District 16 2012 – 2013 Grand National Teams

Conditions of Contest

Revised September 2012

General Information

The masterpoint determination date is August 6 of the preceding year.  For example, the masterpoint determination date for the 2013 GNTs is Aug 6, 2012.

A player must be a member of the ACBL at any event past the club level (non members

are allowed to play at the club level).

A player must be a member in good standing of District 16 at any event past the club level.

New teams may be formed at the District finals from qualified players of previous level.
The ACBL conditions of contest are included herein as a part of the District 16 conditions of contest.

Eligibility for the District Level Competition

Championship (Unlimited):  May 25 – May 27, 2013

There is no unit level qualifying for the Championship flight. All teams are eligible for qualification to the Open Championship Flight Final.  All teams wishing to participate in the Championship flight must register at the tournament site 45 minutes prior to the first session of qualifying. Any team attempting to register late may not be allowed to compete, at the discretion of the Director in Charge.  We would appreciate all teams wishing to participate in the Championship flight final pre-registering with James Thurtell (jthurtell@sbcglobal.net 214-691-6668) at least a weak in advance.

Flight A (0-5000):  May 25, 26, 27, 2012

There is no unit level qualifying for Flight A. All teams wishing to participate in Flight A finals must register at the tournament site 45 minutes prior to the first session of qualifying. Any team attempting to register late may not be allowed to compete, at the discretion of the Director in Charge.  We would appreciate all teams wishing to participate in the Flight A final pre-registering with James Thurtell (jthurtell@sbcblobal.net 214-691-6668) at least a weak in advance.

Flight B (0-2000 MP) and Flight C (Non Life Master with fewer than 500 Masterpoints):  May 25, 26, 27, 2012

Teams must qualify in a Unit qualification game (not necessarily their own units game).  Qualified players may form new teams (as long as all members of the team have qualified somewhere) and are not required to play with the team on which they qualified at the Unit level.

Unit Level Qualifying - Flights B and C

Unit Qualifying Events will be two session Events. Swiss or Round Robin Formats should be used, depending on the number of teams. Appropriate Victory Point Scales will be used for Swiss. Flights B & C may be held separately or together. A team may play in Flight B and Flight C qualifying games. However, once a team plays in a given flight, they cannot go to another Unit to try and qualify in the same flight. Any team which qualifies for Flight B and Flight C must choose which flight they will play in at the district final.
All ACBL dues must be current for participation at the Unit Level and beyond. Payments received at the qualifying game are considered current.
Flight B & C players qualify for the district finals if their team:

If the Qualifying game has an odd number of tables, the greater half qualifies. Ties for the last qualifying position are not to be broken as per the Unit Level Conditions of Contest.

Note to directors:  ACBLScore does not always qualify every team eligible by the above rules.  It might be necessary to add manual qualifications before making the results official.

All teams qualified to participate at District Level will be responsible for paying a normal entry fee at District Level competition. Each Unit is requested to substantially subsidize teams continuing to the National Level, if the team members are from that Unit.
Augmentation: Please note that teams may not be augmented after the start of the first qualifying match at the Unit Level (Flights B and C).  But, new teams may be formed after the unit qualifying event but before the start of the district finals from among all qualified players. 

Augmentation may not take place after the start of the first session at District Level until after District Level is completed. Teams progressing to the National Level will be allowed to augment up to two players from the District, regardless of those players prior eligibility for District play.

As long as three original team members remain, substitution for the rest of an original four, five, or six man team is allowed AFTER the District event has determined the winner in each Flight.

Unit Sanction and Fees

A Unit Sanction is required for the Unit level B & C qualifying event. There is a $15.00 fee (per team) to be paid to District 16 for each team entered in the unit level event(s) and $1.25 per team/per session sanction fee to be paid to ACBL.

Reporting Results

Unit GNT Coordinators will send unit qualifying game file(s) to the GNT District Coordinator and sanction fees to the District Executive Treasurer.

District Level Competition

The format for the District Level competition is the same for each flight, subject to adjustment by size of entry. The format at the District Level competition is as follows:

First Round Competition

Knockout Rounds:

Quarterfinals and Semifinals:

Seeding and Ranking - All Flights

First Round:

Second (and subsequent) Rounds

Final Round

Conventions Allowed

Number of Boards Played

All players must play at least 50% of the boards played in each of the events (Round Robin, 4 Knockout matches) at the District Level competition in order to qualify for overall master point awards and to be eligible to play in the remainder of the Grand National competition.

Substitutes and Replacements

The following regulations must be strictly adhered to:

Substitutes

A team must be prepared to field at least three members or it forfeits the match scheduled for that time. If due to absence for cause, only three members are available, a substitute may be utilized for no more than one calendar day or two half days during any one level of competition. Substitutes must be approved by the Director in Charge, and should not appreciably strengthen or weaken the team. A substitute must be a member of the District and may not be a member of a team still in competition. If four members are available, a substitute is not permitted for an absent fifth or sixth member. A substitute player is entitled to any match awards while playing.

Replacement

New teams may be formed at the district finals from qualified players of the previous level.  Replacements may be drawn from any qualified person within our district.  All replacements must be approved by the District GNT coordinator prior to the beginning of play at the District competition.

Protests

The protest period expires 30 minutes after each match, half match or segment, as applicable.

Protest Committees

The Director in Charge is responsible for the selection of a five-member committee to handle any protest through the semifinal matches. Should a protest (or protests) occur during the final knockout match and the result of the protest is material to the outcome of this match, then a Protest Committee shall be assembled at the earliest practical date to hear the protests. Composition of this Committee is the responsibility of the Chairman of the District Ethics Committee, the District Executive Secretary, or the District Grand National Teams Coordinator, whoever is the first non affected person in the order given. Should all of the persons be affected by the playoff, then the District Director (or alternates in order should the District Director be affected) shall appoint a committee to hear the protest.

Time Limit Penalties

Starting Time Penalty

Any team which fails to seat a complete team within five minutes of the announced starting time of a session, match, half match or segment, will be penalized 3 IMPs in the net score of that match and 1 IMP for every two minutes thereafter. If a full team is not seated within 20 minutes of the announced time, that team will forfeit the match in question.  If the default occurs during a Round Robin Session the team winning by default shall receive the largest of the following:

Playing Time Penalties

Play of the matches must be completed within the allotted time plus the grace period. Failure to complete play of boards will result in the penalties as follows: