Women were in the spotlight in the Sunny Florida Backgammon Championships held August 16-20, 2023, in Fort Lauderdale. The tournament, originally organized by Backgammon.Winning.Women (BWW) co-founder Karen Davis, featured a Sunny Florida BWW Women’s Cup, a Backgammon Masters Awarding Body (BMAB) event, in addition to the American Backgammon Tour divisional events.
Lee Genud (FL), 1981 Backgammon World Champion, won the BWW Women’s Cup, taking home a beautiful trophy, added prize money donated by BWW, and a beautiful BWW backgammon board. Gigi Goyette (CA), came from Malibu to capture the Consolation prizes, making her dream of winning a BWW board come true, along with her trophy and prize money. She made the most of her visit to Sunny Florida, taking an Everglades airboat ride to see alligators and herons with Martin Barkwill from Newcastle in the UK and Karen Davis.
Karen had a great tournament as well, winning the Championship Consolation event in a field of 52 players, finishing strong with 6-straight-winning matches and double sixes on the last throw to take the event by storm! She had the second-best Performance Rating (PR) in the BMAB event, meeting her goal of playing a 4.76 PR.
Samra Hadden came from Atlanta to take second place in the ABT Advanced Division. Teresa Schaeffer (FL) ended on a high note as well, winning the Novice division.
