2007 Silicon Valley Showdown Tournament

Pruneyard Plaza Hotel, May 26-28, 2007

It was the Memorial Day Weekend, a US Federal holiday in remembrance of the US military persons who died at war. As usual, a Scrabble tournament is planned for the long weekends, and we have Monday, May 28 as the holiday.

I started of with rating of 1049 and am seeded 5th in a small Division C of 10 players only. With 20 games, we played double round-robin, with 2 KOTH (I think).

Game 1 – Opponent: BA Toole, seeded 6th, rated 1011

It was a good start for this tournament. Got 2 ‘S’ and a blank on the first draw, with a rack of ?ILLRSS. I did not know the bingos (ShRILLS and SILLeRS), so I started small with ILL, drawing CIM and playing my first bingo SCRIMpS. In the next few turns, I played PARTIED and PLANETS, building a lead that Betty could not catch up with. I won 487-323. Nice start. 1-0.

Game 2 – Opponent: Alison Hotten, seeded 4th, rated 1085

This was a tough game. I was trying to keep up with Alison for most of the game, by 20-30 points. On my 8th move, I thought I caught up with OILIESt to lead 251-180, but she responded with (L)AVENDER to get the lead back. I was trailing again, and towards my last rack, was trailing 309 to 370 after she played a nice IXIA. I bingoed out with RETINAE under her IXIA to form RETINAE/IT/XI/IN/AA to win 411-370. And I nearly did not see it!!! Have not played for so long that I was figuring out how to put down TRAINEE on a closed up board, not seeing RETINAE for a few minutes. 2-0.

Game 3 – Opponent: David Carlson, seeded 2nd, rated 1167.

This was a really tough game. I bingoed ENTRIeS and ALATION in succession in move 4 and 5, but David took a niner with ENTICI(N)G at A15 for 158 points, with me trailing 193-242 after the 5th move. I only caught up to win later as I drew SS? towards to end-game. Won 421-348. 3-0.

Game 4 – Opponent: Bharat Sampath, seeded 9th, rated 834.

Lost this game badly, which was mainly my mistake in challenging AGITA and WORSTEd, both good, in 2 consecutive moves. Could not recover after that. Lost 328-385. 3-1.

Game 5 – Opponent: Vicky Julian, seeded 7th, rated 1001.

Vicky was one of two players who dominated this division for most of the tournament. I was luckier though. Bingoed DISEASE and RO(T)UNdER. Played JUVES# (a British only word) in error, which got challenged off. She played GALLANT, but was not sufficient to win. I had most of the big tiles. Won 407-306. 4-1


Game 6 – Opponent: Mariana Villena, seeded 1st, rated 1168.

Tough game. I played Mariana a number of times before, and my record against her was not too good. Bingoed with RETILES to catch up to her, and she immediately replied with EDIBLES to pull away to lead 181-119. With bad rack balance for most of the game, even with another bingo of BANShIE(S), I lost 310-385. 4-2

Game 7 – Opponent: Helen Gendler, seeded 3rd, rated 1103.

Tough game too. Had bad racks. Had no vowels for several turns, with one rack of DNRSVYY, which I then changed. She phoneyed with with STOOGIe, which I thought was good. Turned out, the word I thought was actually spelt STOGIE, a word for cigar. So, later on, I had a bingo to hook the S on my dECANTS, to her STOOGIeS, she challenged it off! I was soooooo upset….. Next turn bingoed with SCANTEr, but was not enough. Lost 313-388. 4-3.

Game 8 – Opponent: Miriam Kasdan, seeded 10th, rated 789.

Miriam seemed to be like a newbie, but so I took the chance to take advantage to build a bigger spread. Sometimes, when they play small words, it is hard to actually make bigger points yourself. Had one bingo, ReGENTS. Won 408-241. 5-3.

End of day 1, with a 5-3 record, I was in 3rd position. It was not a bad start…

More to follow in next blog entry.

Update 28 August 2007: I realized that I did not complete my blog for this tournament.....trouble is, I cannot find my scoresheets, and hence cannot reconstruct the event. Anyhow, I ended in 3rd position of the group. Pretty nice.... got a good bump up in ratings, 1049 to 1097. So close to 1100...... did not do as well in the next 2 1-day tournaments, so my rating toy is 1065.