by kdc4 on Tue Feb 26, 2008 5:30 am
Laura is too modest to note the silver lining from our knockout at LSE- namely her break as a judge. Hats off to her, as well as to Jason and Art for excellent performances.
The tournament was literally the hardest I've ever been to (bar Worlds and the Durham Open 2006, the latter of which was break to finals).
Oxford and Euros had nothing on it. ALL the old hacks came out to play.
Art alludes to the fact that LSE took the unusual decision to power-pair on points and speaks, which basically means that teams who take a tough loss (a.k.a. a good performance, but not good enough to win) end up hitting other teams who also suffered a tough loss. The result is that some teams can perform consistently well but never garner team points.
Jimmy and I took an unexpected third in round one, for example, and had a reasonable expectation of hitting some easier teams, only to come across James Prior, Dan Bradley, Fred Cowell, and Andrew Marshall, all of whom have made the break at Worlds.
Cheers,
-Doug