Posts:
751
Registered:
Mar 1, 2002
From:
My Own Lil World Mostly
Age:
43
WPPF Las Vegas Tournament Announcement
Posted:
Aug 24, 2004, 2:30 AM
This article was originally written by Tom Braunlich. Up2ng/Partica edited the article. Here goes:
2004 World PENTE® Championship Won by Dmitri King
The first official World Pente Championship since 1983 took place August 7-8, 2004, in Las Vegas, Nevada. The event, organized by the WPPF under sanction by Pente owner Hasbro, and supported by Winning Moves (manufacturer of Pente), was deservedly won by Dmitri King, of Maryland.
Preliminary tournaments on Saturday qualified eight finalists for Sunday¹s playoff matches (see playoff brackets diagram). King defeated Tom Braunlich 3-1, Scott Snow 4-3, and Bob Bugnone 3-1 to win the event. The playoff matches were for two games with 20 minutes per player per game. If tied, sets of playoff games at a fast time control of 6 minutes for White (the first player) and 8 for Black were used. If there were still a tie after three sets, a final one-game match would be played also at 6/8.
Perhaps the key match of the event was the semifinal match: King vs. Scott Snow (Snut). Although the top-seeded King created legitimate chances to win each time he played as player 2, the match remained very close with the first player winning the first four hard-fought games. Then in Game 5 Scott, with White, perhaps made a mistake by repeating the opening of Game 3 for 15 moves. He had won Game 3, but Dmitri had enjoyed a dangerous initiative at one point in that game. Scott had defended well and won. But now in Game 5 Dmitri found the complicated breakthrough that had eluded him in Game 3, which reached the edge of the board, and won the game. With White in Game 6 Dmitri seemed in the driver¹s seat. But Scott came back to win Game 6 with Black himself! Scott then won the coin flip to move first with White in the final game. This time he varied the opening, but on move 5 he made a slight error in remembering the move sequence of his home analysis. The inaccuracy allowed Dmitri to seize the initiative by playing a capture to open a split three a few moves later. He then played precisely to win the final game. Dmitri went on to win another very sharp match with Bob Bugnone to take the championship and win $315 plus the champion's trophy
A few last minute cancellations thinned the field to 14 entrants. Although this was slightly fewer than expected, everyone who attended came excited to play and there was no shortage of high quality matches. This successful tournament, the WPPF's first major event, serves as a good starting point and improvements are already in the works for even bigger and better events to come. It is expected that the turnout for the 2005 main event will at least double this year's numbers, and should be one that no Pente fans will want to miss. Playing Pente face-to-face is the purest form of competition, and remains the true test of one's skill at the game. Those of you who have played only online Pente really need to give OTB (over the board) Pente tournaments a try!
Former World Champion Rollie Tesh has expressed some interest in playing in the 2005 event. Two other players represented the "old timers" (players who were active during the Pente heydays in the early 1980s) in Las Vegas: Tom Braunlich and Peter Hudson. Both did well in the preliminary matches and advanced to the quarterfinal round.
The planned WPPF annual players meeting was truncated because not enough officers were present to make a quorum. However, plans for improving the online Pente "community" by increasing cooperation between the separate Pente websites were proposed and will be pursued. WPPF supporters are becoming more involved, and through their efforts, recreational and competitive Pente continue to have a bright future.
Tom Braunlich, author of the Pente strategy books, volunteered to write and edit a monthly newsletter for www.playpente.com , format to be determined. In the first few articles, he will be providing analysis for many of the key interesting games from the 2004 Championship tournament. Other games will eventually be posted to the databases.
The WPPF would like to thank Winning Moves games for their support of donated games and coupons for the participants and the banner that was provided, and also Tom Braunlich for the beautiful trophies he so graciously donated.
The WPPF would also like to thank everyone who attended this event: Name / Moniker Eric / mickeyss Rex / homebrew Scott Snow / snut Dmitri King / dmitriking Patricia Fisher / partica Dean S. / up2ng Gaylan / Galeenster ? / Iamsam Tom Braunlich / tbraunlich Peter Hudson / phudson Laurie / Indriel Bodo Konze / aaalpha Bob Bugnone / dufus-bugnone Mike Bugnone / mike321
Thank you all very much and hope to see you all next year!
And Benjstev, thanks for all of your support, you Rock!
-WPPF
Message was edited by: partica at Aug 23, 2004 8:31 PM
Re: WPPF Las Vegas Tournament Announcement
Posted:
Jul 24, 2017, 11:43 AM
No, the WPPF no longer exists; it was mostly propelled by the efforts of a single individual. There haven't been IRL tournaments on a national draw scale in the US since Vegas in '04. There have been some European tournaments held since then, though, and some smaller more local draw US tourneys.
Retired from TB Pente, but still playing live games & exploring variants like D, poof and boat
