Newsletter for 18 May 2004

May I have the next match?

Tournament News

• First place: Sho Sengoku
• Second place: Bruce Haight
• Third place: Tom Fahland

The club welcomed Bruce Discher and Steve Cohen, both of whom have played in years past, and are returning from a hiatus. Steve played in the BCSD in the 1970s, in the so-called Golden Age of Backgammon, and told about how the BCSD would regularly attract 40-50 people per night in those days!

Current Master Points Standings

 1. Adrian Costa     39
 1. Jason Lee        39
 3. Sho Sengoku      38
 4. Bruce Haight     37
 5. Tom Fahland      29
 6. Osman Guner      25
 7. Cyrus Mobedshahi 18
 8. Fred Kamgar      17
 9. Henry Chaboki    12
10. Marcia Karen      9
11. Eric Sedehi       8
12. Greg Kopp         6
13. Mark Weiner       3
14. Ryan Knowles      2
14. Chris Rosin       2
16. Maira Costa       1
16. Sam Mehri         1

With both Adrian and Jason due to miss a tournament next week, a regime change could be impending. Don't miss your chance to try to move up the standings!

The point leader at the end of the year will be named the BCSD Player of the Year, and the top 16 in the Master Point standings will be invited to the 2004 BCSD Tournament of Champions, to be held in early 2005.

53rd Gammon Associates Invitational

Problem of the Week

9 point match, tied 0-0. Black on roll. Cube action? Pip counts: White 24, Black 22
Position ID: rQwAANsMAAAAAA Match ID: cAkgAQAAAAAA

Last Week's Problem of the Week

White leads 5-3 in a 7 point match. Pip counts: White 150, Black 147
Position ID: Y85gDDBsG8aAQQ Match ID: QYn0AFAAGAAA

Brutal! After entering with the five, what is Black supposed to do with the ace?

These kinds of positions are difficult because they don't come up often -- or at least you hope to play with enough flexibility so that you minimize your horror numbers.

GNU says that definitely, leaving two blots in the infield is a bad idea, and that the best idea is to break farther down. The six and five points are still important to own, so best to break from the four.

#		Ply	Move	Equity
	1	R	bar/20 4/3	-0.151
			0.545 0.206 0.011 - 0.455 0.121 0.003 -0.151 0.000 0.001 0.000 - 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.001
			Truncated cubeless rollout (depth 11) (trunc. at one-sided bearoff) with var.redn.
			7776 games, Mersenne Twister dice gen. with seed 965100416 and quasi-random dice
			Play: 0-ply cubeful
			Cube: 0-ply cubeful
	2	R	bar/20 5/4	-0.163 ( -0.012)
			0.538 0.205 0.011 - 0.462 0.120 0.003 -0.163 0.000 0.001 0.000 - 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.001
			Truncated cubeless rollout (depth 11) (trunc. at one-sided bearoff) with var.redn.
			7776 games, Mersenne Twister dice gen. with seed 965100416 and quasi-random dice
			Play: 0-ply cubeful
			Cube: 0-ply cubeful
	3	R	bar/20 6/5	-0.176 ( -0.025)
			0.535 0.200 0.012 - 0.465 0.123 0.003 -0.176 0.000 0.001 0.000 - 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.001
			Truncated cubeless rollout (depth 11) (trunc. at one-sided bearoff) with var.redn.
			7776 games, Mersenne Twister dice gen. with seed 965100416 and quasi-random dice
			Play: 0-ply cubeful
			Cube: 0-ply cubeful
	4	R	bar/20 3/2	-0.305 ( -0.154)
			0.517 0.184 0.011 - 0.483 0.170 0.006 -0.305 0.000 0.000 0.000 - 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.001
			Truncated cubeless rollout (depth 11) (trunc. at one-sided bearoff) with var.redn.
			7776 games, Mersenne Twister dice gen. with seed 965100416 and quasi-random dice
			Play: 0-ply cubeful
			Cube: 0-ply cubeful

See you next week! Keep tossing those cubes,
J. Lee