MickyB

Never preempt with two aces - although I once opened a weak two with three aces, I assume that's ok?

Vs 4H, pass then pull to show spades+minor is useful. Even over 4S, you could use the extra space to differentiate between good and bad 5X bids as well as two-suiters, so it's certainly not clear-cut. BTW, to me the question, "should we play PDI here?" means, "it's obviously a FP sequence, but should we invert pass and double?". I assume that's not what you meant!

I'd play pass as non-forcing over 4M, but forcing over higher preempts.

Was this meant as a joke?

That's unsurprising, much of the world believes that men and women are not just equal, but equivalent in most regards. We know from looking at the top players that, for whatever reason, being male is an advantage. Removing the women's event would be little different from telling the top female sprinters that they should be competing against Usain Bolt. Ok, so this is an exaggeration - it is conceivable that a woman could be the best bridge player in the world, but not that a woman could be the fastest sprinter in the world - but the general trend is still apparent.

I'd bid 1H, 2C, 3S. We won't have a spade fit so I want to make sure pard knows I have four clubs. I wouldn't be too sure what bids meant with a pick-up partner over 1H:1N, 2S anyway.

I have it now as - Monaco 156 England 143 Italy 135 Germany 134.5 Russia 127 Sweden, Israel 122 Bulgaria 121 Netherlands 117 Norway 115.5 Poland, Switzerland 114 France 109 Ireland 108 Turkey, Greece 106 Romania 103 Iceland 87

I was under the impression that 3rd/5th was the original name for third from even, low from odd. Many, not unreasonably, misunderstood the concept, thus creating a new method; to distinguish the two, some of those playing the original method adopted the name "3rd/low". No idea if there's any truth to this.

Their results against the likely qualifying teams aren't that huge. They'd have been better off beating Wales 25-5 instead of 25-0!

We lost #5 by 9 as well, think those were the two closest

Only results from qualifying teams carry to the final rankings. Wales are currently 7th in the group, whether they qualify or not will have a big bearing on France.

They can still pass 8C, if you aren't prepared to defend that undoubled then you should double in direct seat to give them less room.

Really? Nat/bal club with transfer walsh allows you to occasionally stop in 1M with 11-13 NTs and in 1N with 17-19 NTs. It also allows you to reach 4-4 spade fits when some people bid 1m:1H, 1N:P. However, I can't see how it makes it easier to reach a good 3m part-score, quite the opposite in fact. A nat/bal limited 1D opening should tend to do better than a nat/bal wide-ranging 1C opening. Obviously many Precisionites open 1D on some unbalanced club hands, but then their 2C opening shows 6 cards and isn't a loser any more IMO.

Have you tried a dual clutch transmission? B-)

Lol. You'll have to explain this one to me. Why are some people so keen to label any call they disagree with as an insult to partner and/or teammates? Surely, if anything it's a compliment to partner to bid here - it certainly shows a lot of faith in their cardplay! An insult to oppo, maybe B-) I'd have passed this hand a few years ago, but I spoke to a few top English players about similar hands and they were always bidding. Interested to see this conflicts greatly with JLogic's opinion, maybe I should have stuck to my guns.

It seems you are under the impression that 17+ hands will do as well, or better, having opened 1C showing 11-13 NT or any 17+, than having opened a pure 17+ 1C. This is not the case. After you've opened a two-way 1C in first seat, the next hand has to be more constructive, I admit. However, when they do preempt, you are in a worse position, as now partner is bidding assuming you have an 11-13 NT, so you will almost certainly have to take another action on a 17-19 hand. Compare that with opening a strong club on a flat 18 count and seeing the next hand bid 3S. If partner doesn't act, you have no more interest in the auction, you have shown your hand already. Worse still is when you open a two-way 1C on a 17+ hand in second or third seat. Now you'll get a lot of preempts from the next hand, who is no longer worried about missing game. The advantage of a two-way 1C like Svan is very much in the <17 hands. Compared with Precision with a 14-16 NT, you get a much better initial description on both 11-13 NTs and unbalanced hands with diamonds. You could play it as 12-14 [or 10-13/11-13 1st NV if you preferred] without any problems. Balanced hands should, as far as possible, show their strength with their first bid. Precision with a 14-16 NT is good for this - 11-13, 14-16 and 17-18 can all make their opening bid then let partner take control. Meckwell take this a step further, they open 2NT with 19-20, so it's only 21+ balanced hands that will need to take positive action. This is why, with a weak NT, it's good to play 1C as 15+, clubs or balanced. You've got the strength of the 15-17 NTs across to partner with your first call.

Most decent multi-club systems use 1C as either a weak NT or a strong hand. If you want to play a weak NT opening, then you are probably best with something like Millennium Club - 1C = 15+clubs/15+balanced/any GF 1D/H/S = unbal 10-21 1N = 12-14 2C = 6C or 5C4M 11-14 Or you might remove the unbal D/H/S GF hands and open them 2D, that way, sequences like 1C-(4H)-P-(P); 4S can show 6+C4+S, not just a hand too strong to open 1S.

Eh? That my 1D opening may have been 4-4-3-2 precisely is irrelevant, that hand is always correcting diamonds to hearts.

2H = any invite. As MGoetze says, RRF isn't really relevant.

So an unbalanced minimum with a heart stop can't bid 3NT over the negative double?

3NT over 1NT was unusual I think.

I find it much easier to adjust when going West, I simply stay up longer, and will usually get a proper night's sleep. Adjusting the other way is awful in comparison - I can't just go to bed early, so it requires having half a night's sleep, and even then I can't get to sleep at the desired time the next night. Obviously those from the East who feel the same way I do about this will still have to go through the "punishment" when they return home.

That's so 2010 B-) I don't know how long Hurd-Wooldridge have played 1NT as diamonds, but playing transfers in this sort of situation has gone out of fashion quite recently on BBF. 1H:1S, 1NT as clubs gains you the ability to bid 2C now to say "I would have passed 2C if you'd bid it" 1H:1S, 1NT as diamonds gains you 2C as a cheap force. A simple use for this would be to play it as "bad preference to either of opener's suits", with direct preference showing good 8-10 or so. I think this is a clear improvement. I put GF balanced hands through 1S, so I get much more mileage out of this 2C bid - it may be a prelude to a GF relay.

As I (almost) said above - 1H:1S 1N = 3+D 2C = 3+C 2D = 11-13/17+ 6+H 2H = 14-16 6+H Alternatively, you could play all of your rebids as natural. Having five spades is much less frequent than having a forcing NT with 0-4 spades, so there must be a decent case for inverting them.

I prefer natural. It is not true that KI and Flannery are two ways to solve the same problem. KI is useful if - You can't play a semi-forcing NT [3-card limit raises and invitational single-suiters responding 1NT] You want to respond 1S with GF balanced hands, leading to full relays You play Flannery - now 1H:1S, 2D can show 11-13/17+ with hearts, with 2H showing 14-16. Flannery fits in well with some methods but I don't recommended it in general. Whether 1H:1S is natural or KI, you should play 1H:1S, 1NT as diamonds [you can include some other hands here too].