PartyGammon Millions Results

Backgammon history was made last week with the successful debut of the Party Gammon Millions tournament at the Atlantis Hotel and Resort on Paradise Island. Advertised as the first million dollar backgammon tournament, the event surpassed all expectations with 120 participants and a total prize pool of over $1.2 million dollars.

When the idea of a million-dollar backgammon event was floated over a year ago, many in the backgammon world were skeptical. Other such events had been rumored in the past, only to fall apart because of a lack of funding or organization, or both. Last summer, however, Party Poker announced that it would provide the funding, and opened a new web site, Party Gammon, which began running online qualifiers for the event in August. As the number of qualifiers mounted, the pros began to ante up their $10,000 entry fees, and by December over 90 players had either paid the full entry fee or qualified for the tournament. The final total of discrete entrants reached 120, including nine former world champions and 25 of the current 'Giant 32' of backgammon (as compiled every other year by Yamin Yamin of Chicago).

(As a historical note and a basis for comparison, the previous record prize fund for the main event of a backgammon tournament was $310,000, set at the Monte Carlo World Championship all the way back in 1979, at the peak of the backgammon craze of the 1970s.)

On Sunday night, January 21, the event was launched with a cocktail party and Calcutta auction on the Royal Deck, overlooking the Atlantis Marina and Lagoon. Interest in the auction was muted; having spent $10,000 apiece on their entry fees, the players seemed to have little energy left for bidding in the auction. A total of only a little over $20,000 was raised on the 28 teams in the auction field, compared to the $1.2 million in the prize fund. In a more normal tournament with a much smaller entry fee, the auction pool and prize pool might be roughly comparable.

With opening festivities out of the way, the tournament began on Monday at 1:30 pm. With a field of 120 and a draw of 128, there were 8 slots available for rebuys at $8,500 apiece. Early losers quickly snapped up the available rebuys, and the tournament soon proceeded with a full field.

For the first time, matches were timed with the Bronstein chess clock. The Bronstein clock has been used in chess competitions for some time, but this was the first time it had been tried in a backgammon tournament. Invented by the chess grandmaster David Bronstein, the idea of the clock is that each player receives 15 seconds per move, plus a reserve of 2.5 minutes per point of match length. Since first-round matches were to 15 points, each player had a 37.5 minute reserve. If you roll and make your move in less than 15 seconds, no time is subtracted from your reserve; if you take more than 15 seconds, your reserve time begins to run. (Note that making your move quickly doesn't add any time to your reserve.) If your reserve time is exhausted, you lose.

The clocks were extremely successful. No matches were actually decided by time-forfeit, but all games moved at a good pace and each round was completed on time. Hopefully other directors will be moved to invest in the clocks as well in future tournaments.

Geographically, the entries were concentrated in just a few countries. The U.S.A. had the most entrants with 43. Then followed Denmark with 15 and Germany with 14. Brazil and the U.K. had 7 apiece, while France had 6. The other 28 entrants were scattered among 20 other countries.

One question on everyone's mind in the early going was "How would the internet qualifiers do?" There were about 35 qualifiers (no one seemed to know an exact count), most of whom had qualified through tournaments with 1-point and 3-point matches. Some of these proved to be complete beginners with little chance, but others were formidable players indeed. In fact, the two finalists were both internet qualifiers! (Each, however, were players of substantial experience in European events.)


Final standings in the Main Event were as follows:

1 Andreas Martens (Germany) $600,400
2 Lasse Madsen (Denmark) $144,096
SF Nack Ballard (USA)
SF Ralf Jonas (Germany)
QF Alex Lehmann (USA)
QF Arkadiy Tsinis (USA)
QF Sander Lylloff (Denmark)
QF Henrik Veje (Denmark)

In the Consolation, the following players cashed:

1 Lars Trabolt (Denmark) $120,000
2 Torsten Haase (Germany) $ 60,000
SF Kent Goulding (USA)
SF Yaniv Shimony (Israel)

In our next few columns, we'll take a look at some interesting problems from the tournament.

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