Bridge Week … It should be more

May 31st, 2011  ~  linda  ~  5 Comments 

I am not complaining about the organizers.  Dick and Jan Anderson worked like dogs.  All the volunteers worked hard and were wonderful friendly people.  I felt I made new friends when I chatted with them.

But it just wasn’t enough.  Now here I am talking about the social aspects of Bridge Week.  We definitely had enough boards to play.  Let me start by saying the tournament itself was run efficiently.  The directors were great.  The organizers were willing to change the schedule when requested by all the women’s teams.  So far so good.

I know that there was no money.  I contributed to a raffle to help make money to pay for the hospitality even though I couldn’t take home the prize!  But here is what was missing:

No coffee in the playing area (once in desperation I bought coffee myself for everyone in both rooms during the finals of the Women’s event and semifinals of the Open).  Not only was there no coffee in the playing area but you would have had to go down four floors to the main floor Starbucks to get a coffee while playing.   When you are playing that many boards without a break that is just not good enough.

The hospitality bag was put together with love and I am sure the booklet with the schedule was useful.  That was about it.  Even a printed sheet with a list of restaurants in the area would be nice.

The hospitality room was too small to contain everyone and at times it was very crowded. In the morning they had bananas and muffins and coffee which was okay.There was food after sessions but it was hard for somebody (like me) who couldn’t really tolerate chicken wings or pizza or various junk food.  Beer and wine was available at $2.00 a pop although your first two were free (tickets in the hospitality bag).

Results were posted and there were hand records but there was no newsletter or any other reporting.  Since the “hotel” didn’t have a bar there was no really good place to all get together.  I missed that.

I know this sounds like I am a whiner.  But really I think things could be better.  I am proud of all the terrific bridge players from Regina who helped out.  They were very nice.  But maybe this event needs sponsorship if it is to go to a small bridge center.  If Regina can’t raise money then maybe it would be best to hold the event elsewhere.  I am certain that the small size of the field was partly a result of the location.  It was very expensive to go and play.  And it wasn’t an attractive destination.  While it did draw one or two players from the area especially in secondary events it wasn’t enough to make up the difference.

There should be guidelines which set minimum standards for Bridge Week.  Organizing committees should understand that they will have to find some money.

But believe me I don’t blame Regina.  You were all wonderful friendly people and I know how hard you all worked.

The Last Segment of The Canadian Team Trial (CNTC)

May 30th, 2011  ~  linda  ~  No Comments 

The Raymer team and the Hughes team were never very far apart during the entire 128 board final.  Starting the last 32 boards the score was Rayner 193 and Hughes 192.  The seesaw battle continued for a while with this win for Hughes on Board 4.

See how you would handle the auction after West opened 1♠ with everybody vulnerable.  What bid do you like with the North hand held by Doug Baxter and Dave Turner.

The choices seem to be double, bid 2♦ or pass.  With modest diamond spots and some support for all the suits both North’s doubled.   East continued with 4♠ so it is now up to South.

Roy Hughes bid 5♦ and David Lindop doubled 4♠ .  As it turned out Roy won the pot when neither East nor West could find a double.  If Roy guesses clubs (and he might have after a double) he is only one down.  At the table he went two down when he played the first club from dummy instead of towards dummy and lost to the stiff ace setting up an extra club trick for the defense.

Unfortunately for Rayner 4♠ doubled was cold, off a diamond (split 3-1) a heart and a trump.  Hughes had regained the lead 196-203.  But in the very next board …

East, Maksymetz taking advantage of favorable vulnerability opened a Marty Bergen style weak two.

Dealer: North Vul: N-S	North ♠ J54 ♥ 9 ♦ AJ954 ♣ Q874
West ♠ KQ2 ♥ 8 ♦ KQ8732 ♣ K62		East ♠ 98763 ♥ K7542 ♦ – ♣ 1095
	South ♠ A10 ♥ AQJ1063 ♦ 106 ♣ AJ3

Lindop, South overcalled 3H and West, Marcinski “hanged: his partner actually expecting him to have something resembling a weak two bid.  Baxter doubled and this went down 3 for -500.  If there is a vulnerable game North South then this would be fine.  At the other table Hughes was in 3NT.  On the lead of the ♠ Q.  Things seemed to hum along but inexplicably Hughes erred when he miscounted the club suit.  Nobody knows more than me how this can happen when you are so very tired.  Had he made 3NT then his team would have won 3 imps.  But because he went down they lost 12 instead putting Rayner in the lead by 11.  Nevertheless they regained form and were able to win a few more imps and regain the lead.

Then came Board 13 both pairs played 3NT.  It should be made.  The Rayner team made it  and the Hughes team didn’t: 13 again.  Hughes fought back hard and by board 31 the deficit was only 3 imps.  Board 32 was one of those partscores that could have gone either way.  It wasn’t an important board but it might have been enough if things had gone Hughes way.

Dealer: Vul:	North ♠ J102 ♥ K108 ♦ A94 ♣ Q1093
West ♠ Q974 ♥ 9765 ♦ 10 ♣ A842		East ♠ 8 ♥ AJ3 ♦ KJ876 ♣ KJ76
	South ♠ AK653 ♥ Q42 ♦ Q532 ♣ 5

In the Open Room, East opened a nebulous and limited diamond.  After that North-South ended in 2♠ .  Marcinski was on lead.  He had to decide whether to try for a ruff or some kind of forcing game.  The advantage of leading a diamond is that it can’t pick anything up really.  Unfortunately for the defense a heart lead picked up the heart suit holding the defense to one heart trick.  After the lead the defense was toast -110.  In the Closed Room  where East had opened a more “real” diamond Turner declared 1NT.  East lead a diamond.  It can be made but I admit you pretty well need to see all the hands.  To start with it you have to rise on the ♦ Q.  Without that you will inevitably lose a diamond, four clubs, a heart and a spade.  It is not a mistake to win the ♦ A in hand; after all East might easily have the Q10 and you do want to be in hand for a spade play.  But on the hand it doesn’t work.  So there was just a small window for both tables to do the thing that worked (I won’t say the right thing) and defeat 2♠ and make 1NT and that (assuming the scores were right) would have given Hughes a 1 imp victory.  That’s how close this match was.

At times they made what must have been “tired plays”.   But both teams played well and fought it out to the end, never giving up.    That speaks well for all of them considering the incredibly grueling event they had played.

Retiring … Why?

May 30th, 2011  ~  linda  ~  2 Comments 

I wanted to write about why I decided to retire.  When I was in Regina I was completely totally exhausted.  Have you every tried to play all 72 boards of a final when you are so tired that you can’t sort your cards or count to 13?  I knew the night before that I was completely exhausted.  I talked to Ray and told him that there was no way I could play a normal game (never mind my best one).  The first set I played in the final my brain was simply not there.

I couldn’t remember what conventions we played when asked.  I missorted my hand.  I miscounted my points.  I suppose some people can play, at least decently, when tired.  I cannot.  When I am exhausted my brain leaves my body.  I think Regina was one of the worst cases of exhaustion for me ever.  It wasn’t till today that I felt normal.  The last three days I slept a lot and I did basically nothing.

So then you think well perhaps if I played on a 6 person team I could still play in events like this.  It certainly would be better.

The biggest problem I have is performance anxiety.  This is those bad feelings you get when you are preparing to play in something important.  I have a bad case of this all the time.  It can strike even when I plan to play in a regional.  Avoidance is perhaps not the best strategy but I use it a lot.  I have tried my techniques and I have a routine when I play that helps.  When I don’t know the system well it is much much worse.  It also means I can’t sleep when I am playing in a multi-day event, I can’t eat properly (I basically live on juice most of the time).  And quite often I get sick.  I have been sick in every world championship I have played in.

I have often questioned whether it is worth it to go through all of that.  As I get older my body is less able to handle these problems.  I have talked to sports psychologists and I do have some techniques to help.  But every time I play in something important I ask myself “is it worth it?”

One of the reasons I like to play is I like being part of a team.  I liked the camaraderie.  But I have found that some of the serious teams I have been on lacked that.  Everybody was so focused on winning that they really weren’t too concerned about socializing especially during the event.  This is probably the way it should be.  But it took away some of the pleasure for me.  I know that in future if I play on teams in less serious competition that will be part of the joy.

My memory is not as good as it used to be and needs to be.  I know I am not the only one with this problem.  I talked to others who told me they had the same problem.  I played a fairly complex system with most of it new and unfamiliar to me and without a lot of time to integrate it.  I tried hard to memorize many sequences, a lot of them not consistent.  I created cute ways to memorize things.  But still several times I just blanked out.  I couldn’t remember some parts at all.  My mind just “blanked out”.  Once I just bailed by jumping to game in our suit.  I am not capable of managing this even without stress.  I was worried about it before I left for the Regina.

The worst thing is that under stress I lose spot cards.  Is my 7 really high?  What spot card did partner play?  It is much more work to count out hands.  My brain doesn’t work as fast as it once did.  All these things are magnified when I am tired.

I need a partner at the table who is calm and helps me to stay calm, a Joan Eaton.  But this does not always work out.

Could I still play well?  With a very calm friendly partner, some sleeping pills, a helpful husband near by and a six person team it would be a lot better.   I wouldn’t want to have huge number of system notes and I would want a familiar system.   But then I would have to want to play.  I am not sure that I will find that motivation again.

Why did I want to share these personal things with you?  Because some of you may have the some of these issues too.  If any of you want to discuss some of these issues privately then email me at linda@masterpointpress.com.

Eric Rodwell … bridge champion and now bridge author

May 30th, 2011  ~  linda  ~  4 Comments 

I have had the pleasure of reading some of the drafts of Eric Rodwell’s upcoming book, the Rodwell Files.  This book was considered for the book of the year even before it was complete.  And why not?

The book started from some files that were circulated among Rodwell’s friends in the 1980’s.  My son Colin had a copy of these notes which he shared with me.  They were notes in point form but they contained a lot of great stuff.  Ray and I have wanted to develop a book based on these notes ever since.  Because the notes were not to be shared and were secret Ray and I always referred to them as the X-files.  Later on Mark Horton, author and publisher of BRIDGE Magazine, heard about the X-files.  He too was anxious to see these notes developed into a book.

Finally after many years Eric Rodwell was ready to “share his secrets”.  Working with Mark Horton with a lot of assistance from Ray (the world’s best editor, IMHO) they expanded the notes into a wonderful book.  The book contains many brilliant examples.  As Eric was playing in events he always seem to come back with new hands.  After a Regional, a Nationals hands would arrive that Eric had played and analyzed.

Why is this book revolutionary?  It has been a long time since much new has been written on card play, both declarer play and defense.  But this book has so many new ideas.  Eric believes in terminology.  You have to name things so that you can know them and recognize them.  (Some of the names of the plays had to be changed to protect underage bridge players though).   While the book is certainly at an expert level (Eric pulls no punches) I think a lot of the ideas will be useful for teachers.  I especially liked the section on making a plan that has some ideas that can easily be adopted for beginners.

I believe that in a few years we will all be talking about the speed of light play and many of Eric’s other wonderful ideas but for many of us the structured and comprehensive approach to planning the play initially will be just as important.

This is a magnum opus from one of the world’s greatest bridge players and bridge thinkers.  It was an honor to have a chance to read some of the early drafts.  I congratulate all who were involved.  At Master Point Press we publish bridge books at all levels and all types.  We care about each and every one of them.  But for us too this is a magnum opus.  We recognize this as one of our greatest projects.  It probably won’t be the biggest money maker (that honor will likely belong to 25 Bridge Conventions You Should Know).  But it will be one of the books we treasure the most.

It is going to press in the next few days.  It should be available online fairly soon.

New Rules for playing in Canadian team trials … need some thought

May 29th, 2011  ~  linda  ~  No Comments 

The CBF announced a new rule for those who wished to play in the Canadian team trials with the goal of representing Canada. I believe starting in 2013 (but I am not sure) you will have to have been a continuous member of the Canadian Bridge Federation for the past two years.

The Canadian Bridge Federation has one major functions and attempts some others as well. Like the USBF it selects teams to represent Canada in international play and attempts to provide at least some funding for these teams. It also tries to act as a national bridge organization providing Canada specific functions (in parallel and in addition to the ACBL). Functions include allocating charitable funds, providing a Canadian magazine, Bridge Canada (now online), encourage junior bridge and so on.

The CBF receives the money it needs to fulfill these functions by running tournaments to fund international teams.  The actual team trials themselves are used to raise money for this purpose with significant surcharges to the fees players pay.  Money raised for these purposes must be used to actually fund the teams.  In addition there is a CBF membership of a mere $12.  Long ago most Canadian ACBL members were also CBF members.  Today the percentage is quite low … so very few $12 fees are collected.  The CBF has always been short of money and this problem continues and has grown.  Why don’t most Canadians pay the fees.  For right or wrong they don’t think the CBF has anything to do with them.  I suspect most of them see it as an organization that functions for a small number of elite players.

You can imagine that this has created a problem.  One answer came from the board of directors meeting in Regina.  They decided that players would be ineligible to play on Canadian teams if they had not been continuous CBF members, I believe for two years, before the trials.  In the past if you entered you did have to join the CBF but that could be done a few weeks before you played.  It seems reasonable that players who plan to play in the trials should pay to belong to the CBF.  I imagine the board thought so when they passed this motion.

The problem is that it is a retroactive fee.  Let me talk from a women’s point of view.  There were only eight teams entered in the women’s trials.  Some came not expecting to have much chance but for the opportunity of playing.  All of the teams had only four players.  Why?  Because at least in the case of the teams I talked to they couldn’t find another pair!  It is expensive to go to Regina, stay in a hotel and pay the high card fees.  And there are relatively few serious women bridge players in Canada.  In fact, among the entries there were only a very few who were much under sixty.  Pretty well the entire field would have qualified for the seniors event.

So how do these two things relate.  Imagine that you are trying to encourage some young players to come out and play in the trials.  You want to get them excited about playing internationally.   Apparently, when I asked Nadar Hanna they can play, they can win but they will not be allowed to collect the prize money or represent Canada because these young ladies didn’t think about joining the CBF two years earlier.  I am not sure what happens to the team.  If only two or three players were “eligible” perhaps they ask the second place team to go instead, or maybe the third or fourth place team.

I talked to a number of women who “came” back to bridge after they had been away to raise their children.  I was one of them.  I got back into playing when the trials were near by in St. Catherines and a friend asked me to play.  We won.  I hadn’t been an ACBL or CBF member for years.

There is an exemption I believe for people who have NEVER been CBF members.  I am not sure.

In any case the inevitable consequence is that fewer people will be eligible.  Fewer teams will form, especially the spontaneous ones.  Less money will be raised to support the teams that do go.  This will be true in the open too but at least there are a reasonable number of mostly six player competitive teams already playing.  I won’t discuss whether this is the way to pick the best team to represent Canada but I will say that if a team enters and wins and is not allowed to go for this reason I wonder what those players and all Canadian players will think.  It is probably not important because they just won’t enter.

I would like to urge the Board of the CBF to change the rules for women.  If a women has not competed in the team trials for a period of time (perhaps 3 years) then exempt them.  We need them in the field.  Players who always play will know they have to play their fees.

I believe that serious players and all Canadians should pay the $12.  When I heard about this rule I was angry and since I am “retiring” I planned to not pay.  But as I am calmer now I think Canada needs a strong CBF.  Whether you planning to play in the trials or not you should pay.  But lets not create obstacle for women who stopped to raise children as I did or haven’t recently thought about playing internationally from participating.  In Canada we used to have a body that encouraged people to play sports called Participation … we need to think that way in serious competitive bridge too.    And ladies if you want to be on a team and can’t find one talk to Jan Anderson.  (I hope you don’t mind me volunteering you Jan).  You can talk to me too and I will try to help if I can.

Comments from all are welcome.

An Epic Battle Ends as Rayner wins the CNTC (barely)

May 29th, 2011  ~  linda  ~  No Comments 

After a long round robin, after a quarterfinal knockout and a semifinal knockout and 128 board final we come to board 126 with the score Rayner 254 and Hughes 245. 9 imps and 3 boards. After a match with so many imps flying would Hughes with 3 boards to go be able to find 10 more. Now from my own experience it is not as if the players know the score. There is no way that either Rayner nor Hughes could even know who was leading but they did all know it was close. Scoreboard watching is for the spectators. Board 126 did offer a chance for a small pickup when Roche opened a weak notrump and ended doubled in two spades. -300. In the Open Room where East opened 1D 2H was not doubled and escaped for 1 down. Perhaps one of the downsides of weak notrump is that this is more likely at imps. (At matchpoints doubling is more common). 6 imps. The deficit was now 3 imps. Board 127 was a flat board in 3NT. One more chance for Hughes. Once Lindop and Baxter got to 2S a plus there was no chance for 3 imps. As it was Turner chose the worst of the two possible partscores, 1NT and went down 1.

Imagine playing all that bridge for so many days, four handed and lose in the end by so little. My congratulations have to go to both teams, to Hughes (Roy Hughes, David Turner, Zygmunt Marcinsky and Bryan Maksymetz

) for putting up such an incredible fight and demonstrating great stamina and determination and to the victorious Rayner team (John Rayner, Michael Roche, David Lindop, Doug Baxter, Mike Hargreaves and Jim McAvoy) who will now be heading to the Netherlands (assuming they defeat Mexico in the playoff).

Joan and Karen … winners

May 28th, 2011  ~  linda  ~  No Comments 

I want to relate an incident that occurred early in the Canadian Womens Team Trial final. We were playing a signficant hand and Karen made a mistake (I personally have the record for those in the final.) Do you know what Joan did? She did absolutely nothing. She just picked up her cards, wrote down the score and got ready to play the next hand. Things proceeded as if nothing had happened.

Joan Eaton is a terrific partner and so is Karen Cumpstone. Karen seems to me to more easy-going and Joan more competitive. But each of them values their partnership and understands the need that taking care of your partner is the way to get the best game from them. Besides it makes the whole thing more fun.

I believe that the Eaton-Cumpstone partnership was greater than the sum of its parts because of how they behaved towards each other. Being able to overcome adversity.

Here is my advice to others. Some of it based on watching Joan and Karen and some of it based on years of doing things wrong!

Don’t talk to partner at the table

Don’t criticize partner or put down your partner.

Don’t try to prove your right.

If you have system confusion don’t discuss it (there may be very rare exceptions to confirm something)

Don’t think about hands that are done and don’t analyze them.

Do be calm.

If partner is upset suggest a break or even make a joke.

Let your partner know that you think they are terrific. Saying bravo when partner plays a hand very well is just fine.

Outside the session:

Don’t try to teach partner.

Don’t draw attention to mistakes (I know this is hard. I didn’t but I wanted to).

Try to lighten up the mood.

Make sure partner is being taken care of.

Keep partners problems to yourself.

I have worked hard in the last few years to follow these rules. I have more work to do. I think it is even harder with a husband and a wife. But if I can talk Ray into playing with me again maybe we can see if I can practice this.

When I told Joan I was going to write this she was very happy that I thought she was a “good partner”. You could see how important this was to her.

Retiring on a Losing Note

May 27th, 2011  ~  linda  ~  10 Comments 

I got a Silver medal yesterday, but in a trials there is only one medal, the Gold.  A bunch of teams get together and fight it out and one wins…Everybody else loses.  So people who compete in these events are pretty use to losing, even the ones that often win.

In the U.S. trials, Diamond who won the world championship came second to Bathurst.  They will not represent the us in the Netherlands.  It is the way of competition.

I congratulate the Eaton team who played with courage throughout.  They did not have an easy road to victory.  They should guts and determination to overcome each obstacle and win.  I will write more about that soon.

Our team had a lot of technical skill and a lot of competitive spirit too.  Of course we could have won.  I was very tired and I played badly at times and much better at others.  But winning in the end is about overcoming these things and in the end our team just couldn’t quite do it.  Evening the last segment we could have won if we made some different decisions and played tighter.

I have no excuses.  I played some very bad bridge at times.  Still it was fun to compete.  But now I am done.  I decided this week that my days of serious competitive bridge are over.  I will play to enjoy the game and that is quite a worthwhile thing.

Ray and i had already decided to skip the world championships in the Netherlands if I wasn’t competing.  Instead we will head to our new home in Sarasota in October where Siesta Key has been named the number-one beach in the U.S.

I do want to say that competing is a wonderful experience.  I would love to see more women competing in the Canadian trials.  I will be with you and I will help you.  I have some ideas about how to do that which I will write about in future.

My partner Francine is a wonderful player.  I love to watch her play dummy and defending with her is a dream.  I know that she will continue to be a shining star in Canadian bridge.

My very best wishes for the Eaton team in the Venice Cup.

Regina update

May 25th, 2011  ~  linda  ~  1 Comment 

Well the round robin is over and I do have some interesting hands to discuss, but I have found the schedule fairly grueling, with a 4-lady team playing a lot of boards and being quite jet lagged. It only gets worse as we enter the knockout phase, with even more boards.

In the open, the biggest surprise was that the Gartagnis team just failed to qualify. I spent a fair bit of time talking David Willis who, with Paul Thurston, formed the other half of the team. They had a rough start but they’d felt it was coming together. They got nipped out of the eighth spot when they lost to Hughes in the last round and the other teams in contention had big wins.

I feel the field is so even this year with a lot of very good teams that it is impossible to guess the winner.

The Zambonini team is Canada’s answer to the Bathurst team, with strong young players including: Ron Zambonini, Darren Wolpert, and Nicholas L’Ecuyer.

Our team finished solidly with a blitz in the last round to make sure of first place in the round robin. It wasn’t an easy choice of opponents and we could have gone either way but ending up playing the McNab team. We will see how it goes.

For once in the last round we didn’t have any big mistakes. My biggest problem has been remembering the system. We had a huge negative swing on one deal where I thought we played negative doubles up to but not including 4♥ and the not including was wrong. In fact it might have been difficult to get the best result in this system since penalty double was an excellent choice but we might have recovered anyway if my memory had been better.

I have come to the conclusion that we have too much system. I have heard the same thing from some other pairs too.

I promise hands when my play is finished.

Going to Regina

May 18th, 2011  ~  linda  ~  6 Comments 

The Canadian team trials are starting in Regina Saskatchewan on Saturday.  The Women start their play on Sunday.  I have my airplane ticket and Francine and I will be on the same plane heading Westward Saturday.

It has not been that long since Francine and I decided to give our partnership a shot (well a reshot really because we played together quite successfully five years ago in Estoril.)

Playing with Francine and especially watching her play dummy on BBO has reminded me of what a fine card player she really is.  We defend well together too.  Once in a while we get it wrong.  We did on a deal a couple of days ago.  Later we both wrote each other an email where we each took the blame.  That was kind of funny.

The hand started with Francine making a terrific play of ducking her offside king on the opening lead and giving declarer a chance to go down.  Later we both had choices to make and either of us could defeat the hand.  The choices weren’t easy and we both got them wrong.  So you see that is why we both blamed ourselves.

Playing together is not always easy but it is always rewarding.  I wish we had at least another year to prepare.  Anyway as Francine always says we will go and have some fun.  We will be on a very fine team playing with Rhoda Habert and Sylvia Summers Cayley.  The competition will be challenging.  I know I will make mistakes.  But I am looking forward to competing.

And to all the other partnerships and teams headed to the center of Canada … let’s go and have some fun.

Hello Regina!

I don’t know if I will blog or not.  Somehow I will write a blog or two.  We will see.