Tournament Players PROTIP: The Gold Standard

Tournament Players PROTIPs have existed far longer than tournaments in the chess world. In fact, the earliest surviving book about the game, Luis Ramírez de Lucena's  (c. 1465 – c. 1530) Repetición de Amores y Arte de Ajedrez con 101 Juegos de Partido ("Repetition of Love and the Art of Playing Chess") from 1497*, contains advice on the practical matter of how to conduct a game of chess. And that advice set a standard yet to be surpassed.

If you play at night with a single candle, place it at your left-hand side, so that it does not disturb your eyes; if you play by day, place your opponent facing the light, which gives you a great advantage. Also, try to play your adversary when he has just eaten and drunk freely. For to play a long time it is best to have eaten lightly. To avoid getting dizzy during the game, you should drink water, but by no means wine. and play only short sessions, and for a stake small enough to avoid the possibility of the loss weighing on your mind.

Gold, baby, GOLD!

* From the Wiki entry linked above: "Commentators have suggested that much of the material was plagiarised from Francesc Vicent's now lost 1495 work Libre dels jochs partits dels schacs en nombre de 100." To my surprise, Edward Winter doesn't seem to have much on Lucena.

PS The full version of the quote (translated, obviously) was hard to track down, though I've seen the quote (both in part and complete) several times. Eventually, and strangely, I found the text above on a page from the South Australian Chess Association's old website, on a list of South Australian Chess Champions.