adel verpflichtet [Updated August 2001]

ADV  3 prizes Experienced Swiss Elim Continuous 
   
  19  Round 2 23 Round 3 Final 24

  Maryland 2

John Pack, UT

2001 Champion

2nd: Tom Stokes, NJ

3rd: Abby Cocke, MD

4th: Greg Crowe, VA

5th: Ray Pfeifer, MD

6th: Frank Arndt, MD
Event History
1991    Ray Pfeiffer      23
1992    Terry Tegler      34
1993    Tom DeMarco      55
1994    Ralph May      49
1995    Beth Barnard      65
1996    Ray Pfeiffer      32
1997    Thomas Stokes      54
1998    Marc Geary      64
1999    Ray Pfeiffer     46
2000    Richard Irving     40
2001    John Pack     58

AREA Ratings

GM: Ray Pfeifer

And Other Equally Unpronounceable Stuff ...

In the first round of the Adel Verpflichtet tournament at the WBC, each entrant plays four games, scoring points for finishing position (1st = 5 points, 2nd = 4, 3rd = 3, 4th = 2, 5th = 1). The ten entrants with the highest total points advance to the semifinal. In the semifinal each player plays two games. The four winners and the best second place finisher advance to a single winner-take-all final.

In the first round the most impressive performance was turned in by Abby Cocke. She won all four of her games, scoring 20 points. She averaged 7.5 spaces past the finish line (a total of 30 spaces out of a possible 52), and finished with at least a
ten-card set each time.1997 champ Thomas Stokes and last year's fourth-place finisher Carolyn DeMarco each had one win and three seconds to score 17 points. Greg Crowe, John Pack, and three-time champ Ray Pfeifer each had one win and a total of 16 points.

There were six players with 15 points vying for the last four slots in the semifinal. The tiebreaker was the total spaces
past the finish line. Frank Arndt finished two of his games with 11 and 10 spaces past the finish
for a 21 (second best tiebreaker after Abby), Mike Hodkins had 15, Greg Mayer14 and Mark Neale (who averaged 11.75 cards in his finishing sets) had 12 to grab the last slot. Patrick Mitchell had 15 points with nine spaces and last
year's runner-up Mark Geary had 15 points with eight spaces, losing the tiebreaker.

In the first two semifinal games, Abby and Thomas won while John and Greg Crowe finished second. In the last two semis, John and Greg Crowe won with Ray and Frank finishing second. Ray's second place at three spaces short of the finish was better than Frank's13 spaces, so he won the last spot in the final for the second year in a row with the best second-place finish in the semis.

In the final, Abby was collecting cards, looking for another big finish in a close game. But John used the strategy of exhibiting often with a smaller set. John opened up a large lead and each of the others seemed unwilling to exhibit against him or steal from him. Uncatchable, John won by exhibiting and crossing three spaces past the finish line with a five-card set. Thomas had the second best set with nine cards, getting the 4-space bonus to finish in second place. Abby had the largest set with 10 cards, but the 8-space bonus could only advance her from fifth to third place. Greg finished fourth with a 4-card set and Ray finished fifth with a 6-card set. We hope to see John, a newcomer to this event, come back again next year to defend his title.

Stats:
Black won 13 of the 44 games played, Yellow won only four games while finishing last in 13 games. Black was last only four times. Last year Blue had the most wins/least losses, while Yellow again had the least wins/most losses.

Greg Mayer had the largest set at the finish of his fourth game, ending with 15 cards in a winning effort. Greg Crowe won the second game he played, finishing without a set.

In 11 of the games played, only one player crossed the finish line. In 19 games two players crossed, three players crossed in nine games, and four players crossed the line in five games. In Ray's first game, all of the four players crossed the line, also producing the tightest grouping (four players in a six-space stretch).

Michael Destro finished 18 spaces ahead of the second place finisher in his first game for the biggest lead in the first round, while John Pack used his Run-Run-Run strategy to finish an incredible 24 spaces ahead of second place in his second semifinal game. Both Michael and John's finishes were the most advanced wins at 12 past the finish line (13 spaces
is the maximum possible).

Lance Ribeiro edged Carolyn in their first game eight cards to five when both finished five spaces past the finish for the closest 1-2 finish. The most common position for the winner was five spaces over the line (eight times), followed by four spaces over (six times) and nine spaces (five times).

Half of last year's entrants (20 out of 40) returned to this year's tournament. The first games of Round 1 consisted of 58 players (12 boards), the second games had 54 (11 boards), the third games had 45 (nine boards), and the fourth round games had 34 players (seven boards).


The Junior version attracted 15 little art collectors. When all the buying, showing and thievin' had finished, the top six future threats were:

1st. Tim DeMarco

2nd. Erica Kirchner

3rd. Daniel Collinson

4th. Jessica Finkeldey

5th. Ashley Collinson

6th. Alex Henning

 GM      Ray Pfeiffer [9th Year]  NA
    NA   NA

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