Organising A 9 Ball Tournament

9 ball

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
I am going to be organising a 9 ball tournament for my local room owner who I am friendly with, I know exactly which way I want to run the tournament the only thing I need help with is the racks needed to win because I have time constraint issues because the tournament needs to start no later than 11.30 am & finish bang on 6 pm so that the room owner doesn't lose table time.

He is giving me the tables to run the tournament so I don't want to have it run too long, btw it's a 16 man single elimination running on 8 tables.
 
A 16 man single elimination tournament with 8 tables available will never be waiting on an open table, and you've got roughly 6 hours to play 4 tiers of matches. Races to 9 should be safe; worst case you end up with one table (finals) going long and adjust from there. All planning goes out the window though if you get slow play.

I might also be completely wrong.
 
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I am going to be organising a 9 ball tournament for my local room owner who I am friendly with, I know exactly which way I want to run the tournament the only thing I need help with is the racks needed to win because I have time constraint issues because the tournament needs to start no later than 11.30 am & finish bang on 6 pm so that the room owner doesn't lose table time.

He is giving me the tables to run the tournament so I don't want to have it run too long, btw it's a 16 man single elimination running on 8 tables.

what is the race 9-ball and what game ? - - - I run a few tourneys and may have a suggestion
 
9 may be a bit long unless they are all good players and no-one takes 2 minutes a shot.

I'd stick to 7 or 6.

Single elim takes a lot less time as well as having tables for every match so you should be done at 6 even with slower sets that go hill hill.
 
A rack of 9 ball, for intermediate player took 5-7 minutes, do your math.

A race to 7 is way to go. Final race to 9.
 
When you're from our side of the pond its organising.

Say each game takes an average of 5 minutes and the first round is a race to 6. Lets say the average number of games per match in the first round is 10 that's 50 minutes for the first round, but we can call it an hour just to keep it simple.

Second round will be the same, race to 6 average of 5 mins a game, but this time the games are closer and the average number of games per match is 11 (doubtful I know, but just to be safe). That's 55 minutes/ and hour again. Now you're up to 1330hrs.

4 players left, 2 matches so its time to bump it to a race to 9. Average time per game is increasing due to all the sweating that's going on; its now 7 minutes per game and avg number of games is 15. The competition is fierce at this point and hard to seperate the field so matches become tight. That's 1hour and 45mins to complete the semi final. This brings you to 1515hrs.

Show time now and the 2 best guys are ready to joust with their cues. The final is a race to 11, average time per game is still 7 minutes because these 2 guys don't mess around, no sir. Uh oh, its gone hill hill so that's 21 games @ 7 minutes. 2hrs and 27minutes which brings you upto 1742hrs. Just enough time to shake hands and handout the winnings.

I didn't put much thought into it, and my math is probably off, way off but I think if you followed this you'd be done for 6pm easily.
 
I agree

with the poster that said a race to 7, with the final a race to 9. Being 8 foot tables, they might see more safeties than a 7 foot table would, and games with a safety battle in them can take 12-15 minutes. You also have to allow for racking time.
 
6 1/2 hours and 4 tiers. So that averages out to 97 minutes per match. We can round it down to 90 minutes, and keep 30 minutes as cushion. If I had time constraints, then I would write the start time of the matches so I'll know which open matches will need to be put on a shot clock.
 
I am going to be organising a 9 ball tournament for my local room owner who I am friendly with, I know exactly which way I want to run the tournament the only thing I need help with is the racks needed to win because I have time constraint issues because the tournament needs to start no later than 11.30 am & finish bang on 6 pm so that the room owner doesn't lose table time.

He is giving me the tables to run the tournament so I don't want to have it run too long, btw it's a 16 man single elimination running on 8 tables.

My suggestion is to first go to http://www.budtour.com download and purchase the software to your laptop, then let the fun begin.

Second if it were me I'd start with a Double Elimination Tournament Race to 5 on the Winners Side, Race to 3 on the Losers Side. Single Race to 7 in the Finals or, if want to the Losers Side Winner has to Beat the Winners Side Person the First Set Race to 5, then Re - Flip or Lag for the Break and Play 1 Game Sudden Death for the Match should they win the First Set of the Finals.

I run my local events this way and they have been a total success. Experiment with the races till you find out what will work best for you. The software is fantastic and allows you to individually time each match, who ever is ahead after the time warning wins, you can keep your event on track and finish on time.

Let me know if, I can be any assistance.

Black Cat :cool:
 
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