Canadian Team Trials on BBO

June 12th, 2009  ~  linda  ~  2 Comments 

After spending yesterday having a good time and contemplating the future  I ended up filling in with Sylvia, for a missing pair in the IMP pairs event.  It was fun but definitely not bridge as we know it.  Various team mates talked about the world championships in 2010 which seem likely to be in Philadelphia (a prime choice for we east coasters).  Sylvia and I also talked about playing in some events in ACBL Nationals which might be fun and seem a kind of reward for playing so well together this week.  Ray and I can now make our plans for Brazil where I will try to provide some colour commentary with lots of blogs.  We will also have a chance to go to Rio and other parts of Brazil just touring.  So as Colin says it’s all good.

The Wolpert team (which is actually the Demme team, sorry Ina) couldn’t quite get the storybook finish they were looking for following just short of another comeback in the final.  Good luck to the winning Nisbet team.

I talked to the Shoe (Michael Shoenborn) this morning who came in just for the Seniors.  He is in the semifinals but talked about how hard it is to play when you don’t usually play and with a brand new partner at that.  The Shoe has just started to play a it of 2/1 and having not discussed any methods with partner passed the first round its hard.  I know this because when I first started to play 2/1 I had no idea what this auction meant and neither did the show.  1S-2D-3S … The Shoe didn’t have solid spades but he did have very good spades and a lot extra.  How do you communicate that you have a lot extra in a 2/1 auction.  It isn’t clear even after playing the system for a long time.  The Shoe does have a way of working these things out though and at least there aren’t pages of system notes to memorize.

Roy Hughes who is playing in the CWTC final made an interestng comment.  He thought that the best way to get the most competitive open team for Canada would be to have sponsors, ideally non playing ones, who would get good teams together and provide the funds for training and coaching.  Even a sponsor who played (but not in the actual world championship) would help.  Interesting, a suggestion that sponsor can make a real positive difference to teams.

I have seen some interesting hands this morning on BBO since it is actually more convenient to watch in my room than downstairs.  I shall write up one of two later.  The Open Event seems to be the young comers in L’Ecuyer versus the old foxes in Carruthers.   It should be a good tight match and either winner will be a good team.

Sigh

June 11th, 2009  ~  linda  ~  3 Comments 

I was hoping that I wouldn’t have to write another blog about how it’s not that bad to lose but here I am doing it again.  There is some irony in that we lost to the Wolpert team, the team that went through because we didn’t lose to the fifth place team.

Congratulations and good luck to them in the final today. 

I wasn’t planning to play in this event and joined in at the last minute and it was a great experience.  I am so glad I came.  Playing with Sylvia worked out very well, much better than I expected and perhaps we will play again in some other events.  It turns out oddly that we fit well at the table.  Sylvia has a wonderfully clear voice for calling out the cards.  I have hearing problems so this works for me.  If she makes some noises when she is startled I don’t hear them and/or they don’t bother me.   I played some of my best bridge in a long time and Sylvia was terrific.  We had some awesome sets.  Over the whole week the team was a pleasure, playing well and fun to be with.

I did talk to Paul Thurston whose team also lost yesterday.  He showed me a few deals, any one of which might have lead to victory.  There was one that was particularly instructive but I will let him write it up.   He was philosophical but we both agreed losing sucks.  But strangely I am just fine this morning.  Maybe it’s because it is a beautfiul day, Ray is here with me at last and tomorrow we drive to Mission to see our family Jason and Jennifer and our three grandchildren, Lucas, Malcolm and Cassidy.

CNTC Handicapping Part 2

June 10th, 2009  ~  linda  ~  1 Comment 

How did I do in forecasting the top 8.  Well I actually only put in 7 teams I had intended to include Rayner (just believe me on this okay) so if you caount that team I got 5 right

L’Ecuyer, Rayner, Thurston,Carruthers, and Ziggy

Joining them are Todd, Janicki and Bart

I have thought about this very carefully and here are my predictions for the winners

Todd versus L’Ecuyer

Todd has played strongly throughout the event but the yound lions on L’Ecuyer will take them through

Rayner is just having too good a tournamnet and they are going to take their match against Thurston

Carruthers is a show-in against Janicki.  Carruthers has really been surging and it isn’t going to stop now.

Bart will beat out Ziggy’s team and make the semi’s

Now I said I would only get 60% of the top 8 right but I am predicting I have the answer in 3 out of the 4 matches in the semi’s.  Let’s see how I do.

I still am having some trouble sleeping but things are just a bit better this morning.  Does jet lag never end?  I hope I can stay awake for the sessions tonight.

Rising from the dead

June 10th, 2009  ~  linda  ~  6 Comments 

There are many stories to tell about the final round of the round robins in Penticton.  But here is one story from my point of view.  I have been chatting a lot with the Wolpert team which includes a lot of my friends.  They have been down and out coming into Tuesday with only a faint hope of qualifying.  The situation was so dire that they more or less gave up and the Eastern ladies changed their airline tickets paying a significant sum to do so.  Well they are going to have to change them back.  Things got better yesterday as several of the top teams faltered.   Going into the last round they realized that if they had a blitz or near blitz and if both the second and third place teams lost badly and if we beat the fifth place team then they could qualify.  This was a lot of iffs.

Meanwhile our team had a near lock on first place going into the last match.  We would need the second place team to blitz and we would pretty well have to be blitzed.  We decided to play safe – my mantra was no numbers to insure a top finish.  Losing that match would have worked out better for us perhaps but we did not follow that strategy.

As a result Wolpert got just enough edging out two other teams (including the fifth place team we played) by one victory point.  Later in the hospitality room I talked two of the ladies on that team.  “If only you didn’t double five clubs (which was down two) we would have won.”  “Well I had two aces an almost certain diamond ruff in partner’s hand and Sylvia had made a takeout double so she had something”.  We all agreed that it was the right bid.  “Well why did you have to bid 6H?  We asked everyone and nobody else bid it.”  I knew it would have a good play.  We didn’t have many high cards but every one was working and we had a double fit.   We chatted amicably.  Winning and losing are all part of the game.  So now one set of friends are in and one set of new friends didn’t make it and thankfully I don’t feel like I was responsible for either result.

The Nuclear Weapon

June 9th, 2009  ~  linda  ~  4 Comments 

Ray calls the weak two diamond bid the nuclear weapon.  Here is a hand where it did cause a lot of problems for South’s.  You are not vulnerable versus vulnerable and East on your left opens 2♦ .  Your hand is

Partner sitting North doubles.  What do you do?  At this vulnerability passing may be tempting.  Ray Jotcham found that bid.  Back to that later.  I just didn’t think fourTH ten was good enough.  Some brave souls bid 3 of a major but with only nine points and three trumps I thought this was too rich.  I decided to bid my better major and bid 2 spades.  Partner raised to 3♠ and with a maximum it was time to bid game.  But which game.  I bid 3NT. If partner had short diamonds or five spades she would go back to spades and if not I hoped that my diamond “stopper” might hold off.  If all else failed I was prepared to apologize to my teammates.

The whole hand was:

Dealer: Vul:		North
		♠	K865
		♥	A532
		♦	K9
		♣	AK9
West				East
♠	1073			♠	Q42
♥	J10			♥	K976
♦	AQJ653			♦	4
♣	74			♣	J8532
		South
		♠	AJ9
		♥	Q84
		♦	10872
		♣	Q103

So you see passing works out best producing 500-800.  3NT is a fine spot producing 430.  Four hearts makes but four spades does not because the defense can make the heart king, a diamond, a diamond ruff and the spade ten holds up as a trump trick.  I wonder how each bid would rate on a bidding panel.

If you passed you desrve 100., at least on the day.  I think most pairs did find their way to 3NT although our opponents did stumble and we won imps on the deal.

Double Game Swing

June 9th, 2009  ~  linda  ~  3 Comments 

During our match last night we had one hand that I knew was good at our table but I didn’t realize how good until I got the hand records and we compared with Rhonda and Samantha.  Here was the hand and exactly what happened at our table.  We were not vulnerable against vulnerable opponents.

Dealer: Vul:		North
		♠	1083
		♥	AQ10642
		♦	Q9
		♣	AK
West				East
♠	A9764			♠	KQ52
♥	J7			♥	K9
♦	5			♦	A10842
♣	QJ1097			♣	84
		South
		♠	J
		♥	853
		♦	KJ763
		♣	6532

 Sylvia opened 1♥ and I ventured 2♥ .  Sylvia now made the aggressive bid of 2♠ .  We are very aggressive with game tries but perhaps not vulnerable this would not be everyone’s choice.   We play long suit game tries but if we don’t have a useful holding in the suit requested we show good holdings in higher ranking suit below the trump suit.  So very often you might start with spades in a heart auction hoping that partner will show you something useful somewhere.  My tablemate who did have spades asked me about the bid and I explained that while it was a long suit game try she might not have a very long spade holding and may be just groping for game.  But in any case once they had passed on the first round they were not coming into the auction now because I bid 4♥.

Well, I wasn’t happy about it.  While I had only one spade I also had only one trump and not much of anything else.  For all I knew after showing spade length Sylvia could have a stiff diamond.  I actually apologized when I put down dummy saying that if this was a bad result, it was my fault.  Sylvia got the lead of the ♠ K and then a club shift.  This allowed her to make  4♥.  I thought we had a good result for getting to game.  I didn’t realize they could defeat the contract on a diamond ruff and I especially did not notice that they could make  four spade their way which is exactly what happened at the other table. I don’t know what the auction was at the other table but it seems odd that East-West decided not to join in at our table.  Perhaps the vulnerability made it difficult for West to bid over 2♥.   East does have a slightly difficult call over 1♥   but still …

A Good Day

June 9th, 2009  ~  linda  ~  6 Comments 

We had two tough matches today.  Yes, I know it is the round robin and the only really important thing is to qualify, but we wanted to win them and make things a bit easier.  Sylvia and I played the first match against the Wolpert Team with Francine and Julie.  Everyone played very well and we won the match.  Sylvia played very well thoroughout and I tried to keep up.  Francine and Julie really picked things up in the second half to get a good score.  Then, our teammates had a good match against the Nisbet team and suddenly we find ourselves in the top spot.  Its nice to walk downstairs and see that all went well while you were asleep.

We won the third match with a good score and the standings after 6 matches with 3 matches to go are:

Us with 115

Smtih 107

Norman 106

Nisbet 97

McGregor 92

So it is still very close.  Sylvia and I are sitting out the first match and will likely play the final two matches.  I confess this is not my preferred schedule since we start late and then play until late with not much of a break but you have to accomodate partner. 

The last half of tonight’s match was all the other way.  Somehow Rhonda and Samantha managed to get to every game that had a chance and made the lot.  They tell me that is because they are playing Precision.

Would you get to 4S with your favorite partner on these cards?

S KJ9653 H 104 D A4 C Q64    opposite   S A74 H K3 D KJ8532 C j2  No problem.  When the HA was onside and the spade came down it rolled home.  I decided to open the rather terrible South hand with 1C.  It seemed to make it even harder to get to game at our table.  I  held

S 82 H Q987 D Q9 C AK1053

I had been conservaitve all evening (which turned out to be right) so give me a break.  At our table the auction went 1C-1S-X-2D-P-2S-all pass.  Perhaps the 2D bidder should have tried a bit more with 3S.  ‘

In the open some of my picks have definitely moved up int he standings.  I still think L’Evuyer who has moved up to 9/10 will be there and I see that Carruthers has at last moved up into a qualifying position.

Dateline: Penticton

June 8th, 2009  ~  linda  ~  No Comments 

The Internet in the hotel has been terrible, up and down every few minutes.  I keep starting posts and losing them.  I will save every few minutes and hope for the best.  Penticton is a lovely resort town, a great place for a tournament and the local committee has done a terrific job on the hospitality with a limited budget.

With great weather, good facilities it’s hard to find something to complain about.  So I won’t.

Here is one hand that I made the wrong choice..

I held

S KJ1073 H 3 D AJ9764 C A

We were red against white and in first chair I chose to open 1D, for better or worse (decision 1) Sylvia bid 1NT and righy doubled.  I bid 2S (decision 2 – I still like this one).  This should show a good hand with 6-5 I think since Sylvia has denied spades and with 5-4 I might redouble or do something else.  Sylvia bid Lebensohl 2NT.  Perhaps I should bid 3S but this seemed a bit rich to me and I think I have already suggested my shape.  Sylvia bid 3D and I passed but lefty balanced 3H.  This came back to me.  I decided not to bid again.  From my point of view the opponents had at least nine hearts since Sylvia had denied four of them and Sylvia had a bad hand.  I didn’t have all that much defense myself.  So I passed them out.  As it turned out Sylvia had S Qxx H xxx D xx C K10765.   Anyway, we passed them out in 3H which makes exactly when we can make about 3S.    We actually won imps on the board since at the other table when my hand opened 1S our side got to 4S which went down two at other the table.  (Now that I look at it 3S is trickier than I thought at the time.) 

One very interesting deal was this one which you knew was going to be a big one at the time.  With nobody vulnerable both Easts opened 3C.  At my table I bid 4D which shows both majors.  Sylvia held

S 3 H AQ2 D KJ108432 C J9

Now some of you might just have bid 4H but Sylvia loves slams and she decided to take a shot at the heart slam.  She bid 5H to ask about a club control and I bid 6H.  Here is my hand.  You get the lead of the CA.  You bid it aggressively so now you have to make it.  The match will be decided by this hand.

S AKJ1075 H KJ973 D 97 C void

Sylvia reasonably decided that from the club lead the preempter was likely to be 7-2-2-2 since she had not lead her singleton.  (But perhaps the CA from the AK or AKQ was just too attractive?)  If you believe that this is the distribution than playing diamonds is reasonable but the problem is that you have to do it right away since if righty ducks the DA you have no way back to your hand for the diamond winners.  You should probably just play a diamond at trick two, planning to play the DK if righty follows low and the another diamond.  You will need trumps 3-2 but you can now win the return, draw trumps ending in your hand and claim.  Sylvia took a similar line playing two rounds of trump first and then leading a diamond.  Righty hoped ace and returned a trump as quick as a bunny.  What do you think now?  Sylvia now lead a spade to dummy and played a diamond and was unhappy when righty followed low.  Do you finesse or not?  I think it is a very close call but Sylvia decided to go with her convictions and did not finesse.  She is weighing a number of things.  Righty would likely have ducked the diamond with Ax (at least I would have).  Also the CA is a mighty attractive lead even with a singleton because it seems unlikely we are off two aces and the singleton is only right if partner has the ace in that suit.  The preemptor is quite a bit less likely to have too much on the side. Blah blah blah.  You have to finesse because the diamonds are 3-1. 

But I think there is a better line.  What about playing on spades, cashing the SA and running the SJ at trick three.  This requires a 4-2 spade break (or 3-3) with the Queen onside, and a 3-2 heart break and the DA onside (you will still need a diamond trick later). 

Both lines need the 3-2 heart break and the diamond ace onside.  So we are comparing a 2-2 diamond break with a 4-2 or 3-3 spade break with the Q onside. 

Maybe I am wrong.  However, no matter how you look at it, this is not a slam we really wanted to be in most of the time.

The Open Team’s have reached the halfway mark and I have done a terrible job of picking teams if the event were to end now.  I am not going to list the results since I have done so twince before and by the time you read this the CBF website should be up to date.  Still things can change a lot and some of my choices may move up.  I am particularly hoping that the Carruthers team which is one of the favourites will gain a qualifying spot.  I expect them to do so.  John has been ill recently and Katie is here for support.  It was good to see her.  So I confess that I am rooting for them to make the round of 8 at least.

At the third, the women’s event is very bunched.  We are in second place but it doesn’t mean much.  Personally I am pretty happy with my game so far.  Not that I haven’t made mistakes or had decisions I would like to take back

Going Away for a bit

June 6th, 2009  ~  linda  ~  2 Comments 

I leave today to go to Penticton for the Canadian Team Trials.   I am looking forward to go especially for the following reasons:

1. see everyone, it is a very social event with lots of hospitality time
2. be on “planet bridge” where nothing else matters
3. blog, blog, blog
4. and of course to compete.
5. visiting my family and especially my grandchildren when it is over

The Women’s Teams is a very nice event.  We are playing a round robin of 20 board matches.  That is long enough to reduce some of the luck and also to visit with your opposition a bit.  Yes, I am very competitive but I still think it is nice to say hello and chat a little bit. 

Penticton is a very pretty place.  I haven’t actually been there but I have been near by.  Ray will be there for the last couple of days and on a six man team there will be time to look around.

After that we are going to dry through the Rockies and over to my daughters place in Mission British Columbia.   We are told the drive is lovely.  Still I will look forward to logging on to BBO to watch the Men’s Finals.

The US Open Team Trials will be taking place the same week so it will be hard to cover as I would like.  It is sad that the dates overlap.

Things I am not looking forward to: long plane rides (I did get some nice new luggage), jetlag.  I could say that all I want is to play well and do my best.  But you know and I know that is a lie. 

I will be in touch online and back to Toronto in a couple of weeks, full of new experiences.

Conventions – is the ACBL falling behind

June 5th, 2009  ~  linda  ~  6 Comments 

Playing 2H is weak with 5/5 in hearts and a minor doesn’t seem very hard to defend.  If you don’t want to think about it too much you can play your normal defense to weak 2 bids quite adequately.  Still we can’t play this convention in many competitions.  I had to submit 9 copies of the ACBL defense to the convention weeks ago.  I have to bring 2 copies to the table.  Is this really necessary at an event where we pick an international team?  I find it a bit scary.

You can see from the poll on my blog site which I will leave up until I get back from the west coast that most of you think the ACBL is falling behind.  The strange thing for me is that the current list of conventions don’t prevent partnerships from playing unfamiliar conventions anyway.  I can play 4 card majors with canape and transfer responses, no problem.  I am fine with the idea that in events limited to players with less than 500 master points that conventions are restricted.  I see no reason to restrict any other events with the exception of excluding Highly Unusual Methods (HUM’s) such as forcing pass. 

The reason North American pairs have trouble when they meet up with slightly different conventions is that they don’t get to play against them.  Innovations are stiffled or sent in directions that work within the “allowed” system but may not be best.  Get with it ACBL.  There must be a better way.