pdmunro

Here is an analysis by Jeff Goldsmith: http://www.gg.caltech.edu/~jeff/bridge/study He comments "A rough guess from experience at OKbridge tells me that a national champion is only about 1 IMP/bd better than a good flight A player. Flight A players are, on average, I think, about an IMP/bd better than Flight B players and the difference between Flight B and Flight C is also about one IMP." His site index is http://www.gg.caltech.edu/~jeff/

Below are links to articles by top players. The focus is on instructive hands. top players' sites (all with numerous files) stewart http://www.baronbarclay.com/sheinwold/SHEINWOL.html lawrence http://www.michaelslawrence.com/Articles/Article.html migry http://www.migry.com/home_page.htm (use her sitemap) cohen http://www.larryco.com/localarticles.htm pavlicek http://www.rpbridge.net/rpbr.htm#05 Kantar (recently redone) http://www.kantarbridge.com/test_your_defense.htm http://www.kantarbridge.com/test_your_play.htm goldsmith http://www.gg.caltech.edu/~jeff/ (see Bridge Problems, 3/4 of way down the page) gitelman http://www.bridgebase.com/dotw/dotwlin.html (you can download .lin "deal of the week" files) http://www.bridgebase.com/articles/index.html collections of lin files deal of the week http://www.bridgebase.com/dotw/dotwlin.html (download.lin files) paulg http://www.pooh-corner.demon.co.uk/paul/bbo/ (commentary in separate "chat log" file) collection of Kaplan comments (hints for today's vugraph commentators) http://www.sarantakos.com/bridge/kapnuggets.htm Buy educational software by top players through BBO http://www.bridgebase.com And see Interesting Bridge Hands in this forum

Ok Fred the following may not be what happened. And I commited the mortal sin of using Deep Finesse. But it was fun. Using Deep Finesse and following Fluffy's suggestions, I gave West ♠KQxxx ♥Qx ♦xxx ♣Jx. The play of the hand is characterised by high card leads that drop West's honours. Three times the opponents are put on lead. I have called them all endplays. But the first two are not real endplays, the opps have an escape card, so I wrote them as "endplays". Finally comes the real endplay, from which there is no escape. Declarer takes the ♠A on the first trick. No need to hold up, E has only one spade. Play the ♥AK to drop the Q. Take a finesse in ♣'s. East ducks. Now bravely play the ♣K from the table to "endplay" E, and watch W's ♣ honour drop. East tries the ♦A and a small ♦. Win in dummy with the ♦K. Now "endplay" W in ♠'s. He escapes in ♦. Declarer take his ♠J winner, his ♦Q winner, and endplays E with a ♣. Now this is a real endplay. East has to play his ♥x to dummy's ♥J. Of course, E could have discarded his ♣ to avoid the endplay. But then declarer's ♣ is a winner. East preferred to suffer an honorable endplay rather than an ignominious squeeze.

I would be happy with these mini-BBO's: BBO-main: friends + list of mini-BBO's + ... BBO-social: kitchen/party bridge BBO-clubs: BIL + Total Points + WP Refugees + ... BBO-1: half the online players BBO-2: the other half of the online players BBO-T: teams + tournaments (including Vugraph) BBO-$: services for which you pay The main function I want is the ability to switch between the different mini-BBO's to find a table to kibitz. I don't want to be blocked from entering a mini-BBO because it is "full". Obviously the BBO-# idea is scaleable. With 20000 members you could have 7 mini-BBO's each with about 3000 players. Ah, to dream ... :-)

Autoplay of singletons used to be an option on one's profile. It doesn't seem to be available any more. I only used it a couple of times. It was too obvious that a singleton had been played, so I turned it off.

Do you have "Log deals | When playing" checked on your profile? If so, then you can look in the BBO directory on your computer to see the tournaments you have played in. All the files are labelled. I rearrange them by date to find the most recent.

Try these links. They are principally learning/teaching material. pdf files SAYC (booklet at acbl website) http://www.acbl.org/documentlibrary/play/sayc_book.pdf Kenneth L Lindsay "Foundations of Modern American Bidding"; an incredible effort http://northshorebridge.com/index.htm Complete 100+ page book on Acol, very clearly written. http://www.leeds.ac.uk/union/sports/bridge/guide.html zar points (difficult) http://www.zarpoints.com/TheDownloads.htm Robson & Segal (Partnership Bidding, advanced+) http://www.geocities.com/daniel_neill_2000/sys/index.html migry (see her Sitemap for lots of pdf files) http://www.migry.com/home_page.htm minibridge http://www.ebu.co.uk/ecpubdefault.asp?page...ching+Materials (click Teaching Materials, then "MiniBridge teaching hands.pdf" (156 Kb), located about middle of the list) loser count (site of xx1943 BBO bridge teacher) http://www.albrecht-hollstein.de/Bridge.htm acbl teaching (see pdf handbook at bottom of page) http://www.acbl.org/teachers/index.html txt files bridge museum http://www3.telus.net/ldh/bridge.html HTML pages for beginners/intermediates Standard American by Richard Pavlicek http://www.rpbridge.net/bbtc.htm http://www.rpbridge.net/rpbr.htm#05 (advanced articles) Karen Walker's Bridge Library http://www.prairienet.org/bridge/ SAYC http://www.annam.co.uk/sayc01.htm Rainbow SAYC http://www.firesides.net/sarc.htm http://www.firesides.net/genrules.htm (lots of interesting ideas, see links at bottom of his page) Acol by Geoffrey Ostrin http://www.leeds.ac.uk/union/sports/bridge...html/node1.html Notes on Standard American by Michael Furstner http://www.jazclass.aust.com/bridge/br0.htm Collections of Links (each of these sites has 100's of links) greatbridgelinks http://www.greatbridgelinks.com/ dmoz bridge http://dmoz.org/Games/Card_Games/Trick_Capturing/Bridge/ bridgeguys links http://www.bridgeguys.com/PGlossary/Person...geWebsites.html steiner links http://www.trsteiner.de/bridge/en/links.shtml claire links http://www.clairebridge.com/index.html BridgeWorld links http://www.bridgeworld.com/default.asp?d=b...idge_links.html dutch links http://bridge.coolbegin.com/ Teaching material of BBO BIL teachers Books for sale http://bridgebase.com/clubs/bil/text/books.html xx1943 http://www.albrecht-hollstein.de/Bridge.htm sdoty http://www.dartmouth.edu/~bridge/BILNotes.htm shep http://lsiprelle.simpli.biz/bridgementor/ paulg http://www.pooh-corner.demon.co.uk/paul/bbo/ precision http://bbo.pigpen.org.uk/ Conventions conventions http://www.slospin.net/Duplicate%20Bridge/...ntions_home.htm Books that can be delivered over the internet Frank Fongasira http://www.masterbridge.com/order.html Gerard Cohen http://gerard.entsoft.com/ (but also see http://www.godofthemachine.com/bridge/books.html) Free Bridge Playing Software, "Easy Bridge" http://www.winsite.com/bin/Info?4500000036163 Free Learn Standard American (Fred Gitelman) http://www.acbl.org/learn/ltpb.html In BBO Forums we also have FAQ (includes links to book reviews) http://forums.bridgebase.com/index.php?showtopic=5612 Book reviews (Arclight is building up a collection of reviews) http://forums.bridgebase.com/index.php?showtopic=6478

This is a limited review of Terence Reese, Play Bridge with Reese, Dover Publications, 1960. In an attempt to improve my play, I read some of "Play Bridge with Reese". In this book, Reese writes about his thoughts during the play of the cards. I had a flash of inspiration: I could put the hands on Deep Finesse! The book opened at Hand 18, "No Suicide". Reese revealed his table thoughts. It turned out that the hand was all about squeezing both opponents. I have never knowingly done a squeeze. Give me a simple finesse any day. Deep Finesse let me move cards between the opponents' hands. I worked out a relationship between failing finesses and successful squeezes. Next I tried Hand 19, "A Hail of Bullets". This hand was a combination of end plays and trump control. Unfortunately, I did not reach any dawn of understanding. Reese commented at the end, "that it would not have helped East to hold off the first diamond". Well Deep Finesse disagreed! It was some consolation to think that Reece himself could make a mistake in analysing that baffling hand. After some hours of study, I wondered, "Would all this study of two dastardly bridge hands improve my play?" The immediate effect was not good. I went on BBO, miscounted trumps, and went down in a contract that most made. Some of Reese's comments stuck in my mind. "I can't form much of a plan until I know what is going to happen in spades". In other words, there are hands where you have to get the count in one suit, before you can stop and plan the rest of the hand. "I am going to play a diamond next (from dummy) ... If I lead from my hand and West has a doubleton he will begin an echo which will give East a count." This idea of denying one particular opponent an early crucial count was new to me. That night I met a friend whom I hadn't seen for about a year. I told a few funny jokes about being sucked into black holes by bridge analysis. Two days later, he turned up on my doorstep really worried. From our conversation, he had concluded that I was on drugs. In conclusion, the book "Play Bridge With Reece" is about Reese's thoughts during some spectacular plays of baffling hands. Using Deep Finesse adds a whole new dimension to what you can get out of the book. But, after a heavy study session, give yourself a reasonable break before dealing with the general public.

When I watch a sport/game, I don't want to know the outcome in advance. For me, it takes away from the excitement to be told that there is a makeable game in 4S on a finesse. Or that this cannot make, because of the bad trump split. When I kibitz a tournament on Vugraph, I only look at one player's cards. I ignore the expert commentary, if they are giving away too much about the hand. I think about the decisions that one player has to make. It's interesting that any hand usually has various bidding options. What one seems best for this situation? I do change seats occaionally. For instance, to see the play in a slam from declarer's viewpoint. My ideal BBO expert commentary would be one that looked over one player's shoulder and tried to get inside his mind. That showed me how to count the cards. That found the best defence. I just saw a swindle by an Italian expert at a table I was kibitzing. I would jump out of my seat with excitement if any expert could have predicted that play.

Analysis of Brd 4 http://online.bridgebase.com/cgi-bin/histo...940-1109801144- Your play looks OK to my intermediate eyes. On the first trick, a small ♠ was led, with South (Fred) playing the ♠Q. I can tell from the bidding, dummy and first trick that S (Fred) has only that ♠QJxxx(x) and a singleton or void in ♦'s. North has all the missing honours. So you can take the ♥ finesse safely. In the actual play, you didn't take the finesse. But you made 11 tricks, and you were only in 4S. You lost an imp to those who made 12 tricks. No one was in slam. Before I looked at what happened on the first trick, my instinct was to do just what you did: go up with the ♥A and play another ♥ to get rid of trumps. It shows how the first trick adds vital information. I just had an idea. Perhaps, South should keep quiet about the exact nature of his honours. If he didn't show you he had the ♠Q, you would have to guess who had the ♥K. :-)

I copied the table below from http://www.microtopia.net/bridge/day4.html It is an analysis, by bridgebrowser, of about 85 000 results from OKbridge (i.e. approximately 2700 boards, each played about 32 times). It shows the frequency and average IMPS for each possible contract. Cntrct Nmbr Freq(%) AvgIMPS PassOut 675 0.76 -0.25 1C .... 102 0.12 0.84 1D .... 171 0.19 0.70 1H .... 445 0.50 0.08 1S ... .884 1.00 0.37 1NT .. 5375 6.08 0.13 2C ... 1155 1.31 -0.49 2D ... 1858 2.10 -0.19 2H ... 3987 4.51 0.20 2S ... 4900 5.54 0.21 2NT .. 2612 2.95 -1.15 3C ... 2228 2.52 -0.60 3D ... 2615 2.96 -0.65 3H ... 3817 4.31 -0.49 3S ... 4140 4.68 -0.59 3NT . 16454 18.60 0.50 4C ... 1078 1.22 -0.77 4D ... 1054 1.19 -0.80 4H .. 10513 11.88 0.19 4S .. 12677 14.33 0.19 4NT ... 151 0.17 -1.61 5C ... 1736 1.96 -0.77 5D ... 2169 2.45 -0.63 5H ... 1503 1.70 -1.55 5S ... 1013 1.14 -1.83 5NT .... 23 0.03 -6.08 6C .... 554 0.63 0.88 6D .... 627 0.71 -0.49 6H ... 1238 1.40 -1.00 6S ... 1389 1.57 -0.24 6NT ... 855 0.97 -1.56 7C ..... 45 0.05 -3.99 7D ..... 70 0.08 -1.88 7H .... 118 0.13 1.85 7S .... 148 0.17 1.91 7NT .... 95 0.11 2.89 The author, Stephen Pickett, makes the points that 1) Not counting partscores that count as game when doubled, 51.8% of all contracts are Game (3NT,4H through 5NT), and a further 5.6% are slams (6C and up). Never let it be said that Bridge is boring! 2) The consistently profitable contracts are 1NT, 2H, 2S, 3NT, 4H and 4S. ________________________________________________________________ One question I have is: why do 3H and 3S score minus IMPS, on average? Is it because declarers have overbid or underbid? That is, do our bidding systems cause us to overbid to 3H-3S when we should be in 2H-2S? Or, do our bidding systems cause us to underbid 3H-3S when we should be in 4H-4S? I think it is an interesting table that provokes a number of questions. Any comments?

I have found two earlier posts on this topic: http://forums.bridgebase.com/index.php?sho...t=0entry20567 http://forums.bridgebase.com/index.php?sho...=15entry54095 Will the Vugraph schedule really show my local computer time? Fred said there have been less complaints after changing from GMT to Paris + New York time. Unfortunately, I have never been able to easily convert these to local time in my head. I know I can use software, but I would really appreciate it, if the Vugraph schedule did use another latitude for us on this side of the earth. Maybe Bejing time. That should please a few billion people. :-) But I still like my idea of a BBO clock. It seems the simplest solution.

Good point. In another post, Walddk said he get lots of enquiries from people about tournament times. Here's how easy my idea is: Say, I am logged on to BBO and I read, "There is a BBO vugraph from Russia at 14:00 on Saturday, 19th February, 2005 (BBO time and date)". I look at the BBO clock which says it is presently 12:00, Wednesday, 16th February, 2005. It is very easy to tell that the vugraph is in exactly 3 days + 2 hours time. It is also very easy to check as I get closer to the start time.

I would like BBO to have a 24 hour clock that displayed BBO time (i.e. either local time in Las Vegas, or UTC) and date. Players, commentators, announcements, etc. could use that time and date. I would find it much easier than the present use of a variety of local times.

Any suggestions for those secret comments you add to a player's profile. [Might be best to avoid using players' names.] I have used these phrases so far: "knows his onions" "grumpy ... fun to watch" "expert but will play with intermediates" "very critical" "psyches" "overbids" "watches cricket while playing ... gets hit for 6" (that's equivalent to getting hit out of the ballpark) "please, please never ask me to play with you again" I am sure some players have notes about me such as: "probably taught by his grandmother" "plays plain vanilla sayc" "bids on thin air" "born to lose .... play this guy for money" "will double our making contracts! ... big scores coming up!"

Mistake: is it the funniest word in the English language? For some reason, I find any sentence with the word "mistake" in it, hilarious. On the little packets of sugar, is the message: "Experience teaches us to recognize our mistakes when we repeat them". What a nightmare: endlessly repeating one's mistakes. You've gotta laugh, or you'll cry. Of course, it's not true - I hope. The true sequence is: repeat, recognize, repeat, recognize ... (fill in the number of years) ... fix. There is a line from a movie: "I have only ever made one mistake in my life. It was back in (fill in the year). That mistake was thinking I had made a mistake". You gotta laugh at the egotism captured in that line. BBO definitions (the endless debate) Beginner: someone who makes lots of mistakes, and fails to recognize most of them. Expert: someone who makes few mistakes, and immediately recognizes them. Any tradesman we hire, we expect to be an expert and make few, if any, mistakes. We don't want the house to fall down. Is making mistakes a key step in learning? I can remember the day when I lead small from K Q x x . Declarer held A J - so I gave him a trick. It was perhaps not the first time I had done it, but it was the first time that a flashing light came on: "Error alert! Error alert!". I asked advice from a better player. He said, that with K Q x x, you have to lead the K. I had known to lead the K from K Q J x, but hadn't known that it was also the best lead from K Q x x. Survive your mistakes Some big-time baseballers, who earn more money while putting on their sox than I do in a week, never make mistakes. It is always the fault of the bat, or the wind, or the ... This is the way they maintain their supreme self-confidence. The only problem with online bridge is that I have to learn new excuses for my play. I cannot use my offline favourites: "sorry partner ... my spade got mixed in with my clubs" or "that woman touched me on the knee, and I completely lost it" or ... :-) Who's at fault? I have only one rule about bridge arguments: I can never win them. I learnt that lesson from my partner at our local club. It took me a while to realize that he just enjoyed the whole argumentative process. I think he learnt that game on his mother's knee.

Jump Bid in Response to a X A top player (tax456), playing West, had a hand like yours recently in a team game. However, instead of 5 to the AQ in diamonds, his was 5 to the AJ in spades. [hv=d=w&v=n&s=saj983h93d754c762]133|100|Scoring: IMP[/hv] The bidding went W ------ N ------ E ------ S P ------ 2H ----- X ------ P 3S ----- P ----- 4S ----- P P ------- P The 2H was weak. Would you have jumped to 3S? I wouldn't have. Don't you need about 9 points for the jump? When his partner tabled his hand, their hands were: ------------------- West -------- East [hv=d=w&v=n&w=saj983h93d754c762&e=st742hakqtda2ck95]266|100|Scoring: IMP[/hv] A heart was led. The ♥A was played from dummy. South's singleton ♥J fell. NS's spades were divided 2-2. Playing the ♠A and another got rid of them. The hearts were used to get rid of two club losers. North held the ♣A. The contract made. I would not have thought to jump. But West can see 3 tricks in his hand: ♠A and two other spades. Agreed? Is that worth a jump?

I went to the English Bridge Union website: http://www.ebu.co.uk/ecpubdefault.asp?page...ching+Materials and downloaded the file "MiniBridge teaching hands.pdf" (156 Kb), located about middle of the list. It is arranged in sets of 4 deals. The 4 directions (WNES) get to play a hand with the same play feature: "high from shortage", "hold-up", etc.. This may be useful for teaching.

#1 What do we know so far? Dummy turns up with 2 top honours, as expected. Declarer has not mentioned any other suits. Possible shapes include 6331, 5431 and 5332. If 6331/5431 + 5 AKQ, partner has a top honour, and 1 trump, left. If 5332 + 6 AKQ, partner has no honours left, but has 2 trumps. Declarer didn't play ♥ AK. Why? Perhaps he has ♥ A K 10 x x and he plans to take a H finesse? Should we let him get to the board and take the losing finesse? Perhaps he has ♥ A x x x x x and he doesn't know our ♥K and ♥Q will fall together, Why is he playing ♠'s? Does he have a singleton spade and is trying to sneak a trick? In that case, should we take our ♠A, or will that give him two tricks in spades instead of one? Does he have 4 spades? If so we can win with our ♠A and play another spade to give partner a ruff. We have to imagine some scenario. I think I would duck mainly on the grounds that, if I play the A, I give declarer 2 spade tricks. (see S. J. Simon "Why You Lose at Bridge") But your question seems to say that you took the ♠A. Well you could try playing ♠10 now, and partner may ruff, and lead back to your ♦A, for another ruff. It is hard to imagine that declarer has any other weaknesses. But if you are going to tell me that declarer went to game on ♠ x ♥ A x x x x x ♦ Q x ♣ A Q J x and that you had to switch to D's, then I am going to burn all my bridge books. Just kidding, I can never even throw away a book, any book, let alone burn it. #2 I think SAYC is the following: Given the shape of your hand, you can assume you have a fit with whatever suit your partner bids. Count your HCP + ( void = 5, singleton = 3, and doubleton = 1). Points --- Bid 13-15 ----- X + no further bidding (let partner set the contract) 16-18 ----- X + bid again (support partner's suit or bid a new suit) 19-20 ----- X + jump in a suit 21+ -------- X + cue bid opp's suit (cue bid may not always be this strong, perhaps you just want to see if p has stoppers) I like to think about winners and losers. 13-15 ---- 7-6 losers ---- 6-7 winners ------- X 16-18 ----- 5 losers ------- 8 winners ---------- X + bid again 19-20 ----- 4 losers ------- 9 winners ---------- X + jump Your hand ♠ --- ♥ A K J 3 2 ♦ K Q 6 5 4 ♣ A T 5 Assume a fit with partner and count 5 points for the void. Points = 17 HCP + 5 = 22 points* Losers = 4 (underlined) Winners = 9 = (5 AKQ + 2 long H + 2 long D) [*22 points seems to overvalue the hand; you are counting 5 points (2 tricks) for your void, which is most applicable if the best contract is clubs and your hand is used for two ruffs; whereas, if you finish in H or D, you would prefer to use partner's trumps for ruffing, and hope to have to take only one ruff in your hand. So you have more like a 20 point hand.] This is a great hand. RHO may have opened on 2 A and a K. Say, ♠ A K x x x x x ♥ x x ♦ A x x ♣ x x You have a slam if partner's clubs are ♣ K Q x x x If you bid 3S, you force partner to bid again. If he has stoppers in S he can bid NT. It is most likely he will just repeat his C. Then you will start bidding your suits. Partner has to cooperate and get to game/slam. About a year ago, with a similar hand to yours, I doubled, then jumped to 3H, promising 19-20 points (4 losers, 9 winners). Partner left me there. He said that he found it rare that people have what they promise when they X and jump. So the next time, I doubled then cue-bid the opponent's suit. That made partner sit up!. That time we got too high. We ended in slam when we should have been in game. Maybe I can only remember when things go wrong! I am sure the bidding worked at other times. :-)

Hand 1 E has 19 points (16 HCP + 3 for singleton) = 6331 hand with 5 top honours (AKQ) W has shown 6-9 points. Say 6 points. = 3 hearts & 2 AKQ So we three players have 3+5+2 =10 AKQ Leaves partner with 2 AKQ. Now partner doesn't have 4 spades. He would have bid 2S. I am going to say he has two spades to the K. I am going to lead away from my ♠A. Hope he puts up his K and returns it and I give him a ruff. Thinking a bit more. Guess trumps are 6322. Maybe p has ♥Kx. His K forces the A and my Q wins. Or maybe he has ♦K and ♠K But with 2245 hand and 2 top honours in support, I think he would bid his long minor at the 3 level (Not Vul). So I stick with my plan to lead away from my ♠A. How much time does one have to think at the table? :-) Hand 2 I have 9 winners. This is the way I count them. 5 top honours (AKQ) 2 small diamonds (small = those left after the suit has been played 3 times) 2 small hearts. [This way of counting winners is the opposite of the Losing Trick Count. I used to count losers. But now I prefer counting winners.] This is a strong hand. I have a pick-up partner. We have no agreements on 2 suited hands. E has 12 points for his opening bid = 4 AKQ (top honours) We two have 4 + 5 = 9 AKQ Our partners have 3 AKQ. If I double and if LHO bids 4S with ♠ K x x x x I could bid 5D. Can partner guess I have ♥'s and ♦'s? If partner has the ♥Q and ♦A we have 11 tricks. (5H + 5D + 1C). Give partner the ♣K and ♦A ; and E the ♥Q and we have 12 tricks! (5H + 5D + 2C) Partner with a 3334 hand and 2 AKQ is going to leave it in 5D. If I want the slam, I am going to have to bid it. So the bidding is X followed by either 5D or 6D. I think I would choose 6D. Maybe that is why I have so few partners lining up to play with me! Thinking again. The first problem is I must tell partner about my two suits! The second problem is "How high to bid". I think I will try this: I overcall 2H (rely on W not to pass with long spades, cross fingers) W goes 4S I bid 6D, Partner can choose between 6D and 6H. If I make slam, I will be accused of voodoo magic. If I miss slam, partner may say "Worth a try". If he gets upset, say nothing, or say "Sry p, hit the wrong button". Or maybe I have to be content with an average board and bid 2H followed by 5D. Let p choose the final contract! 5D/5H/6D/6H. Then when we miss the slam, I can go away and make myself a coffee while p writes me a 20 line message. So that's my final choice: 2H followed by 5D, played in 5D or 5H for an average plus. Hand 3 What has partner got for his 2C bid? He has only shown the ♣A so far. Declarer has a 62?? hand. Say 6322. That's 2-3 diamonds. You expect partner to have the ♦A for his bid. You are dreaming. Ending #1 to dream: You play low, thinking to keep your ♦KJ sitting over the ♦Q. Declarer puts in his ♦10, and partner rains a 1000 curses upon your head. You say "I assumed you had the ♦A for your bid p". P suggests that you "Never assume. Think". You roll your eyes glad that the razor blades are locked away and you cannot remember where the keys are. Ending #2 to dream: You play ♦J. Declarer wins with ♦A. And forces out your K for another ♦ trick. Partner suggests it is better to play low: "Declarer would never guess to put in the 10". You suggest that "He would have put on the ♦10 to force out the ♦K that you had to have for your bid p". P replies that, "He was going to put up the ♦A and finesse the ♦K that I didn't have p". You start kicking your CPU trying to get your computer to crash. Ending #3 to dream: You win a bridge argument .... Wake up: it's never going to happen.

I would like to distinguish between two types of friends. Some possible terms for these two types are in brackets. 1) Those I want to partner (Friends, Partners, ...) 2) Those I want to Kibitz (Top players, Kibitz these, Good, Watch, Kibitz, ...) I find my preferred partners keep getting lost in the long list of top players I like to kibitz. Peter

I set out below some tasks that I have only just learnt and think will be useful to others. I used Help to work things out. 1. Making a Poll If you want to have a poll, click New Poll rather than New Topic. Can you see those two choices at the top right of this page? There is one thing about the poll above (my first) that concerns me. When I preview the post, the poll questions themselves are not shown, just this post. I like to be able to preview everything. Also, at first, the program didn't like my poll questions, it said I needed more than one choice and they had to be on separate lines. Well that was exactly what I had. But I had a line, then a blank line, then another line, another blank line, etc. It didn't like the blank lines. Once they were removed, all was fine. 2. Edit a Post I didn't realize you could edit a post after posting it. But if you look at your post after you have posted it, you will see that there is an edit option at the top. I guess this means that you can even delete it? How long does this option last? Up to a week? Can I also edit/delete poll questions after posting them? [Oops. I have just tried it and it looks like I cannot do this.] 3. Do you want to remain up-to-date on any topics you have posted a reply to? Try this. ________________________________________________________________ Click My Controls (near top of page, middle-right). Click Email Settings (left side of page, near bottom). Tick this check box: [ ] Enable 'Email Notification' by default? Enabling this option will automatically subscribe you to any topic you start or reply to. Click [Amend my email settings] ________________________________________________________________ Hopefully it will work. :-) 4. Help Windows I find the best way to use Help is to open it in a separate window. So for instance, Ctrl-N will open a separate window which is a copy of this window. Use that as your window for reading pages you want instant reference to.

I found the following in Klinger, "Guide to Better Bridge" 1990. I presume it is SAYC. ____ Interference over 1NT _____________________________ Overcall of major at 2-level = powerful 5-suit, strong 6-suit, 9-14 HCP (6.5-7 tricks Not Vul; 7-7.5 tricks Vul) Responses to overcall: raise = invitational new suit = strong & forcing (except if 3rd player doubled the 2-major bid) 2NT = strong + doubleton support ____________________________________________________________ I am going to think about this a bit more. Thanks to those who contributed their systems.

I have always wondered what is meaning of "Luck's a fortune". Now I know! These 3 hands show the opposite: "Unlucky = bankrupt". Here I decided to invite partner to game with a 3H bid. He held in his hand ♠ 10 4 ... ♥ K Q 8 7 3 ... ♦ A K 6 ... ♣ 8 7 He has 6 sure tricks (4H + 2D). I am promising 3 tricks. Now 6 + 3 = 9 tricks, so he passed. We easily made 10. The diamonds, being 4333, gave us 4 tricks. We were not going to miss game this time! I leapt to 4S. Our 2 hands were: West ----------------------------------------East ♠ K 8 4 2 ------------------------------------ ♠ J 9 7 6 5 3 ♥ A 10 8 7 4 -------------------------------- ♥ K 6 3 ♦ 10 4 2 ------------------------------------- ♦ Q 7 ♣ 10 ----------------------------------------- ♣ K 5 How many losers do we have? The opponents took their ♣A and ♦AK on the first 3 tricks. North held ♠AQ so that hurt. We also lost a heart. We lost 6 tricks in total. But my brain was in denial: it refused to count that high. Luck's a fortune. Unlucky = bankrupt. Thank goodness, our opponents didn't double us. South, from Mexico, spent a long time over his bid. I began to wonder if maybe a Tsunami wave had just hit Mexico. Finally a bid appeared: 4S. Sitting West I held ♠ 7 5 3 ♥ A K J ♦ A Q 10 4 ♣ K 10 6 I have a long memory. I remembered that, on the previous board, the opponents had not doubled us. I felt no urge to repay the favour. They were big boys now: let them take their medicine. I doubled 4S. I won the ♥A and ♥K. Declarer won the ♥Q. These were declarer's and dummy's hands: North -(declarer)--- ♠ A J 10 9 6 ----- ♥ Q 10 4 ------ ♦ J 8 2 ---- ♣ 3 South (dummy) ---- ♠ K Q 8 4 2 ------- ♥ 9 7 5 -------- ♦ void ---- ♣ A Q J 7 4 Can you see how declarer won the rest of the tricks? He won the ♣A and did a high cross-ruff. Result: 4SX (+1) 690 points. Luck's a fortune. Results from the other tables Hand 28 At the other tables, only 1 out of 16 tables bid to 4H. So the invite looks like the right bid. It was just lucky to make 4. Result: 0 imps. Hand 31 Still not sure if the correct bid was to invite, or to jump to game. Did my partner have his 2S bid? The results from the other tables: Contract ----- Result ------ Number of tables (out of 16) 4SE -------------- -2, -3 ----- 5/16 5CN -------------- -1, -2 ----- 4/16 Oh, to have opponents who will make a sacrifice bid over our losing contract. Oh, to be so lucky. Result :-1 imp. Hand 32 No NS pair felt that their hands were worth a slam. Great men think alike. I broke "the rule" that it is nearly always wrong to double a non-vulnerable game contract at IMPS. Bad, bad, bad bid. At the other tables, there were two chumps like me who doubled the winning 4S contract. Fools seldom differ, and bad luck follows as close as their shadows. Result: -9 imps. The moral of the story OK, OK, maybe it was not all a question of good or bad luck, maybe there were other factors. But sometimes you have to tell yourself "I was so unlucky" just to give yourself the strength to get out of bed. Then in the clear light of day, you can look at your wounds more closely, give them a little lick, and see if there is some way to avoid the sword in the future. Peter

I have now checked what happened on other tables with these hands. If I get a number of replies here, I can write a comparison with what players actually decided in the heat of the battle. I will post this soon. If you just write a short reply saying what you would bid in the 3 cases that's fine. But I would also like to know what the SAYC system is. ***** SAYC ************************************************* After 1NT (15-17) opening, followed by overcall of major (2H or 2S) support of overcalled major = ? game support of overcalled major = ? 2NT = ? new suit = ? what do we need to think "slam time? ************************************************************* Thanks, Peter