Month: March 2010

Hi all

In the Vanderbilt Geoff and I teamed up with Drew Hoskins and Michael Bodell. Because of my massive amount of eligiblity points we didn’t get seeded dead last, instead we entered a convenient four-way. Convenient because just 32 boards might be enough to squeeze out a lucky win. Our first opponent was team O’Rourke with Duboin, Wold and Sementa as hired muscle.

The sponsor played a decent first half and then the Italian mercenaries rotated in. We did the best we could, but the 30-something imp gap was too much to overcome. Memorable was the 6 the Italians bid on:

Another big loss during the first half occurred on the following deal:

Geoff (North) ended up playing a modest 2 contract after West had opened 1. At the other table though, North got to play 4. When the finesse against the combined Queen – Ten worked we lost a bunch. Man, at top level bridge they do know how to combine overbidding with decent declarer play!

In a couple days I will tell you a story about the French ladies in our second match.

Hi all

I found Reno not a particularly interesting city. Sure there are casino’s, but it felt as a ghost town when strolling around. And when I see people frantically pushing buttons on slot machines, I feel wrapped in unease. A bête noire lurking in the shadows.

On the other hand I enjoyed playing bridge there a lot. Scratching the IMP Pairs with Drew Hoskins, winning two sections in side events, and some good bridge in the Vanderbilt as well. So I got home with my first Platinum points, a handful of Gold points and a couple of ACBL Reno mugs. What a bounty!

This deal is from the IMP Pairs. Drew and I easily qualified for the finals on Saturday, and out of the remaining 178 pairs we finished 43rd. Of course we could have ended about 20 places higher if I hadn’t blundered in blasting to slam off Ace – King of (-12 IMP). Hrrmph.

West

North

East

South

 

1

21

X

3

a.p.

 

 

1. Of course this is nowhere close to a vulnerable overcall

Drew and I punished declarer for his lighthearted overcall. A to Drew’s Ace followed by a ruff, a to the Ace and another ruff. Ace of , King of and a third ruffed with the King (just in case). Drew put the icing on the cake by playing a fourth round of that I could ruff with my Jack in front of dummy. Down four!

Who needs to bid vulnerable games when you have opponents like this?

Hi all

In a week I’ll be in Reno, participating in the Nationals. I have planned to play the IMP Pairs (with Drew Hoskins) and the Vanderbilt (with Geoff Hopcraft). Both partners are capable of creating action and generating imps and stories. I’ll post them here.

Here’s another Beowulf story from last week at Piedmont.

West

North

East

South

 

11

pass

12

pass

23

pass

24

pass

3

pass

3NT

pass

4

pass

4

pass

6

a.p.

 

1. 15-17 bal or any 18+
2. 6+
3. Natural
4. Natural

Perhaps I shouldn’t have ventured with 2, it shows (or should show) more than this crummy four card suit. On the other hand finding a fit might get a bit difficult if I can’t take the slow approach. Anyway, Geoff pushed to slam when he found out I was holding too.

My LHO starts with the Ten of , and I take stock. I have two paths, establish the or try to ruff two in dummy. If the opponents had started with the latter plan would have been fairly easy to execute. But the lead creates some transportation problems. So I decide to establish dummy’s .

After winning the King of I draw two rounds of trumps with the Ace and King, the Ten hasn’t shown up yet. Next I cash the Ace and ruff a with the 9, LHO discarding a . I cross to the King and ruff another with the Queen. This is the position:

My plan was to cross again in , extract the outstanding Ten, cash the and pitch dummy’s losing on my long for thirteen tricks. I fell off the bridge when East ruffed the to dummy and cashed the Ace for down one.

Mere minutes later the solution hit me. A surge of pure, redeeming insight made me want to crawl back in time and replay those last couple of cards.

Instead of crossing to dummy with another , I should have exited in . The opponents can take their trick but now dummy’s void and Queen function as entry to draw the last trump. Combining the chances of any favourable split with an unfavourable split but a well placed Ace of . It might be talking towards the cards, but assessing the value of that overtrick in 6 should have steered me in the right direction.

Hi all

They haven’t fixed their initcap problem, and their mailing room isn’t quite up to speed, but Oracle finally sent me my OCP certificate.

Together with Geoff Hopcraft I’ve been experimenting with a homebrew big 1 opening: Beowulf. A 1 opening shows 15-17 balanced or any stronger hand. There are just two responses possible to 1: 1 showing any 6+ and 1 showing a bust. After that the bidding takes a surprising natural turn. So the relays and asking bids I’ve always been so very fond of have been sacrificed to robust natural proceedings. I can’t tell yet whether this is systematic imp positive, but if so, our competitive agreements more than make up for it. As always the 1 is the Achilles heel of conventional systems, ours being nebulous to the n’th power, for it can be as short as zero.

Here’s an example of Beowulf in action:

West

North

East

South

 

 

 

11

pass

12

pass

1

pass

2

pass

2

pass

2

pass

3

pass

4NT

pass

5

pass

6

a.p.

 

1. 15-17 bal, or any 18+
2. 6+ hcp

After 1 the auction switched to natural mode and Geoff launched himself to slam.

During the auction Geoff figured the side fit would provide enough tricks for slam. As the cards lie slam barely qualifies as questionable. In order to enjoy the long Geoff needed to discard one on the top . Then the two top would have to survive before ruffing a third one high. After that he had to draw the remaining trumps ending in dummy to enjoy the . But at that point there are still only eleven tricks (four , five and two ). The twelfth needed to come from the suit, but when the Ace proved to be off side we wrote -50.

I enjoyed the 3 bid best, I could show a big hand and my exact distribution, and we were just at the 3-level! I’ll keep you posted with more Beowulf action.