Here’s a novel way to play a round robin tournament for eight people (i.e. a schedule of seven rounds where each player plays everyone else). Assign the following nametags to the players.
BAGNIOS BUSIEST CONCISE CURTALS LARCENY LEGIBLE PENNANT POSTBOY
In round one, the players who have the same first letter play each other (eg BAGNIOS plays BUSIEST). In the second round, players with the same second letter play each other (eg POSTBOY plays CONCISE) and so on.
Finding a set of words like this is difficult. The problem was posed in 1978, and after several computer programs tried and failed, it was written off as impossible. However twenty years later a set of 63 solutions was found by Steve Root. Read more of the story and see Steve’s 63 solutions at http://wordways.com/every.htm. The richer SOWPODS lexicon should produce more than 63 solutions. Any takers?
