AMERICAN CONTRACT BRIDGE LEAGUE
6575 Windchase Blvd. Horn Lake, MS. 38637
Claire Jones
District 18 Director
(901) 332-5586
2708 Lakeview Ave FAX: (901) 398-7754
Regina, Sk. S4S 1G3
Canada
H: (306) 584-3516
F: (306) 585-1443
Email: stats@accesscomm.ca
Providence Newsletter
November 2014
Greetings to Everyone,
Everything at ACBL headquarters is almost back to normal after the flood. A large thank you to everyone for the patience demonstrated when trying to deal with headquarters during this difficult time. This year’s final tally for the Longest Day was $590,290. This as a great tribute to the effort of all our clubs. You have probably heard that the contract to rewrite ACBLSCOR had to be terminated. The current plan is to enhance the capabilities of the current program. The first new feature of ACBLscore will be ACBL Live, where results will be sent via text or email upon the completion of an event. We are focusing on the speed of results dissemination and the goal is to have basic results arrive to members before they are even posted on the wall. The plan is to do testing in Providence and it is hoped that this feature will be available for all our tournaments in the New Year. Be sure to check with your local Tournament Director to find out when it is available in your area.
One of the privileges I have each year is the naming of the District 18 selections for the Charity and Goodwill Committees. These names come to me as suggestions made by the State and Provincial members of the District 18 Board of Directors. I would like to congratulate the 2015 nomination: Jack Stone of Bozeman, MT. and Marilyn Swadron of Calgary for the Charity nominations and Estelle Kevitch of Salt Lake City and Sharon Carter of Billings, MT. as the Goodwill nominations. These are just a few of the many players across our District who so generously donate their time and effort to bridge. A second privilege I enjoy each year is the naming of the District beneficiaries of the Charity Foundation. This year the Farm in the Dell Foundation in Helena received the $1000.00 donation from our District.
I would like to mention some of the more pertinent motion coming before us in Providence. There are a number of masterpoint motions which will be receiving their second reading. The M, R, T, and maybe even X/Y/Z factors are being changed. Not being the mathematical sort I will try and give you the short version of what is happening. For a long time pairs players have been complaining about team events paying more than pairs. The T factor for pairs is being changed from 1 to 1.25. The net result of this will be an increase of 25% for pair events. Combine this with a proposed increase in the depth of field awards for pairs and a decrease in depth of awards for teams the net result should be a more equal payouts for everyone. Over the past few years there have also been an increase in the number of special games at the club. These games have made Sectional tournaments appear to be less special. The T factor for sectional games with ACBL tournament directors is being increase from 10 to 11. This change will increase masterpoint awards at sectionals by 10% with a desired effect that Sectional tournaments will be a more desirable place to play.
The other major change is a proposed new strati-flighted structure for Regional tournaments. The new structure will allow either 2 flights each consisting of 3 strats or a 3 flighted event with each flight having 2 strats. Page 25 of the November Bulletin has a more detailed explanation of how this works. Be sure to have your tournament chairs check this out before you print your 2015 Regional programs.
There is also a new proposal for the length of Regional tournaments. Currently regionals are limited to 6 and a half days. If this motion passes tournaments starting after January 1st 2015 will be able to be 7 full days in length.
There are many more motions that I haven’t mentioned here. You can see a complete list of the motions on the ACBL web site.
http://www.acbl.org/acbl-content/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Providence-Motions.pdf
Please send me your thoughts on these or any of the motions I will be voting on in Providence. Thank you for any and all input.
All the best in the upcoming holiday season and as always may all your finesses be successful,
Claire Jones
District 18 BoD
(306) 584-3516
2708 Lakeview Ave.
Regina, SK. S4S-1G3