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Irwin Boris, always a fine analyst, has an excellent hand for us to review this week.
Words to live by: when you think you have found a solution to your defense, give the hand another moment of thought. It may make the difference between success, failure - and a bunch of IMPS!
For those who were among the thousands who logged onto BridgeBase for the finals of the Vanderbilt, you know just how thrilling that match was.
For the rest of us - and for those who would like to review the excitement that they watched - Mike Cassel has kindly written up some of the more fascinating hands from the last day of St. Louis' most prestigious event.
Our thanks to Mike for his analysis, and to the Auken and Prooijen teams for their spectacular play. Special congratulations, too, to the Auken team for an amazing win playing four-handed and besting so many exceptional teams!
While shooting some events in St. Louis, two gentlemen excitedly came up to me. They'd made it to the semi-finals of a Bracket III knock-out in St. Louis. With the points that they'd earned, Charles Frisch of St. Louis Park entered into the realm of Life Master.
Please join me in congratulation Charles - and wishing him the best in his many competitions to come!
The last board of a NABC event. Most are tired; some a bit irritable. A few know they are in the hunt; their senses are heightened and every trick matters tremendously.
John Koch, one of Minnesota's finest, faced this hand as his last in St. Louis. All of us would do well to read why John played as he did - and likely got a whole pile of matchpoints on his last hand of the Silver Ribbon Pairs.
Well done, John!
A new NABC event is underway in St. Louis - the 0-10,000 Swiss. As I am sure all know, there are some most talented players out there who for various reasons have not built up a gigantic tally of masterpoints. After Day One of qualification, they are competing in this new team event.
Lots of Minnesotans made it through - including the team of Bob Balderson, Kurt Schaeffer, Tom Holzer and Rick Ekstrom, whose score put them in 2nd place with lots of carryover. Also competing are these teams:
Mike Cassel, Barry Purrington, John Koch and Terry Beckman
Tony Ames, Judy Nassar, Bruce Boje and Terry Lijewski
Peg Waller, Ron DeHarpporte, Jay Baum and Kathy Baum
Grant Broadwine, Ann Van Ryn, Pat Burrows, Carol Cummings
Needless to say, we wish them all the best of luck in the virgin voyage of 0-10K Swiss!
Do you have a friend who doesn't know how to play bridge - but who wishes they could enjoy it as you do? Here is a marvelous opportunity for them!
On May 20th, at the Thunderbird Hotel, nationally known educator and top level player Patty Tucker will be presenting her "Learn Bridge in a Day" seminar. Five hours - and the tools to start playing!
Please check out the flyer below. Let all your friends know you can learn bridge rapidly and begin to have as much fun as we do!
The Spring NABC in St. Louis is now underway! Day One of the North American Pairs has concluded. The 28 pairs of qualifiers will duke it out in two sessions to see who rises to the top.
Alas. In District 14, two of our three pairs didn't make the big cut. Bob Balderson and Kurt Schaeffer, and Bill Kent and Peg Kaplan needed a bit more.
Nevertheless, our third qualifiers at the District level, Terry Beckman and John Koch, will be vying for a win today. Good luck to T & John!
As anyone who has played bridge for more than a brief moment realizes - bridge is an imperfect game. Although we do our best to learn and improve, error-free bridge is impossible.
Slam bidding can be particularly tough. First - as slams are infrequent occurrences, most of us aren't as familiar with all the intricacies of slam auctions as we are part scores and games. Second - slams can lead to larger swings. Calculating the location of a mere jack can mean a swing of 26 IMPS!
Sometimes, however, power leads us to slam. Our dummy can be excellent - or our values in all the wrong spaces and places. In today's column, John Koch delivers a hand where dummy is not the dummy of our dreams. Yet, with a bit of imagination, calculation of odds and weighing of the information we receive as the hand progresses - success can be ours. Let John explain how to achieve those extra chances.
Spring may be coming. Yet, if you look out your front door this morning, your view will resemble mid December more than the cusp of spring! Nevertheless, this past weekend bridge players from the Twin Cities and beyond enjoyed three days of competition at the Twin Cities Bridge Center - knowing that springtime will arrive, despite today's huge snowfall!
Thanks to Director in Charge Mike Flader, along with indispensible Larry Oakey, Teri Blu, volunteers and all of you who made the tournament so fun!
Congratulations to Paul Meerschaert, whose over 18 masterpoints headed the leaderboard - with Joe Rice close behind at 16.49. The full list and results from each event are here.
For shots of the weekend - please see below!