tournaments
why, with 21 tables for a 3A tournament would you not just play a mitchell movement instead of mitchell and howell combined? I have not played in other clubs tournaments for some time when they were always mitchell movements but have been told it is quite normal to mix both systems.
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- GILES HANCOCK27 Oct 2016 at 09:39PM
Hi Eleanor
My understanding.
A 21-table straight Mitchell is a one-board-per-round movement, with 21 boards. Two sessions gives 42 boards, not enough for a tournament. So you have to extend the Mitchell to 23/25/27 boards and have a few rounds where pairs meet previous pairs. This appears unfair to players - "we had to play the grandmasters twice".
Also, one-board-per-round movements are considered a bit frivilous and social. Players like to settle in and play two or three boards against the same opposition. The one-board movement gets a bit noisy, slow players cause delays, the director has to keep on top of the time and doesn't get much chance to take a break or study a decision, etc etc
A web movement is probably best for 21 tables but a lot of directors (like myself) don't want the complications so we just run a 13-table Mitchell and a Howell on the side, 26 boards in both sections. I think a lot of players also don't understand a web.
I find the Howell runs slower as players take longer to find their table and settle in. Tip : hand out the boards in the Howell first !
hope that makes some sense
Giles
- ELEANOR BRADSHAW28 Oct 2016 at 07:57PM
Thanks very much for the answer Giles. That clarifies things for me as to the reason behind this. The one query I have is if it gives a fair result as you are not actually playing everyone else sitting the same direction as you are due to the Howell players changing directions. Cheers, Eleanor
- GILES HANCOCK29 Oct 2016 at 08:48AM
That makes it more fair
A Mitchell is really two separate competitions, NS and EW. A Howell provides more variety in the comparisons - a 7-table Howell is fairer than a 7-table Mitchell. Some directors deliberately put an arrow-switch into a Mitchell movement to get variety.
In your 3A tournament it's important a) to play the same boards in each section, and score across the sections; b) seed the top third of the field and scatter them around the tables c) switch half the pairs in the afternoon, so some of the Mitchell NS go EW and some go into the Howell, some of the Mitchell EW go NS and some go into the Howell, and most of the Howell morning pairs go into the Mitchell.
regards, Giles
- ELEANOR BRADSHAW31 Oct 2016 at 12:21AM
thanks for reply. the tournament was played on saturday with an experienced tournament director and went well. He played both systems.
cheers.
- Ed Roggeveen31 Oct 2016 at 04:47PM
I'll just back-up Giles's comments. I like 21 when directing a B or a 3A as it allows me to run exactly this system. If it is a 5A then 23 is great for the same reason - 15 and 8 plays 30 boards twice.
I personally would like to see a rule that, for 8B and above, directors MUST run a movement that avoids any pairs playing each other twice. Good directors do this anyway, but I have played an 8B with 21 tables where a 25 board Mitchell was played in both sessions and there was no seating plan / instructions. I ended up playing one pair 4 times. Ludicrous.
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