We maintained the same format that we have used for the past couple of years with three heats and the winners of each game in each heat advancing to the single elimination semi-final round. This year, all were 5-player games, which is the GM's preference. Disappointing for me was that I only played in one heat this year in order to make all of the games 5-player contests.

Heat 1 on Wednesday afternoon had eight games. Winners included Jim Fry, Mark Love, Jennifer Thomas, Scott Cornett, Tom Browne, Jared Scarborough, Charles Hickok and Ben Foy.

Heat 2 on Thursday afternoon was the biggest heat in the years I have run the event. There were 14 games with winners being Scott Cornett (the only player to win two heat games), Ann Cornett, Kevin Youells, Ken Gutermuth, Ken Rothstein, John Pack, Scott Pfeiffer, Joe Jaskiewicz, Jeff Mullet, Tom Saal,
Carmen Petruzelli, Mario Lanza, Jeff Cornett and Bret Mingo. In her game, Ann Cornett managed to deal herself the "10 gold" card, a 5-value commodity and a 4-value commodity when no one else could bid on these cards so she got them for a bid of one florin in the second round of the game.

Heat 3 on Friday evening saw seven more games. The winners were Harald Henning, Robert Paul, Tom Agostino, Bob
Runnicles, John Wetherell, Su Hung and Jeri Freedman. In Jeri's game, she ended up with the top spot in two of the commodities and the second spot in two others.

We had exactly 25 heat winners appear for the semi-final. This perfect configuration yielded five 5-player games with the winners advancing to the final. The first game ended in a tie between Jeff Cornett and Bret Mingo with Jeff advancing via the tiebreaker. The second game saw Ann Cornett wipe out her table with a 54-florin victory over Joe Jaskiewicz. Jeff Mullet won the third game by 10 florins over Charles Hickok. Scott Cornett beat Kevin Youells by 45 florins in the fourth. In the fifth semi-final game, Harald Henning made a bid to force Ken Rothstein to bid 13 florins for a 5-value dye card that gave Ken the 10-florin bonus spot and third best boat in the second round. However, Harald's two cards that he got for free as the next action at the end of that round got him the top boat for the round and gave him a 22-florin lead, which he retained.

I should have known how competitive the final was going to be when we had three players make a random draw because they all wanted to play the red pieces. In all three rounds, there was at least one player who did not have a full ship of five commodities. The order of seating around the table for the final was Scott Cornett, Jeff Mullet, Jeff Cornett, Harald Henning and Ann Cornett. In the first round, Jeff Cornett bought the four cards offered in the first three auctions for a total of 24 florins (and later bought his fifth card for his remaining six florins). Ann then bought the next five cards that were auctioned for 21 florins. The other highlight of the first round was that Jeff Mullet had no cards when all four of the other players had filled their ships so he got a free draw of four cards which turned into four spice commodity cards, which some players felt was a very lucky draw. I felt that he would have been luckier drawing three spice cards, which would have still given him the lead in that commodity with one card of another commodity to maybe get some second place points in that commodity and also to give Jeff a second commodity to collect. After the first round, Ann had a 14-florin lead over Jeff Mullet, with the other three close behind.

Round 2 started with Jeff Cornett turning over three more spice cards. Ann bid 24 florins to try to stop Jeff Mullet from getting the 20-point bonus in the spice commodity that early. However, Jeff bid 25 florins for the three spice commodities. The second round also saw a 13 florin bid by Scott for a couple of dye commodities and a porcelain, Harald bid 10 florins for a 5-value cloth card and Scott bid 10 for 4-value metal card. Jeff Cornett only got one bid this round, but it was a three-card flip that included the "10 gold" card, a 5-value dye and a 5-value porcelain when no one else could take the lot so he got these cards for one florin. By the end of the round, Scott Cornett managed to get to the 10-point bonus space in dyes and Ann Cornett got to the 10-point bonus in metals in addition to Jeff Mullet's 20-point bonus in spice. At the end of the second round, Ann and Jeff Mullet were tied for the lead with Jeff Cornett one florin behind. Harald and Scott trailed 20 florins back.

Round 3 saw very few high bids with the highest being Jeff Mullet's 20 florins for the "10 gold" card, a 5-value dye and a 2-value metal relatively late in the round. Earlier, other high bids were Jeff Cornett bidding nine florins for a 5-value cloth, 11 florins for a 5-value metal, 5-value porcelain and 1-value cloth and eventually 10 florins for a 5-value porcelain. The first card of the third round was the 0-value metal card dealt by Scott and won by Ann for 1 florin to get her the 20-point bonus space in the metal commodity. Scott paid seven florins for a 4-value dye, which gave him the 20-point bonus in that commodity. And Harald ended up getting to the 20-point bonus space in porcelain by bidding a total of 10 florins for the 4-, 1- and 3-value porcelains offered in three separate lots. The key bid was the penultimate auction where Ann got a 0- and 1-value dye, and 5-value cloth for two florins to give her the fourth best ship and a tie for second in dyes. The 4-florin profit that Ann made on this bid was her margin of victory over Jeff Mullet to give Ann the championship. Harald wound up in third 27 florins behind Ann with Scott and Jeff Cornett very close behind Harald.

I am seeking feedback on two questions before next year's tournament. First, I am considering moving the third heat, semi-final and final from Friday evening to Saturday afternoon. Would players prefer I leave these games at the current time or would you prefer the move? Second, the past two years I have had the potential to have more than 25 semi-finalists. If I get over 25 heat winners for the semi-final, should I have six 5-player semis with a 6-player final, five 6-player semis with a 5-player final, or should I just go up to 36 semi-finalists with six 6-player semis and a 6-player final? Please let me know your opinion by sending me an e-mail or regular mail.