Linda Lee — My personal bridge blog

Macho Bridge Match

Isabelle and I played against Jeff Smith and Nick L’Ecuyer on BBO the other night.  The match was very exciting with lots of bidding and I confess that I did my share. The match started off relatively quietly with this hand:  You Isabelle hold Q7 KQ965 K102 KJ4.  Here is the bidding:

Nick Isabelle Jeff Linda
  1H Pass 1NT (F)
Pass 2C * DBL 2S*
3S Pass Pass Dbl
Pass ?    

Isabelle opened 1H and bid 2C over the forcing notrump.  Jeff bid doubled showing the other two suits and values and I showed a big club raise with 2S.  Nick (Macho 1) bid 3S with S J9852 H J10 D 86 C Q1053 and I balanced double (Macho 2) with S A10 H 74 D QJ97 C A9876 .  3S would have gone down 1 or 2 but Isabelle who had not yet moved to macho mode pulled to 4C  which makes despite the bad spade break

By Board 4 we were ready for more action.  Here is my hand sitting South all vulnerable S A1076 H 8 DJ102 C AKJ102.  You hear this auction

 

Nick Isabelle Jeff Linda
Pass Pass Pass 1C
1H 1S* 2S ?

1S promised only four spades and presumably 2S showed a good hand for hearts.  What do you bid?  Remember is this is macho night.

Yes of course I bid 4S and Isabelle was able to make it by guessing spades and clubs.  (Jeff had the spade Queen).  Here is her hand

S KJ54 H K4 D Q86 C 7643

But the night was still young.  Nick and Jeff won big on the next board by bidding the hand sensibly and getting to the right game.  But the competitive action started again on Board 6.  Nick held a good minor 2 suiter

S 109 H void D AKQJ2 C K105432

Nick Isabelle Jeff Linda
    1S 3H
4D 4H DBL Pass
?      

 

Nick had to bid 5C I think.  Isabelle doubled and then doubled 5D.  I had been having another macho moment when I bid 3H with S 8 H J976432 D 843 C Q8 (hey I was NV vs V).  The play and defence was not perfect, especially mine and we could have had 800 at one stage but settled for 200 still a good result.

The guys had their revenge on Board 10 where their aggressive tactics paid off when we opened 1NT 12-14 all red and had no good place to land safely.

All was quiet until Board 14.  In first chair with noone VUL Jeff held S 8 H K D 1087 C KQJ97532.  What do you open?  What do you think Jeff opened? 

Jeff made the macho bid of 5C and heard partner bid 6C.  But no worries partner had a 22 count in aces and kings and being off the diamond ace with no way to check for it made the good bid of 6C.  This was a very economical auction although most of the field did get to slam,  You may not believe this but this did actually continue like this for 19 boards. 

I give you one more hand and you can tell me if you think I was TOO MACHO: something that was mentioned at the table (along the lines of "you are crazy").  White on red you hold in fourth chair S 106 H K97532 D AJ96 C 6.  Jeff opens 2NT in third chair and I bid 3H.  This was doubled and went down 2 when Isabelle had a few useful cards.  This did not compensate the boys for their game in either notrump or spades.  Okay you get to chose…. is it DEAL or NO DEAL.

All is all it was a lot of fun with each side holding their own.  I will not let my macho run away with me next time, promise guys.

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