Congratulations to Ronny Conaert, winner of the Belgian Individual Championship 2023! Detailed report to follow.
Club gatherings
Brugge: alternatingly on Thursday or Friday evening, Sports bar Extra Time, Nijverheidsstraat 113, 8310 Assebroek. Contact: Line Vandamme, linevandamme@gmail.com
Brussels: every Wednesday evening at 18h15, at The Black Beard — La Barbe Noire, Lakensestraat 166 Rue de Laeken, Brussels 1000
Ghent: every Tuesday evening, at 19h, at Union-Sandeman, Kantienberg 5, 9000 Gent
Leuven: the Leuven Monthly series takes a Summer break, but there may be some spontaneous club gatherings. Keep an eye on their website.
In Red Beaver League (RBL) duels, three matches to 7 points are played whereby one point is awarded for the match win and one point for the better performance rating (PR). Does this mean the best player always wins? Well, not always, but he certainly has an edge.
This is what Guy Van Middelem experienced in his opening duel of the season against Alain Chif. At Orée on 29 May Guy won the opening match (1-0) but squandered away the PR point with a 15+ PR (1-1). This gave Alain a realistic opportunity for an upset. The dice gave Alain a little push in the back (he won M2 7-0), which gave him a 1-2 lead, but sadly Alain could not take advantage of Guy’s 10+ PR, so that the PR point went to Guy (2-2). All to play for in M3 then. Guy, under threat of an ignominious defeat, was able to sufficiently lift his level of play to take one point with a fine PR of 8,33 (3-2) and although he lost M3 (3-3) came out the winner with a better overall PR (OPR). A narrow escape for Guy and a missed opportunity for Alain, whose play was just too erratic to topple the 2022 Belgian Individual Champion (BIC).
The second Level 5 duel was played on 9 June between Itzhak Solsky and Maurits Pino. In the comfortable surroundings of Itzhak’s flat in Uccle, Itzhak made sure he did not fall into the same trap and left no doubt as to his intentions. He won M1 with an excellent 3,73 PR (enough to beat Maurits’ good 7,69 PR) and a match win: 2-0. Maurits, however, had an easy ride in M2 which he won 7-0, but just like Alain, he could not take advantage of Itzhak’s unexpected 10+ PR: 3-1. In M3 Itzhak cruised to a 7-3 victory, which together with a better PR, secured a comfortable win: 5-1.
These two duels indicate that the stronger player toys with fire if he plays below par. The format is sufficiently volatile to give the underdog an outside chance to win if the favourite comes up with a slapdash performance.
Itzhak and Guy now progress to Level 4 where they will meet Johan Segers and Bert Van Kerckhove respectively.
You can find the updated Results and Leaderboard via the RBL 2023 links in the menu.
Brugge: alternatingly on Thursday or Friday evening, Sports bar Extra Time, Nijverheidsstraat 113, 8310 Assebroek. Contact: Line Vandamme, linevandamme@gmail.com
Brussels: every Wednesday evening at 18h15, at The Black Beard — La Barbe Noire, Lakensestraat 166 Rue de Laeken, Brussels 1000
Ghent: every Tuesday evening, at 19h, at Union-Sandeman, Kantienberg 5, 9000 Gent
Leuven Monthly, Sunday, June 18, at 12h45, at Squash Club De Vaart, Kolonel Begaultlaan 15, 3012 Wilsele
On April 22nd the Gent Open XVI attracted 25 players over 3 categories: 8 masters, 8 intermediates and 9 beginners battled it out for 7 rounds of 7 point matches at the premises of K.A. Union Sandeman. In the masters, last man standing after 7 rounds was Michel Lamote, who wins back-to-back editions of this tournament!
Paulus Van Rooijen and Bert Van Kerckhove share 2nd prize. Jasper Watertor, organizer of the Rotterdam tournaments, wins the intermediates on resistance points and shares prize money with Robin Bilderbeek and Eric De Bouter. Johan Segers wins the beginners division and receives a backgammon book to up his level of play even more! Maybe next time he can compete in a higher category…
Everything went fluently and according to the schedule. A big thank you to Nick De Ruyck for the catering, and to Magda, Roos & Bob for tending the bar. A special thank you to bgfed.be for the financial support and to Toon Van Herreweghen for the tournament software.
The maiden Red Beaver League season 2022-2023 has come to an end. First and foremost: thank you to all fifteen participants for playing all twenty-three duels in true sportsmanship spirit and within the set time frame.
Geert Van der Stricht was the last man standing, becoming BGFed.be 2023 Ultimate Backgammon Champion. Player of the year has to be Robin Bilderbeek, who promoted from Level 5 to Level 2. Itzhak Solsky prevailed in the RBL Qualifiers, winning all his duels in masterly fashion with a below-5 overall PR of 4,80 over twelve matches. A detailed report is to be found in the RBL 2022-2023 Wrap-Up document.
BGFed.be’s Red Beaver League: Starting grids Seasons 2022-2023 and 2023-2024
All duels (in RBL and RBL Q) were transcribed and overseen by a Transcriber/Referee, making every duel effectively a RBL threesome. A special thanks therefore to Guy Van Middelem, Nick De Ruyck, Geert Van der Stricht and Robin Bilderbeek for transcribing a big chunk of duels and helping make this start-up season a success.
RBL wishes everyone an exciting and rewarding 2023-2024 season. The schedule will be released in the upcoming RBL 203-2024 Kick-Off announcement.
Brugge: alternatingly on Thursday or Friday evening, Sports bar Extra Time, Nijverheidsstraat 113, 8310 Assebroek. Contact: Line Vandamme, linevandamme@gmail.com
Brussels: every Wednesday evening at 18h15, at The Black Beard — La Barbe Noire, Lakensestraat 166 Rue de Laeken, Brussels 1000
Ghent: every Tuesday evening, at 19h, at Union-Sandeman, Kantienberg 5, 9000 Gent
Leuven Monthly, Sunday, May 21, at 12h45, at Squash Club De Vaart, Kolonel Begaultlaan 15, 3012 Wilsele
Brugge: alternatingly on Thursday or Friday evening, Sports bar Extra Time, Nijverheidsstraat 113, 8310 Assebroek. Contact: Line Vandamme, linevandamme@gmail.com
Brussels: every Wednesday evening at 18h15, at The Black Beard — La Barbe Noire, Lakensestraat 166 Rue de Laeken, Brussels 1000
Ghent: every Tuesday evening, at 19h, at Union-Sandeman, Kantienberg 5, 9000 Gent
Leuven Monthly, Sunday, April 16, at 12h45, at Squash Club De Vaart, Kolonel Begaultlaan 15, 3012 Wilsele
After the first four matches of the Red Beaver League Final, Geert was leading 6-2. This meant he only needed two points out of the remaining three matches to become the first Winner of the RBL.
Marc Van Damme (l) versus Geert Van der Stricht (r) during the final of the Red Beaver League 2022-2023, played on Tuesday, March 28, 2023, in the Sandeman (Ghent).
It was therefore imperative for his opponent Marc to not only win M5, but to do so with a better PR. Marc looked well underway to achieving this, but an avoidable checker-play mistake under extreme time pressure had grave consequences. Marc ended up winning M5, but his PR was just 0,016 too high to earn the PR point: 5,01 v 4,85. The score was now 7-3, which meant Geert only needed one more point out of two matches to take the coveted RBL title.
Geert did not falter. Realizing this was the match that mattered, he produced his best PR of the duel (2,45) and although this was not enough to take the PR point (Marc played PR 2,17), he won M6 quite easily with 7-2, making him the Winner of the first edition of the RBL and 2023 BGFed.be UBC Champion: 8-4.
Although M7 was of no importance, Geert and Marc agreed to play it anyway, bringing the final score of the duel to 9-5.
The Red Beaver League cup, now in possession of BGFed.be UBC Champion Geert Van der Stricht. The cup will be passed on to the winner of the next edition. A player who can win the title three times, can keep the cup.
True, Geert was lucky to win five of the seven matches, but his OPR (= Overall PR) of 4,34 shows that he thoroughly deserves this title. Congratulations! Marc, on the other hand, only produced his A-game when the calf was drowned and will regret not having managed his time better and having lost four valuable points with 5+ PR’s in Matches 1, 2, 3 and 5. Notwithstanding all this, he produced a noteworthy PR of 4,11, something he can find some solace in.
As Champion, Geert can now rest on his laurels till the 2023-2024 edition of the Red Beaver League is completed. He will then defend his title against the Challenger, i.e. the winner of RBL 2024.
Please find the updated Results and Leaderboard via the link in the menu.
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