San Francisco Scrabble

I had already been along earlier in the week to find the location for the San Francisco Scrabble tournament, so I knew where I was going.  I went along on Sunday morning and there were 6 of us in the Collins (i.e. worldwide lexicon) division and 10 in the NWL (North American lexicon) division.  This took place in a small alcove in the food court on the ground floor of the San Francisco Centre - a shopping centre in the middle of the city, which does spell its name the British way!

We played a full round robin and then king-of-the-hill final game.  I was player #2, as the second-highest rated player, although that's due to my vastly inflated US rating ... which is now no longer quite as inflated.  I started against Anuj, who won 498-343.  Then came Bruce, who won 422-355.  Next up, was Carson, from Hong Kong, playing his first tournament in the US, but not new to the game.  This game was better for me as I had 4 bonuses (INTROLD to start the game, then SOCIETAL, NEGATES and CORONATE) to his lone EQUITIES - I was over 100 ahead after 4 moves each, but he won 427-417 as I struggled with vowel overloads most of the game.  4th up was the bottom-ranked player Sridhar, who I outbonused 3-2 (BILTONG, SCATTIER and DRAGNET) but lost 456-443.  I was over 100 in front in this one too until over half way through, but there was nothing I could do.  Up next, was Kevin, the #1 seed, who started with CARIOUS, and replied to my exchange 5 from EELLOOU with DISGRACE to be leading 148-0 straight away.  I did rather well in this game to close the losing margin to only 57 as I lost 449-392.

Final board in final round against Sridhar

It was disappointing to lose all 5 round robin games, although with my opponents averaging over 450, it is less surprising.

In the final game, I played Sridhar again, as we were the bottom two.  Finally, I had an opponent who didn't score well over 400 and I actually won the game 466-321, putting it away thanks to BRAINIER and SEALERS, and MIZ (67)

Overall, I finished in 5th place, and I'm now rated 1848.

  I raised my overall average to 402 across all 6 games, which is about where it would normally be.

The shopping centre closed at 6pm, so we were really being ushered about by just after then.  Handily, the exit goes straight into the Powell St BART/MUNI station concourse, so I was able to get the train back to my hotel to drop things off.  I decided to try Scott's down in Jack London Square in Oakland for dinner, so I'm not ancipating going over the Oakland again.

It was OK - there was a pianist performing live jazzy versions of songs - which made it hard to hear the waiter sometimes.  It was also disappointing to be positioned in the bar area rather than the main restaurant, which they were keeping for larger groups, although all I saw throughout the evening were empty tables.  It wasn't so bad though, and there was a TV that I could watch Sunday Night Football on, as a bonus!  The food was excellent, although I was expecting to be offered a free refill of the coffee but it was never forthcoming.  I don't think I'll be bothering with that again, unlike the excellent Left Bank from earlier.