Official Chess Summer Scholastic and Adult Showdown Tournament at Baruch Middle School MS104 – August 9, 2025

🏆 NEW SECTION FORMATS — MORE TROPHIES + OVER $1,200 IN CASH PRIZES! 💵

💡 Innovative Pairing System:

Balanced like Quads. Competitive like Swiss.
We use a hybrid Monrad pairing system that:

– Matches you with opponents close to your rating

– Still lets you compete for trophies and top prizes

➡️ Say goodbye to early round mismatches and rating-risk matchups!

🔄 Our Smarter Hybrid Pairing System:

We’ve combined the best of both worlds:

– Quads: Close rating matchups

– Swiss: Clear tournament winners

Benefits:

– No more “automatic first-round loss” for lower seeds

– No more “rating risk, no upside” games for top seeds

– More fair, competitive, and growth-focused experiences for all

More Balanced Pairings. More Meaningful Competition. Better Results

🧠 Want Game Feedback? Upgrade with “Entry PLUS”

Add Entry PLUS at checkout to review your games with:

– Grandmaster and World Champion Jon Edwards (Reigning World Correspondence Chess Champion)

– Original Life Master/NM Eric Fleischman in between rounds (an OLM title is bestowed when a player keeps an established rating above 2200 for 300 rated games)

📋 Notation required for game reviews

🏫 Tournament Info:

– Location: Simon Baruch Middle School (MS 104) 330 E 21st St, Manhattan

– Rounds: 4 rounds (3 rounds for Super Champion 1800+ section), US Chess Rated

• Premier / Elite: 10:00am Round 1 start time, sharp
• Grand / Championship / Super: 9:30am start time, sharp
• Subsequent rounds for each section start as soon as previous round is finished

– Check-in: Check-in not required, everyone who has not requested a bye will be paired for Round 1 by default

• However, please try to stop by the front desk a bit earlier to get a bracelet if you have an Entry PLUS ticket
• We will also hand out little goodies prior to Round 1 at the front desk and can help setting clocks, if needed

🧮 Pairing Procedures:

– Round 1: Pair with closest-rated player in your section

– Later Rounds: Pair by score, then by closest rating

– Scoring: 1 point win / 0.5 draw / 0 loss

– Up to 2 byes (0.5 points each). Must be requested at registration

– Color alternates each round (may repeat rarely due to other constraints)

📊 Sections & Time Controls:

Ratings based on the current Official US Chess Supplement (Look for Current Published Regular Rating for August 2025) 📌 Check your rating here

– Trophies to Top 4 in each section (increased from Top 3!)

– “4th Place Tie Trophy” – Those with the same final score but lower tie breaks than the 4th place winner will NOT LEAVE EMPTY HANDED – They will also receive a “4th Place Tie Trophy”

– $1,200 Cash Prizes for top two sections (Championship & Super Championship only):

Monetary awards will be split in cases of ties – e.g. If 2 players score 4.0, they will both split $400 evenly (sum of first and second place prizes), any players with 3.5 will split $100 evenly (third place award), if no 3.5 scores, then the 3.0 scores will split the third place award, etc.

🥇 First Place: $250

🥈 Second Place: $150

🥉 Third Place: $100

⭐ Class Prize: $100 (see eligibility criteria below)

– New Class Prize offered in each section! – A Class Prize is awarded to the top-performing player below a certain ratings threshold, giving lower-rated players a shot at a trophy even if they don’t finish in the top 4.

• Only one winner of Trophy Class Prize in scholastic sections (Premier, Elite, Grand) – Tournament tie break methods (see below) will be used to detemine single winner
• Cash Class Prize awards will be split evenly in Championship and Super Championship sections (see above for monetary award split methodology)

🏫 Team Awards (Same School Building Only):

🏆 Premier/Elite Team Trophy

– Scores from the Top 5 players from eitherPremier or Elite combined

– Top 3 schools awarded

– ALL players from winning Premier/Elite team should take their bow on stage regardless of tournament points! EVERY teammate is important.

🏆 Grand/Championship Team Trophy

– Scores from the Top 5 players from eitherGrand or Championship combined

– Top 3 schools awarded

– ALL players from winning Grand/Championship team should take their bow on stage regardless of tournament points! EVERY teammate is important.

⛓️ Tie-Break Rules (Recommended US Chess tournament methods):

1) Modified Median – Total points scored by your opponents (half-points for early withdrawals), and disregards the least-significant (usually the lowest scoring) opponent.  The player with the highest total has played opponents with the best scores in the tournament‑‑ in theory, the hardest opponents.

2) Solkoff – Total points scored by your opponents (half-points for early withdrawals), including the lowest scoring opponents

3) Cumulative – Sum of your total points after each round (each rounds score is added to the previous rounds which means players who won in earlier rounds score higher than those won in later rounds)

4) Opponents Cumulative – Same as above exccept this method is based on your opponents’ score

📌 Additional Info:

– Parental Supervision: Required between rounds

– No running/ball play indoors

– Notation Required in all sections except U500
Notation sheets/pencils provided. Notebooks available for purchase.

– Equipment: Boards provided. Players must bring clocks (available onsite)

– Lunch: Pizza will be available for purchase starting at 11:30am

– US Chess Membership Required
👉 Join or renew here

📧 Questions or Team Room Requests?

Email us at [email protected]