New Team Inquiry About Tournaments In General

[FHSACADEMICTEAM]

Hello, we are a relatively new QB team and we we're just wondering how registration for tournaments usually works and basically an introduction to how it works in general lol(For next year). Also, we we're wondering how overnight tournaments work and whether there are any big ones worth noting (We are in the DC area), and whether overnight tournaments are just competitions that last for multiple days or just a large tournament that's far away.

[AKKOLADE]

Hello, we are a relatively new QB team and we we're just wondering how registration for tournaments usually works and basically an introduction to how it works in general lol(For next year). Also, we we're wondering how overnight tournaments work and whether there are any big ones worth noting (We are in the DC area), and whether overnight tournaments are just competitions that last for multiple days or just a large tournament that's far away.

User was reminded to enable a signature. -Mgmt

Hi,

Typically, to register for a tournament, you just need to email a tournament director. If the host requires an actual form filled out, either online or on paper, they usually indicate that in their announcement post or invitation letter.

As for overnight tournaments, there really aren't very many outside of nationals that are true overnight tournaments (by which I assume you mean tournaments that spread over multiple days). The ones that do exist tend to be "warm ups" for national tournaments, and are pretty rare.

"Overnight tournaments" can also be used to describe tournaments where you need to stay in a hotel; obviously, your ability to attend these are dictated by your own finances, resources and scheduling.

[UlyssesInvictus]

If you go to the board index, choose "National and Regional Comparisons and Discussions" and then choose "DC Metro Comparisons and Discussion," there is usually a stickied date claim thread that lists tournaments for the upcoming year. It doesn't look the 2014-2015 thread has been created yet (someone should get on that I guess...), but you can look at the 2013-2014 thread to get an idea of when and where tournaments will generally happen. Which high school is FHS? Depending on where you are, you can probably contact one of the local QB strongholds if you'd like to scrimmage or get more tailored information. If you mean actual DC, you can contact GDS, if VA-suburbs then TJ, if MD suburbs then RM. Any of these schools would love to have you attend tournaments they host.

Like Fred says, the most important overnight tournaments are the two springtime national events. There are a sprinkling of tournaments that have traditionally drawn strong teams due to the strength of their sets, like HFT, Prison Bowl, or Texas Invitational, that might require hotel stays for those far-travelling teams but are not "required" and would still be structured like normal (i.e. the vast majority) tournaments: a single Saturday afternoon. No modern tournament has more than two days of competition.

[RexSueciae]

If you're looking to take a day trip for a one-day tournament, it might be worth noting that Maggie Walker Governor's School hosts their housewritten tournament GSAC (Governor's School Academic Competition) each year around the first or second Saturday of December. We're in Richmond, Virginia, and it shouldn't be too far away for a DC-area school. (For the sake of full disclosure, I am soon to be an alumnus of Maggie Walker. The fact that I'm promoting a tournament that I once wrote for shouldn't be surprising.)

If you're looking for a place to find tournaments to attend, camp out in the Regular Season Tournament Announcements subforum. People post announcements when they're hosting a tournament, and probably quite a few will be in your general area (the Mid-Atlantic has a pretty active quizbowl circuit). Once someone makes an announcement, follow the directions in their initial post to register, whether through email or filling out an online form. Since you're relatively new, I'd suggest looking for a novice tournament or one run on an NAQT A-set (i.e. any tournament that states its question set is IS-124A or something along that format) to start off, although transitioning to regular-difficulty events is also important (there's a pretty good difficulty guide by Ted Gan that lists popular question sets by difficulty, so you'll have some idea what you're in for).

Typically, entrance fees for tournaments are around $40-$70 per team, depending on the tournament, and there are usually discounts for things like loaning the use of a working buzzer system, providing someone to help read questions or scorekeep, or travelling great distances to attend. You're generally expected to pay when you arrive at the tournament.

There aren't any overnight tournaments to speak of other than the PACE NSC, the NAQT HSNCT, and possibly the National History Bowl, and all of them require fulfilling some eligibility requirement in order to attend (usually, something along the lines of finishing in the top X% of a tournament using an accredited question set).

[FHSACADEMICTEAM]

Thanks all! We are located in Northern Virginia actually and take part in our state affiliated quizbowl activities. I was also wondering whether there were any LARGE tournaments that we could go to.

[UlyssesInvictus]

Oh, ok, so I'm going to guess you're Fairfax High School based on the Northern Virginia part (my home is actually in Fairfax and I drive by fairly regularly so...). You should definitely scrimmage with TJ during the school year, or maybe attend summer practices if we can ever figure those out. (Please ignore this rambling if you're not Fairfax, but if you are, I really want to invite you guys into the circuit seeing as how close you are!)

I don't know what your threshold for "large" tournaments is, but regular season DC Metro tournaments (and as Vasa says, Richmond/Charlottesville tournaments, which are certainly in travelling distance), can expect from ~20-30 teams attending, which is fairly good and expected for the area. This of course pales in comparison to NAQT's HSNCT, which draws ~200 teams, and even PACE's NSC, which draws 60+, but those are only once a year (as is VHSL, which you seem to be alluding to, and which, I'd note, offers you a paltry guaranteed 4 or 5 games compared to 10+ you should expect from standard tournaments).

[Panayot Hitov]

In the DC area, Centennial's tournament on the first sunday in December is the "LARGE"est tournament

[FHSACADEMICTEAM]

Were actually Freedom High School in Loudoun, so still not too far away!

[RexSueciae]

Going off what I can remember about quizbowl in this state, Virginia Commonwealth University annually hosts at least four very well-attended high school tournaments (Fall, Winter, Spring, and Season Finale); this year, I believe, they were all held at New Kent High School. Virginia Tech and the University of Virginia both also frequently host high school level tournaments. All of these generally draw somewhere around 20 teams.

Centennial High School (in Maryland) hosts one of the largest tournaments in the Mid-Atlantic, run on an NAQT A-set and split into JV/Novice and Varsity divisions. Their most recent one had 42 novice teams and 30 varsity teams attending, which is pretty impressive.

But yeah, shop around, browse the forums. Most tournaments keep a running list of which teams have entered the field, so you should be able to judge a tournament's size before attending.

[AKKOLADE]

This link to the database should be useful to you to see where tournaments were hosted relatively nearby.

Of course, if you're willing to make the trip, we'd love to have you at a tournament at the University of Kentucky. Our Fall championship was 48 teams, and there was no reason our Spring one wouldn't have rivaled that until the school made us move to a Sunday.