Tournament Chess! Lichess, I request your assistance

@Toscani Regarding clocks:
"6.5 Before the start of the game the arbiter shall decide where the chessclock is placed."
Thats a paragraph from the fide rules of chess. handbook.fide.com/chapter/E012018

Every arbiter will place the clocks in a way he has easy access to the displays. E. g. on a long table row every clock in the same direction. Or when a table is next to a wall, the clock will of course be placed that the arbiter can see the clock from the other side of the table.

And with the own clock that's a special north american thing i guess. In all tournaments i've participated the tournament provided clocks.

But @mheadley please check your USFC rules and let them demonstrate how to start and stop their clocks. If you must call the arbiter, you're allowed to stop the clock. I don't know if the arbiter knows every clock they use, so you maybe trust your opponents settings or you could check yourself, maybe also write down the time on every move. Keep an eye on delay / increment. If the game is 60 minutes with 5 sec delay, the time should never go up and the delay should be same for both players. I'm not saying, that many people want to betray. Often the settings must be made manually and faults happen.

@Karpfenkopf That is true in FIDE rules....as well as in clock adjustments and how to stop/start clocks... since @mheadley is flagged as a US player and thus, assuming USCF rules, if the arbiter/director does not specify clock placement, black gets choice on which side the clock may be placed.

Most US tournaments request players to bring their own equipment, and black gets to decide which set is used, unless black has no or non-standard equipment.

I simply assumed it would be USCF since most tournaments here in the states are... but I just read Saturday's casual blitz is "not FIDE rated." Does this mean the tournament as a whole is FIDE? This is something I need to look at further! Thanks!

Generally, when the announcement says that (not-FIDE rated), then it implies that there may be one or more of the top sections that are both FIDE and USCF rated, with the lower or other side events being not FIDE rated, but still USCF rated.

If you look at the tournament announcement (if they have one) in Chess Life, or online, any sections that are FIDE rated will explicitly state "FIDE" or "FIDE-rated" for that particular section. If the whole tournament is FIDE rated, it will usually say so in the beginning of the announcement.

If you like, you can send me a PM to the link of the tournament ad and I can help you out.

Cheers!