We usually hold a serious Christmas tournament with some invited international players using Lidraughts. This year, we couldn’t do it in December, so it will likely be held in January. However, Jason suggested running a small internal tournament on Friday, 20th December. Erica and Lyndal haven’t been able to play for several weeks, and what better way to get back in shape than by playing a small tournament?
We played with clocks, which always adds an extra dimension to the game. We set the time to 5 minutes with a 5-second bonus for each move. There are some rules for playing with a clock:
The clock needs to be on the right side of white.
The clock needs to be pressed with the hand you made the move with.
This is the result :
James | Jason | Geert | Lyndal | Erica | Total | Place | |
James | 0 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 2 | |
Jason | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 5 | |
Geert | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 8 | 1 | |
Lyndal | 0 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 3 | 3/4 | |
Erica | 0 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 3 | 3/4 |
I don’t count myself (Geert) as the winner, but James is the real winner. James is starting to play really well. He has done quite a bit of work on the combinational aspect of the game and is way ahead of everyone else in that area. When you watch his game, you can see he actively tries to create combinations. He still needs to learn a lot about positions, where he currently lacks the skill to win against humans on Lidraughts.
Lyndal and Erica shared second place, playing a draw against each other even though Lyndal had a winning 4 vs 1 endgame. The time was against her, and she had to accept a draw. Lyndal likes to play with an outpost, and her game usually gravitates there quickly—sometimes too quickly, leading to losing the outpost. She just finished Bergsma’s first book, which is a huge achievement. Erica is getting close to that milestone as well. Erica is still very young, but she has adopted the development skills quite well. However, she hasn't yet learned how to proceed beyond that. I have a study planned for Erica and Lyndal that we need to cover so they understand that there are multiple ways to develop into a base position and then work towards a target position.
Jason is/was a chess player, so he has a strong understanding of positional and central play, but he lacks the combinational skills to convert a winning position. He still needs to learn how to develop properly; despite knowing the theory, he often doesn’t apply it correctly in games, leading to various problems. The clock got the better of him in a few games, such as losing on time versus Lyndal in a winning position. Also, against James, the game shifted between them multiple times, but James ultimately prevailed. There’s no doubt that Jason will soon be a player to watch out for.
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