2023 US Online Collegiate Rapid

2023 US Online Collegiate Rapid and Blitz Championships

Event Information

• Registration: Click Here.
  • Registration deadlines:

• Rapid: Saturday, October 28, 2023 9:00 PM Pacific Time.
• Blitz: Saturday, November 4, 2023 9:00 PM Pacific Time.

Eligibility

The US Online Collegiate Rapid and Blitz Championships are open to students of any U.S. post-secondary school (university, college, community college, academy, seminary, conservatory, institute of technology, etc.) enrolled in at least one class in the Fall 2023 semester.

Players having a title of GM/IM/WGM/WIM shall be full-time degree seeking students in the Fall 2023 semester. In the final semester of their degree program, students can be enrolled in fewer classes, if it suffices to complete their degree requirements. A player shall not be enrolled in high school. There is no limit as to the number of participants per educational institution. Faculty and staff are not eligible to compete. In this context, “staff” is not intended to include student workers or teaching assistants.

Players must have a Chess.com account in good standing. If they are using a “second chance” account, they must disclose that during registration. Failure to disclose this information may result in immediate disqualification.

Additional requirements include:

• Current US Chess (USCF) membership is required.
  • Foreign GM/WGM/IM/WIM are exempt from the requirement.
  • To check your US Chess membership, please visit THIS page.
    • If you do not have a membership, or your membership expired: Join or Renew via THIS page.
• PLEASE NOTE: You will NOT be paired if your USCF membership is not current.

Format & Time Control

The 2023 U.S. Collegiate Rapid and Blitz Championships shall be treated as two separate events that include a 9-round Swiss System rapid tournament and a 12-round Swiss System blitz tournament.

The registration, tournament information, pairings and standings will be found on our chess.com/event pages and the relevant google sheets (Rapid, Blitz – coming soon!).

Rapid: The time control shall be Game in 10 minutes, with a 5-second increment from move one (G/10+5). The Rapid Championship will be US Chess Online Quick rated. 

Blitz: The time control shall be Game in 3 minutes, with a 2-second increment from move one (G/3+2). The Blitz Championship will be US Chess Online Blitz rated.

Each tournament will have one open section. 

 

Players from the same educational institution shall not be paired against each other in any round.

 

Schedule

 

Pairings, Game starting, Scoring, Standings & Tiebreaks

The tournament will be manually paired offline by NTD Judit Sztaray, pairings will

be posted for the players to view prior to the round start time. All games will be

manually started on chess.com by Chess.com staff.

 

US Chess regular ratings shall be used for pairing purposes, unless a player’s

USCF Online rating is 200 points higher than their US Chess regular rating. In this case, the USCF Online rating will be used. If a player does not have a regular or online US Chess rating, their FIDE standard rating shall be adapted per standard conversion formula.

 

Games will be manually started by Chess.com event staff. At the official start times of each round, all players must be online on chess.com/play/online. If the players are not online, tournament directors reserve the right to deduct the time elapsed from the start of the round from the player’s clock. This will be manually done by the directors immediately upon game start.

 

Match forfeit times are 10 minutes for rapid and 3 minutes for blitz, respectively.

Forfeited players will be withdrawn from the tournament, unless players notify the Chief Tournament Director directly at least 15 minutes before the next round starts.

The top four individual scores from a school will count towards team prizes. If more than one team ties for first place, the teams will be declared co-champions.

Players with the same final score will be differentiated using the following list of Individual Tiebreaks: US Chess per Rule 34.E (page 115). 

1. Modified Median
2. Solkoff
3. Cumulative
4. Cumulative of Opposition

The player with the highest tiebreak score will be declared Champion.

Team standing will be posted starting from Round 4 in the Rapid and Round 5 in the Blitz Championships, respectively.

Players can take as many zero-point byes as they wish, but they shall request it before registration closes (12 hours before the tournaments). 

Fair Play

• Players may be asked to join a zoom call before or during the event. 
• Chess.com’s fair play team will monitor all games played during the event
• For both events:
  • Players must join a Zoom call with up to 2 cameras and screen share upon request.
  • Player monitoring will be more aggressive for players who are ranked higher in the Swiss standings.
  • We may request more players to join the proctoring call at the beginning of the event
  • Players who refuse to abide by the Fair Play policies will be removed from the event immediately
• Rapid Championship only
  • Non-observable/private server mode will be implemented to prevent spectating and outside help
  • Official broadcast and games on /Events will be delayed by up to 60-seconds
  • Any live streams must be delayed by 60 seconds

Adjustment of scores (based on US Chess rules):

When a player is removed due to a Fair-Play violation, scores will be adjusted as follows:

1. If two or more rounds remain, all opponents of the disqualified player will receive a win by forfeit, unless they defeated the disqualified player, in which case they will retain the rated win.
2. If the tournament has concluded or if there is only one round remaining, the last opponent of the disqualified player will receive a win by forfeit.  Other opponents who lost to the disqualified player will receive a half-point bye.  Opponents who drew with the disqualified player will receive a win by forfeit.  Anyone who defeated the disqualified player will retain a rated win, instead of a forfeit win.

Broadcast

Event will be broadcast via the Collegiate Chess League Twitch channel: https://www.twitch.tv/collegiatechessleague

Awards

National titles

• 2023 U.S. Collegiate Rapid Champion
• 2023 U.S. Women's Collegiate Rapid Champion
• 2023 U.S. Collegiate Rapid Champions (team)
• 2023 U.S. Collegiate Blitz Champion
• 2023 U.S. Women's Collegiate Blitz Champion
• 2023 U.S. Collegiate Blitz Champions (team) 
• Second and third-place individuals in each event
• The top player in each tournament rated under 2200, under 2000, and under 1800 based on over-the-board USCF Ratings

Event Contacts

Chief Tournament Director - Judit Sztaray, IA, NTD: Click here to show mail address
Collegiate Chess League Commissioner - Joe Lee: Click here to show mail address
USCF College Chess Committee - Andrew Schley: Click here to show mail address