From: Larry Kaufman COMCAST NET> Date: 30 apr 2003 Subject: Re: U.S. Championship ----- Original Message ----- From: "bogin" YAHOO CO JP> To: TECHUNIX TECHNION AC IL> Sent: Wednesday, April 30, 2003 2:20 AM Subject: Re: U.S. Championship > Thanks for the update. It makes me happy that such an important shogi > tournament was held in my hometown. From what I read most of the stronger > shogi players tend to be located on the coasts, so it's nice that a local > player came out on top. > > I have a few questions about these "national championship" so maybe someone > can help out. > > I agree that 10 30 is a relatively fast time control. But, wasn't this fact > known well in advance? It was in the flyer we received a couple weeks before the event. It would have seemed more appropriate to express an > dissenting opinion to the tournament organizing committee before actual > play had begun. I did so, but only two days before the event, as I had not noticed the time control change until then due to my own travels. Perhaps, then someone may have been able to persuade them > to change the time control or at least the organizing committee might have > been able to explain the reasoning for choosing such a time control. They would not change the schedule, which allowed only one hour between rounds. 20/30 (the time control of all previous championships) would require about 1 hour 15 minutes between rounds. This > kind of leads me to my first question. > > Are the rules for these "national championships" decided by each individual > national committee or are they following guidelines set up by FESA? For > example, since the US Championship used a time control of 10 30 then does > that mean that all of the other "national championships" use a time control > of 10 30? > The USSF is not part of FESA (which is only for Europe), but we do have a joint rating system ("Pan-Atlantic") which stipulates a minimum time control of 20/30 or comparable. > It seems unfair to decide to not rate a tournament after the fact, and even > stranger to have hold a "national tournament" that can't be rated because > of the format chosen. > It was not decided after the fact. I announced at the start that if the time control were not changed, all games played at the fast time control would not be rated. > > My next question is about "nationality requirements", according to the > update by Mr. Kaufman stated that only 2 Americans made it to the final 16 > but were eventually eliminated and no American made it to the final 8. Let > he mentioned that he was eliminated by former US Champion, Y.Suzuki. I > thought that non-citizens or non-permanent residents were ineligible to > become US Champion. Are non-US citizens or permanent residents now allowed > to become US Champion? The US Championship has generally required only 1 year residence in the US, not permanent residence, and usually the winner is a short-term resident. Mr. Suzuki has been here about 6 years, but I don't know his legal status. This year's winner has been here 1 1/2 years. For this event there was obviously no U.S. residence requirement, since three Canadian players participated. Is this the same for other countries with respect to > their "national championship" as well? If no Americans advanced beyond > round 16 then does that mean that there will now be a playoff between Mr. > Fernandez and Mr. Kaufman for the title of US Champion? How will the > American representative to the next world championship be determined? This was not a qualifier for any other event. No playoff is necessary; the US Champion need not be a citizen or permanent resident under current rules. > > Finally, Mr. Kaufman mentions that maybe the faster time controls were > chosen because Japanese prefer rapid shogi, whereas, Americans prefer > longer shogi. Now, this is probably a silly question. But, since this > tournament was called the US Championship, wouldn't it have been better for > it to have been organized by the US National Shogi Association and set up > with the time control preferred by Americans? The fact is that the overwhelming percentage of players in U.S. Shogi events are not Americans, but are Japanese citizens here for varying lengths of time. The USSF did establish guidelines which were adhered to every year until now (the organizers claim not to have heard of them, although they participated in past events). Even the USSF itself is now rather dominated by Japanese citizens; there are just not enough American citizens active in tournament shogi. This tournament was supposed > to determine the US qualifier for the World Championship, right? No. This event has not been announced yet. If so, > then why was it organized to make it convenient for non-citizen, > non-resident alien Japanese players. I may be the only one, but I feel that > this type of tournament should have been planned and organized with the > best interests of American shogi players in mind. As it is, it seems to > have been set up to make things only convenient for the Japanese players. > How can it be called a "national championship" if it's set up to be > convenient for people who don't even qualify to become US Champion because > they are not US nationals. > A tournament to decide the champion of US nationals would basically mean a match between me and George Fernandez every year, since no other upper Dan US national is active in tournament shogi now. Of course, with enough incentive perhaps some of our inactive Dan players might be persuaded to return to the battlefield. > Bill Gaudry > Larry Kaufman