Russell Sherwood Sunday, March 6, 2022
The ICCF KO Tournament is almost upon us. This is something a little different and a different approach will be required to succeed in the event.
Looking at the detail – the first round will be made of:
- Groups of 11
- Each group to have the same average rating
- A score of >50% required to advance
- The relative performance in the first round will determine the group for the 2nd (In simple terms a list of percentage performance will be created, the Top 13 players make up the first group, the 14-26 players the second and so on.
Pondering this for a while determines that our strategy and tactics in the event should determine our approach.
The first and most obvious objective is to score more than 50%, but beyond this there are two paths. Do we want to succeed in the event or meet other objectives? By other objectives, I can detail out possible desired outcomes:
- The desire to boost our rating
- The desire to target Title Norms
The average rating (as it is for all these kinds of events), for the first round, will be around 2150.
If we want to do well in the event, then a strategy in the first round is to score above 50% but not massively so. This should lead to a weaker 2nd group, which whilst probably a lower Category Norm should be easier to score higher in.
In we want to gain the highest ELO benefit, then our aim should be to score as highly in the first round as possible, which should give us access to a group with a much higher rating than ours in the second round.
If Titles Norms are our aim, probably the best option is to aim for a “middling” score in the first round – which should get us a slightly easier Category group in the 2nd round.
Agree/Disagree? Either way, have a good think about your strategy for this event!
CorrespondenceChessICCFWCCF
