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Questions tagged [tournament]

A series of chess games between a number of player, who compete for a set of prizes. Chess tournaments are of different formats and categories, and they can be open or by invitation only

A series of chess games between a number of player, who compete for a set of prizes. Chess tournaments are of different formats and categories, and they can be open or by invitation only

Formats: The three most common formats for Chess Tournaments these days are: Round-Robin (all play all, once or twice) Swiss style (fixed number of rounds, players meet others who have done equally well) and elimination (a loss means you don't advance).

Tournaments have a TD (tournament director, the official) and a pre-set of rules.

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Is it too late for me to start professional chess?

I am 25 years old. I play online chess regularly and I am rated about 1900 on chess.com. And I recently won a local tournament. Now I want to start playing professional chess. Here are some of my questions: Is it too late for me to be ambitious? I…
Inspired_Blue
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Arbiter ignored cheating, and I signed the scoresheet. Did I lose my right to object?

I am currently playing in an ELO tournament. Today, while I was playing, my opponent occasionally got up and walked around. At first, I did not care much. Then, I realized that some people were behind me, examining the game very carefully. At the…
padawan
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Tournaments for adults only?

Are there any over-the-board tournaments open only to persons over 18? Everywhere I go it's like a school field trip, more than half the players are from some elementary or middle school, all parents in tow. And as I am in the ~1600 rating range…
Duke Leto
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Why are there separate tournaments for men and women?

Why are there separate tournaments for men and women? It is obvious that in physical sports men have a huge advantage, but what is the reason why in chess we differentiate by gender?
Ant
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What is the correct pawn promotion procedure?

This may be a frivolous question, as I believe that most chess players are good sportsmen, but I was wondering: what is the technically correct procedure for promoting a pawn to a queen? Do you ask your opponent to put the queen on the promotion…
firtydank
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Why is chess failing to attract big name sponsors?

Despite all the efforts that chess professionals put to the game the majority of them cannot make a living out of chess. Only 4 or 5 super grandmasters across the world have been able to make a few million dollars from chess. This is mainly because…
Phemelo Khetho
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How to organize a chess tournament

I want to organize an amateur chess tournament inside the company I work for. I am looking for a convenient way of creating groups, keeping the scores, and getting some statistics. Is there an online solution to organize a chess tournament? Do you…
Haralan Dobrev
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Am I allowed to call the arbiter on my opponent's turn?

My opponent, in their turn, was distracting me making annoying sounds. However, the arbiter said that I should wait until it's my turn when I called them. Is this correct?
double-beep
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I was playing a tournament and some kids were talking about the game in a foreign language

I was playing and I am pretty sure that my opponent was talking about the game with his friend in another language. I don’t speak the language, but you can tell. What should I have done?
user21437
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Should an arbiter claim draw at a K+R vs K+R endgame?

I was asked for first time to help at a non federated tournament for kids to arbitrate their games, played at 30 minutes with no increment time. It was a scholar tournament and they made mistakes as leaving checkmates in one, let the queen to be…
user18196
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Anti-cheating: should there be a limit to a number of toilet breaks per game per player?

With the advent of smart phones, cheating in chess tournaments has become rife to the extent that if unguarded it will kill the spirit of competitiveness. There has been several such cases, accussations and allegations including the infamous…
Phemelo Khetho
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Why do players in the past play much longer tournaments than today's top players?

Looking through the history of chess we find tournaments that are significantly longer than today's, e.g. London 1899 - 15 players, double round robin New York 1924 - 11 players, double round robin Today we get tournaments such as: Tal Memorial…
Allure
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Is it allowed to prepare for a game after the round has started?

At the recent US Open I started the tournament well and was paired against a GM in the roped-off area. I had worked out the pairing well in advance and was able to do some fairly heavy openings preparation before the game. The official pairings,…
Cleveland
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Tools for automated notation: webcam movie to PGN

Sometimes during blitz games over the board, or when in zeitnot, it gets very difficult to annotate them. I've seen several software / hardware to help in writing the notation, even one that's FIDE approved; these require that you repeat the moves…
Riccardo Zorn
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Pressing the clock using the same hand you use to move the pieces

I participated in a club and went to training. The guy who played against me is right-handed, so he placed the clock on the right. I'm left-handed, so I play with the left hand and press the clock with my right hand since it's closer. It's not very…
Lynob
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