YouHold

I’ll be away on vacation for the next week.  I’ll be back for regularly scheduled blogging when I get back (October 1st).

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The USA, down -1 to 1 “Buffet Point” going into the finaly day of play, pulled out on top to win the first ever Buffet Cup.
More details at http://buffetcup.com/.

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This year, there is a new event on the international bridge cicuit, the inaugural Warren Buffet Bridge Cup. This bridge event was conceived and created by Warren Buffett, the “Oracle of Omaha”.
This tournament is modeled after the Ryder Cup, a golf tournament where the best from the US take on the best from Europe. 12 of the best players are competing for each time.
You can find out more at http://buffetcup.com/

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I’m currently working on a new system, something a little different from the mainstream. A good idea when trying new changes to a system is to generate some practice hands that fit your new system.
My personal favorite generator on the web is at http://playBridge.com/. Their advanced generator is perfectly suited to creating a set of hands which meet arbitrary criteria. There are also options to create “bidding sheets”, where only one player’s hands appear on the page, letting you practice with a partner.
If you have the need to practice bidding, check it out.

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There are many games which have similar card play to bridge.  Bridge is a member of the Whist family of games, or trick taking games.  Other well known examples are Hearts and Spades.
Every suit has an order or rank to the cards.  Ace is the highest card, followed by the King, Queen, Jack, then 10 down to 2.
Each player plays a single card in clockwise order, known as a trick.  The person “on lead” gets to choose any card in his hand; every player after that must play a card of the same suit if they can (“following suit”), otherwise …read more

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Today is the 5 year anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Center.  Everyone in the US was impacted to some degree by these tragic events, and the media is naturally buzzing with stories reflecting on the events of that Tuesday morning 5 years ago.  I wanted to take the time and share my personal story of the day.
The day started simply enough.  It was the first week of the NFL, and the Giants had played the Monday night game the night before.  I had gotten together with Blair Seidler, a good friend, bridge partner  and co-worker to watch …read more

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A local Atalanta player, Patty Tucker, created a series of bridge camps this summer to teach Atlanta area kids the game.  It’s be an incredible success, including getting over 30 kids to come out and play at the regional event here last week over Labor Day weekend.
There was an article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution about her efforts, which can be found here.  She started “Atlanta Junior Bridge, Inc.”, a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting bridge to Georgia’s youth.
For more information about the organization, please visit their website at   altantajuniorbridge.com

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In my previous post, I described this highly unusual hand:

AQTxxx
—
—
AKT9xxx

After 3 passes to me, I chose to open 1C (natural) rather than 2C (strong).
On a different deal yesterday, I had another strong highly distributional hand:

AKQJxxx
AJTxx
—
x

This one I chose to open 2C. I’m sure that there are players who would advocate 2C on both hands, and some who wouldn’t bid 2C on either one. Why did I “mix and match”?
In terms of playing strength, both hands are incredibly strong. The key difference between the hands lies in suit quality.
In the first hand I have …read more

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Playing in the Atlanta regional today, my partner held this hand (IMPS, all vulnerable, 2nd seat.):

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