Heart racing, you glance at the standings posted in the jammed tournament room. You’re in the hunt. You have the match points you need to make the cut. But so do three other. Now it comes down to who had the best match win percentage against whom. Until then, that seems like an arbitrary number. … Read more

Match wins tell you less about your performance then set win percentage does. On a score sheet, you see which team earned more sets but many times it’s a closer call than final score lets on. Your set win percentage clears the noise. It’s what tells you if you’re actualy good or just had a … Read more

Match win percentage help determine whether a draw is worth taking to stay in contention or whether it will kick you out of the bubble zone. It turns every win, loss, bye, and draw into a single figure that tells you where you stand at any point in time. Enter your record and let the … Read more

For example, you play a few rounds in a casual board game night with your friends, winning three rounds, losing one round, and drawing two rounds. Based off your gut feelings, you think you did pretty well. Your skill level have gone up. But based on the raw numbers alone, you may end up having … Read more

And so that’s where we end up with an unruly last round in the league. Three player is tied for match points and all three are holding their breaths as they wait for someone to untangle the knot. A call goes into tournament director. He opens the rule book. It’s fat. And it doesn’t say … Read more

When we talk about tension in a chess tournament, usually that tension isn’t found in the games of the final round. That tension comes after two players has finished with same score and the tournament organizers must break the deadlock with a calculator. One of the most common methods of breaking a deadlock like this … Read more

Beyond perfect play, a perfect tournament means perfect planning. And by planning I don’t mean just packing snacks and bringing hand sanitizer, I mean nailing down every detail of logistics. Even if you play like a boss, failing to consider things like how many games you need to win or how many foreign player are … Read more