Petition from chess players at the 11th EICC in Rijeka
The zero default time questioned again
Report by Chessdom
The participants of the European Individual Men and Women’s Chess Championsh in Rijeka have submitted a petition to the Organizing committee and the ECU President Boris Kutin in which they request changing the delay tolerance from 0 to 30 minutes. They require this measurement to be valid from the 4th round. The petition was signed by 110 participants.
Due to request, on the behalf of Organizing committee, the president of the Executive Committee Damir Vrhovnik said: “The organizers are trying to do their best for the sake of our players. In accordance to that, on the behalf of Organizing committee and myself, I support the participants’ request. However, this question is under the European Chess Union’ jurisdiction and therefore, they are the ones who must make the decision“.
The rules of chess according to FIDE
At the Presidential Board Meeting 2009 Q1 the zero default time was discussed and it was decided that, “the PB approved changes in the Laws of Chess including that the default time would be zero unless otherwise specified in the regulations of the tournament.” The specific FIDE rule is now present in the Laws of Chess, saying,
6.6 a. Any player who arrives at the chessboard after the start of the session shall lose the game. Thus the default time is 0 minutes. The rules of a competition may specify otherwise. b. If the rules of a competition specify a different default time, the following shall apply. If neither player is present initially, the player who has the white pieces shall lose all the time that elapses until he arrives, unless the rules of the competition specify or the arbiter decides otherwise.
As per tournament regulations in Rijeka (text here) no specification about time of appearance at the board is present, thus, the FIDE regulations for zero default time are valid.
Stay tuned for more details on the matter, we will bring you all reactions by the arbiters, appeals committee, the players, ECU, and FIDE officials.
In the U.S., the players get screwed by Bill Goichberg and his cronies in the USCF. In Europe, the players get screwed by others. What a way to make a living in chess.
In my opinion a reasonable solution is the 15 min tolerance and the penalty for coming late is the loss of time which is sufficient.
The real solution is to get rid of all the corrupt politicians like Bill Goichberg, Jim Berry, Randy Bauer, Campomanes and people like them.
I agree with “cyprus” (commenter #2) about 15 minutes being reasonable. As I noted here, the Association of Tennis Professionals has a similar 15-minute rule, though () with fines, and () only for players already on-site.
My own feeling is that there should be 2 rules depending on whether players have received appearance money to play:
(*) Have ZT but start at 5-10 min. past the hour or half-hour in events where everyone is thus supported.
(*) In Opens where sudden traffic problems (even Olympic Games have had those) could be a factor getting onsite, and especially in events with more than one game per day, 15 or 30 minutes is appropriate.
A factor in both cases is that visiting dignitaries or pairing queries can delay the start of rounds, and the same kind of “clock” should apply to organizers and players. Indeed, I once delayed the start of a US Open round by a few minutes in the former role myself…
The default time should be -10 minutes.