GijsH

The Dutch national team were asking themselves the same question, when successes didn't come after winning the Bermuda Bowl in 1993. As usual the answer is a combination of reasons: 1. most important: THE ITALIANS ARE BETTER AT SLAM BIDDING. I have witnessed hands where an Italian top pair bid to slam in less than 1 minute, while a French or Dutch pair take 5 minutes to deliberate if they will pass the game level and then stop at the 5 level. 2. long term partnerships is of course a must, but more importantly the TEAM SPIRIT in the Italian team is extreemly good. It was the main reason for their success in the 60s and 70s and it is the main reason now, especially during long tournaments. 3. the Italian team have more individually TALENTED PLAYERS than the other teams. And there are some rich people in Italy willing to foot the bill to supply a decent living for these talented players. (this was also the case in the 60s and 70s). Some time ago I played against Bocchi and mrs Lavazza at a pairs tournament. I was declaring a 4S contract and after 2 tricks Bocchi (who is quite noisy all the time) indicated that I had a trow-in against mrs Lavazza to play for. He was right of course, and mrs Lavazza frowned heavily at him for making me aware of that, but it just showed to me what talented players they have. At this level of bridge, systems have nothing to do with it, less than the 3% Hamman likes to quote, as long as you don't play complicated relay systems, which will drain you of energy in long tournaments. Thorough mutual understanding of your "natural" methods comes with a long term partnership and discussing a lot about bridge with partner, team-mates and coaches.

Last night I had a very unpleasant experience in the ACBL tournament on BBO. We play a strong, forcing and unlimited 1NT opening, in accordance to General Convention Chart of the ACBL. The tourney on BBO specifies that GCC applies. After I opened such a strong 1NT, after a few rounds of bidding the opponent called the director (without informing me). The director asked what we are playing and I explained, including mentioning the GCC. We had to stop playing during the discussion. After a while the director told us we could not play this system. When we insisted the director read the GCC properly first, an other director arrived and after more discussion now we were OK to use the system. Due to the time passed, we could not play the 2nd board of the round. All the time the opponents fuelled the fire by making rude comments about us. After all that aggravation we did not get a decent score anymore, and our evening was ruined. The director made all kinds of unnecessary comments about how much fun the tournament was, which aggravated the situation even more for me. An apology for the initial mistake (forbidding the system) was never given. My point is, should the ACBL / BBO not supply properly trained directors for these tournaments, who know at least the GCC and who can deal with people in a decent way? -posted edited to remove the ACBL TD names - in keeping with general site policy [ben]

for anyone interested, surf to www.gijs-haarlem.tk and click on MIDMAC.

No one was answering your question, so I'll try to do that: 1. show 1st suit fit: a GF is established, so Principle of Fast Arrival applies: 3-in-opener's major: 3-card support, 10-12 hcp 4-in-opener's major: 3-card support, 6-9 hcp 2. show 2nd suit fit: opener's 2nd suit can be a 4card: 4-in-opener's minor: 4card support, FORCING, unbalanced 3. New suit: just bid it, this shows a 6card, 6-10 hcp, denies support for opener's major 4. Splinter: NO. Never splinter or queue shortage in opener's 1st suit. Those partial misfit hands are not worth much. 1♠-1NT, 3♣-4♦: This should agree ♣ and show a ♦queue with slam interest, something like: ♠xx ♥xx ♦AQxx ♣KJxxx A subsequent ♠ queue by responder show specifically Qx.

For this bidding I expect partner to have: ♠Ax ♥109xxxx ♦xx ♣Axx so 2 aces but a very weak ♥suit. With ♥Axxxxx he should open 2♥, I think it is nonsense that a hand is too weak to open and too strong for a weak-2. So I bid 3♥ now (as 4♥ does not make: good opponents with draw trumps first) and I will pas when LHO bids 4♣. I will venture a double on 5♣ and pray partner doesn't lead a ♥, because then declarer will discard his ♠/♦ losers on dummy's high ♥s!

I think you forgot that S opens the bidding Mike.

All very interesting this ZAR discussion, but it is a bit theoretical as long as it is not related to a real bidding system. Jon Drabble's "A New Approach to Bidding" has been criticized by you guys, but at least he has been able to make his theories practicable. Let's see how MIDMAC would deal with the hand, combined with some common sense: South has [6] tricks, North has [6] tricks after South's 1♠ opening. S N 1♠ - 2NT (5card major; 4card support and 4+ controls) 4♣ - 4NT ([6] tricks, 5 controls; RKC) 6♦ (odd number of keycards (3) and ♦ void) now N knows we have 10 controls (plus a void) and all keycards, that is enough for a grand according to the table Drabble provides on required controls. What about tricks: N can count 12 hard tricks: 5 ♠, 1♦, 1♥, 2♣ and 3 ruffs after pulling trumps. S must be 5-3-0-5 or 5-4-0-4 and must have some extras even counting ♠KQ, ♥A and ♣A for his 18 points (equivalent to [6] tricks). If the extra is ♣Q or ♥K, 13 tricks are there. Worst case is ♥Q as extra, then the ♥finesse might succeed or a 4th ♦ ruff might survive without an over-ruff. All in all the grand is almost a certainty and N can bid 7♠ confidently.

MIDMAC is a natural bidding system devised by Jon Drabble in his book "A New Approach to Bidding". I have been playing it for years and would love to play it on BBO. I have a summary available on my WEB site: www.gijs-haarlem.tk If you are interested and play good level bridge (at least advanced, better still expert or world class) you won't be disappointed. I can play on UK times, weekday and weekend, from 19:00 hours. Please respond to this Bulletin Board email address, NOT the one on the WEB site.

Playing Ambra we play a different convention here, called Turbo. After a major is agreed we play 3NT (or 4NT) to show an even number of keycards and bypassing 3NT an odd number of keycards. So we would bid: 1S 2H 2S 3S 4H 4N 6S p 2H: in Ambra 2D and 2H are transposed, but that makes no difference here 2S: 11/16 3S: slam invite with 3card support 4H: bypassing 3NT: odd number of keycards, no C/D control 4N: shows Q of trumps reponder knows opener has AK in S and A in H 6S: nothing to add (5S might be mistaken for having only 1 keycard)

It has been interesting to see the diversity of the replies here. I honestly can say my reply at IMP would be 5♦ and at matchpoints: pas. (I don't even want to discuss 3NT here, disgusting!) At rubber I would even more readily bid 5D, because: 1. vulnerable partner is supposed to have a good suit 2. nobody can blame you after the event, if it goes down it is opener's fault. 3. at rubber. vulnerable preempts are especially sound I have played with some professional rubber players (never for money though :P ), e.g. the winner of the Dutch Master pairs competition last year. He likes heavy preempts, especially in rubber and would not hesitate on: ♠ x ♥ Kxx ♦ AKJxxxx ♣ Jx to open 3♦! especially in 1st or 3rd seat and I would like to say you young players can learn something from that. This only shows the importance of knowing partner's style of peempting.

His name is Jon Drabble and the book is "A new approach to bidding", it is still for sale at book sellers like Amazon. I played MIDMAC several years, with good results, but like every system: two good players do better with it than two beginning players.

Interesting discussion about Dutch Doubleton. I played DD for some time (I am Dutch after all :P ), but now I started with AMBRA. If you are looking for the holy grail, this is it, but you must be prepared to study a lot. AMBRA is based on Dutch Doubleton and tought by Benito Garozza to the Italian youth team. Garozzo has managed to solve a lot of problems of DD (and other 2/1 systems) with many artificial relay bids. My partner and I are developing an English version from the Italian original (but we replaced the very complex 1NT system with Ron Klinger's "Keri over 1NT") Drop me an email if you are interested. 1C is not absolutely forcing in AMBRA, but in practise we never pass (exept maybe with zero points and a few clubs)

I would like to start a general question and answer session on Polish Club here. Hopefully Polish players can help other Europeans to grasp the system better. My first question is: 1♥-(1♠)-2NT Is 2NT natural: 11-12 balanced with ♠ stopper, or is it GI with ♥ support? Jassem's book about wj2000 has been translated by Dan Neill, but there are a few things unclear. Is there a English / Polish speaker who has the Jassem book and can explain some things?

I am looking for a partner to play regular on BBO, WJ2000 Polish club. Evenings: 19:00-22:00 GMT and weekends. My level is expert. please replay to my email account.