Rules and Tournament Regulations Committee

Over the previous 2 days I spent 7 hours at the Rules and Tournament Regulations Committee (RTRC) meeting. It was the first time I have attended a FIDE committee meeting, and I don't think what I am about to post will be able to completely describe the experience.
The first thing to note about FIDE meetings is that are pretty democratic, in that anyone is allowed to attend. In this case the RTRC meeting attracted 65 people. However democracy only extends so far, at least in terms of the voting practice. When an issue comes up for vote, usually the committee members vote first, and if there is a big majority for or against, the issue is decided. If the vote is close, then the rest of the room gets to vote as well! Nonetheless there were also occasions were essentially the chairman (Geurt Gijssen) had the only vote, simply by passing over a contentious issue.
Secondly, I picked up a strange vibe from a number of people present. It seems that there are a number of experienced arbiters who believe the rules need to be able to deal with every situation, and in the absence of such rules, they cannot make a decision. This resulted, in my opinion, a number of rule changes that were overly prescriptive, and downright silly.
As for the proposed changes (noting that the committee only make proposals, which have to be approved by the General Assembly) the major ones were as follows.:
Sections 1-5 (Basic Rules of Play) were untouched except for some corrections to the wording.
In section 6 the phrase "even with the most unskilled counterplay" has been removed (making this rule definitive)
One big discussion (of which I was involved in) was section 6.7, dealing with forfeit time. At this Olympiad it has been set to 0 minutes, which even the meeting chair (Gijssen) accepted was against the current laws of chess. I had always had problems with the wording of the old rule (in that I believed it did not allow the organisers to reduce the forfeit time to below an hour) and after much back and forth I proposed a new wording, which I believed added clarity to the wording. In my proposal I suggested a default forfeit time of 30 minutes, but also allowed the arbiter discretion as to what would happen if that time was exceeded. The motion went forward, but 30 minutes was suddenly replaced by 0 minutes by the chair. (If this was a formal meeting I would have been entitled to object). The committee voted 8-7 in favour (a number of negatives were based on the time, not the wording), but the whole meeting voted 40-20 in favour. I then tried to move a motion changing the default time to 30 minutes but Gijssen simply said "Moving on to the next item".
The other big issue was whether organisers can forbid draw offers/agreements in under x moves. A motion to this effect was passed, although Campomanes (who was present throughout) tried to pull a swifty by changing the wording to make the default case one where no draw offers were allowed, unless allowed as part of the tournament conditions. This was spotted in time, an the motion that passed allows organisers to forbid draw agreements before move x, but in the absence of a regulation, then draws can be agreed at any stage.
What is also important about this motion is that the topic of contrived repetitions was not addressed. What this says to me is that arbiters cannot refuse a valid repetition claim at any stage of the game (whether that is move 5 or move 25). Of course this makes it easy to circumvent any 'no agreed draws' rule, but we'll see what happens in practice.
The meeting adjourned after 5 hours, and then we reconvened the next day.
Day 2 dealt with the appendices to the Laws.
The first big topic was an attempt by Campomanes to abolish the section on Adjourned Games. I could not see the sense in this, but the discussion went on for 45 minutes. At first Gijssen asked the whole meeting to vote and although I thought it was split 50-50, Gijssen stated that the motion had passed. Stewart Rueben then objected to the change in voting procedure from the previous day, and when the committee members voted it was 6-2 against removing the adjournment rules (So that's 2 in the eye for Campo).
Under the discussion of the Rapidplay rules the wording was changed to allow the arbiter to call flag is BOTH flags have fallen (to prevent games from dragging out), but gives them the freedom not to.
Under the discussion of the Blitz rules, the most absurd rules change I have possibly seen was passed. Previously under section C.4 players could not ask for a draw under 10.2 (insufficient winning chances). However, after describing a absurd hypothetical (in a 15 minute game, which is now considered blitz, it gets to rook v rook after 5 minutes, and one playercannot claim a draw), the meeting decided to reword C4 to allow claims under 10.2. What they stupidly missed is that 10.2 only applies when you have less than 2 minutes on your clock anyway, so you would need to play another 8 minutes minimum in the given example. I voted against. So from the 1st of July next year, players can now claim draws in blitz games, which is both a nightmare for the arbiter, and a radical departure from what blitz is really about (ie winning on time).
Discussions about Chess 960 were held over and the meeting broke about 2 hours later.
Overall it was an interesting experience, and it was revealing (not always in a good way). I also attended the Technical Commission (of which I am also a member), but I will get to that later.

Olympiad Day 6

'Jamaica?'. 'No she was happy to' is an old music hall joke. However, at the chess olympiad, Jamaica is one of a couple of very tough Carribean teams (along with Trinidad and Tobago who beat New Zealand in round 1). Although we were both on 3 match points Jamaica was probably a team we wouldn't normally play (at this stage of the tournament), although I'm sure they were pleased with the pairing.
The good news is that we manages to scrape half a point (therebye losing 3.5-0.5). Stuart Fancy never really got going on Board 1, while my short term tactics were never a match for Shane Matthew's positional advantages in a Sicilian. Rupert Jones was the only player to score something, after finding a perpetual, although he had probably blundered slightly earlier. Craig Skehan was closer to winning an Olympiad game than he ever has been, after his opponent knocked over his king while reaching for a glass of water. Sadly for Craig, this doesn't count as a resignation, and the game continued, with his opponent eventually winning.

Olympiad Rest Day 1

No play today and I suspect everyone is appreciating the rest. Of course not everyone is resting as yesterday, today and tommorrow are taken up with FIDE committee and commission meetings. Rupert Jones, my room mate, had to recvover from last nights Bermuda Party by 9:00 am this morning, in order to be secreatary to the CACDEC meeting this morning (The commission for the assistence of chess in developing countries). I was a little more fortunate in that my Rules and Tournament Regulations Committee meeting isn't till 3pm this afternoon (actually 20 minutes from now).
As for the Bermuda Party it was better this year, both because the venue was nicer, the crowd was larger, and most importantly, no one got punched out. The latter point was appreciated by the organisers, but not so much by the ClosetGrandmaster, who was running around wondering when the 'action' would start. I was well behaved and left at 2:00am but in the press room a couple of journalists are comparing depature times ('I left at 5' etc)

Olympiad Day 5

The PNG machine gains momentum, with our first win of the tournament, over the British Virgin Islands. For experienced Olympiad watchers, the British Virgins are much tougher than the American Virgins, so it was a good victory for us.
Our board 1 match ended in a draw on move 20 after the arbiter seemed to not mind an early repetition. On board 3 Rupert Jones hacked his opponent with a closed Sicilian, while Criag Skehan managed to avoid a number of tricks but eventually collapsed and lost 'dismally' (His words not mine).
On board 2 I was paired with the legendary Bill Hook, who played his first Olympiad back in 1968 (when I was 2 years old). Indeed his legend grows with every Olympiad as photographers buzzed around the board, taking photos before the game begin.
After a quick start to the game I came up with an idea that at first I didn't think worked, but after I played it, looked better and better. I was helped by the fact that Bill went into a big think on move which enabled me to check that the tactics worked. I emerged a pawn up and then won a second and third pawn while Bill went looking for tricks. The game ended in a king chase and he resigned just before mate.
It was a narrow win (2.5-1.5) but a win nonetheless. Of course this means we will slingshoted up the table, and be paired with some team who are looking for a face they don't like.

Hook, Bill (IVB) - Press, Shaun (PNG)
2008 Olympiad - Dresden

1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 g6 3. Nc3 d5 4. Nf3 Bg7 5. Qb3 dxc4 6. Qxc4 O-O
7. e4 a6 8. Be2 b5 9. Qb3 Bb7 10. e5 Nd5 11. O-O Nxc3 12. bxc3 Bd5
13. c4 bxc4 14. Bxc4 Bxf3 15. gxf3 Qxd4 16. Bb2 Qb6 17. Qa3 e6
18. Bc3 Nd7 19. f4 Qc6 20. Rfd1 Nxe5 21. Bxe5 Bxe5 22. fxe5 Qxc4
23. Rac1 Qg4+ 24. Kf1 Qe4 25. Qa5 Qh1+ 26. Ke2 Qxh2 27. Rxc7 Qh5+
28. f3 Rab8 29. Rc5 Rb2+ 30. Ke3 Qg5+ 31. Ke4 Re2+ 32. Kd3 Qe3+
33. Kc4 Rc2+ 0-1

Olympiad Day 4

Despite starting with 2 free points, PNG only managed to draw 2-2 with Uganda. Using the slightly dubious strategy of only playing on boards 3&4 (and apparently on 2&4 to give their 'No 1' White in every game), they faced Rupert Jones and Craig Skehan, while Stuart Fancy and I had the afternoon off. Once again Craig played a solid, unambitious opening, until he got overwhelmed in the centre and eventually mated. Rupert had prepared well for his game (the Scandanavian Portraguese Gambit), but at some point it went awry and he never recovered the pawn.
However it is our first match point, although we remain sufficiently low down to hopefully avoid anyone too scary. However, given the randomness of the draw we could end up against anyone, so a PNG v Russia clash may still be a possibility!

Defaults at the Olympiad

There are a anumber of unpopular rule changes at this years Olympiad including Match point scoring, the random pairings and the shortening of the tournament to 11 rounds, but probably the most unpopular rule is the deafult rule. Basically any player who is not present at the board at the start of the game loses immediately. No 1 hour default time, instead an instant forfeit for being even 10 seconds late.
Or 3 minutes as New Zealander Bob Smith discovered 40 minutes ago. Deciding to stay back at the hotel for some last minute prep, he took a late bus, missed his stop, and arrived 3 minutes after the start time. New Zealand down 1-0 to Solvenia.
Indeed a number of games were over very quickly by this method, including boards 1&2 of the PNG v Uganda match. The Ugandan's suffered from the usual visa difficulties that afflict many African teams, meaning they started down 2 points against us.

Olympiad Pictures

My first set of Olympiad pictures are now up. Just click on the 'Chess Photos' link on the left. The pictures are of the opening ceremony and before the first round. When the schedule settles down a bit I'll try and get more pictures of the action and the leading players.