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Nickell vs Clayton


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Well we lost. The 2nd half was a lot closer - they only beat us by 9 the last 32. We won the 3rd segment in spite of me blanking on a lead against a slam looking at ak tight. Really happened.

 

Arend and Han played fantastic and they were great teammates. I hope we can play again.

 

Zia's team lost to my friend David Chechelashvili's team.

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I am still on adrenaline overdose, this is the first time I play in a serious event, we get to play Hamway for the 1st set and Meckwell for the next 3, and we don't look bad...

Probably some of us will post some hands later this week when I am back home, but here is one hand for a start:

Bidding goes (I think we were unfavourable, will check later):

1S by Meckstroth, P P X by me

2D 2S X (by Rodwell)

I ask about the double, Meckstroth explains it shows preference for a spade lead over diamond, but doesnt promise a spade honor - quite an impressive agreement for such an everyday auction, and indeed Rodwell had xxx of spades and xx of diamonds. Anyway, the contract to be in is maybe 3N by me with my spade QJ "stopper", but after Rodwell doubled AND I asked about the double, I am pretty sure there was no way Meckstroth would lead anything but a high spade from AKTxx...

(But they make mistakes, too.)

 

Was great fun playing with Phil and Brian, don't miss to meet Phil when you get the chance on a tournament...

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No results from 1/64 round. It seems usual ACBL precedure

The results are in the Wednesday Bulletin -- at least the remaining teams are listed with the match-ups.

 

Wednesday's matches are also listed under the Wednesday results link. looks like someone put it in the wrong place.

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No results from 1/64 round. It seems usual ACBL precedure

The results are in the Wednesday Bulletin -- at least the remaining teams are listed with the match-ups.

Match-ups for the Round of 32 yes, but would it not be a natural thing to list the results of the previous round too? Like ....

 

Nickell vs Clayton ??? - ???

etc.

etc.

 

My point is that the bulletin has zillions of results from all kinds of side events every day (most of which are impossible to read with a normal vision), so why not results from the most prestigious of all tournaments?

 

Roland

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My point is that the bulletin has zillions of results from all kinds of side events every day (most of which are impossible to read with a normal vision), so why not results from the most prestigious of all tournaments?

They don't list the losers in the zillions of side events, either.

 

I imagine as soon as the Spingold progresses to the point where the losers win masterpoints for their overall placement, the results (winners and losers) will be reported.

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You guys are all a credit to the game. Congratulations on your success and sympathy for your eventual loss. There are many of us reading this who can only hope to someday approach such accomplishment.

 

I'll look forward to seeing some hands from the match.

 

Ken

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I enjoyed the tournament so much, I was sad to fly home yesterday. It was great fun to meet or re-meet so many of you forum-posters: Double !, keylime, jlall, elianna, awm, jdonn, pclayton, barmar, fred, sheri, uday, joshs, cherdano and whoever I forget [edit: I forgot jchiu, sorry!].

 

My previous tournament was already a year ago, and for Arend it really was his first big tournament. We have practiced a lot on BBO though, and we were eager to see if we would be able to play as well as we thought we could.

 

I arrived on Thursday evening and immediately had a big disappointment: my LMP partner forgot that we would also play with him in the Spingold. He was going to play in the Senior Swiss instead, good start of the tournament!

 

Arend would arrive on Saturday and would also be very disappointed, we were looking forward to this event so much. Fortunately the next day I met Phil, and it turned out that he and his partner would be able to play with us in the Spingold. Such luck! Not only did Phil and Brian get a great result in the Mini-LMP, they also had fewer masterpoints than my original teammates so if we would get through day one then we might play You-Know-Who!

 

On Sunday I told Arend that I wouldn't be surprised if he wouldn't be able to play his best game right away. Unfortunately that came true, he played quite poorly in the first set. The second set he played a lot better, though still not as well as I thought he could. In the break we went to a nice restaurant with Brian, Phil and Justin. I don't know what Justin said to him but in the evening Arend played just great, and he continued to do that the next day against Nickell.

 

The next morning many people told us to enjoy the experience against Nickell (except for awm who thought we got a lucky draw!). I know that this was all meant well but after a while it started to piss me off. We were playing good bridge, we should be trying to win! Well, I don't think we really believed that we could win, and of course we lost. I wasn't even disappointed. Maybe we could have played better otherwise, I hope that we will get another try.

 

The day after Arend and I played in a one-day knock-out event with the icelandic pair that beat us in the Spingold round-of-four. As Arend and I have almost no masterpoints we got to play in bracket 4 which turned out to be much to low. When is the ACBL going to figure out a way to bracket based on how good you are, instead of how many masterpoints you have? This wasn't much fun for us (although our drunk Icelandic teammates were very happy!) but it also wasn't much fun for some of the LOL's we got to play (not counting Uday's team of course!).

 

Anyway, it was wonderful tournament. I have lots of hands but I will start new threads.

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Yeah, I was a little star struck playing Nickell. So was Brian.

 

What I now realize later is if we would have played our normal solid game, the match would have been a lot closer. Combine that with a little luck, and we would have pulled this off.

 

The Nickell team actually gave up a lot more than you would think.

 

I guarantee you, the next time I come into a match like this, I will have a completely different perspective.

 

Hamman did tell me later that he's never lost a 1st round matchup since 1961.

 

And he hasn't always been the top seed either.

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It was a blast to meet both Han and Arend - it was one of the main highlights that I will take from this NABC. They both are truly outstanding gentlemen and players.
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A friend of mine has played against Meckwell about 4 times in the last month, most often at the Bethesda Maryland regional. His team one once but lost the other three times, most recently in the round of 4 of the GNT at Nashville.

 

When I spoke with him in Bethesda, he told me how impressed he was with their play. His best comment was "the only time they touched a wrong card was on their way to the right card!"

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