commentary from Sherrie Saint John... Round 9 One of the first challenge slips to come in this round was ".com" and this had the word judges in stiches. The Internet has so infiltrated our lives, that we can't even see com without thinking .com. The play, dot or not, is unacceptable. (OSW has COMS.) Table 1 pits two red-shirted Brits against one another. Russell Byers (GBR) 6-2 vies against David Acton (GBR) 7-1. Table 2 has Nyman (GBR) 7-1 vs. Jeff Grant (NZ) 6-2. Wapnick (CAN), who fell last round to Nyman (GBR), is now 7-1. Howard Turkenkopf has almost recovered from yesterday's ink stains. As master of the Big Board, he basks in the ongoing high of Sharpie marker fumes. Last night, as he got into a cab, the driver asked him if his hand was bleeding! It was a pretty red mess! For the most part, the ambience in the room is gentle and calm. The loud, insinuatingly funny CHALLENGES hollered in most tournaments are noticeably absent here. Perhaps the profusion of runners makes this more possible. Arms gently sway in the air, patiently waiting to be noticed. The NSA, ever ready to respond to changing circumstances, designed a runners how-to list. I will type it in to fill in these slow moments. Feel free to pass on reading it if your eyes glaze over. World Scrabble Championship Runner Guidelines Uniformity and compliance with tournament rules are extremly important. Please take a few moments to read the following guidelines: 1. Stand silently on the perimeter of the playing area actively looking for players who have challenges. Don't wait for the players to call out. 2. When you see a player who wishes to challenge, approach the table. 3. The players will give you a challenge slip. [bold] It is your most important job to verify that the challenge slip is filled out correctly and is legible. [end bold] Each challenge slip must have the table number and the word(s) being challenged. 4. Verify that the table number is correct. 5. Spell the challenged word(s) aloud to the players. Do [bold]not [not bold] pronounce the word(s). 6. Verify that the challenged word(s) is on the board exactly as written. Watch out for transposed letters! If the challenged word(s) is not on the board, give the slip back to the players and say, "There is a discrepancy." 7. Do not leave the table until the challenge slip is correct. 8. Immediately bring the challenge slip to the word judges. 9. If all the judges are busy, relax and wait your turn. Accuracy is far more important than speed. 10. The judge will mark either the ACCEPTABLE or NOT ACCEPTABLE box and initial the slip. Make sure you understand the decision before leaving the judges' table. 11. Bring the slip back to the players and show it to them. If necessary, say "Acceptable" or "Not Acceptable," but nothing else. 12. Do not leave the used slip at the table. Put it into the box at the judges' table. 13. Either player may request a second opinion. If so, mark the SECOND OPINION box on the challenge slip. [bold]This is very important. [not bold] 14. If the player requesting a second opinion wants to rewrite the word(s), (s)he may do so. If the word(s) is rewritten on a new challenge slip, mark the SECOND OPINION box on the challenge slip. [bold] This is very important. [not bold] 15. Bring the second opinion request to the word judge pair that did not adjudicate the original challenge. When you hand the slip to the judge, say, "Second Opinion." 16. Bring the results of the second ruling back to the players the same way as the first ruling. 17. If the players are still not satisfied, call the Director immediately. 18. Do not hesitate to call the Director if there is any uncertainty. In particular, any rules question must be referred to the Director, not the word judges. 19. The word judges are usually extremely busy. Please understand that they never intend to be rude. Your work is very important. Thank you! (This was written by word judge Rich Baker.) Robin Pollock Daniel (CAN) continues to have wretched tile luck. She's had ONE out of 24 Es in the past two games. She just lost by 292 and is literally lying on my shoulder crying as I type. Not really crying. She did try to call her husband for consolation, but he is out, probably doing some swank museum while she cries into my shoulder. Poor thing. And, she can't eat. She is nauseous (she had to spell that for me). She has a little squirrel's nest of fruit by me at the press table that she nibbles at. It is presently hard to eat while crying, but she will work it out. He opened with GNARLED. She had 6 consonants and a vowel. she managed WALLET, through the E in his play. He played a phoney!!! .com. Now we know. At a hot spot next to the W, of course she had no E or O. She could go on. As a matter of fact, she is..... She is now telling Joel Wapnick (CAN) her tale of woe. He is now 8-1 having defeated David Webb (GBR). Joel says he is only playing the British, and Robin says she is playing Americans. Joel says Mark Nyman is better than the rest, one of the very best. John Luebkemann (USA) has had 6 blanks in 9 games, 0 this am. He has managed to eke out wins against Nyman and Edley. His gorgeous OSW was OzAENAS#. Lynne Butler (NZ) and Jeff Grant (NZ) are visiting with me right now. Lynne has 5 wins and Jeff 6. Jeff is noticing that some players are not as well versed in the larger words not from their main dictionary. THey might know the 3s, but not all of the others ones. Makes sense. Jeff lost by 47 to Nyman (GBR) last game. Lynne, who played Andrew Fisher (GBR) had a win by 75 points. So, clearly the Brits are not invincible. Kendall Boyd(NZ) just played John Holgate (AUS) and he lost by more than 100 points. He isn't as happy as he'd like. Michael Sigley (NZ), the one Lynne calls the handsomest member of the NZ team (I agree), played Shafique Thobani (KEN). Michael was victorious. Michael played ANTITANk$ for 62 or so. Rita took the challenge, it was good! :) I later ran into Shafique and he said he was looking for a missile to direct at Michael. Rita says she took a challenge ROJAS and STEAKED, both words on the challenge slip... So there must have been a bad word on the board, because one of the words was bad. Another word, ROAN, was challenged twice. It is good in both dictionaries. Joel just won big against Ron Tiekert (USA). He played three bingos in a row: LOSABLE, HOMEMAdE, and LIFEBOAT.Then he followed these with 66 point J play: JEHU. Ron isn't happy. To be fair, he played PeNNIED, FAIREST, and that was it for his big plays. The score 574-354. Oh, and for those keeping track, there is a QI on this board. We need SOWPODS. I HATE eating the Q. :) Steve Gruzd (ZAF) played Sammy Okosagah (NIG) and Steve got crunched. Sammy started with GaLEATE and Steve replied with TABANIDS, but he missed INDABAS, which is especialy annoying because it is a Zulu word that he should know. It is a meeting of chieftans. Sammy also got OEILLADE with all the vowels in the right place. HANTLES, EMPORIUm, and SUQ just to kill the board at the end and give Steve absolutely no chance. Score 528-303. Needless to say, Steve is demoralized. But in the cosmic sense of things, he will come back. Rita Norr says that I should note that he is a GOOD dancer. How she knows that.... I'll never know...... Actually, they had a dance together at the last World Championships in London at the ball. He is cute, I can imagine why she chose him for her partner that dance! :) Joe Edley (USA) played Jakkrit Klaphajone (THI) last game. The game was reasonably close, but then Joe played three bingos in a row. When I asked him who won, he told me that if I EVER play three bingos in a row and I DON'T win, to call him. He promises that I will have made some major addition mistakes! He is 2 wins out of 2 games today and in smiling mode. Felt blew his game against Allan Saldanha (GBR) by "not playing two OSPD words." We were about to go into the next round, so there was no time for him to elaborate. Either that is a good thing or a bad thing..... I'll let you decide!