How to run a club tournament from your phone

Most club tournaments are still run on paper, or on a single laptop belonging to the one person who knows the pairing software. It works, right up until that person is ill.

Here is how the same evening runs on ChessConnect.

Before the night

1. Create the event. From your club page, add an event with a date, a start time and a venue. The address is what puts it on the map, so players searching your city can find it without knowing your club exists.

2. Choose the format. Swiss for an open field, round robin for a small, fixed group. Set the number of rounds and the time control.

3. Let people sign up. Players register through the event page. You can see the field growing rather than counting heads at the door.

On the night

Close registration and pair round one. Pairings are generated for you. If someone shows up late or drops out, adjust the field and re-pair — no formula to re-enter, nothing to recalculate by hand.

Report results as they finish. Each board's result goes in as the game ends. Standings update immediately, so nobody has to wait at the end while someone adds up scores.

Pair the next round. When the last result of the round is in, the next pairing is one tap away.

After the last round

Final standings are published on the event page. Players can look them up later from their phone, which — if your club currently posts results to a mailing list — is the single biggest quality-of-life change here.

Results also feed each player's profile, so the game they won against a much higher-rated opponent stops being a story only they remember.

A few things worth knowing

• Multiple admins. Pro clubs can share organizer duties, so the tournament doesn't depend on one person's phone battery.
• Recurring events. A weekly blitz night is created once, not fifty-two times.
• Walk-ins. You can add a player after registration closes; the pairings absorb them.

Running something this weekend? Get the app and set the event up tonight — it takes about five minutes.