alexis Hogg (Fox
player and wife of Al Hogg) won the Last Chance
and charmingly all she could say was "I won,
I won, I won" before she curled up on a sofa
and slept, Sonia Spencer (the slowest Fox player
around) who was attending her first live
tournament was as cool as ever as she won the
Consolation. Joe Crook (quite the most vocal
player there) won the
Suicide. Tom Duggan, who had spread betted,
took the entire auction. Backgammonwise Tom
didn't do so well - he lost in the 1st round of every (6)
tournament brackets he entered.
The Doubles had started with just 16 teams but
filled up to 32 and was won by Stef Rohan and John
Broomfield (who had also teamed up last year)
under the apt name of "Our first step to
world domination". The Sweep was won by Paul Lamford and Sue
Perks.
The Chouette Corner was buzzing, All IBA matches
were on schedule and the In-Housers Tric Trac
Tourno was about 3/4 played.
Now that we had some results in I could update the
Champ o Champ points. Put simply this is a method
of deciding who did the best throughout the
weekend. Each tournament had a set number of
points awarded for a win, second or third place.
The overall winner would walk away with the Champ
o Champs trophy. Alex Naylor and buggalugs2u (who
was a losing finalist in both the Main Singles and
Doubles) were currently looking the favourites.
Play continued back in the B-G Room of the YHA for
another couple of hours or so. Would these people
ever go to bed? Maybe it was the free drinks
available in the esky
(Australian
word for ice box) and the bottles of schnapps
bought over by the German players that were
attending that kept them going! The one casualty
of the overruns was the Hypergammon Tournament. It
was scraped entirely. This was a shame, but nobody
complained. Free cabs were called for the Fox
players and at long last the In-Housers found the
lift upstairs to their rooms.
Sunday morning and after an English breakfast we
were back in the B-G Room and YHA bar for
In-Houser Tric Trac Tourno matches and New Zealand
v South Africa and England v Wales in the Quarter
Finals of the Rugby World Cup. This certainly was
not just a backgammon, backgammon, backgammon
weekend. The All Blacks and P.O.M.S. did the
business and Richard Biddle stormed through his
TTT matches to look like a likely winner. The TTT
overran by 30 minutes and hence slightly delayed
the start of the Swiss Tournament in The Spice
Island. The last match of the In-Housers TTT was
played in The Spice Island and confirmed Richard
Biddle as the winner - an impressive performance
considering he was up against some of the most experienced
TTT players there are.
We had 38 players in the Swiss. As in previous
years this (and the £5 & £10 pools) was run
by Guy Jewsbury. Players all sat down and play
commenced. Other players were happy to play
chouettes and some elected to just play in the
Sunday Tric Trac Tourno.
Meanwhile we had a backgammon workshop to run. I'd
added this on the basis that any weekend Music
Festival you go to these days includes a workshop
and they always seem very popular. Also I'd had a
workshop running in the Backgammon Tentquee at the
London StokeFest last summer and it too had proved
a great success. I'd been hoping for 6 - 12 people
turning up for it but, probably because it had not
be advertised separately in the London press, we
only had 1 person turn up for it. Felicity
probably benefited well from this and got some
very good one to one tuition.
At 1.00 o'clock I kicked off the Sunday Tric Trac
Tourno. We had 3 x 10 player Pre-TTTs with the top
three players going through to the Final play off.
Reports trickled through as players squeezed their
TTT matches in between Swiss matches and it wasn't
until about 10.00 p.m. that we were ready to start
the Final Play-off.
The Chouette Corner was in various corners of the
Spice Island and as the evening progressed it was
clear that there were two players in contention
for the trophy. Every player had been (or should
have been - sorry, some had to ask) given 32
dollars worth of Bank of Backpacker Backgammon
Boards Bucks. This ensured that players could
learn how a chouette works without them getting
fleeced for real cash. Chouette rules had also
been enclosed in their chouette money envelopes.
How some players acquired bucks off other players
is questionable (I gather some donations were
made) and some games were head to heads for $32.
However the goal of new players learning the
basics of chouette play was achieved. Last year we
had one player who had considerably more bucks
than anybody else so the winner was clear. This
year is was closer.
The IBA Weekend long Knockout was also drawing to
a close with the Final between two Fox players
(now also IBA members) Vianney B and Sue Keeble.
Sue had already acquired some well thought of
scalps during the weekend and now won this 9 point
Final. Sue was chuffed to bits and promptly order
champagne.
This also meant that the Fox Ladies had
had a very good weekend - Sonia, Alexis, Stef and
Sue picked up 4 trophies between them.
The Swiss Tournament went to 5 rounds and was won
by buggalugs2u. There were numerous players on 4
wins and hence the Champ o Champs points chart stretched
considerably but bugs had done enough now to be
the winner of the Champ o Champs.
Back in the Chouette Corner our two leaders had
very similar looking wadges of BBB bucks. CJ reckoned
he had 455 bucks, Richard Biddle totaled 419
bucks. In view of this Sammy (an accountant)
offered to count both wadges. It seems like a
damned good idea so I sat her down at the T.D.
desk and she did the count ups. Sammy counted CJ's
417 bucks, Richard's 419. "Oh my God" I
thought. I asked Sammy to count them again. She
did. Same figures. I took the bucks (now in 2
plastic bags) over to Joy the IBA Director and
explained the situation. She agreed that another
count was in order. She did so. CJ 417, Richard
419. CJ was explained the counts. He accepted them
as fair and was gracious in defeat. Richard had
actually left by the time the counts were completed but
has since been informed of his win. In the spirit
of the event he replied "I ever come across
CJ again I will offer to play him for the trophy
as under a half percent difference is a pretty
even score." From my point of view it is a
real pleasure to organise this event for such a
decent bunch of people.
The Final Play-off of the Sunday Tric Trac Tourno
was still playing and we still hadn't got round to
presenting all of the prizes we had though a
number of them had already been handed out. Before
the weekend I'd handed over the presenting of
prizes to Bigdave (I'm not one who loves the
limelight) and sorting out who should win what of
the 70 or so prizes we had is a considerable task.
Everybody there was due to receive something that
had been donated by our 13 sponsors. Time and time again Dave called forward players to
receive their prizes, each cheered by
the remaining players. Some players had gotton
away without their Prizes. These will be posted to
them.
The last two matches of the Sunday Tric Trac
Tourno happened in the B-G Room. It was long past
closing time in The Spice Island and I wasn't
willing to annoy the management by over-staying
our welcome - I want the venue next year! It
turned out we had a draw for 1st place in the
Sunday TTT. So we went to a Final Final play-off
between Grant and buggalugs2u. Just to cap his
weekend buggalugs2u won
this as well.
Backgammon continued until about 2.00 a.m. the
last cabs were called, I locked the B-G Room and
took the lift to my room and fell asleep as my
head hit the pillow.
So how did it all go? Without doubt the best so
far. This can mostly be attributed to the change
of venue for backgammon play but also to the
continued mix of online and live players. The
Spice Island was the perfect size for 64 players.
It was large enough that players were not crammed
but small enough that we were not thin on the
ground and the outside balcony was a lovely
cooling off space. The staff were excellent though
under considerable pressure. Adding the boat trip
to see the fireworks was very popular and for many
was a highlight of the weekend. The YHA provides
decent budget accommodation for those that need it
and we also have the B-G Room and bar for morning
and late night play. Sponsorship from the GLH cab
company means players only need get to a central
London Station or The Fox Reformed and don't have
to search for the actual venue.
Looking forward to next year I'm going to keep it
as a maximum 64 player event. I'll move the
Seminar to the Sunday and start the Singles
Knockout at 11.00 a.m. and, to save time and make
the betting more understandable, change the
auction to the Swiss and pools to the Knockout. In
this way we stand a chance of having the 4 Finals
happen on board the boat, the evening Doubles
Tournament will run a lot smoother and there
should be time for a Hypergammon Tournament. We'll
keep the Weekend long Knockout but have a few
maximum 10 player TTTs running instead of two big
ones. I might tinker with the Chouette Corner set
up, I'll certainly give it a section of its own in
The Spice Island. Plug the workshop better in the
London press and have that as an on-going event
during the daytimes. I won't run any tournaments
myself - we'll have a different T.D. for each
tournament - which will leave me free to attend to
all players needs whatever they may be. Increase
the staff in both The Spice Island and bring in a
couple myself. Oh, and allow more time for
chat!
Many many thanks to the sponsors and to those (in
particular but in no particular order CJ,
Dan, Dave, Dod, Grant, Guy, Jessica, Joy, Lisa, Miranda,
Tony and
Will) who helped and gave their time
during the weekend without whom this event would
not have been possible.
In-Housers Tric Trac Tourno
IBA Knockout Chart
Singles Knockout Charts
Doubles Knockout Chart
The Sunday Tric Trac Tourno
Champ o Champs
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