[John Hernlund]

Hi Chuck, my wife is running a ladies tournament in a couple weeks, and as part of the event the players are self-organizing into teams of 4 apiece. The idea is for these teams to compete against one another, but since some of the women don't yet have a rating we can't use ratings information to do any sort of handicap-like scheme. The players span the entire spectrum in ability, from the highest-rated woman in the world, to first-timers. They will have 3 rounds (2 Sat, 1 Sun) total.

I've personally been advocating for simply using the 1st two rounds as a baseline, and just base the team scores on the final round. I.e., with team scores calculated from Sunday's round, relative to the team's cumulative average scores in the first two rounds. That way the teams know that it comes down to Sunday performance, the revenge round. I like that it would motivate them to finish strong, and reward those who put together a great round down the stretch. Also, the new players might actually improve more by the 3rd round, than other players, so they'll feel valuable.

But I've also been wondering what sort of ideas you might have for this type of scenario (small N), and whether you might have a more clever suggestion. I'm sure you've probably come across this kind of situation previously.