Welcome to the Hand of the Day. There are two ways to navigate this section. You can either right click here to save this file and play the hands (if you have a program that allows you to load and play .PBN files) without seeing any of my commentary or you can scroll down and see what I had to say about the hands. It is probably more interesting to play these hands but I always like to offer my partner a choice. If you are curious to see how Pam and I made out, then you can click here to see the tournament schedule and the games we played or here to see if we placed in anything.
Monday) Today's problem hinges on how you
evaluate the following hand. It is a regular
matchpoints game and you are in first seat non vulnerable
while they are vulerable. What is your bid?
Monday Result) I was sitting
West and South chose to open 2S which got raised to 4S and
made 6. The interesting question is whether you and
your partner would get to 6S here. (Pam and I would
not have made it using Chilli.) For me it hinges on whether
the South hand is a 1S opener or not. I play with
another partner
and we use a concept called Zar Openers. In order to
open a hand you need 26 Zar points. In this system, Aces = 6
points, Kings = 4 points, Queens = 2 points, Jacks = 1
point, plus you add up the length of your two longest suits,
plus you add the length of your long suit minus the length
of your short suit. So, the South hand has
(6+4+1)+(6+5)+(6-0)=28 Zar points and is more than a minimum
opening hand! When I opened 1S with Jack (my
computer program), Jack drove to 6S without any more lies
from me.
1) Jacoby 2NT (at least 4 spades,
game forcing)
2) Singelton or
void in hearts
3) Control in
clubs
4) lead
directive (Wow, I have a big hand in this auction!)
5) Control in
hearts
6) 1430 in
spades
7) 1 or 4
keycards in spades
On this evening, I was playing with a brave guy from the partnership desk who had at least 8 points.
I don't know if we would have bid this slam either.
Tuesday) Although we would not have got
to slam on the previous hand, on this deal Pam and I used
the Chilli system to reach 6H
without much effort. Would you and your partner have
done the same? Assume that East is the dealer and the
opponents don't bid.
Tuesday Result) We got to the 6H which I
made. I did not check the results to see how many
other pairs bid this slam.
1) 11-15 HCP, at least 4 hearts, could have a longer
suit
2) 14-15 HCP,
artificial, invitational to game
3) Artificial,
forcing to at least game
4) Agrees
hearts, asks for further hand description
5) Singleton or
void in diamonds
6) Asks for
keycards in hearts
7) 0 or 3
keycards
Tuesday Aside) Can you believe
that Pam was once a very timid slam bidder? After
hands like this, I started to call her the Queen of the Slams.
Wednesday) Today
you are playing against "crazy" Jason who is in first seat non
vulnerable while you are vulnerable. You have an
unbalanced 24 count and he opens 1S in front of you.
What is your bid? Assuming you double then West will
pass, your partner will bid 4H, and Jason will pass.
What then?
What happened)
Alright, I admit that even I have limits. I only wish
that I had opened 1S (11-15 HCP, at least 4 spades could have
a longer minor) with the East hand because it would have
worked out amazingly well here as South has a very tough
bid. I passed and the opponents got to a slam of some
kind. Take a look at the E/W hands and see what slam you
would get to you. I have shown the Chilli bids that I
would make as my partner.
1) At least 16 HCP, artificial
2) At least 4
HCP, at least 4 hearts, could have a longer suit
3) At least 4
spades, could have a longer minor
4) At least 10
HCP, artificial, game forcing
5) Asking for
keycards in hearts
6) 2 keycards
7) Asking for
specific Kings
8) King of clubs
Wednesday Result)
Unknown. If you were able to get to the cold 7NT then I
am impressed.
Thursday)
Experience has taught me that successful "moves" are more
about timing and feel than anything else. Obviously,
with the vulnerability in my favour, I decided to open this
hand 3D (2D shows 6 diamonds and 11-15 in our system).
When it got passed out I thought that I had probably picked
the wrong time to make a move. (Despite the evidence
compiled on this website, I only make moves when it "feels"
like the time to do so. I can and do pass with hands
like this in situations like this. The previous hand is
a prime example.)
What happened) I
wasn't surprised at my partner's singleton but I was surprised
that the opponents had 26 HCP. Anyway, I plugged away at
the contract and probably ended up going down 3 for -150.
Thursday Result)
Our matchpoints score was 5 out of 11 for a slightly below
average result.
Would
you take a call with the East hand after hearing 3D, P, P to
you?
Saturday) It's a
one session afternoon side game and you are a young woman
sitting South (the board has been rotated as she was actually
sitting North) and playing against a decent field (for a side
game) with multiple world champion Tobi Sokolow (1) as
your partner. How would you bid the South hand assuming
that E/W are silent and you get to open the bidding?
What Happened) As
you can see from the auction below, N/S got to 6D.
Immediately afterwards, the atmosphere at the table turned
frosty as Tobi's partner had no trouble making 7. It was
almost as if Tobi's partner had made a grievous error that
neither of them were going to talk about while Pam and I were
at the table. I really wanted to say something
complimentary to lighten the mood (like don't worry you are
going to get at least an average plus) but (strangely for me)
I decided against it.
Saturday Result) As it turns out, Tobi and her partener were the only ones that even got to any slam so they scored 13 out of 13 matchpoints.
Interesting Connection) Back in 2008, Pam and I played in a knockout
on a team with a woman named Malou Flato (it sounds nice if
you say it aloud like this, Ma looo Fla tooo). At
that time, Malou mentioned that she was giving art lessons to
World Champion, Tobi Sokolow in exchange for bridge lessons
from Tobi. Pam's comment to Malou when she heard this
was, "Wow, you must be good at art."
Why) Well this feature is not called the
Hands of the Day so I did not record a hand from our
magnificent Saturday Evening Side Game that followed the
interesting experience from Saturday Afternoon. Pam and
I had a record (for us at that time) 68.5% game that
earned us each a lovely wine glass and our first blue ribbon
qualification. In addition, we got to impress Jack
Triplett (aka The King of the Side Game) after we beat him by
16.5%.
Sunday Result) We ended up in 4S -1 which lost us 4 IMPs because
our opponents were in 2S making 2. Could you stay out of
this unmakeable game? Did you end up in 3NT which feels
like it has a better chance of making?
2) at least 4 HCP, at least 4 hearts, could have a longer suit
3) at least 6 spades headed by AKQ, game forcing.
4) forced
Why) At week long bridge tournaments, Pam and
I have been playing this game I invented called Bridge
Bingo. Essentially, I created a list of 75 different
things (ranging from likely to very unlikely) that can happen
during a week of bridge. Then I randomly take different
sets of 25 things to create unique bingo cards for me and
Pam. Generally speaking, the items in the top line are the
easiest to get while the items in the bottom row are the
toughest. The first person to complete a line (or complete
the majority of the line by the end of Sunday) wins the dollar
amount designated for that line. It is just another way to
make bridge a bit more exciting.
Below you can see my Bridge Bingo card from
San Diego as well as the designated winner (a / denotes a tie)
for each line. In 1 game so far, neither one of us has got a
blackout bingo.
San Diego
