1st Thomas Reinke, with a 4-0 +235 record, finished in first place yet again, forcing a certain beleaguered writeup editor to come up with more adjectives to describe his tiresome feats of Scrabble dominance. His best game was a four-bingo outburst against Mark Kenas; bingos of FENLANDS, UNSEEMLY, REVIEWAL, and RIBWORT propelled him a 501-454 win. Thomas played just three more bingos in his other three games, but won them all anyway, proving that his unstoppable scoring attack is provided not just by bingos, but by strong all-around play. The closest of those wins was a 425-385 encounter with Dave Kinzer, where his bingo of TENORITE matched up evenly with Dave's find of GORILLA. Thomas' undefeated record was finally sealed with a solid 447-346 win over Bryan Benwitz.

2nd Charles Reinke enjoyed a lofty 469 per-game average en route to a 3-1 +364 final record. His single loss was to Mark Kenas in round two, 443-464, despite a nifty find of GAWMOGES (a gawmoge is apparently Newfoundland slang for a foolish person, but has very few attestations on the internet - this blog post will probably become the authoritative source of information for that particular word once it gets indexed by Google). That loss was avenged in round four, with Charles prevailing in a repeat match against Mark, 494-404. In that one, Charles bingoed thricely with NORMANDE, STUBBIES, and AIRHOLES, while Mark was limited to a 60-point TAUTENED. Another big victory was scored against Lynda Finn, 517-279, thanks to bingos of BRAKEMEN and SMIDGES (against Lynda's LEANNESS).

3rd Bryan Benwitz also went 3-1, but with a smaller +282 point spread. Interestingly, he played exactly two bingos in each of his four games, leading to a rather predictable per-game bingo average of...two. Bryan came out with all guns blazing as he downed Helen Flores in the first round, 450-282, playing UPSTAIR and EARSHOT along the way. He also made easy work of Richard Lauder, taking victory with a 439-320 final score, thanks to bingos of VANISHED and PERTAIN. Sadly, a loss to Thomas Reinke in the final round, 346-447 turned his promising 3-0 record into a not-quite-as-pristine 3-1 record. His two bingos there were RETAILER and EDITIONS, although at 60 and 59 points respectively, Bryan probably wishes they had been a bit more potent scoring-wise.

4th Sara McLaughlin gets a bonus mention for her 3-1 -3 finish. Her best game was a huge 453-369 win against Richard Lauder. Her triple-triple of TRAIPSED for 131 points was certainly key for her victory.

We welcomed new player Jessica Pasch, who managed to win a game (not an easy feat against our bunch) and also bingoed three times with COTTAGED, BUDGING, DEVIATE. Certainly a promising start and we hope to see her again!