Staying Current Between Tournaments
Extemp topics shift weekly, so a file that is even a month old can be dangerously stale. You will be able to build a sustainable weekly reading and filing routine that keeps your file current all season.
The Weekly Filing Habit
Set aside a consistent block of time each week — many competitors use thirty to sixty minutes several nights a week — to read new articles, extract evidence, and file them, retiring outdated articles to a back section or discarding them if a topic has genuinely moved on. A file that is updated in small, regular doses beats a frantic all-night session the week before a tournament.
Tracking Breaking News
Following a small number of reliable news aggregators or setting alerts for major recurring topics — an upcoming Federal Reserve meeting, an election, a peace negotiation — ensures a competitor is never caught off guard by a major story that broke the day before a tournament. When a major story breaks, competitors often do an emergency file update the night before competing to make sure their most recent folder reflects it.
A tournament is five days away and a surprise interest rate decision was just announced.
The competitor spends forty-five minutes that evening reading three fresh articles on the surprise decision, extracting the key statistic (a half-point cut instead of the expected quarter-point) and two expert reactions, and files them at the very front of her 'Fed Policy' folder so they are the first thing she sees if she draws a related question at the tournament.
1. What is the recommended approach to keeping a file current?
Answer all 1 to check.
A sustainable weekly reading and filing habit, backed by attention to breaking news, keeps a file useful all season instead of stale by tournament time.