Sean Grant wins the First Inaugural Pioneers Tournament

blog post courtesy of Koi Morris and Francesco La Rocca

Sean Grant wins the 1^st Inaugural Pioneers Tournament that was held at the Pioneers Bar and Lounge (between 6^th and 7^th Avenues on 29^th St. in Manhattan) on Sunday, March 16, 2014! This tournament ,directed by Francesco La Rocca and Koi Morris ,was of a similar format to the Creek and Cave tournament that was held last month in Queens, NY. Four games were used in the tournament (Iron Man, Metallica, Star Trek Pro, and The Simpsons Pinball Party). There were 25 participants in the tournament. Each player played one game on each of the 4 games for their one entry in the tournament.

After all the scores were ranked on each of the games the ranking on each game for each player was added up and the top 12 players qualified for the playoffs. The playoffs were played in a survivor style format. The first round was played as 3 groups of 4 on a randomly chosen game for each group. The person with the lowest score in each group was eliminated from the tournament and the rest of the group stayed together for the next round. The second round consisted of 3 groups of 3 played the same way as the first round. The top 2 from each group went on to the quarterfinal which was 3 groups of 2 played like the previous two rounds. The winner of each group then played in one three-player group (Sean Grant, Andrew Friedman, and Steve Zahler) in the semifinal (on The Simpsons Pinball Party). The loser, Steve Z., in that group took 3^rd place and the other two players played the final game on Iron Man. Sean G. won the game and Andrew F. took second. Rounding out the rest of the top 12 are Francesco, Robert Sovatsky, and Ed Zeltmann (all tied for 4^th place); Ed Rojas, Mikey Gabbard, and Koi (all tied for 7^th place); Robert Wong, Levi Nayman, and Al Cihak ( famous Pinaholic owner of the games at Pioneers) (all tied for 10^th place). The top 3 places won 60%, 30%, and 10% of the total prize pot ($250) for 1^st, 2^nd, and 3^rd places respectively,also Sean Grant took home a Star Trek Translite .

There were some impressive games played at the tournament. Al Cihak got 36M+ on The Simpsons Pinball Party, Steve Zahler got 103M+ on Iron Man, and Francesco La Rocca got more than 61M on Star Trek Pro while Andrew had great game with 44M+ on Metallica.
There was also a side tournament, pingolf style, going on during the main tournament. The game used was No Good Gofers (also owned by Al Cihak). Players had to get the target score of 20M in as few balls as possible. If a player didn't get the target score in three balls, it was recorded as 4 strokes for that player. It was $2/1 entry or $5/3 entries. There were 27 total entries among 18 players in this side tournament. Only 7 players reached the target score. Coming in first was Nick Lombardo winning $78 and a Wizard of Oz translite. Second place was Sean Grant winning $42 and third place was Steve Zahler winning $15.