Tournament
In the 1980s through 2008, there were 24 Challenge tournaments held throughout the United States and in other countries. The tournaments were very popular in Pennsylvania, where many participating schools held school competitions. Each school then sent one or two students to compete at a regional level, and the top four went on to the state level Championship. In many states, there was no state-level competition.
Official, Suntex-sposored tournament events were suspended after the 2008 season due to lack of corporate funding, which had provided 24 Challenge Math Program materials to participating schools. Today, many schools continue to conduct their own 24 Challenge events. Over a period of months preceding the event, teachers use the 24 Game in their classrooms to help students hone their mathematics skills. Schools or districts that hold regional or district-wide events schedule playoffs to determine which students will advance to their Championship event.
In tournament play, several extra rules apply:
- A player, upon tapping the card, must state the final operation they used to reach 24 first. They then proceed to list the operations in normal order, subsequently repeating the final operation. If a player forgets to state the final operation first, they receive a penalty flag. If, in mentioning all steps they used to reach the card, they do not use the same final operation, they receive a penalty flag.
- Tapping a card with one finger, four or five fingers, or slapping with the whole hand results in a penalty flag, or a relinquishment of a card.
- Players must keep their hands (usually, only the tapping two or three fingers) on the blue region in the mat, about eight inches away from the card. Touching inside this area results in a penalty flag.
- Fake cards with no solution were included in "Tournament Decks"* in the first round to discourage impulsive tappers. Tapping one of these fake cards results in an automatic penalty flag. *(Special Tournament Decks (with non-working cards) were only used at official Suntex-sponsored events, and were not distributed to the general public or sold.)
When a player receives three penalty flags, they are disqualified from further play in that round, but they keep any points they have earned up to that point.
In order to win, the player must earn more points than everyone else in the competition. Usually there are two rounds. The players move from table to table playing other students in their same level. For each card that they receive, they get more points. The points are distributed based on the number of dots found in the corner of each card. The player at the end with the most points wins.
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