The 2018 Puget Sound Regional Start Page

Gateway to masterpoints, results, photos

Basic Tournament Information

Location: Lynnwood Convention Center, north of Seattle and near I-5, at 3711 196th St. SW.  

Driving: the site is very close to I-5's main Lynnwood exit, 196th St. SW, which is less than a mile south of the northern junction of I-5 and I-405.  You'll want to go west from I-5, but not for very far: the Lynnwood Convention Centre is on the northwest corner of the first traffic light off of the highway at 36th Ave.  Go through the light and turn right just past the building and you will find ample free parking: watch for signs leading to additional parking across 36th Ave. if there is none available.

Transit: Community Transit's 196 route goes very close to the playing site, starting in Edmonds at the Amtrak station (a good way to get to Lynnwood if coming by train) and going to the Ash Way Park & Ride.  The Lynnwood Transit Center, with many bus routes, is about a 10-15 minute walk from the site.

Restaurants and Shops: There are at least forty restaurants within easy walking distance of the playing site, more a short drive away!  A few blocks west is a large Fred Meyer grocery/department store, and the sprawling Alderwood Mall is about half a mile north.

Tournament Site: The Lynnwood Convention Centre's upper level will be used for the tournament, and the main entrance is on the northwest corner, nearest the parking.  As you walk in, you will see past the site reception area on your left a door (one of many) leading to the playing area, but continuing straight will lead you to the TournTables bookstore in the corner, then left to washrooms, and the Partnership and Hospitality Desk.  An onsite concession stand near the main entrance is open 10:30am - 2:30pm from Tuesday through Saturday and on Sunday from 9:30am - 2:30 pm.  Inside the playing area, there are usually two entry-buying stations, one for pairs near the front of the room, and one for teams near the back of the room.  A microphone is setup usually at the corner farthest from the main entrance, for mini-lectures from expert players before the evening session.  Robert Todd was the Tuesday speaker; Local player Tom Carmichael is Thursday's speaker.  Oregonian Al Wilson is Friday's speaker, with the topic "A Player's Workbook."  Come back early and take in the free tips!

Dates, Times, Events: 9:00 am, 1:00 pm, and 7:00 pm are the start times from Tuesday thru Saturday.  The tournament begins on Monday August 20, (1pm and 7pm) with two-session Open and Gold Rush Swiss Teams, single session open Side Games benefiting the Educational Foundation and the Charitible Foundation, and single session 199er Pair Games.  On Sunday August 26, play begins at 10:00 am with a two-session Fast Pairs and a triple-decker Swiss Teams: open, under 2000, and Gold Rush.  Sessions should end 3¼ - 3½ hours after they begin, on Sunday things end by about 6pm in the teams and somewhat earlier in the fast pairs.  Morning Sessions from Tuesday to Saturday have only one event: the Morning Side Game Series (open pairs).  The main sessions are afternoon and evening, with three full knockout teams, Swiss Team days on Monday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday.  Each day from Tuesday thru Saturday has a two-session Open and Gold Rush Pairs, Side Game Series for Morning, Afternoon and Evening Games, and 199er Games in afternoon and evening sessions.

This Web Site: We have a group of pages linked together by links bars like this one:

Daily Pages: Before the day's events are processed, these will contain a schedule of events in this order:

• Morning-only Games
• Two Session Afternoon and Evening Games
• Afternoon-only Single Session Games
• Evening-only Single Session Games

There will be details on each event, what type of game it is, what the strat limits are, last year's winners, and a direct link to the ACBL Live results, which will be active following each session.

At the end of the day Director-In-Charge Matt Koltnow will send me the days results and I will process them into the website in the early hours of the morning.  The day completed version will feature the following:

• Masterpoint Leaders at the end of the day (not including events that are not yet complete
• Noteworthy News Items Received
• Two Session Pair Games: Open Pairs, Gold Rush Pairs
• Two Session Swiss or Bracketed Teams
• Single Session Open Swiss Teams or Board-A-Match Teams
• Completed Knockouts
• Rosters for Surviving Teams in Knockouts that are not yet complete
• Side Games
• Side Game Series Leaders
• 199er Pairs

Once a day is complete, no changes will be made unless there are late scoring corrections.  Some browsers save a copy of a page and do not check to see if the content has changed; in most browsers you should be able to hit F5 to reload the page and stop using the one your computer has saved.

Other Pages: You're looking at the Welcome page right now.  The Masterpoints! Page, which we call DUMPS (Daily Updated Master Point Summary) will be updated every night first, before the daily pages of results take shape, and will contain the latest masterpoint totals and tournament leaders, both overall and limited to non-Life Masters.  Also, they will have everyone's current total broken down into red and gold points, but will not include masterpoints already won in events that have yet to be completed.  The Photos Page will depend on people sending me photos taken.  Now that everyone's cellphone has a camera, anyone can do this!  Here is a good guideline on how to get best results:

• Above the Strike Zone: Try not to include in the frame any part of the body below where the letters would be on a baseball uniform.  People want to see faces, not waistlines.  If you have people of different heights, you might have to include the tall one's strike zone(s), but make faces your focus.
• Fill the Frame: Don't stand so far back that only 10%-20% of the frame is faces.  Move up close and look at your screen as a guide.  I will always crop out legs and shoes, and if this leaves an image that is small, the quality will suffer.
• Send the biggest version you can: It's important.  ooga@shaw.ca is the address to send photo files to.  Don't send the one that takes up the least bandwidth, it will look blurred on a screen if the resolution is lowered beyond a reasonable level.
• Identify!: I need to know who the people are and what they did.  If they won an event, tell me which one and first names from left to right in the photo will suffice (I can get the rest from the data I am sent).  I'd also like to credit the photo taker, so tell me who you are as well.
• Watch the lighting and background: At night, photos taken in the dark may not look too well and require touchup.  The playing area is usually best for light.  I have taken a lot of photos that seem to have trees coming out of the tops of people's heads, so avoid that if you can.  Lynnwood's Convention Centre has some displays of modern art that might look great for lighting but as background they can be rather confusing.  Simple is usually best, against a wall inside the playing area, or even in a space in the middle with people milling around a distance away can sometimes work.
• Patience: There's a lot to do at scary hours during a Daily Bulletin week, and it may take a day or two before I can get around to posting photos.  Or responding to those who have sent them.

The Table Counts page simply has a spreadsheet with table counts and event types which can be used as a nice visual schedule to the different types of events, as well as to track the attendance of the tournament.   This comes directly from my spreadsheet program and looks better on a computer screen than on a mobile device, but even there you should be able to see what's happening.  Finally, the ACBL Live link goes to the list of tournament events, from which you will need another click or three to find the one you want.  Direct links are available from the daily pages and may be faster.

Thanks for visiting!  This is still a work in progress and the progress in getting it where I want it to be is quite slow, but there's quite a nice new look from what I was producing in Penticton (for which I must thank Google Fonts, Python, and several good sources of HTML5 and CSS material).  Feel free to contact me (see above) with reports of errors or if something isn't working for you.