INVITATION TO NIKLAS DATA 2000
  • TWO PARTS The Niklas Data Championship is divided into two separate events.
    The first, played on Thursday evening the 20th of April 2000, is a PRO-AM and is organised by the Swedish Bridge Federation. Information about the PRO-AM will be sent from the Swedish Bridge Federation (phone +46 8 22 00 56) by Micke Melander and is not dealt with in this invitation. The second event is the main tournament.
  • WHEN AND WHERE The main event starts at Friday the 21st of April 2000 and ends at Sunday the 23rd April 2000. A detailed program is given below. It is played at the S:t Erik Bridge-club in Stockholm.

  • TYPE OF BRIDGE The main event is played as imps across the field. Every pair plays 14 boards against each other, 15 rounds making a total of 210 boards. The time allotted for each round is 110 minutes.
  • SCHEDULE        Friday 09.30 - 10.30 Breakfast and, on Friday, registration
  • 10.30 - 12.20 Round 1
    12.25 - 14.15 Round 2
  • 14.15 - 15.00 Lunch
    15.00 - 16.50 Round 3
    16.55 - 18.45 Round 4
    18.50 - 20.40 Round 5
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    Saturday + Sunday: Same time schedule except that on Sunday we will have the price-giving ceremony at about 21.15 and after that the banquet will commence. Smaller adjustments may be made to this time schedule.

     
  • FOOD & DRINK Free food - breakfast, lunch and dinner – will be served in the same locality as we play. There will also be refreshments such as fruit, coffee, tee and biscuits free of charge.

  • AIM This tournament serves a twofold purpose.
    Firstly it is the second Swedish international invitation tournament with financial sponsoring of Niklas Data.
    Secondly it serves as the third stage in the qualification, or more correct "observation" as we call it, for the Swedish national team. This second purpose explains some of the strict regulations that follow below.

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  • TD + AC Tournament Director will be L-G Magnusson. Chief responsible for the whole tournament is Daniel Auby. These two will jointly decide the director’s decisions. They may consult with other persons if they decide it may be advantageous. There will be no formal AC. The Swedish Law Commission will be on duty during the weekend and to which appeals may be made.

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  • LANGUAGE All conversation with partner, TD or the opponents must be in English when one or more players have their cards out of the card sleeve. Gross violations of this rule will result in penalty points.

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  • ENTRY FEE Players living not more than 80 kilometres from Stockholm pay an entry fee of 1000 SEK per player, more than that but not more than 160 km pays 500 SEK. Other pays nothing. Unemployed juniors pay half this fee.

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  • PRICES 1.st price is 25.000, 2nd 10.000 and 3rd 5.000. All in SEK.
  • DRESS In the main tournament there is no formal rule for correct dress. There may however be for the PRO-AM.
  • VUE-GRAPH One table during the whole tournament will be showed on vue-graph. All players are required to play on the vue-graph when asked for.

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    PAIRS Inside the parenthesis the following abbreviations are used:
    A = A-pair in the Swedish national squad
    B = B-pair in ditto
    F = Foreign pair

          1. Jeff Meckstroth – Geir Helgemo, USA/Norway (F)
     2. Huub Bertens – Bart Nab, The Netherlands (F)
     3. Jukka Pesonen – Sakari Stubb, Finland (F)
     4. Vladimir Mihov – Ivan Nanev, Bulgaria (F)
     5. Sance Panelewen – RobertTobing, Indonesia (F)
     6. Jacek Pszczola - Michal Kwiecien, Poland (F)
     7. PO Sundelin – Johan Sylvan, (A)
     8. Tommy Gullberg – Lars Andersson (A)
     9. Anders Morath – Mårten Gustawsson (A)
    10. Mats Nilsland – Björn Fallenius (A)
    11. Magnus Lindkvist – Peter Fredin (A)
    12. Magnus Eriksson – Ulf Nilsson (A)
    13. Mats Sjöberg – Olof Bergström (B)
    14. Hans Göthe – Lars Albertsson (B)
    15. Fredrik Nyström – Peter Strömberg (B)
    16. Bengt-Erik Efraimsson – Kenneth Borin (B)

     
  • SYSTEM RULES The rules of the Swedish national squad apply. A brief description of these rules is given below for the benefit of the foreign players. All Swedish players already have these rules.

    Basically we try to follow the WBF rules for event of category 1 (Bermuda Bowl etc.). However, we do have some specialities.

    All systems are allowed.

    As we know by the 16th of March there will be no HUM systems in the tournament. We will therefore not spend too much space here on our rules about HUM. Should any foreign pair announce that they play a HUM system I will inform them about their responsibilities more in detail.

    Brown Sticker Conventions (BS) are allowed. The fact that you use BS must be noted on the first page of the convention card. It must be clearly stated which BS you play. The detailed description may of course be given on supplementary sheets.

    When your opponents play a BS convention you are, during the bidding, allowed to consult private prefabricated written notes about your defence to this BS. If you have such a defence your opponents have the right to look at it before the round starts.
  • PRE-INFORMATION We have special rules about informing your opponents before the tournament starts. There are two different obligations.
    1. You must send in your convention card
    2. If you play something you believe your opponents would like to see in advance you should make a "message". This aims at non-standard conventions and treatments in potentially contested auctions. Try to be brief if possible. For instance you do not need to tell that you play a nebulous 1D opening, the players are assumed to have met that before on frequent occasions. BS conventions should of course be mentioned. Only in exceptional cases there will be need for more than a page. Many pairs will have nothing at all to write a message about.
  • If your convention card or message is incorrect or lacks something you jeopardise your right of playing these conventions or treatments. Those pairs whose information is grossly incorrect will be put out of the tournament until the faults are corrected and they will receive average minus on those boards not played, there opponents will receive average plus (average minus/plus is +/- 3 imp from each table).

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  • SEND BY EMAIL All this pre-information must be made in English and sent by email to Micke Melander,
    micke.melander@bridgefederation.se
    not later than the 5th of April 2000. Late arrivals will be penalised at the discretion of Daniel Auby.
  • Note that they must be sent by email because they will be made available for all players at a special page at the home page of the Swedish federation
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  • http://www.bridgefederation.se/niklasdata/SBFNDC9900.htm
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  • The Swedish pairs have already submitted this material for the OBS-2 tournament and do not need to send it again, except if they have made changes since then.

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  • FORMATS Accepted formats for your convention cards are MS Word (a MS template for the convention card is supplemented to this invitation, it will print nicely although the columns appear above each other on the screen when you work with it), PDF and the WBF convention card editor (CCE). If possible, please refrain from using the CCE for MS-DOS. For the messages MS Word, PDF and plain text format are allowed.
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