The Columbus Backgammon Club

This year’s OVCC saw the Cincinnati Backgammon Players Club take top honors with an impressive 17-7 score, with the Columbus Backgammon Club winning a solid second place performance with their 14-10 record. The final scores were:

In a wild start to 2014, we have 3 different winners out of 3 tournaments. This time, Howard Shirey bested the field of 8 with a finals win over second place finisher Bob Hickey. David Rearick took 3rd place by winning the consolation final over Tad Mitchell. With the results from this month, the Masters Points race is very tight so far. Chris Yep and David Rearick are tied for first place with 116 points each, and Howard is right behind them with 110.

Congratulations, Howard, on your win this month!

The updated Masters Points standings can be found here. The next monthly tournament will be held on April 13th, 2014. See you there!

An ill-timed snow shower cut down on attendance this month, but we still had a respectable 7 players brave the snow and come play. The field included a newcomer to the CBC monthly tournament – Alex Gerding. A speedy tournament (thank you to everyone for keeping the pace moving!) saw David Rearick win his first monthly tournament in over a year with an exciting double match point victory over second place winner Howard Shirey. Current points leader Chris Yep placed third with a consolation final victory over Rhonda Beckett.

The current masters points standings can be found here.

Welcome to Alex, and congratulations again to David Rearick on his win this month.

Thank you to all who played this month. The next monthly tournament will be held on March 9th. Hopefully the weather will be more cooperative!

The Ohio Valley Cup Challenge for 2013 will be held in Dayton, Ohio on March 23, 2014, pitting the 6 highest ranked players from the Columbus Backgammon Club, the Cincinnati Backgammon Players Club, the Hoosiers Backgammon Club, and the Miami Valley Backgammon Club against each other in a round-robin tournament.

We currently have 5 player spots filled, and need a 6th as well as alternates, just in case. Time is running out, so if you have interest in representing the club, please reach out to me as soon as possible!

The OVCC is part of a weekend long event that everyone is invited to. More information can be found at the event website:

http://www.cincybg.com/Pages/OVCC2011.aspx

Mary Hickey has graciously donated 2 items to our library for lending to any club member interested. The first are print copies of articles that appear on Mary’s CD-ROM about chouette play, entitled “Chouette and More”. The second is of more historical interest – a VHS tape of a WQED-TV news story done on the 2004 Pittsburgh Backgammon tournament, featuring Mary Hickey and other players.

Thank you, Mary, for your contribution!

We broke a club tournament attendance record this month with 11 players showing up to start the year! This total also included 2 new players – Dan Henley and Jim Weitthoff, and 2 prodigal players – Howard Shirey and Mary Hickey. We got to break out the dusty 16-player bracket for this month, and after all was said and done Chris Yep came out on top over runner-up Tad Mitchell. Jason Marshall took third place as the winner of the consolation bracket.

Beginning this month was also start using our new Masters Points system. The current standings can be found here.

Welcome again to our newcomers, Dan and Jim, and congratulations to Chris on his win this month!

Thank you to all of the players who attended. The next monthly tournament will be held on February 9th. Let’s see if we can break the attendance record again!

With the end of the Social/Open play event held today, we finish the club’s scheduled events for the year. Overall, I think this has been a good, stable year for the club. Attendance at events in general have been up over 2012, and we seem to have an influx of new participants over the past couple of months which should carry over nicely into the new year.

I plan on having the same schedule of 1 monthly tournament, 1 Social/Open play event, and 2 chouettes per month, as this is what my current availability allows. If anyone would like to assist as far as event hosting so that we are able to expand the calendar, that would certainly be appreciated. Please feel free to reach out and let me know.

There will be some changes to the format of the monthly tournaments next year, as well as how Masters Points are assigned. Chris Yep has been instrumental in helping me formulate these changes and we feel they are an improvement over the current system. It is still a modified double-elimination tournament, with one more tweak. Here is a quick summary of the tournament changes coming in January:

• The tournament payout will be 100%, rather than the current 95%
  • This means slightly higher prizes for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place, but it also removes a source of income for the club to offset expenses such as hosting for the website, office supplies, yearly trophy, MeetUp.com fees, etc. From this point forward, the club will be entirely funded by voluntary donations. No one is obligated to donate, and no special privileges will be granted to those who do.

• The current consolation final between the loser of the main bracket final and last consolation player will be eliminated
  • The loser of the main bracket in the tournament will be considered 2nd place and not drop into the consolation final. The winner of the consolation bracket will be considered the 3rd place winner. This shortens the tournament by one round overall, helping the day to finish sooner.

• Main bracket wins will still be worth 10 Masters Points, Consolation bracket wins will now be worth 7 points
  • This puts an emphasis on winning in the main bracket while still awarding credit for consolation wins

• The Main bracket final will be a 9-point match, and the Consolation bracket final will be a 7-point match

• Rather than the current Masters Points “multiplier” bonus for placing 1st or 2nd, a flat bonus will be granted to 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place:
  • 1st – 40 points
  • 2nd – 20 points
  • 3rd – 20 points
• Players in Round-robin tournaments will score Master Points based on overall number of wins
  • The number of Masters Points earned in a Round Robin tournament is directly linked to the number players in the tournament and the of wins the player has.

So, in short: more money, less time, sightly different points system. 🙂

All of these changes are now reflected on the website. If there are any questions or concerns, feel free to reach out and let me know!

I want to thank you all for what I consider to be a successful 2013, and I look forward to another year of good times, fun games, and hopefully a lot of growth in 2014!

Ready for Prime Time, the team representing the Columbus Backgammon Club in the USBGF National Club Team Tournament, lost in their semi-final match to team Franklee Unflappable from the DC area. The tiebreakers seem to indicate that our team leaves with a 4th place result!

An excellent effort from team members Chris Yep, David Rearick, and Jason Marshall, and a great result for the club!

Mike Rezai has generously donated 4 more books to the club library. The new titles available to be borrowed are:

• Backgammon by Paul Magriel
• Backgammon For Profit by Joe Dwek
• Backgammon Openings – Book A by Nack Ballard and Paul Weaver
• Paradoxes and Probabilities by Barclay Cooke

Thank you very much, Mike!

In an effort to get more visibility for the club, and as a result gain some membership, I have created a Meetup group on Meetup.com. Early results are encouraging, as we have already seen some new faces at the Social/Open play events and the Chouettes from this effort. (Welcome, Susan and Michael!)

If you are already registered on Meetup.com, I would encourage you to join the new group. It’s free to register if you don’t have an account, and you might find some other groups that you would be interested in.