Organizing an OTB Chess960 Tournament

A couple of months ago, in What about Biel? (September 2023), I wrote,

Before I discovered this video, my objective in the search was to learn about best practices for organizing and directing an OTB (i.e. not online) chess960 tournament. The year 2023 saw both a round-robin and a Swiss chess960 event in Biel. What can be learned from them?

I posted a few more times about Biel, where the most recent was Live Coverage from Biel (November 2023). I didn't learn much about Biel 'best practices', but I did have the time to create my own list of points to consider.

Note that I've never participated in an OTB chess960 tournament, so I have no direct experience here. I've discussed the main points with a few people, always informally. If you have something to say about the subject, you can leave a comment at the end of this post. Here's my list of considerations (SP = Start Position):-

• Allow SP518 RNBQKBNR?
• Play same position on each board?
• Play two games with each SP?
• Use what time control?
• Use what ratings for seeding / pairings?
  
  
• Choose SPs how? [A]
• Announce chosen SP how?
• Announce SP how long before game starts? [B]

The first five questions can be decided beforehand. The last three are more operational. The comments in brackets ('[]') have further considerations below.

[A]: There are a number of pitfalls to avoid. The first pitfall involves the SP generator on Chessgames.com, which uses nonstandard numbering. I've posted a few times about this:-

• 2021-04-24: Chessgames.com Start Position XREF
• 2021-05-29: Chessgames.com Converter Cleanup

The second pitfall is that there are a number of bad algorithms in use. They are bad because they overlook the requirement that all SPs should have an equal possibility of being chosen. See, for example:-

• 2017-09-23: Start by Placing the Bishops!

For some novel selection methods -- not necessarily good -- see:-

• 2010-07-17: Special Chess960 Dice
• 2011-10-01: The Chess960 Wheel of Fortune

[B]: One idea is to distribute a short list of SPs before the event starts, then choose one SP from the list before each round. This allows for some brief home preparation. The short list can be longer than the number of rounds, e.g. twice the number, to satisfy purists who want to keep home preparation to a minimum.

While preparing this post, I found an interesting description for the NZ Fischer-Random Championship 2023 (newzealandchess.nz; New Zealand Chess News). The announcement ('Format') said,

There will be two six-round Swisses. The A-grade is restricted to players familiar with Fischer-Random (Chess 960) rules; the B-grade is open to less experienced players (the Organisers reserve the right to move a player to an appropriate section).

We are using FIDE rapid ratings for seeding, and will apply FIDE rapid chess rules (eg 2nd illegal move loses the game). The time control is 25 minutes for the game with 5 seconds increment per move from move one.

Positions will be drawn at random and displayed. Players will be expected to set up the boards themselves, and there will be 10 minutes between the start of the round and the start of the clocks, for players to study the position (without moving any pieces).

One of the problems in researching 'best practices' is the large number of synonyms for chess960, like 'FRC', etc. Add that to the large choice of relevant keywords and I was never sure if I was overlooking good announcements.

Live Coverage from Biel

A couple of months ago, in What about Biel? (September 2023), I embedded a video and noted,

It turns out that this video is the first of two parts and that there are previous year streams going back to 2020. Before I go any further with this post, I need to determine exactly what I'm looking at.

The video for the full 2023 event encountered a technical glitch, lost some footage, and was restarted in a second part. Following are links for all live streams from 2020 through 2023.

'Biel Chess Festival 2023: GMT Chess 960' • Commentators: GM Arturs Neiksans and Angelika Valkova

• 2023-07-15: Part 1 (embedded in 'What about Biel?')
• 2023-07-15: Part 2

'Biel Chess Festival [2022]: ACCENTUS Chess 960 tournament' • GM Arturs Neiksans and Angelika Valkova

• 2022-07-11: Full event

'54th International Biel Chess Festival [2021] - Chess960' • GM Arturs Neiksans

• 2021-07-24: Full event

'Biel Chess Festival 2020 - Day 1: Chess960' • GM Ian Rogers

• 2020-07-18: Part 1 (annoying echo stops at 04:00)
• 2020-07-18: Part 2
• 2020-07-18: Part 3

There is much to be discovered here, but I'll leave that for another time.

2022 FWFRCC Hikaru's Climb

The previous post, 2022 FWFRCC Lichess Swiss Group 2 (October 2023), featured IM Eric Rosen, a popular chess streamer, broadcasting his participation in an intermediate stage of last year's 'FIDE World Fischer Random Chess Championship', aka FWFRCC. The post quoted IM Rosen saying,

This is a more serious stream than usual. It's a [Chess960] World Championship and this is stage two. [...] To move on beyond this tournament I need to finish top-18.

That post provided enough background to locate online resources that documented the entire FWFRCC event. This current post features GM Hikaru Nakamura, an even more popular streamer, who won the entire event. For more background, see last year's post 2022 FWFRCC Finals - Live (November 2022). The following video covers the end of the last stage of the event.

Dear YouTube, Meet Your New World Champion (44:17) • '[Published on] Oct 31, 2022'

The video's description said,

Hikaru played Ian Nepomniachtchi in the Fischer Random World Chess Championship in Iceland on October 30, 2022, and WON! Here's his recap of the last five games.

The video was the last in a series by Nakamura that captured, from start to finish, his climb to the C960/FRC title. The winner's Youtube channel (GMHikaru) currently boasts '2.15M subscribers'. I found nine videos relevant to the 2022 FWFRCC on the channel:-

• 2022-09-13: Hikaru on Lichess Fischer Random World Champs Qualifier • 'Hikaru plays in a qualifier on Sept 11, 2022 held on Lichess for the Fischer Random World Championship being held in Iceland in October. This is the first qualifier, the top 15 will play on Sept 18th in a knockout format. This is part 1. Hikaru recorded this off stream.'
• 2022-09-18: Can Hikaru Be World 960 Champion? • 'This is the 2nd half of the qualifier played on Sept 11, 2022, on lichess.'
• 2022-09-19: Hikaru Finds Young Talent in 960 Quals • 'Hikaru Beats up two youngsters, FM Andy Woodward and GM Awonder Liang, and recaps it for us in the 960 World Championship Qualifier played on Lichess on September 18, 2022.'
• 2022-09-26: I'm Going to Iceland to Play Bobby Fischer! • 'Today, Sept 25, 2022, Hikaru played in the Qualifier to the Fischer Random World Championship 2022 in Iceland.'
• 2022-10-26: How I Beat Magnus - A Strong Start to 2022 FRWC Day 1 • 'Thanks to everyone for your continued support. The FR World Champs will be broadcast on my Twitch channel every day and I hope to make recaps after each day.'
• 2022-10-27: World Championship Recap Day 2, Fedoseev is a Tough Fish to Catch • 'Hikaru's recapping Day 2 of the Fischer Random World Chess Championship, two matches vs Vladimir Fedoseev.'
• 2022-10-27: Dear Youtube, Magnus is a Beast • 'Today I played Magnus in two games to qualify to the Semifinals'
• 2022-10-29: Dear YouTube, I'm Playing in a World Championship! • 'Hikaru played World Rapid Champion Nodirbek Abdusattorov in the Fischer Random World Chess Championship Semifinals today and here is his recap.'
• 2022-10-31: Dear YouTube, Meet Your New World Champion • 'Hikaru played Ian Nepomniachtchi...' [as above]

The video embedded on this post is the last clip of the series. It currently has over 519K views and over 2200 comments. The first comment says,

The man just won the Fischer 960 World Championship. Does he rest or go out for celebratory drinks or dinner -- nope, he goes back to the hotel, gets back to work, and gives his fans/subscribers a recap and analysis. Hikaru, you’re a true gift to the game of chess. Congratulations and thank you!

You might have a problem with GM Nakamura's brash style -or- you might have a problem with the idea of C960/FRC, but that's your problem. Naka is a legitimate World Champion in a chess discipline of the 21st century.

2022 FWFRCC Lichess Swiss Group 2

A few months ago, in Talking About Chess960 (July 2023), I discovered an interesting link:-

No.35; 2023-07-30: [Google] Swiss Rapid Fischer Random Championship (bielchessfestival.ch) • The runner-up was popular streamer 'IM Rosen Eric'; possible action: review his resources.

I reviewed IM Rosen's resources and quickly found the following Youtube video.

SERIOUS Chess 960 (3:04:05) • '[Published on] Nov 1, 2022; Originally streamed on Sept. 10, 2022.'

The clip has no description, so what are we watching here? At around 10:00 into the clip, we learn,

This is a more serious stream than usual. It's a [Chess960] World Championship and this is stage two. I believe this is a Swiss stage. I played the the Arena stage last week and because I finished top-500 in Arena -- which wasn't too difficult -- I'm in this tournament now. To move on beyond this tournament I need to finish top-18.

I covered that complicated World Championship tournament last year, where the final post was 2022 FWFRCC Wrapup (December 2022; 'FIDE World Fischer Random Chess Championship'). The stage of the tournament in the video was covered chronologically by an earlier post, 2022 FWFRCC Qualifiers (October 2022).

The many FWFRCC preliminary events were played in parallel, independently on the two main online chess sites, Chess.com and Lichess.org. IM Rosen participated on the Lichess side. My 'Qualifiers' post had a link to Midway Through The World Fischer Random Championship Qualifiers on Lichess (lichess.org; September 2022), which gave some context:-

With the open and invitational arena stage over, we now move to the first Swiss stages marking the midpoint of the qualifiers on Lichess. At the Swiss stages, eligible players can only take part in the groups they’ve been sorted into. Eligible players and the groups they’ve been sorted into can be >>> found here <<<. [...] The top 18 players of each group go through, where they will meet on 11th September (with the same start times), and be met by 10 wildcards. In total, up to 100 players will compete in the second Swiss stage to determine the final 16 who go through to the KO stages.

The 'found here' anchor leads to FIDE World Fischer Random Championship - Swiss Stages (lichess.org), where we learn that one 'EricRosen' qualified from the 'FIDE CCC & NACCL World Fischer Random Qualifier' into the CCC and NACCL: Swiss Group 2. That is the 11-round event presented in the video.

After that long introduction to set the scene, let's list the games played from the video. The first column shows the video start time, followed by the start position:-

0:00:08 SP422 RNBQNBKR
0:14:32 SP459 RNNKBQRB
0:31:05 SP670 RNKRNBBQ
0:46:13 SP385 BQRBNNKR
1:01:58 SP060 NBNRQKBR
1:18:43 SP901 RKBBQRNN
1:35:35 SP280 NBRKBNRQ
1:51:03 SP099 BQNRNKRB
2:07:21 SP803 BRKQNRNB
2:25:24 SP228 NBBRQKNR
2:39:43 SP466 BRNNKBRQ

The page for 'Swiss Group 2' lists 'No.10 IM EricRosen'. His participation ended in the next step of the event, CCC and NACCL: Swiss Phase 2, where he finished at no.74. Will I find the time to study Rosen's games in more depth?

What about Biel?

The annual chess960 tournaments at Biel (Switzerland) have been running for some years now and I've never given them a good look. In a recent post, Talking About Chess960 (July 2023), Biel appeared twice with links to the results:-

'ACCENTUS Chess960 (ACC) - Biel International Chess Festival (bielchessfestival.ch; w/ PGN)' *and* 'Swiss Rapid Fischer Random Championship (bielchessfestival.ch) • The runner-up was popular streamer "IM Rosen Eric"; possible action: review his resources.'

That first tournament, 2023 ACCENTUS, was streamed live; the coverage starts at 9:10 in the following video:-

Biel Chess Festival 2023: GMT Chess 960 (2:59:21) • 'Streamed live on Jul 15, 2023'

The description doesn't add much except an error:-

Biel Chess Festival 2022 [?; sic] live from Biel/Bienne, Switzerland.

Before I discovered this video, my objective in the search was to learn about best practices for organizing and directing an OTB (i.e. not online) chess960 tournament. The year 2023 saw both a round-robin and a Swiss chess960 event in Biel. What can be learned from them?

It turns out that this video is the first of two parts and that there are previous year streams going back to 2020. Before I go any further with this post, I need to determine exactly what I'm looking at.

2023 Champions Showdown, Videos

In the previous post, 2023 Champions Showdown, St. Louis (September 2023), I quoted a press release from the Saint Louis Chess Club which started,

SAINT LOUIS, September 12, 2023 - GM Sam Sevian won the 2023 Champions Showdown: Chess 9LX after a brilliant final day [...]

Here's a video from the club's Youtube channel featuring a chat with the winner not long after he won the event.

9LX Champ Sevian: 960 Helps the Imagination (5:09) • '[Published on] Sep 11, 2023'

The description said,

Sam Sevian talks to Cristian Chirila after going [+2-0=1] and winning the event on the third day of the 2023 Chess 9LX.

The three days of action were streamed live on the same channel under the title '2023 Champions Showdown | Chess 9LX':-

• 2023-09-08: Day 1
• 2023-09-09: Day 2
• 2023-09-10: Day 3

The description for the first day said,

Live from the World Chess Hall of Fame, the sixth Chess 9LX event is a 10-player Fischer Random chess (Chess960) round robin rapid tournament (with pairings). Today are the first three rounds. Join GMs Yasser Seirawan, Cristian Chirila, and IM Nazi Paikidze for the move-by-move.

For all of the club's videos for the event, see:-

• 2023 Champions Showdown | Chess 9LX (playlist)

The playlist includes two more videos featuring GM Sevian.

2023 Champions Showdown, St. Louis

The top chess960 tournament of the year is undoubtedly the annual event hosted by the St. Louis chess club. The results for this year were announced on the club's blog in Grandmaster Sam Sevian Delivers Brilliant Performance to Win 2023 Champions Showdown: Chess 9LX (saintlouischessclub.org). The press release started,

SAINT LOUIS, September 12, 2023 - GM Sam Sevian won the 2023 Champions Showdown: Chess 9LX after a brilliant final day, where he defeated a competitive field including legendary former World Champion Garry Kasparov and World No. 2 Fabiano Caruana to take home the $37,500 first place prize.

The crosstable shows that GM Sevian won the event without a loss, a full point ahead of the next group of players.

2023 Champions Showdown Chess 9LX
(uschesschamps.com)

I'll have more to say about the event in the next post. For the report on last year's event, see 2022 Champions Showdown, St. Louis (September 2022).