Good Day, Good Time, Good Fun

A SRC / Medalist Launch Tournament Roundup - Feb 11, 2006

What do you get when you put a plain old dart board and a loud, glittering arcade machine together? A whole load of fun and excitement and at the same time, receive tips and rub shoulders with the best Asian darter in the world championship leagues.

That was what 70 people found out last Saturday at the Singapore Recreation Club.
It played host to the launch of the first Medalist Soft-Tip Dart Tournament on Feb 11 and gave a warm welcome to the return of Paul Lim, a Singaporean who has won many dart championships and international dart tournaments throughout Europe and the US.

What’s so different about soft tip dart?
Soft – tip darts are played using plastic tips instead of metal ones, thus they are lighter and safer for kids. The game is played on modified dart-boards which are installed on an electronic machine that also counts and shows you your score on a pretty, full-color LCD screen. Add to that a variety of interesting games, a speaker sound system and graphics that cheer you on as you play and you have a whole team behind you all the way!

Coming back to the tournament, a few early birds came in to test out the machines and did some warm ups before the start. Mr. John Tan, chairman of the SRC Games Control Board opened the event with a speech about how he and his wife were playing on the soft-tip dart machine last night. It was the first time that his wife ever played dart even though she often accompanied him to many local dart leagues and sports bar. And it was also the first time she was still talking excitedly about the game and the machine during the ride home. And that is precisely what Medalist hopes to achieve: to encourage new players to pick up the sport by making it more fun.

Mr. John Tan then introduced our very own Mr. Paul Lim, who has returned to Singapore from the US just to participate in this opening tournament. Mr. Lim expressed he had missed many of the local food and was excited to share his passion and tips with all the local darters.

The game soon got underway with a round robin random doubles match. The purpose of the round was to give time to players to familiarize themselves with the game format and allow them to accumulate their average ratings. This was interesting because the pairing was done randomly without regard to their dart expertise, so players get a chance to play with someone else whom they may not have played with before.

Initially players were not used to the plastic tips and thought it will be expensive to replace them when broken. However Mr. Paul Lim reassured them that the cost of the tip is almost nothing, at almost one cent a piece, it is even cheaper than a piece of tissue paper.

Even though many players had finished all their round-robin matches, they continued playing and having fun. By late noon, after the scores were tallied and the players rating calculated, they were split into two groups – the high flights (i.e. better players) and the low flights. Again, the pairing was randomly assigned so that each pair’s total rating was about the same as the next pair in each flight. This allows for a fairer play between each pair and matches are more competitive as they are played between equally experienced opponents. The second round continued with a double knock-out system.

Mr Paul Lim then ran a dart workshop to players who dropped out of the matches early. He freely dispense game tips advice to all those who gathered around him to watch him throw darts with deadly accuracy. Paul also demonstrated some interesting new fun games that he developed for the machine, including one called “Out-on-a-Lim” and “Air Attack”. The graphics on the machine made the game a whole lot more fun. Even the kids couldn’t stop playing on a machine setup in the back until the organizers had to pack up and go home.

Paul Lim with the winners of the Low Flight
From left : Mohd Haris, Paul Lim, Andy Tan

Finally, the Final of the low flight was played between Ron Tan / K. Arumugum and Andy Tan / Mohd Haris. It was a close fight as the game drew into the third game of 501 after each pair won one game each. However, the new pair of Andy Tan / Mohd Haris pulled through in the end and won the final game.

As Mohd Haris (left picture in red t-shirt), winner of the low flight, remarked: “I have been playing darts since 1989 and this is the first time in my entire life that I have won big in a dart tournament”. And that is how precisely how Medalist hopes to spread the joy of the game with all its players. With the Medalist parity rating system format, each and every individual player stands a chance to win in a tournament.

The Final of the high flight was even more nail biting. As the pair Ricky Chua/R. Rajoo had clawed to the top of the Loser’s Pool to reach the finals, they had to beat the Winner’s Pool pair of Alexis Lim / James Shing, who had so far never lost any match, two matches to win. In the first leg of 501, R.Rajoo contributed a strong 93 average to win the first leg and followed it up with a strong 3.33 average on the 2nd leg of Cricket to win the first match. Since both teams will now have lost only once, thus neither team have been eliminated and both teams compete again, the winner being the winner of the whole tournament.

And to the loud cheers of the crowd, the underdogs Ricky Chua/ R.Rajoo won the first leg with a strong combined average of 84 and 67 against Alexis Lim/James Shing score of 97.1 and 59. In the next leg, Ricky Chua and R.Rajoo played with a consistently strong game with both scoring 2.6 average on cricket to win the Finals and the prize money of $600! And everyone was happy and cheered the loudest because that also means they will finally get to eat dinner and collect the prizes!

Paul Lim with the finalist of the High Flight.

The night ended with a buffet dinner under the stars on the Padang and a prize presentation. The Highest Rating obtained in the first round was by CC Poh and Randy M. got a surprised prize award for scoring a 170 checkout. The final prize presentation ended just as the River Hong-Bao fireworks festival started. It was a spectacular and fitting finale for a day that ended with everyone having played a good day, enjoyed a good time and had real good fun!