Badness and Goodness and The Contest continued

Today I went downstairs with big plans for blogging and working. I turned on my computer. Well I tried. Something had fried. The computer has to go to the doctor and the doctor is not in on Sundays. So here I am on my portable without most of my files feeling rather sorry for myself. General badnsss.

On the good side Colin and I spent the afternoon bidding some hands Colin had from a coaching session. I thought we did pretty well except it is clear I will have to spend a few more days memorizing some of the less used parts of our system. Forcing clubs systems seem to work best when you have limited your hand and you can then bid hard.

Playing four card majors can some times make it a bit more difficult in competition but we seem to do okay. Colin pulled off one incredible bid. Here is what happened:

I had ♠ AKxx ♥ AKxx ♦ AKxx ♣ A

24 high card points.

I opened a club and it went three clubs on my left. Colin said double showing 6-8 points and I said four clubs. Coln bid four diamonds. I knew Colin didn’t have a cue bid and I figured that if he was pretty likely to hold five diamonds. Slam look very likely so I checked for the diamond queen by starting with keycard. Colin bid five diamonds, none of course and I bid five hearts the queen ask. Colin bid 5NT which I thought meant I have the queen and no kings (I knew that) but I have a maximum. He had to have some filling queens so I bid seven diamonds. Now you might think this is the end of the auction but now Colin bid seven hearts.

 

West	North	East	South
1♣*	3♣	dbl*	pass
4♣	pass	4♦	pass
4NT	pass	5♦	pass
5♥	pass	5NT	pass
7♦	pass	7♥?!!

 

You figure it out. After a lot of swearing this is what I got to. Colin has hearts or hearts and spades and he never meant to play diamonds. But why did he bid diamonds then? Well if he had hearts I was happy and if he had both majors I had no reason to pick spades over hearts so I passed.

The rotter had S QJxx H Qxxx D QJ C xxx. As you can see spades is better but it is impossible for me to tell. When I asked him why he started with four diamonds he said he had no way of telling which major was better and he always planned to play a major. I guess he would bid five hearts over five diamonds.

This all tells me that it is going to be a hot time in Washington with lots of hands to report from my sessions with Colin. Ray made a great dinner for us which included some wonderful fruit wine we bought in Penticton. General goodness.

The nominees for the Master Point Press IBPA book of the year award have been announced and most of them look like very good choices. It will be a tough year to pick the winner. (I don’t get a vote). Still my personal favorite book is the Frank Vine book, North of the Master Solver’s Club and I am definitely rooting for it. If you want a laugh you have to read it. The Setting Trick by Australian Ian McKann was the other book of ours that was nomintated and it is also a very good book although Ian is much better known is Australia and Aussie bridge player will tell you he is one of the best. More about the award when my computer returns.

You may recall that my personal top picks for the seniors are:

Belgium

Sweden

Turkey

Canada

USA I

USA 2

Indonesia

Australia

So now I will pick the final fab four. I am picking USA1, Canada, Australia and Turkey. I think USAI will meet Canada in the final (wouldn’t that be nice) and USA 1 will win.

Send in your entry for the competition. How else can you get a gift certificate for a bridge ebook for free and a chance for a prize.

Send it to eric@masterpointpress.com

Eric, our intern loves getting email.