From the editors......
W hat an eventful summer! First
things first — our juniors have cer-
tainly done us proud. First the Canadian
team headed off to Bali and finished
strongly in fourth place; Eric Sutherland
describes the Bali experience in an article
in this issue. Then ten more juniors
headed off to the World Junior Pairs and
Bridge Camp in Ghent and had a strong
finish there as well. Darren Wolpert
(Toronto) and Frederic Pollack (Montreal)
placed 14th overall. Toronto's David
Halasi and Colin Lee finished 19th, and
were named the top Youth Pair. Halasi
also distinguished himself by becoming
the first non-European to win the
Shroeder Cup as top finisher in the Camp
pairs series. This Canadian success story
is described in another article.
Congratulatioons to you all; you not only
played well but represented us with the
sportsmanship the world has come to ex-
pect from Canadian teams.
We are sure you have also noticed
the exciting new look of our magazine.
Technological advances and a lot of work
by Ray mastering QuarkXpress have en-
abled us to bring you a higher quality
magazine at the same price, so we hope
you enjoy the new cover and interior de-
sign (thanks to Olena Serbyn), and en-
hanced photograph reproduction.
We would also like to welcome a
host of new readers in the Atlantic
Provinces, with a special welcome to
those in three provinces to which we have
never distributed before: PEI, New
Brunswick, and Newfoundland. Let us
hear from you and thank you all for your
support.
Anyone who happens to be at the
Oshawa Regional this month may be sur-
prised to see some real-life characters
from David Silver's stories at the table.
Keep an eye out for Wright Cardinal,
Bruce Gowdy, the Professor himself, and
more. This is all by way of launching our
latest book, Tales out of School, a collec-
tion of stories from David's talented pen.
David is also starting a new four-part tril-
ogy in CMP this month, beginning with
The Prisoner of Zelda.
Another new author will be familiar
to many readers. Karen Allison moved
back to the New York area from Toronto
some years ago, but has recently been
active "on the nets" under the pseudonym
of the Bridge Doctor. She brings you the
flavour of those classes in her first article,
which deals with overcalls.
Last, but certainly not least, we want
to express our admiration and gratitude to
our newest editorial board member, Patti
Lee. If you are a club owner or tourna-
ment chairman, and you haven't yet heard
from Patti, you will soon. Patti has done
a terrific job of getting our advertising
organized and on track, and we expect
her work to be a key factor in our contin-
ued growth.
 c a n a d i a n

Master Point
a m a g a z i n e f o r b r i d g e p l ay e r s

331 Douglas Ave., Toronto, Ont., M5M 1H2

Tel: (416) 781-0351 • Fax: (416) 781-1831 • E-mail: ray@masterpointpress.com

October 1995 Vol. IV Number 4

From the mailbag ... 3
The prisoner of Zelda by David Silver 4
Hands from here and there by Fred Gitelman 8
Giving something back by Sheri Winestock 11
Bali high by Eric Sutherland 13
Bali quiz by John Carruthers 17
World bridge camp 1 by Ray Lee 20
Bourbon St. bridge by Ray Lee 22
All the world’s a bridge article by Roselyn Teukolsky 26
Sharples/Marx over 1NT (part 2) by Ken Braithwaite 29
The Toy Shoppe — Competing over 1NT by John Gowdy 31
In memoriam: Dr. Gordon Shorting 32
The source of good deals by Prakash J. Paranjabe 33
Mood swings by “Trent Valley” 35
Ask the Bridge Doctor by Karen Allison 37
The Elementary Squeeze by Forrest Smith 39
A history of conventions (2) by Thomas M. Gordanier 41
Reviews 42

Canadian Master Point is published four times a year. It is available free of charge thorugh bridge clubs and bridge supply
houses across Canada or by subscription ($15/yr, US $15 for US subs). Copyright ©1995 Master Point Press. All rights re-
served; reprinting of contents without the express written permission of the publisher is prohibited. Correspondence and ar-
ticles should be sent to the above addresss with SAE for return or reply.

ED. BOARD: Ray & Linda Lee, Maureen Culp, John Gowdy, Ron Bishop
 From the mailbag .....
No discussion required
T he article on “Active Ethics — his
rules or hers?” (July 1995) deserves
a response.
I do not doubt that women and men
may have different reasoning concerning
moral issues. However, the situation de-
scribed does not involve considering the
feelings of other people or relationships:
this was strictly a case of improper be-
haviour.
Certainly, the man’s actions were
very impolite and hostile. However, the
woman’s actions were almost equivalent
to table talk. Considering it was a
Regional Flighted Swiss, the woman
should have known what was acceptable
— no philosophical discussion required.
Adrian Stonell
North York, ON
Computer hand problems
M ost journalists and editors prior to
the publication of an article criti-
cizing any person or organization give
the target a chance to explain the methods
being used and the problems that arose.
Fred Gitelman, in his article “Deja vu
again.... and again...” (July 1995) did not
enquire. Nor did the editors of Canadian
Masterpoint check the facts and the back-
ground.
In the late 1970’s, ACBL reviewed
and authorized two computer programs
which could be used to produce dupli-
cated hands to be distributed in Canada.
Canadian Master Point
The producer of these programs was not
then and never has been affiliated directly
with the ACBL.
This is the first problem that has
ever been reported to the ACBL concern-
ing this program.
When the ACBL was informed of
this problem, permission to use this pro-
gram was rescinded until such time as the
ACBL could review the source code and
production procedures. The ACBL has
yet to hear from the people who produce
the hands that caused the problem.
Therefore, the prohibition against using
these hands in ACBL-sanctioned contests
continues to be in force.
The program reviewed and approved
by ACBL for use in the past apparently
had worked problem-free for a great
many years. What caused the problem in
Toronto will remain a mystery until and
unless the programmer, who is not affili-
ated in any way with the ACBL, com-
municates with the ACBL.
It remains curious that a system that
had operated efficiently for so many years
with no known glitches should have a
problem such as this, but we remain un-
able to comment on what went wrong.
Gary Blaiss
Chief Tournament Director
ACBL, Memphis TN
We are less concerned with affixing blame
than with avoiding repetition. As Fred
pointed out, this was an especially subtle
problem that may have been present and
escaped detection for many years.
Computer-hand generation is generally
very good and a real asset to everyone’s
enjoyment; when something does go
wrong, we need to find out why. Ed.
 The prisoner of Zelda
D a v i d S
Being Part I
of The Legend of
Zelda, a trilogy in
four parts.
F ortunately, I
had bought the
newspapers, for I
found in them
news which immediately affected my
plans. For some reason which was not
clearly explained, the date of the
Ruritanian Invitational Team Tournament
had suddenly been advanced and the first
match was to take place on the next day
but one. The whole populace had been in
a stir about it since His Majesty’s
Ambassador to Canada had confirmed
that Professor Silver had condescended
to form a team and to represent his coun-
try.
It was evident that Streslau, the
capital, would be thronged. The reporter
warned that rooms were all let and hotels
overflowing, so there would be little
chance of my obtaining lodging. Despite
being in my eighty-second year, I de-
cided to make bivouac in Zelda, a small
town fifty miles short of Streslau, and to
go by train to and from the site of the
tournament. No Ruritanian would stay in
Zelda after dusk, so accommodations
should be plentiful and cheap. Fortune
favoured me; I quickly secured suitable
accommodation in Zelda, and set off to-
wards Streslau for an evening’s kibitz-
ing.
Clutching my dog-eared copy of
Das Bridge: die folgrechte Silverordnung
I disembarked on to the station platform
at Streslau to be immediately accosted by
two foreigners. The large one, a young
i l v e r
fellow in his mid-sixties, grasped my
elbow and began addressing me as
“Professor Silver” while chattering excit-
edly to his companion in what I assumed
was English. The smaller one peered
myopically at me and responded calmly
to the giant’s increasingly agitated dis-
course. They obviously had no German
and I despaired of communication until I
noticed they were wearing badges dis-
playing a red maple leaf on a white back-
ground, the insignia of Canada. I
remembered that Canada was officially
bilingual and that all Canadians were re-
quired by law to speak fluent French.
“Messieurs, je crois que vous etes en
erreur,” I said coldly. “While I have the
honour to be related to the great man, I
regret I am not he. I am his nephew, Fritz
von Zelber, retired Colonel of His
Majesty’s Imperial Guards. Oui,
Professor Silver is by birth a Ruritanian
— his real name is Sigmund von Zelber.
He emigrated to Canada in 1914 shortly
after the outbreak of war, anglicized his
name and settled there. That was the last
we heard of him until the German transla-
tion of his book, Bridge the Silver Way,
appeared a few years ago and made him
the national hero of Ruritania.
“A national hero?”
“Bridge was introduced into the
country by the same American soldiers
who restored our monarchy in 1945 and
has been our national pastime ever since.
Professor Silver’s book, and its exhilarat-
ing theory of Blitzkrieg Gespraachen,
Pre-emptive First Strike Bidding, estab-
lished die folgrechte Silverordnung as the
national bidding system. Everyone plays
it, except for a tiny minority of tradition-
alists who still play Goren. His Majesty,
October 1995
King Rudolf, decided to observe the fif-
tieth anniversary of our national sport
with a commemorative tournament with
a generous cash prize to the winners.
Ruritania is one of Canada’s principal
creditors, so his Majesty was able to pres-
sure the Canadian Bridge Federation to
send Professor Silver’s team to partici-
pate. Mon Dieu but now I recognize you
— you’re Wright Cardinal!”
“Oui, mon colonel, and may I intro-
duce my countryman, Bruce Gowdy,”
replied the shorter stranger. “We need
your help. Professor Silver has been kid-
napped by a terrorist group of bridge fun-
damentalists, Les Gorenistes. They are
demanding a ransom of 100,000 Canadian
dollars for his release. We have appealed
to the Canadian bridge community for
contributions but the tournament starts
this afternoon and we shall have to forfeit
if we don’t field a team. Your resem-
blance to Professor Silver is striking, so
all you have to do is impersonate him
until we can obtain his release.”
“It won’t work,” scowled the giant.
“The colonel can’t speak English and is
obviously much younger than David.”
“Relax, Bruce, you’re forgetting that
the Canadian Master Point runs a picture
of Silver taken in the 1950’s so none of
the locals could recognize the genuine
professor. We’re using bidding boxes so
it won’t matter what language he speaks
in. My only worry is that the Colonel is
too intelligent to pass as Silver, but we
have to chance it.”
I could not, of course, resist such a
plea from a fellow bridge player in dis-
tress, not to mention the chance for me, a
lumpenspieler, to take the legendary
Professor Silver’s place, playing with his
favourite partner in an international
match, with Bruce Gowdy and Eric
Murray at the other table. In the event,
the secret of my imposture defied detec-
tion. I had bad moments, of course: it
needed all of Herr Gowdy’s tact and gra-
ciousness to smooth over some apparent
Canadian Master Point
lapses of memory and unmindfulness of
old acquaintances of which I was inevi-
tably guilty. But I survived, and I attri-
bute my escape most of all to the very
audacity of the enterprise.
We compared scores at the half and
we were winning by several IMP’s.
There had been a communication from
the terrorists informing us that they were
playing bridge with Professor Silver to
occupy the time until the midnight dead-
line and, inexplicably, they had reduced
their ransom demand to fifty Canadian
dollars. At this, Bruce and Wright ex-
changed knowing glances and we re-
turned for the second half of the match.
Up until now, the match had been
uneventful. My bidding had been con-
fined to raising Cardinal’s trump suit, and
avoiding bidding notrumps. My few
gaffes had been more than compensated
for by my partner’s prowess in dummy
handling, but I felt unfulfilled. I longed
to implement the principles outlined in
Bridge the Silver Way, especially Die
Uberlegenheit der herzen Farbekennen,
the supremacy of the heart suit. I did not
enlist in order to cower under cover, I
came to fight, and later in the match my
opportunity arose. I picked up the fol-
lowing hand and as Goethe put it, Amboss
oder Hammer sein. Tired of being an
anvil, I became a hammer; I bid the hand
as if I were Professor Silver:
♠ AKQxxx ❤ AJx ◆ x ♣ xxx
von Zelber Cardinal
1❤1 2❤2
4NT3 5♠4
6❤5
1. Straight out of BFS
2. Inverted major raise: BFS
page 1024
3. Keycard Blackwood
4. 2 keycards and the ❤Q
A t r i u m p h f o r d i e f o l g re c h t e West North East South
Silverordnung! The two hands were: Cardinal von
Cardinal Zelber
♠ xxx 1❤1
❤ KQxx 1♠ 2❤2 3♠ 4❤3
◆ xxx all pass
♣ AJx 1. BFS page 1
2. Inverted major raise
3. Herr Cardinal will play the wheels off
von Zelber it
♠ AKQxxx
❤ AJx
To my horror, LHO led the ♠A and I re-
◆ x
membered that I had bid hearts first. The
♣ xxx dummy was disappointing but I did see a
winning line if the distribution was fa-
Cardinal vourable.
♠ Qxxx I ruffed the opening spade lead and
❤ AQJ crossed to the ♣K. I ruffed another spade
◆ Jxxx with my ❤10. The ♣A and ♣Q both
lived and I cashed my ◆A. I now ruffed
♣ Kx a fourth club with dummy’s ❤A and led
a third spade, ruffed with my ❤K. I had
scored one diamond, three clubs, three
von Zelber hearts in my hand and one in the dummy
♠ — — eight tricks! Since dummy’s ❤QJ en-
sured tricks nine and ten, I claimed my
❤ K10x contract.
◆ Axxxx Happily, the opponent’s comments
♣ AQxxx were interrupted by the arrival of a cou-
rier, and we took a short break to discuss
the latest proposal from the Gorenistes.
The play was simple: I ruffed the second Their letter, which I translated from
diamond and laid down the ace and jack German, was short and to the point. They
of hearts. Crossing to the ♣A, I discarded were willing to drop their ransom demand
my two losing clubs on the king and and return Professor Silver immediately,
queen of hearts and claimed the balance if we would come and take him back. He
— plus 1430! Later, I found out that our was being held at Castle Zelda but he was
inexpert opponents had bid to four refusing to leave until his captors fully
spades, making five. Flushed with suc- understood his bidding system. Wright,
cess, I picked up the next hand: over my protestations, instructed me to
write a reply stating that we would accept
♠ —- ❤ K10x ◆ Axxxx ♣ AQxxxx Professor Silver only on payment of $500
in US funds, cash on the barrelhead!
Ach du Lieber! What would Professor “Such dedication,” I said to myself.
Silver bid? The answer was soon forth- “Imagine the courage of the man to pros-
coming: elytize his kidnappers while in mortal

October 1995
danger!” But my reveries were inter-
rupted when LHO opened the bidding
with 1❤. Astounded by such audacity, I
glanced at my cards. I held:
♠ Axx ❤ xxx ◆ QJ10x ♣ AJx
The bidding proceeded and at my turn, I
had a problem:
West North East South
Cardinal von
Zelber
1❤1 2♣ 2❤ 3❤2
dbl 3NT dbl all pass
1. Impudent auslander!
2. Systemic — BFS page 34 passim
I had some difficulty recalling the sys-
tem’s handling of heart bids by the op-
ponents, but it came back to me.
According to Professor Silver’s “Law of
Subtotal Tricks”, the level to which a
partnership should compete was deter-
mined by the number of hearts held by
the opponents. Therefore, I bid 3❤ to tell
Herr Cardinal how many I held. His 3NT
bid was obviously a save against their
heart contract so I passed. LHO led a
heart and Wright claimed nine tricks.
The full deal was:
Cardinal
♠ Kxx
❤ A
◆ xxx
♣ KQ10xxx
West East
♠ Qx ♠ J10xxx
❤ KQJ109 ❤ 8764
◆ Ax ◆ Kxxx
♣ xxxx ♣ —
von Zelber
♠ Axx
❤ xxx
◆ QJ10x
♣ AJx
Canadian Master Point
I pointed out to the opponents that they
were cold for four hearts and urged them
to buy copies of Bridge, the Silver Way,
as soon as possible. Despite the setbacks
inflicted on them by these hands, our op-
ponents showed their mettle by com-
pletely collapsing and the rest of the
match was a virtual harvest of IMP’s.
The score was tallied and reported in
great haste as another courier had arrived
with an envelope full of American dollars
and directions to Castle Zelda. I urged
Wright and Bruce to drive quickly to en-
sure Professor Silver’s retrieval before
sundown. They left hurriedly, but not be-
fore Herr Cardinal had paid me the su-
preme compliment of comparing my
bidding to that of my distinguished rela-
tive.
Since all these events whose history
I have set down happened, I have lived a
very quiet life at a small house I have
taken in the country. Sometimes I have a
fancy — the superstitious would call it a
presentiment — that my bridge career is
not yet altogether complete; that some-
how and someday, I shall play again in
high-level matches. I shall again spin
bids out of the Silver Method, brace my
brain for a competitive auction, strike
first with pre-emptive calls. Whether this
fancy will be fulfilled I cannot tell, but I
fervidly wish it may be, for I would love
to see myself once again at the tourna-
ment at Streslau, watching the epic battle
between Princess Flavia’s team and
Professor Silver’s brave warriors, or kib-
itzing the climactic ghoulie game within
the frowning keep of Castle Zelda itself.
But of those tumultuous events I
was a mere observer, and it is fitting that
at this point I lay down my pen, and refer
my patient readers to Wright Cardinal’s
own account of the following days.
to be continued..........
 Hands from here and there
f D r a e vd i dg
T his has been a
busy year for me
as far as bridge goes.
I have already been
to tournaments in
Iceland, the
Netherlands, and
Indonesia as well as
the Spring Nationals in Phoenix and the
Summer Nationals in New Orleans. In
addition, the Bermuda Bowl in Beijing is
rapidly approaching and in November I
shall either be going to the Fall Nationals
in Atlanta or to a tournament in Japan.
With bridge being such a major part
of my life, I get to see an awful lot of
bridge hands. Here are a few interesting
problems I have seen in the last couple of
months.
North
♠ Jxx
❤ xx
◆ KQ10xxx
♣ xx
South
♠ AKQx
❤ Q9xx
◆ Ax
♣ KJx
This problem was faced by Montreal’s
Marty Caley at a recent invitational team
event in Bali, Indonesia. Marty’s partner,
Peter Schwartz, opened the North hand
with a weak 2◆, and Marty placed the
contract in 3NT. The lead was the ❤J
(standard leads). East won the ❤K,
i St i e l l v m e a r n
cashed the ❤A, and played a third heart.
Marty won the queen as West followed
small (presumably still holding the ❤10).
How would you continue?
Marty took a straightforward line
that would normally succeed. He tested
the diamonds, and when they did not
break (East had four to the jack), led a
club toward the closed hand.
Unfortunately, Marty misguessed the
clubs, playing the ♣J and losing to the
♣Q. West cashed the ❤10 and played a
club to East’s ♣A. East cashed the ◆J for
down two.
After the session Marty, who quite
rightly prides himself on having excellent
table presence, was upset for having mis-
guessed the clubs. As Marty is a good
friend, I tried to cheer him up a bit by
claiming his misguess was a normal play.
After thinking about the hand a bit more,
I managed to really make him miserable.
This is not a hand for guessing at all!
After winning the ❤Q, cash four rounds
of spades: you find that West started with
four spades, making East much more
likely to hold four diamonds than West.
Now cash the ◆A and exit with a ❤9.
West will win the ❤10 (the third defen-
sive trick) and is down to just diamonds
and clubs. If West has a diamond left to
play, that suit is very likely to break
(make sure you keep exactly one club in
dummy just in case West is the one with
four diamonds — you will then need to
lead a club down for trick nine). If West
plays a club, the defence will be power-
less to prevent you from taking your ninth
trick with either the ♣K or the ◆10.
Now, I could have written up this
hand without mentioning any names. I
October 1995
wanted the opportunity, however, to men-
tion in print what a pleasure it was play-
ing on a team with two complete
gentlemen like Marty and Peter. Both are
also fine players — this was the only card
play error I can recall either of them
making in a week of top-level bridge.
Unfortunately, Marty’s mistake happened
on the most interesting hand of the tour-
nament — one I really wanted to write
about.
My favourite hand from New
Orleans took place in the National IMP
Pairs. It is a bidding problem. With no-
body vulnerable, your LHO deals and
opens 1◆ (playing Standard). Partner
(bridge as well as business), Sheri
Winestock, passes and RHO responds 1♠.
Believe it or not, your hand is:
♠ AKJ98x ❤ x ◆ AKQJ10x ♣ —
During the dinner break of one of
our coaching weekends, I gave this prob-
lem to members of the Canadian National
Team. Silence. After a while, Coach
Kokish, one of the world’s foremost
bridge theorists, and players, suggested:
“PASS is the technically correct call. 1♠
is forcing so you will get another
chance.”
Lots of heads nodding in agreement
with the wise man of Westmount.
“If you PASS the auction continues
2♣ on your left, PASS, 3♣ on your right.
What now?”
“4♣”, from Kokish, “obviously
showing a strong two-suiter in spades and
diamonds.”
“Well, Eric, if I ever hold this hand
again, that is exactly how I will bid it.”
“So what did you bid at the table?”,
asked my coach.
“I jump cue-bid at my first opportu-
nity.”
“Jump cue-bid? To what?”
“To 6◆! DOUBLE on my left,
PASS, PASS, PASS. The lead was the
♠Q! Sheri, who thought the bidding was
very funny, put down the 10x of spades,
Canadian Master Point
and eleven other unimportant cards (no
❤A so no overtrick). I was moderately
surprised to win as much as 8 IMP’s for
+1210 as I expected this to be a very
common number on this deal.”
My last hand is from a little closer
to home; in fact, it is from Kate
Buckman’s Studio which is only three
blocks from home. This problem was
given to me by Shelagh Paulsson, who,
despite all my travels, remains one of my
favourite bridge people in the world (and
she lives only five blocks from home).
You are declarer in six diamonds on
a heart opening lead. Since North opened
the bidding with 1❤ you can be fairly
certain the lead is a singleton. Plan the
play on that assumption:
North
♠ Ax
❤ KQ876
◆ Kxx
♣ Jxx
South
♠ Qxx
❤ Ax
◆ AQxxx
♣ KQx
You have five diamond tricks, three
hearts, two clubs, and the ♠A — only
eleven tricks. East presumably has five
hearts, so a squeeze is your only chance
for a twelfth. You must play East for the
♠K in order to squeeze him in the ma-
jors.
Play low from dummy at trick 1.
East must play the ❤9, ❤10, or ❤J. After
winning the ❤A, draw three rounds of
trump and play a club to the ♣J. If this
wins, play another club. There are several
possible outcomes:
1) If the defence lets you win the
first two rounds of clubs, discard your
third club on dummy’s hearts and lead
towards your ♠Q for trick 12 (remember
we are assuming East has the ♠K).
2) If West wins the first or second
club and returns a spade, win the ♠A,
cross to the closed hand in clubs and run
the minors squeezing East. You can do
this yourself if they win the first round of
clubs and play another club.
3) If either defender wins the sec-
ond club and returns a third round of
clubs, play your second-last diamond,
discarding dummy’s small spade. The
position will be (with East still to dis-
card):
North
♠ A
❤ KQ87
◆ —
♣ —
West East
♠ immaterial ♠ Kx
❤ ❤ J10xx
◆ ◆ —
♣ ♣ —
South
♠ Qxx
❤ x
◆ x
♣ —
East is trump-squeezed. Whatever he
plays, cash the top hearts for a spade dis-
card. If East is down to one heart, you
can set up a heart trick with a ruff using
the ♠A as an entry. If East has kept two
hearts, cash the ♠A, dropping the ♠K and
return to your hand with a heart ruff to
enjoy the ♠Q.
4) If East wins the first or second
round of clubs and returns a major, he
gives up a trick immediately. On a spade
return, you can put up the ♠Q. A low
heart return allows you to win a trick
cheaply in dummy. On a high heart re-
turn, your spots are good enough to set up
a fourth trick in hearts with a ruffing fi-
nesse, using the ♠A as a late entry.
It’s nice when you don’t have to go
half way around the world to find an in-
teresting hand. Thanks, Shelagh!
October 1995
 Giving something back
s h e r i w
M ost Canadian
bridge play-
ers know John
Gowdy, not only
because he has
done well at the
table or has proba-
bly tried to tell
them some old
bridge story, but because he does a lot of
community services for bridge — from
playing with youngsters in the Bridge
Buddy league to writing articles for
Canadian Master Point. Gowdy doesn’t
expect a lot of thanks for his generosity,
he thinks of it simply as “giving some-
thing back” to the game he loves. I’ve
always admired this attitude and would
like to give him the credit his most recent
endeavour deserves.
This summer John organized a
league in Toronto where twelve junior
players received the opportunity to play
with twelve expert-level players over a
six-week period. John has a way of talk-
ing others into giving something back
too!
The twelve original ‘experts’ or ‘se-
niors’ were John himself, Ron Bishop,
Brad Boyle, David Caplan, Mark Caplan,
Steve Cooper, Roy Dalton, Fred
Gitelman, Marty Kirr, Chuck Messinger,
George Mittelman, and myself. However,
there were many substitutions when peo-
ple couldn’t make it, so the list also in-
cludes Gerry Charney, Dianna Gordon,
Chris Hough, Linda Lee, Fred Lerner,
David Lindop, Irving Litvack, Gloria
Silverman, Jonathan Steinberg, and David
Turner. One week, Eric Sutherland, un-
able to commit to a regular position in the
junior roster, was commandeered as a
‘senior’ to complete the movement.
Canadian Master Point
i n e s t o c k
The juniors were Jeremy Goldman,
David Halasi, Colin Lee, Eric Lee, Dan
N a d l er, M ik e Nadler, Alexander
Nicholson, Jared Riley, Darren Wolpert,
Gavin Wolpert (at 12, the youngest par-
ticipant), Christopher Yeung, and Ben
Zeidenberg, with Sam Leung and Jason
Manso as substitutes.
The format was that each junior
played in an 8- or 12-board IMP match
with each expert in turn, comparing
scores with randomly drawn team-mates.
Juniors always sat North and East while
the seniors were South and West. Each
week’s IMP’s were added together to de-
termine the final standings. Although this
league was originally meant just to offer
the benefit of playing with more experi-
enced players, the spirit soon became
competitive when Irving Litvack (also
giving something back) made the gener-
ous offer to fund the four top finishers to
play in an inter-city match in Montreal.
The Toronto representatives will be (in
order of finish): Jared Riley, Colin Lee,
Dan Nadler, and David Halasi. As there
was a tremendous amount of substitution
among the experts (some playing only
once or twice), their final standings will
be withheld!
After the initial week, the first order
of business was clear — restrict the con-
ventions! Like all young and upcoming
bridge players, these juniors were af-
flicted with excessive use and abuse of
conventions. For example, one junior
holding
♠ 10xxxx ❤ Ax ◆ AKQxxx ♣ —
chose to use a Michaels cue-bid after a
1❤ opening on his right. He was boxed
in when the auction proceeded 4❤ on his
left, 4♠ by partner, pass, to him.
 Since partner would bid with most
hands containing any four or five spades,
there was little safety in going on. Given
the disparity between the two suits and
the high-card value of the hand, as well
as the club void, the Michaels convention
should be repressed in favor of a 2◆
overcall. In this particular case, a 2◆ bid
would start an auction that would allow
you to bid the lay-down six spades with
confidence (partner bids spades freely!).
North
♠ Jx
❤ Axxx
◆ Kxx
♣ KJ87
West East
♠ Q9xxx ♠ AKxxx
❤ KJx ❤ 10xx
◆ — ◆ 642
♣ Q9xxx ♣ xx
Nadler
♠ 10
❤ Qxx
◆ AQJxxxx
♣ A10
Mike Nadler played this hand well
in 6◆.
After ruffing the second spade, he
drew trumps and proceeded to run his
diamonds. With one diamond left to play,
this was the position (see top of next col-
umn):
On the play of the last diamond,
West was squeezed. He correctly dis-
carded a heart, baring his king: this would
defeat the slam if East held the ❤Q.
Mike also discarded a heart and then
crossed to the ❤A, felling the ❤K. He
returned to the ♣A, cashed the ❤Q, and
finessed the ♣J at trick 12 to land his
slam.
John Gowdy and Fred Gitelman
worked out a standard convention card
for everyone that, while not simplistic,
North
♠ —
❤ Ax
◆ —
♣ KJ87
West East
♠ — ♠ x
❤ KJ ❤ 10xx
◆ — ◆ —
♣ Q9xx ♣ xx
Nadler
♠ —
❤ Qxx
◆ x
♣ A10
was back to basics. The juniors were not
impressed that their only weapon over a
1NT (15-17) opening was Landy — after
all, most of them think DONT is for
LOL’s! Ultimately, though, I think the
juniors benefited from learning how best
to describe a hand naturally. One fellow
was unsure of how to bid a hand contain-
ing five hearts and four spades and 11
hcp after his partner had opened 1NT —
what did they do before Smolen? As Roy
Dalton pointed out, after the 2◆ response
to Stayman, one could jump in one’s five-
card suit rather than one’s four-card
suit!
On the whole the juniors were very
impressive and the future of Canadian
bridge looks quite bright.
As if organizing this group wasn’t
enough, John invited everyone to his
house for a barbecue before the bridge
game on the last week. Here, though,
most of the credit for a great meal goes to
Joanne Lange, John’s long-suffering bet-
ter half. Thanks for everything, Joanne,
Irving — and John.
Three of the participants (Wolpert,
Halasi, and Lee) went on to distinguish
themselves in the World Junior Pairs and
the World Bridge Camp that followed this
event. Ed.
October 1995
 Bali high
e r i c s u
W hat an amazing
trip. John Car-
ruthers and I met up
with the Montrealers
(Jeff Blond, David
Levy, Darrell Kovacz,
and Frederic Pollack) at
Terminal 2 in the Toronto
International Airport. The journey had
but begun. We flew five hours to Los
Angeles, only to find that the only flight
that had been delayed was ours. Suddenly
our two-hour layover had turned into six.
Never mind, we just broke out a deck of
cards and started playing. We wandered
into the waiting area about thirty minutes
before the plane left and met up with our
sixth member, Mike Roberts of Victoria.
United, we climbed on board Garuda
Indonesia for the five-hour flight to
Honolulu, followed by the twelve-hour
flight to Denpasar, Bali. Naturally, there
was an additional hour delay in Hawaii,
but by then we were all numb with tired-
ness.
All of the sleepiness was gone as
soon as we hit the island. It was truly
paradise. As we entered the customs area,
we were greeted by six lovely ladies who
were to be guides for the entire tourna-
ment. We were quickly ushered through
customs to a desk proclaiming a
“Welcome to the Participants of the 5th
World Junior Bridge Championship”.
When we had gathered the luggage, we
went outside, only to be shocked. People
say that the first thing you notice when
you arrive in Bali is the humidity: not so
for us. The first thing we noticed were the
banners, and the billboards, and the vans,
and the flags. Everything was geared for
Canadian Master Point
t h e r l a n d
t h e 5 t h Wo r l d J u n i o r B r i d g e
Championship. It was truly amazing.
Several other teams were here al-
ready, and the field would be strong.
There were 2 teams from the United
States, although Leni Holtz couldn’t
make it due to job requirements, so USA
I would be playing five-handed, with
Andrew Moss playing with each of the
other people on the team. European
Junior Champions Great Britain were the
pre-tournament favourites, with Denmark
(runners up by a hair) close behind. Italy
would make up the European contingent.
Argentina represented South America,
and China and Japan came from the Far
East. Apparently China had cleaned up
at the Far East Championships and would
likely be in the running all the way. New
Zealand, Australia, and Indonesia rounded
out the field. New Zealand had a strong
team, that not many would have known
about; they would also be in the thick of
things.
The twelve teams would play a full
round-robin of 32-board matches, scored
on the WBF 25 Victory Point Scale,
where 15 VPs is a tie, and 25 is a full
win, but you can go down to 0 VPs for
losing by more than 106 IMPs.
Predictions were that Great Britain,
Denmark, China and USA I would make
the semis. My feeling was that it would
be Great Britain, Denmark, New Zealand,
and (of course) Canada.
We still had a couple of days before
the opening ceremonies, so we did a little
touring of the island. Our team quickly
developed a reputation as the “half-witted
Canadians’’. Much of this had to do with
an incident by the pool where we were
 Left to right: Fred Pollack, Mike Roberts, Darrell Kovacz, Eric Sutherland,
Balinese friend, Jeff Blond, David Levy, John Carruthers (npc)
surely do well against Indonesia. We play
the first half, and lose by 20 IMPs. Not a
disaster. If we play the second half even,
we should do it. No such luck: we lose
another 20 IMPs, and we get only 8 VPs.
How sad — we fought for so long, only
to lose it in the last match. But wait!
What’s happening in the Italy-Indonesia
match? Believe it or not, our hosts tie the
fighting Italians, and we squeak into the
semifinals.
The semis would see Great Britain
take on Canada, and Denmark play New
Zealand (please note the prediction from
earlier on!). It would be 64 boards, with
the winners playing a 96-board final, and
the losers playing a 64-board consola-
tion.
After two quarters, Great Britain
and New Zealand each led by about 30
IMPs, not an insurmountable lead. In
fact, if I hadn’t missed that compound
squeeze, and taken that silly sacrifice, we
would have been tied! The third set,
however, was not a pretty sight, and we
lost over 60 IMPs in sixteen boards. We
lost even more in the last set, and it was
over. New Zealand also added to their
lead, so Great Britain and New Zealand
would fight it out for the World Junior
Bridge Championship, while Denmark
would face Canada.
The final was never close, with
Great Britain widening their lead with
every set and finishing as easy winners.
Meanwhile, Denmark built on an early
lead, and were 63 IMP’s up going into the
last set. Some of you may remember that
during the Canadian Junior Trials, the
Montrealers were 57 IMP’s up going into
the last set when Mike Roberts started
working his magic, and his team was ac-
tually leading with five comparisons to
go, although they ended up losing by
October 1995
throwing around a little football with the
New Zealanders, when the ball flew into
the pool-side bar, knocking over a bottle
of sambucca, which proceeded to crash
all over the bar. Over the rest of our stay,
we managed to break a tooth, a plate, a
chair, and a glass. Pretty impressive.
The opening ceremonies were fan-
tastic. There were over 350 people in at-
tendance for the opening of this event, of
whom fewer than half were directly in-
volved in the event. There were television
cameras galore, and more press than you
could believe.
The first day. In the first match, we
are playing Italy on VuGraph. Mike and
I are out for the first set, and I take ad-
vantage of it to watch our boys on the big
screen. We finish the first 16 boards
slightly down, and we come in for the
second set. JC likes to do a simple rota-
tion, so we’ll probably continue like this
for the remainder of the round-robin. The
unofficial score is us winning by 3 , but a
director’s ruling overturns one of our
team-mates’ contracts, and we lose by 12.
Still, not a terrible start.
The evening session brings China.
Jeff, Mike and I remember meeting China
in Denmark two years earlier, where they
pasted the floor with us on the first day.
We win the match 19-11 in victory points,
and we are all happy. A reasonable first
day, scoring 32 VPs in all.
On the second day we play Indonesia
and USA II. We score 25 against our
hosts in the first match, and 24 in the
evening session. We are on our way up.
At this point, Great Britain were in first,
with New Zealand, Canada, and Italy
climbing up. Denmark and China were
just behind the leaders.
The third day we faced New
Zealand; the match was close through
the first half, but the second half broke
things open, and we won 22-8. Japan
was the foe in the evening set. Mike and
I had a really funny card, where out of
sixteen boards, only five contracts were
Canadian Master Point
made — they made three and we made
two. However, we managed to set them
eight times to their three. We blitzed
Japan, and took a share of the lead with
Great Britain at 128 VPs.
The next day we had an excursion in
the afternoon to Mount Batur, one of the
volcanoes on the island. It was a nice
break from the bridge, but I wanted to get
back to the table while we still had mo-
mentum.
The evening session, however, was
disastrous. We played USA I, who had
been floundering so far during the week.
We realized that they were far more dan-
gerous than they had been playing. I had
a horrible set, most notably allowing 1NT
doubled to make when it was booked for
down two. Ugh. We lose 22-8, but are
still among the leaders. Denmark has
now moved into the top four, with China
and Italy nipping on their heels.
The next day we drew Argentina
and the leaders, Great Britain. We needed
a big set, and we had it in the first half
against Argentina, leading by over 60,
already enough for a blitz. We slipped in
the second half, though, and only won by
22-8 — a little disappointing in a situa-
tion where every VP counts. Back to
VuGraph in the evening session. Great
Britain play like machines, and we do
not: they drill us to the tune of 24-6 . We
are starting to think we might not make
it. Italy is closing in fast, and they have
a relatively easy draw, facing USA II, and
the hosts, Indonesia.
On the final day we play Australia
in the first set, and when the dust clears,
we have a 25-5 win. Or do we? The
Australians want to appeal a board, and
that could make the result 24-6. They are
fighting for pride, and we are fighting for
a playoff spot. Fortunately, they decide to
withdraw the appeal, and we have what
we need for starters.
The final set was against second-
place Denmark on Vu-Graph. We need to
get at least 12 VPs to qualify, as Italy will
twelve IMP’s. But could the same magic
happen again?
We are put on VuGraph for this final
set (our match was actually the closer of
the two at this point), with Mike and I on
the screens. On the first board, he
psyches, but we miss the defence to beat
3NT. The next few boards are rather bor-
ing, and then the magic starts. We win 45
IMP’s over six boards! We were trailing
by only 25 with six boards to go! But
then the steam runs out, and it is over.
But we have given it our best shot.
Meanwhile, at the same time as the
semifinals and the finals, the remaining
participants were invited to play in a
Swiss Pairs event. In this event, your
score is IMPed against every other pair in
the room, and the average is taken. After
all the scores have been tabulated, the
pairings for the next set are then made as
in a Swiss Team movement. It is a fun
game, but really requires a computer in
order to speed up the scoring. The orga-
nizers also invited any local juniors who
wanted to play to join the event. Over 46
tables played, with only sixteen pairs of
players from the main event: 78 pairs of
local juniors! Is it possible to get a turn-
out of that size in any event in North
America? The locals did well too, finish-
ing 1st, 5th, and 9th, proving that the
Indonesian team was really just getting
warmed up all along.
By now it was time for the closing
banquet, with as many tables as at the
opening. Everyone bid each other a
teary farewell, with the promise to write
and see each other in two years’ time.
This Championship was an incredibly
well organized event in a breathtaking
location. Rumour has it that the 2002
Bermuda Bowl will be played at the same
location. Plan to be there. It will be worth
it.

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October 1995
 Bali quiz
j o h n c a
T
hey say the on-
looker sees most
of the game. Let’s
see if you can do
better than the play-
ers on the following
problems from the
World Junior Teams.
1. You hold:
♠ AQ75432 ❤ 743 ◆ — ♣ K42
Only your side is vulnerable and your
partner (North) deals and passes. RHO
opens 1◆, and you bid 3♠ (don’t bother
to write, I know it’s not everyone’s
choice). LHO finds a (negative) double
and your partner raises to 4♠. East’s 5❤
ends the auction. What do you lead?
2. At favourable vulnerability, you
hold as South:
♠ J98762 ❤ 9 ◆ AQ8 ♣ AQ2
East deals and passes and the opponents
are silent throughout the auction. You
open 1♠ and partner responds 2❤. You
rebid 2♠ and partner bids 4◆ (splinter for
spades). What now?
3. (see top of next column)
At both vulnerable you (East) pass as
dealer. South, your LHO, opens 4♠ and
everyone passes. Partner leads the ◆9,
declarer wins the ace, you follow, and
declarer plays the two. South crosses to
his hand with the ❤2 to his ace, partner
playing the three. The ♠2 goes to part-
ner’s four, the ❤9, and your ♠9. What do
you play now?
20 Canadian Master Point
r r u t h e r s
North
♠ —
❤ KQ1092
◆ AKQ76
♣ Q65
East (you)
♠ AK9
❤ 84
◆ J104
♣ J10973
4. Both vulnerable
You hold
♠ 7 ❤ 4 ◆ J10743 ♣ 1098632
Partner deals and opens 1♣ (natural).
RHO doubles and you bid 3♣ (would
you?); LHO passes and partner bids 3♠.
RHO passes and the spotlight falls on
you. Choose your weapon.
Solutions
Hand 1.
You didn’t underlead your spades to get
a diamond ruff, did you? You did? You
thought that I wouldn’t be giving this as
a problem unless the solution was a sexy
one? Poor table presence! As you can see
(facing page), you must take your black
winners immediately. Our guys really
made the Italians look bad on this hand.
First of all, Albamonte underled the ♠A
against Blond’s 5❤: -450. At the other
table, Roberts showed how it should be
 North North
♠ J109 ♠ AQ105
❤ J9 ❤ AQ764
◆ 852 ◆ 9
♣ AQ1095 ♣ J75
West East West East
♠ 86 ♠ K ♠ K3 ♠ 4
❤ AK82 ❤ Q1065 ❤ J1052 ❤ K83
◆ J1064 ◆ AKQ973 ◆ J1074 ◆ K6532
♣ J76 ♣ 83 ♣ 983 ♣ K1064
South South
♠ AQ75432 ♠ J98762
❤ 743 ❤ 9
◆ — ◆ AQ8
♣ K42 ♣ AQ2

Hand 1 Hand 2

North North
♠ — ♠ 7
❤ KQ1092 ❤ 4
◆ AKQ76 ◆ J10743
♣ Q65 ♣ 1098632
West East West East
♠ J4 ♠ AK9 ♠ QJ42 ♠ 10863
❤ J7653 ❤ 84 ❤ KQ76 ❤ J8532
◆ 9 ◆ J104 ◆ A965 ◆ K82
♣ AK842 ♣ J10973 ♣ Q ♣ 7
South South
♠ Q10876532 ♠ AK95
❤ A ❤ A109
◆ 8532 ◆ Q
♣ — ♣ AKJ54

Hand 3 Hand 4

October 1995
done by making a lead-directing bid in
clubs. This had an unexpected benefit
— it allowed Sutherland to push on to the
five-level in spades. The Italians did the
best they could here, by saving in 6◆ for
-300.
If you underled your spades, or led
a trump, you lose 13 IMP’s. If you led a
mundane ♠A or an aggressive club, you
lose only 6 IMP’s.
Hand 2.
As you can see (previous page), the only
way to go down in six spades is to take
the heart finesse and refuse the spade fi-
nesse! Most declarers made all the tricks.
Slam seems a good proposition. In prac-
tice, it’s +11 IMP’s if you bid anything
other than 4♠ , a push if your bad trumps
talked you into bidding 4♠.
Incidentally, do you like partner’s
bidding? How about an immediate splin-
ter instead? Both sequences have their
pluses and minuses. If you make an im-
mediate splinter, you’ll have to wait until
the dummy goes down before partner
finds out how good the hearts are, but the
powerful trumps come across. If you bid
2❤, then splinter, your partner may not
play you for such good trumps. One sug-
gestion would be to look at the strength
of your trumps — if they are strong, as
they are here, you should be concerned
that your partner will worry about the
strength of his own trumps and pull in his
horns, even with excellent controls. So
you should splinter immediately. On the
other hand, if your own trumps are weak,
say jack fourth, then go the two-over-one
route.
On Vugraph, the New Zealand North
splintered immediately and reached slam
when his partner trotted out Blackwood.
In contrast the Argentine player bid 2❤,
then splintered. His partner signed off in
4♠ and North respected that decision.
Hand 3.
Partner made a wonderful lead here.
Canadian Master Point
Were you there for him with the diamond
ruff? I hope you don’t think he led you
astray with his ❤3 — you should draw
the conclusion that partner has the ♠Q,
♠J, or ♠10, otherwise declarer would
have led one of them. Secondly, if de-
clarer needed discards for club losers, he
would have tried to take them already
(you can see he has at least six winners
outside spades, and he must have at least
seven spades, even in the 90’s).
Your teammate made a disciplined
pass with the South hand and reached the
good 6◆ slam. On a club lead, he ruffed
two clubs and a heart in dummy, but
when hearts were 5-2, had to go down
one. So, if you beat 4♠, it’s a flat board,
if not, it’s 12 IMP’s away, which was our
sad fate on this hand.
Hand 4.
Having bid only 3♣ the first time, you
can still reach slam by bidding 5♣ or 4❤.
In either case, partner will carry on, but
if you lazily bid 4♣, he will sign off in
game. Sure, you could blast a slam with
the South hand anyway, but as many as
four major-suit cards in North’s hand
would sink it. An encouraging bid pushes
the board for you, 4♣ loses 13 IMP’s.
Both teams in the Italy-Argentina
match missed a chance to gain here. In
our match with Great Britain, and in
every other match, the hand was a 13-
IMP swing as one team (in our match,
GB) bid the slam while the other did
not.
Summary
There were plenty of IMP’s flying around
on these hands: the difference between
getting them all right and getting them all
wrong was 43 IMP’s. How did you
rank?
 World bridge camp 1
D a vr i a d y
1 54 pairs competed last August in the
inaugural World Junior (under 25)
Pairs, held in Ghent, Belgium, and more
than 240 players stayed for a further nine
days to attend a World Junior Bridge
Camp. While similar events have been
held in Europe for some years now, this
was the first time that young players from
North America had attended.
The ACBL, currently in youth de-
velopment mode, subsidized more than
50 players, eight of them Canadians, to
attend, while the Ontario Unit also gener-
ously added its support to the seven play-
ers from its own area. Those of us seeing
them off at the airport had only one major
emotion: jealousy. We’ve always looked
at the Nationals as a sort of adult bridge
camp, but this was the real thing. We
wanted to go too.
After the opening four-session
World Junior Pairs, the Camp itself be-
came more free-form. While there were
organized competitions each evening, the
playing hall was open (and occupied!) 22
hours a day. There were impromptu rub-
ber games, lectures from IBPA Bulletin
editor Patrick Jourdain, and even a Daily
Bulletin.
And if the results are anything to go
by, the future shines bright for Canadian
bridge. Darren Wolpert (Toronto) and
Frederic Pollack (Montreal) placed 14th
in the World Junior Pairs, although well
back of runaway winners Geir Helgemo
and Boje Brogeland of Norway. Colin
Lee and David Halasi (Toronto) placed
19th, and won the trophy for being top
under-20 pair in the event. No other
North American pairs placed in the over-
all.
S l i e l ev e r
This was not the only trophy for the
16-year-old Halasi, who also brought
home the Schroeder Cup for best overall
performance at the Camp. This was de-
termined by overall placings in three
pairs events, each of which had to be
played with a partner from a different
country than your own; Halasi scored 298
out of a possible 300 points to finish first
handily.
And how good was the bridge?
Well, judge for yourself from these ex-
amples, which as you might expect fea-
ture aggressive, imaginative bidding, and
Baremaus (NL)
♠ 1073
❤ A
◆ 762
♣ AKQJ74
Lee Halasi
♠ Q965 ♠ A82
❤ Q ❤ J10654
◆ KQ9543 ◆ 8
♣ 92 ♣ 10865
(NL)
♠ KJ4
❤ K98732
◆ AJ10
♣ 3
excellent card play.
Colin’s off-centre 3◆ call at favourable
vulnerability started the ball rolling, and
we can sympathize with South’s problem
when this was passed around to him.
October 1995

David Halasi receives his trophy
After lengthy thought, he elected to make
a takeout double. We can equally sympa-
thize with North, who must have sus-
pected the best contract was 3NT, but
couldn’t figure out how to get there! He
must also have been worried that they
were missing a club slam. Eventually,
after even lengthier thought, he chose
5♣.
Alert to the table action, David
found an in-tempo double of 5♣, cor-
rectly judging from South’s initial reluc-
tance to double that he wouldn’t sit for
this one. The resulting number from 5❤
doubled garnered the Canadians all the
matchpoints.
Curiously, the same contract is fea-
tured in this hand, where Pollack and
Wolpert took all the matchpoints from
Primavera and Busacchi, the Italian pair
who eventually finished in fifth place.
Neither side was vulnerable, and
when Wolpert made the normal trump
lead, decalrer could have escaped for
down two, since clubs were 2-2. Not
knowing the situation, however, he won
the first trick in dummy, and led a small
heart off, to prepare the way for heart
Canadian Master Point
Primavera
♠ 10xxx
❤ x
◆ Qxxx
♣ QJxx
Wolpert Pollack
♠ AQx ♠ K98xx
❤ AKxxx ❤ QJ10x
◆ xxx ◆ AK
♣ xx ♣ xx
Busacchi
♠ J
❤ xxx
◆ J10xx
♣ AK10xx
West North East South
1❤ pass 1♠ 2♣
dbl1 4♣ 4❤ 5♣
dbl all pass
1. Support double
ruffs. This turned out to be a fatal mis-
take.
Alertly, Pollack rose with the ❤Q,
and cashed the ◆K and ◆A in that order,
to show his doubleton. Now he led a
spade to his partner’s queen, and duly
received his diamond ruff to score up
+500.
 Bourbon St. bridge
r a y l
W hat a site
f o r
Nationals — New
a
Orleans, or
N’awlins, as the
locals say it. It’s a
city of extremes,
set in a country-
side of extremes. Steps away from your
hotel, you’re walking through the Vieux
Carré, the French Quarter, where many of
the buildings look just as they have for a
century or more. The districts and the
street names themselves are familiar —
Bourbon Street, Basin Street, Rampart
Street, St. Louis Street, Desire (yes, the
streetcar still runs), Preservation Hall
(birthplace of jazz), the Garden District
(home of occult novelist Anne Rice) and
Metairie (with its famous necropolis of
neatly organized above-ground tombs).
This is one of the few places in the
world that lives up to your expectations;
not a nice city, but a great city, and a
unique one. You can walk down the
streets of the French Quarter in the small
hours, drink in hand, listening to music
coming out of the doorways, tour the
Mississippi on a paddle-wheeler, or visit
an ante-bellum mansion such as magnifi-
cent Nottaway, where it takes little imag-
ination to see those Southern belles
dancing in the great ballroom and the
gentlemen sipping mint juleps.
And don’t forget the food. Even the
coffee tastes different, laced heavily with
chicory. Louisiana has produced not one,
but two unique cuisines, both highly
spiced, Creole and Cajun. Actually, as
our Nigerian taxi driver told us, Creole
food is fundamentally African cooking
e e
under a different name — the native
dishes of the original slaves and Cajun
(derived from “Acadian”) food has
French Canadian roots. Both make use
of local herbs and ingredients such as
andouille, crawfish, and filé.
Good fortune found us one day in
Lafayette, about two hours’ drive from
New Orleans in the heart of Cajun coun-
try, eating an unforgettable meal in Enola
Prudhomme’s restaurant. Our waitress, a
native French speaker, steered us through
the menu, and we can assure readers that
Enola compares favourably with her more
famous brother Paul (at about a quarter
the price!).
Then there was the little matter of
Hurricane Erin. The tournament, of
course, was not affected by the onrushing
natural disaster. The night before Erin
was due to hit, we found ourselves play-
ing against ACBL president Roy Green,
and asked him what was going to happen.
One concern, he told us, was that people
wouldn’t be able to leave the hotel be-
tween sessions during the hurricane. “I
guess we’ll just organize some extra
games,” he mused. Fortunately, the hur-
ricane did a U-turn and bypassed the city
entirely.
Which brings me to the bridge.
There were a large number of Canadians
at the tournament, and several did well in
National events. Nader Hanna and Doug
Fraser placed overall in three National
events, while a number of Canadians and
ex-Canadians were still competing at a
late stage of the Spingold: Martin Caley,
Geoff Hampson, Ralph Cohen, Bruce
Ferguson, Peter Nagy, and Haig
Tchamitch.
October 1995
 Two-time GNTB champs from Quebec: Frederic (Kermit the Frog) Pollack, Sylvain (the Knife)
Descouteaux, Marc-André (the Fork) Fourcaudot, and Larry (the Lamprey) Crevier
Most noteworthy was the Final of Descouteaux Crevier
the GNTB, which for the second year 1♠ 2❤1
running featured a Montreal team com- 3♣2 3◆
peting against a Toronto team. The de- 3NT 4NT3
fending champions, a foursome led by 6♣4 pass5
Sylvain Descouteaux, defeated the
Toronto squad, which was captained by 1. Game-forcing
Sam Yoga. The Quebeckers play aggres- 2. Extras
sive bridge, and needed all their skill to
get past a tough Los Angeles team in the 3. Quantitative
semifinal. 4. I accept, but I’d rather play in
Crevier a suit
♠ Q 5. Fine by me
❤ Q109xx
◆ AKxx The above nice co-operative auction was
♣ A108 worth a 13-IMP pickup in a match where
the final margin was 19.
The same pair had another neat auc-
Descouteaux tion on the next hand, which came up in
♠ AKxxx the first round of the Life Masters Pairs.
Bidding to the right contract was a real
❤ A challenge, and many pairs got to 7♣ on
◆ xx these cards, only to discover that it had
♣ KJxxx no play. In fact, 7◆ on the 4-3 is the

Canadian Master Point

only making grand. The trick is both to West Crevier East DesC.
get there, and to do it deliberately! 1♣1
1❤ 2◆ pass 2♠2
Crevier
pass 3❤ pass 4◆3
♠ A75
pass 4NT4 pass 5♠5
❤ A72
pass 7◆ all pass
◆ AJ95
♣ KQ2 1. 1-round force
2. Unbalanced

3. Patterning out
Descouteaux 4. Keycard for diamonds
♠ K1098 5. Two keycards with the queen
❤ 10
◆ KQ4
♣ AJ1074 The next hand was one of our own good
memories from the final of the Life
Masters Pairs (see top of next page):

Nottaway is the largest of the beautiful ante-bellum mansions that

can still be seen in the New Orleans area

October 1995
 North
♠ J943
❤ 964
◆ KJ5
♣ A74
West East
♠ AK875 ♠ 106
❤ AJ1032 ❤ KQ87
◆ Q63 ◆ A1092
♣ — ♣ 1093
South
♠ Q2
❤ 5
◆ 874
♣ KQJ8652
West North East South
Linda Lee Ray Lee
1♠ pass 1NT 3♣
3❤ pass 4◆1 pass 4♠
5◆2 pass 6❤ all pass
1. Cue-bid for hearts
2. I have diamond cards and a club con- the ❤A at trick one, and exited with the
trol — what do you think?
Linda played the hand very carefully on
a dummy reversal, avoiding the very real
risk (on the auction) of a bad spade break
en route to a fine score.
Sometimes a good player can be
persuaded to go wrong by the defenders
— but only a good player! Watch what
happened on this hand, where Rhoda
Habert and Joey Silver of Montreal were
East-West against Howard Chandross and
Richard De Martino.
(see top of next column)
Habert led the ❤6 (third and fifth), and
Silver guessed that she did not have the
❤Q. Cashing the top hearts would there-
fore simply set up a discard for one of
dummy’s diamond losers. So Joey played
Canadian Master Point
De Martino
♠ Q7532
❤ 92
◆ Q95
♣ KQ4
Habert Silver
♠ J106 ♠ 94
❤ J1064 ❤ AK8
◆ 84 ◆ AJ106
♣ 10653 ♣ J982
Chandross
♠ AK8
❤ Q753
◆ K732
♣ A7
Chandross De Martino
1NT 2❤1
2♠ 3NT
1. T ransfer
♠4, won by dummy’s queen.
Declarer led a heart from dummy,
and Silver ducked. When Chandross let
the ❤9 ride, Habert rose to the occasion
by winning the ❤J. Now the picture was
clear: Silver had started with exactly the
❤A108. So South drew two more rounds
of trumps, and played the ❤Q, intending
to smother East’s ❤10 and, if West cov-
ered, establishing the ❤7 for a diamond
pitch.
Imagine his chagrin when the ❤Q
was not covered, he took a diamond
pitch, and Silver won the ❤A — then
cashed the ◆A for one down and all the
matchpoints!
One final memory: cafe au lait and
beignets at the Cafe du Monde on Jackson
Square at 2 am. If you’ve been there, you
know what I’m talking about. If you
haven’t, you’re missing something!
 All the world’s a bridge article
r o sD ea l v y i n d
A question I am
often asked is
“Where do you get
your ideas for bridge
articles?”. The an-
swer, of course, is
that for me Life is a
metaphor for Bridge,
and, as such, everything I see, hear, read,
or do is a potential bridge article.
Take great literature, for example:
“Great Expectations”, “Crime and
Punishment”, “War and Peace”, “Pride
and Prejudice” — the titles alone make
me think of my bridge partner. And po-
etry, that great well of emotional despair,
expresses the bridge experience in every
stanza. “Gather ye rosebuds while ye
may...” (take your tricks). “On His
Blindness” (my partner again). “Full
many a rose is born to blush unseen, and
waste its sweetness on the desert air....”
(where are the kibitzers when I make bril-
liancy plays?). “Paradise Lost” (the hand
was cold).
Shakespeare, that great bridge player
in the sky, is without equal. Surely, with
all those jesters, fools, faeries, asses, and
women disguised as men, he had bridge
in mind? And some of the lines! “The
quality of mercy is not strained...”; “To
be or not to be?”; “Forbear to judge for
we are sinners all”. Even the titles:
“All’s Well That Ends Well” (I misplayed,
they misdefended, and I made the con-
tract anyway.); “The Taming of the
Shrew” (how some men view playing
with a female partner); “A Midsummer
Night’s Dream” (it was late, it turned into
a nightmare); “Twelfth Night” (how long
was that tournament?).
t S e i u l k vo e l rs k y
Going from the sublime to the ri-
diculous, nursery rhymes cover the entire
bridge scene. “The knave of hearts he
stole those tarts”; “To market, to market
to buy a fat pig”; “This little piggy ate
roast beef”; “Along came a spider...”;
“Little Bo Peep has lost her sheep”;
“When she was good she was very very
good, but when she was bad she was hor-
rid”; “He put in his thumb and pulled out
a plum”; “Little Boy Blue come blow
your horn”. This particular list could go
on forever.
How about all those fairy tales?
Surely the Brothers Grimm were bridge
players? Just think of the Sleeping
Beauty; the poisoned apple; the slipper
that didn’t fit; the carriage that turned
into a pumpkin; selling a cow for beans;
the beanstalk that reached into the sky;
and that big bad wolf who huffed and
puffed till he blew the house down.
Going to the theatre is always a rich
bridge experience. For example, “No
Exit” by Sartre (endplayed); “Three
Sisters” by Chekhov (where’s the
fourth?); “Death-defying Acts”, Off-
Broadway (pre-empting vulnerable, at the
five level).
The movies, too, are fertile bridge
grounds: “The Good, the Bad, and the
Ugly” (partner’s pre-empts); “Dirty
Harry”; “Lethal Weapon” (my pre-
empts); “Clueless”; “Honey I Trumped
Your Trick”; “The Bridge in Madison
County”.
Take time out to eat? There’s bridge
in every bite. Squeeze cake, vanilla coup,
cooked goose, dead duck, strip steak and
endplays, scream puffs....
How about Physics, Math, Computer
October 1995
Science and Philosophy? The Heisenberg showed me one keycard I decided on
Uncertainty Principle (as in ‘I know how 6NT, in a misguided attempt to ‘protect’
many hearts he has, but does he have the my ♠K. Since I could only count eleven
queen?’); the Big Bang (if only I had a probable tricks without the ♠K, I should
gun...); Fermat’s Last Theorem (that’s have bid six clubs. This was confirmed
how hard the hand was); Artificial intel- after West led the ◆K, and I saw the
ligence (just as bad at bridge as the dummy. (A plunge into Thomas Cole’s
human kind); the great fire of Heraclitus brooding landscapes.)
that sparked the universe (versus our own How would you play the hand?
puny pilot light); the nature of reality North
(man, this bidding is unreal); the meaning
of Existence (like, if the king is singleton ♠ J72
onside, does it really exist?); ontology ❤ 63
(there is no god), and mind-body dualism ◆ 6
(as in ‘I lost my mind’). ♣ KJ106543
And don’t forget politics: prayer at
the bridge table (a moment of silence
before playing to the first trick), and con-
servative bidding versus (out-of-control) South
liberal bidding. ♠ K53
Religion provides no relief. Just ❤ AKQ
think of heaven, hell, purgatory, original ◆ AJ10
sin, the Rabbi’s Rule, and Lazarus risen
from the dead (I made a fatal mistake and ♣ AQ72
then I got lucky). I went to a wedding What I did was run all my tricks,
last week, where the ceremony was ending in dummy, and then play a low
bridge heaven: in sickness and in health; spade. East was good enough to hold on
for better or for worse; love, honour, and to the ♠A and a low diamond, so I uncer-
obey. Oh yeah? emoniously went down one. Here were
Then there was the woman who re- all four hands. Notice that six clubs is
marked at a bridge tournament “I haven’t cold.
had this much fun since I cleaned the North
oven”, and the man who said “Not even
a fish gets caught if it keeps its mouth ♠ J72
shut”. ❤ 63
As you can see, there are articles ◆ 6
everywhere. And there is certainly no ♣ KJ106543
shortage of hands. Typically, I wait for
disaster to strike, file away the hand and West East
then match the hand up with a suitable ♠ 1098 ♠ AQ64
theme. ❤ 9542 ❤ J1087
In a team game a few weeks ago, I
picked up ◆ KQ987 ◆ 5432
♠ K53 ❤ AKQ ◆ AJ10 ♣ AQ72 ♣ 8 ♣ 9
and, with both sides vulnerable, heard my
partner open 3♣ in first seat. (Monet’s South
shimmering cathedral images flashed ♠ K53
through my brain.) I checked for key- ❤ AKQ
cards in clubs, and when my partner ◆ AJ10
♣ AQ72

Canadian Master Point

Clearly the only hope to make 6NT was
a defender’s error (yes, I know, in the
next life). What I should have done was
win the opening diamond lead and shoot
back the ◆J. This would really have put
it to West when he won the ◆Q. The best
that East could have done to scream for a
spade is play the ◆5, his highest spot in
the suit. If West doesn’t find the spade
switch right then and there, I will make
the slam. He might have found it. Any
person who watches the spots should be
able to tell from declarer’s play that the
five is East’s highest. But we’ll never
know, because my stubborn personality
strongly prefers to go down at trick 13
rather than at trick 3. (An anatomical
theme? Lacks stomach. No backbone.
Pea-sized brain.)
There are many possibilities for
turning this hand into an article. Biblical?
Love thy neighbour. I proved my love for
my opponents by the way I played the
hand. How about Greek mythology? The
hand that launched 1000 slips. Or
Philosophy? Earth, Fire, Wind and Water
(my partner’s reaction to my bidding). Or
Shakespeare revisited: “The Tempest”
(my partner’s reaction to my play). But
what I would probably pick would be an
all-encompassing Shakespearian sonnet
which sums up my bridge relationship
with my husband, who was my unfortu-
nate partner at the time:
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no; it is an ever fixed mark,
That looks on tempests, and is never
shaken....

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October 1995
 Sharples/Marx over 1NT
(Part 2)
k e n b r a i t h w a i t e

2◆ Semi-transfer and Baron 2♠ the only super acceptance; re

Most of the time 2◆ is a simple Jacoby
transfer to hearts. The follow-ups are all
natural and are discussed under the 2❤
transfer.
But two other hands use 2◆:
i) invitational hands without a major,
ii) balanced slam try hands with two
four-card suits.
These hands follow a 2❤ bid with an
artificial 2♠. This announces that re-
sponder does not have a five-card heart
suit, and it asks opener to rebid 2NT with
a minimum or bid four card-suits up the
line with extras (Baron).
Because hearts are not guaranteed,
some agreement must be reached for
super -acceptances. Two schemes are
workable. First, use your normal super-
acceptance but use responder’s 3NT bid
as a signoff, and his 3♠ as Baron.
Second, allow only an artificial 2♠ as a
super acceptance. Over this, 2NT is a
retransfer, any 3-level bid is Baron. In
either case, a super-acceptance in hearts
must show a maximum to cater to invita-
tional hand (i).
2◆ puppet to 2❤; may not have hearts
Opener’s rebids:
2❤ normal; responder now can bid:
2♠ denies 5 hearts; asks minimum) and if responder bids 3◆ bid
for strength: 2NT shows a 3♠. If he bids 3♣ bid diamonds, and if
minimum; responder can he next bids 3♠, cue-bid with 4❤.
start
Baron: (asks for four-card suits may still have the invitational hand with-
upwards)
3♣/◆ Baron
sponder has these options:
2NT retransfer to 3 ❤
3♣/◆ Baron
3♠ up two-suited slam tries
Baron
Baron is a balanced slam try looking for
a 4-4 fit. Responder never has a 5-card
suit.
The rules for Baron are simple: with
a fit, raise, or keep bidding four card
suits. It is allowable and usual to delay a
raise to show a higher 4-card suit.
It is sometimes possible to raise a suit
with a cue-bid. If you bid a suit that either
you or your partner has denied, it cannot
be natural. It is a cue-bid in support of
partner’s last bid suit. Similarly, if
Responder rebids a suit then he is cue-
bidding since he cannot be rebidding to
show five cards. Note however the
opener can have a five card suit so he can
rebid it naturally: 2♠; 3♣ 3◆; 4♣ shows
five.
Here is an example hand:
♠ KQ10x ❤ Ax ◆ QJxx ♣Kxx
You open 1NT and partner bids 2◆ fol-
lowed by 2♠. Rebid 2NT (showing a
A passed hand cannot use Baron but
out a major. Facing a passed hand opener
will bid 2NT or 3NT over 2♠.

Canadian Master Point

Jacoby Transfers
The rebids are simple: three of a lower
ranking suit is a one round force, usually
with a four card suit. Jump shifts are
slam tries and show 5-5. This is at vari-
ance with North American praxis and
new suits can be played game forcing just
as easily. This will sharpen slam auctions
at the cost of some game tries. 4NT is
quantitative with a 5-carder.
The partnership must somehow distin-
guish between 2◆ then 3♠ and 2❤ then
4❤. The jump to game is a signoff, ex-
actly the reverse of North American
praxis.
1NT - 2❤ Jacoby, shows 5+ spades
2♠ - ?
3♣/◆/❤ 4 cards, forcing to 3♠ 3❤/♠ stiff with at least 5-4 in the
4♣ natural, 5-5, slam try
4◆ natural, 5-5, slam try
4♠ signoff
Gap Transfers
2♠ and 2NT are transfers to clubs and
diamonds respectively. They show at
least five cards. All new suit bids are
natural, show four cards, and are slam-
mish. Jump shifts are splinters.
The opener accepts the transfer with a
good fit and hand. This too is the reverse
of the usual practice here. There seem to
be two reasons for this: first, with a weak
hand 5-5 in the minors responder can bid
2NT and chance a pass of 3♣; second,
responder can use 2♠ as a sensible invita-
tion in clubs and still play no trumps.
Either method is playable.
1NT - 2♠ transfer with clubs are splinters.
2NT no fit,
3♣ fit Alternatively, a Gerber/Texas structure
new suit natural, slammish, 5-4 fits well, too.
or 6-4
jump shift splinter
1NT - 2NT transfer to diamonds
responses along the same lines
Immediate Jumps
These are natural forcing slam tries,
showing 6 or more cards. The hand is
always a single suiter.
The one important hand type that this
system of responses cannot handle is 5-4
or 5-5 in the minors with a major stiff but
no slam interest. The following simple
gadget can be used to remedy this.
3♣ strong single suiter in clubs,
hearts, or spades; 3◆ relays, and
3NT or 4♣ show clubs
3◆ natural single-suited slam try
minors
As a passed hand there is a good case for
making all three level responses show
minor two-suiters. One possibility is:
3♣ both minors weak
3◆ a major stiff with longer
diamonds; 3❤ asks for stiff
3❤/♠ stiff with longer clubs
South African Texas and Four
Bids
4♣ slam try with good hearts
4◆ slam try with good spades
Opener bids the next suit up to show slam
interest, signs off in game, or bids 4NT,
which is quantitative with a 4333 hand.
After the slam try, new suits by responder
October 1995
The Toy Shoppe
j o h n
Compet-
ing over
1NT
In today’s competitive bridge arena, play-
ers are faced with many notrump ranges
(from as little as 10 to as many as 18
hcp’s). It stands to reason that your de-
fence should change along with your op-
ponents’ notrump strength.
I suggest that you lump their
notrumps into three ranges, and defend
accordingly. Those ranges are:
strong lower limit 14 (14-16, a broken suit or a 6-4
etc.)
weak upper limit 15 (12-14, distribution and a very
13-15, etc.)
super-weak upper limit 13 (10-12, 2NT* very good two-suiter
11-13)
vs. strong NT
Modern theory is that it is imperative to
be active against top range notrumps, and
that further, the penalty double is better
used for other purposes. Popular today is
DONT (“Disturb Opponents’
NoTrump”):
double 1-suiter
2♣ ♣ + a higher suit
2◆ ◆ + a major
2❤ both majors
2♠ ♠ one-suiter, but offensive
only — weaker than dou
ble followed by 2♠
This is played in both direct and balanc-
Canadian Master Point
G o w d y
ing seats, and at matchpoints is used very
liberally. Don’t wait for 5-5 hands — 4-4
is okay on occasion, not vulnerable. If
you go for the odd big number, that’s all
right too; at least you’re getting involved,
and overall your matchpoints will be a
net plus.
vs. weak and super-weak NT
This is an area where you still want to be
active, but you should save double for
penalties. I like:
double penalties
2♣ majors
2◆, 2❤ transfers; this allows
you to transfer and then
bid on
2♠ 3-level minor — either
minor-major
good hand
3-level solid suit
*against super-weak NT, we play this
to show 19-21
If you double their notrump and they run,
your partnership should play that you are
forced to at least 2❤. That is, if they run
to 2♣, pass is forcing and double is pen-
alty; a free bid shows a bad hand with at
least five of the suit you bid.
In general terms, you should be very
active at matchpoints, especially not vul-
nerable, but use a little more sense at
IMP’s. Remember, you can’t be perfect
over pre-empts, and their 1NT opening,
regardless of range, pre-empts your part-
nership to the 2-level.
 i n m e m o r i a m

O ur world, and
the Canadian
bridge community,
welcomes to
newcomers when
they came to
lost a dear friend clubs where he
and supporter with played, together
the recent passing with his imposing
o f D r. G o r d o n physical pres-
Shorting of Toronto, ence, made play-
in July. ers feel as if they
The only me- were in a friendly
morial column that game at home.
has appeared in His true enjoy-
Canadian Master ment of the game
Point to date has showed so much
been a remembrance that it was infec-
of Percy ‘Shorty’ tious. He was a
Sheardown, one of constant sup-
Canada’s great play- Dr. Gordon Shorting porter of, and
ers; Dr. Shorting (just plain ‘Gord’ or cheerleader for, Canadian achievements
‘Doc’ to his friends) would have been the in bridge, and enjoyed spending time kib-
first to say that he wasn’t a top-echelon itzing his friends in important competi-
player like Percy. Gordon will, however, tions. And he delighted in those rare
be remembered for his contributions to perfect moments that he found within an
the game. imperfect game.
Doc’s good humour and camarade- We know that his friends and family
rie were ever present despite considerable will sorely miss Gordon. Canadian
personal struggles (a leg lost in childhood bridge will miss his participation, enthu-
hadn’t slowed him down, but a constant siasm, and support. And I myself have
fight against diabetes did put a damper on lost a supporter in my efforts, a partner
his physical activities). So, too, were his for my games, and a friend in my life.
never-ending willingness to give of his Good-bye, ‘Doc’; adieu.
time and advice, and to field questions
from beginning players. His booming Ron Bishop

October 1995
 The source of good deals
p r aD k a a vs hi dj
I am neither a professional bridge player,
nor a regular club player. All the same,
I have been writing a weekly column in
Times Of India, one of the most widely
circulated dailies in India, for the last two
years, and I make it a point to write about
hands that have actually been played.
“Where do you get those interesting
hands from?”, many bridge players ask.
My answer is simple. Since I am not par-
ticularly keen on winning, I can concen-
trate more on the finer points of play and
bidding, and the strategy does pay divi-
dends.
Examine the following two hands
for example. I joined a group of under-
graduate students for a weekend team
event. We played somewhere in the bot-
tom half of the draw most of the time, but
I got what I wanted — these two interest-
ing hands, and both of them in a single
session of twelve boards!
White against red, West opened a
Precision 2♣ (11-15 HCP, six clubs or
five clubs and a four-card major) after
two passes. North doubled before East
gave a preemptive raise to 3♣. Finally
South landed in 4◆. The lead was the ♣J.
Plan your play.
(see top of next column)
From the bidding, the ◆K is certain
to be with West, so the only problem for
the declarer is to find a suitable entry to
his own hand. Can you think of a good
way of creating that? After winning ♣A,
my partner tried a spade to queen. West
won and continued clubs. When South
tried to ruff a spade back to hand, West
overruffed and that was the end of the
contract.
The bidding really gives a clue to
Canadian Master Point
. S p i a lr v
a ne j r a b e
North
♠ A653
❤ A102
◆ AJ976
♣ A
West East
♠ K8 ♠ J10974
❤ K876 ❤ J94
◆ K3 ◆ 42
♣ KJ1094 ♣ Q87
South
♠ Q2
❤ Q53
◆ Q1085
♣ 6532
the better line. Since East raised the 2♣
opening, West is likely to have only five
clubs, and therefore, he certainly has four
cards in one of the majors. In addition, if
he has at least two cards in the other
major, which is quite likely, there is an
elegant solution to the problem.
Instead of ruffing the third spade,
South should just discard a heart at trick
five. If East wins and returns a spade,
South will discard one more heart from
hand, and a heart ruff will provide the
much needed entry to the South hand. If
East returns a club, South can ruff it in
dummy and play another spade, and if
East doesn’t follow, ruffing in South hand
will be safe. If East does follow, South
discards a heart as before. Isn’t it sim-
ple?
 In the second hand, I played in 3NT wards my hand. After all, the intra-finesse
after the following Precision sequence. in spades was my best chance of gaining
a trick. If East held 10x, or Q10, or K10,
North that would have worked.
♠ A92 East went up with the ♠K and
❤ KQ98 pushed a diamond through. I won the ◆K
and played the ♠J, which was covered by
◆ A32 West with the ♠Q and won by dummy’s
♣ QJ2 ♠A. The ♠10 did not appear from East, so
I had to play another spade to set up my
spade trick. East parted with a club, and
South West now returned a small club. Do you
think that the contract can be made at this
♠ J876 point?
❤ A32 There were only two chances. Either
◆ KQ4 the hearts had to break or the club hon-
♣ 765 ours had to be with East. In the latter
case, I could win the ◆A and ◆Q in that
sequence and cash the ♠7 discarding a
West North East South club from dummy. East would get strip-
1♣1 pass 1NT2 squeezed: he could not afford to pitch a
pass 2♣3 pass 2♠4 heart, and after a club discard I could exit
pass 3NT all pass to his hand with a club and wait for two
heart tricks. Which way to play? I went
for the former option and lost. I wonder
1. 16+ points whether one can evaluate the chances of
2. balanced, 8-13 pts hearts breaking 3- 3 in this scenario in a
3. Stayman realistic way, and compare the two op-
4. four spades, 8-11 pts tions. East had, of course, started with

♠ Kx ❤ J10xx ◆ xxxx ♣ AKx

West led the ❤7, which was very likely
to be from a doubleton. It went so the squeeze was on.
❤8-❤10-❤A. I now went to dummy A bridge session always offers
with the ❤K to lead a small spade to- something to an analyst!

October 1995
 Mood swings
“ tD ra ev ni td
O ne of the really interesting things
about this game that we all love is
the roller coaster ride our emotions can
go through in a single evening, nay even
a single hand.
Just last Tuesday, I decided to take a
short break from marking exam papers.
We were in the middle of that heat wave;
you remember, the one that made us all
wish for January’s blizzard again. I
stopped in at the club. After all, a base-
ment location had to be more comfortable
than my third floor garret and a handful
of cards had to be more interesting than a
deskful of essays. Let me say as well that
there is absolutely no truth in the foul
story that I could not find a partner and
that I was there just to haunt all the peo-
ple who had turned me down. Why,
when I looked around the room, at every
table I saw someone I had played with
once.
Just as I was about to leave, to re-
turn to my students’ brilliant essays, I
was asked to fill in for one hand for
someone who had to run an errand. My
new victim and I quickly agreed that we
would play “Standard” for this hand,
whatever that means any more. I picked
up
♠ K92 ❤ 8742 ◆ AQ1084 ♣Q
and heard my partner in fourth seat, red
against white, open 1♣. Having already
passed, I tried 1◆. I, of course, wanted
partner to bid hearts, but no such luck:
she rebid 2♣. Now, what does this mean
in “Standard”? Minimum values, no
four-card major.
What do I do now? ‘Pass’ can’t be
all bad on this misfit, but we are playing
matchpoints. Besides, this will probably
be the only hand I get to play tonight, and
Canadian Master Point
vS ai ll vl ee ry ”
possibly for the week. My ♣Q ought to
be good for something, and they can’t run
more than nine hearts through me, so I try
2NT. Not pretty, but I’ve seen worse.
Partner now finds another card and bids
3NT. A passed hand opposite a minimum
opener; this should be cute.
The opening lead is a spade. Partner
tables her hand and an apology for bid-
ding 3NT at the same time. I see:
North
♠ A
❤ KJ10
◆ K93
♣ KJ9654
South
♠ K92
❤ 8742
◆ AQ1084
♣ Q
If I can get two clubs, I have nine tricks
if the diamonds behave. But I don’t seem
to have enough quick entries to dummy.
Will leading the ♣K help? Only if the
♣10 is doubleton. Too bad the card part-
ner found wasn’t the ♣10. As soon as
they take the ♣A, my spade stopper will
be knocked out. Should I just take my
eight tricks and give up? Maybe some-
one will take my ♣Q at trick 2? No such
luck; now I’m in my hand.
Aha! I’ve seen this before. I do
have the ◆9 over there; I can finesse
against the ◆J and get the entry I need.
Maybe I should cash the ◆Q first, and
keep some sort of fluidity. This is easy
and fun.
 The Toronto team that recaptured the Maurice Paul Trophy from Montreal in
September. From the left: Diane Bryan, Elaine Morrison, Bill Milgram, Ron
Bishop, Leah Milgram, Bob MacNeal, Ray Lee, Doug Baxter, Colin Lee, Linda
Lee, Chuck Messinger, David Halasi, Jared Riley, Dan Nadler
Crash! On the second diamond, the max; in fact, the recap later shows we
LHO shows out. Back to the drawing have a clear top on this board. I’ve had a
board. Win the ◆K, play the ♣K. If 100% game, but this partnership is even
someone ducks this, I’m still home free. shorter-lived than most of mine.
Damn — there’s the ♣A. Of course, a See what I mean about the roller
spade comes back. I duck, and pitch a coaster?
club from dummy. Another spade — I
have to win and pitch another of those North
nice clubs. ♠ A
Again, I can make eight tricks. Is it
time to give up yet? One last chance. If ❤ KJ10
the spades are 6-3, and the ❤A is with ◆ K93
the short spades, I still have a shot. I lead ♣ KJ9654
a small heart: when LHO doesn’t win the
❤A, I figure he doesn’t have it. I try the West East
❤J: when I open my eyes, RHO has ♠ QJ10543 ♠ 876
played the ❤Q. Now I wait. Back comes ❤ 653 ❤ AQ9
.... a diamond. Yes! I take the marked ◆ 2 ◆ J765
finesse, carefully winning the ◆10, not
the ◆9, cash the ◆A, and lead another ♣ 872 ♣ A103
heart, avoiding the trap of squeezing South
dummy. RHO wins the ❤A and con-
cedes: just in. ♠ K92
At this point, the player returns from ❤ 8742
his errand and reclaims his seat. I can ◆ AQ1084
honestly say I’ve played every hand to ♣ Q

August 1995
f o r f u t u re
Ask the Bridge Doctor
b ak ra br ae rn a
T his is an edited
version of a
class taught re-
cently online at
the Comp-userve
Bridge Forum.
Jeff and Ken are
students in atten-
dance.
Bridge Dr. We’re going to begin
a large new topic today — competitive
bidding. The first topic we’ll look at is
overcalls, then we’ll look at bidding with
distributional hands. The first item for
today is the overcall and, as we’ll see,
that ties in with the takeout double in
some interesting ways. The takeout
double is one of the first artificial con-
ventions you learn when you play bridge.
I know you’ve learned some things about
takeout doubles and I intend to help you
unlearn some of them. First, a takeout
double does not guarantee some number
of cards in any unbid suit; all it says is
that you have:
• values to suggest partner bid and
• (if a minimum) support for any
unbid suit and
• (if a very strong hand) one or more
independent suits or else notrump stop-
pers
Thus, with a minimum hand, your
double does promise at least adequate
support for any unbid suit, and that can
be as few as three cards in the suit. The
ACBL Yellow Card system also uses the
takeout double rather than an overcall to
show hands of more than 16 hcp, sug-
gesting that making an overcall on a hand
this good risks missing a game. The
simple overcall is limited to hands con-
Canadian Master Point
e x p er t s
a sl el ai sg or na m
taining a maximum of 16 hcp, so with a
hand of 17 hcp or more and a nice suit,
you don’t overcall, you first double, and
then bid your suit to show these values.
Jeff So you must have 16
hcp to double?
Bridge Dr. Not at all, Jeff. To
make a takeout double, you need a hand
with the values to open the bidding and
support for any unbid suits. With as
little as this shapely hand, over an open-
ing 1◆ bid, for instance, I recommend a
takeout double:
♠ AJxx ❤ Kxxx ◆ x ♣ QJxx
You can nicely support any suit partner
bids and you have about the values for an
opening bid. This is a minimum takeout
double.
Jeff So when do you need
16 hcp?
Bridge Dr. Since your overcall
promises a maximum of 16 hcp, if you
have a good suit and a hand with more
than 16 hcp, you must begin with a take-
out double. Here’s an example of that
sort of hand. Over an opponent’s 1❤
bid, you hold:
♠ AKJxx ❤ Axx ◆ KQx ♣ Qx
Instead of bidding 1♠, the ‘normal’ over-
call action, with this hand containing 19
hcp, you begin with a double. Then, after
any bid by partner, you now bid spades,
showing 17+ hcp.
Ken So a double followed
by a new suit bid implies a strong hand
i.e. more than 16 pts?
Bridge Dr. Precisely! Bear in
mind that the precise cutoff for an over-
call varies by system, but sixteen is not a
bad limit to set for an overcall.
You and your regular partner may
well wish to discuss just this issue so
you’ll know what’s meant when one of
you starts with a takeout double and then
bids a new suit. In ACBL Yellow, that’s
not 100% forcing, but it shows a very
good hand. If you want to force, you’ll
need to jump in your new suit after mak-
ing a takeout double.
By the way, with a balanced hand
and 15-18 hcp and a good stopper in the
opponent’s opening bid suit, you overcall
1NT. (And if the opponent has opened
with a weak two-bid, then with the above
balanced hand, 15-19 hcp and at least one
good stopper, you overcall 2NT, natu-
ral.)
Jeff Is Kx a good stopper,
or do you need KQ?
Bridge Dr. Kx is a good stopper,
but Qx is not; you need to be able to stop
the suit if it’s led from your left.
(However, I prefer an even stronger hold-
ing, like K10x, which is safe even from a
lead from the right.) So now, you can
handle these hands:
• a normal opening bid with support
for any unbid suit
• a strong (17+ hcp) hand with its
own good suit
• a balanced hand with 15-18 HCP
and a good stopper in the opener’s suit 1♣ 1♠ pass 2♣
What about any other hands? With a good
suit and 8-16 hcp, you simply bid your
suit at the next convenient level (this is
after an opening bid of one of a suit).
With a normal opening bid, but lacking
support for some suit, and with no suit
good enough or long enough to mention,
you pass! (This is called a trap pass,
since it usually includes some length and
strength in your opponent’s suit)?
Jeff Do you need more to
overcall 2 over 1 than 1 over 1?
Bridge Dr. In general you’re ex-
pected to have more; however, overcalls
don’t guarantee opening bids. If your
RHO opens 1♠, I recommend an overcall
of 2❤ with as little as:
♠ xx ❤ AKJxxx ◆ Qxx ♣ xx
This is not an opening 1❤ bid — it’s a
weak two-bid — but it has a little extra in
the diamond suit, so I would simply over-
call, rather than make some kind of
preemptive bid. Over an opening bid
of 1♣, I definitely recommend you over-
call 1♠ with as little as:
♠ AKJxx ❤ xxx ◆ xxx ♣ xx
It’s important to get partner to lead your
good suits and perhaps he’ll want to raise
to compete if he has some length in
spades and some values. The way partner
finds out about the strength of your over-
call is by cuebidding. After your overcall
of 1♠ on the previous hand, partner may
have a good hand and ‘cuebid’ 2♣.
This would be the auction then:
1♣ 1♠ pass 2♣
?
You are asked to describe your hand fur-
ther. In this case, you would rebid 2♠
saying, “I only wanted to show you my
good suit; I have nothing else to tell
you.” However, if you had a better hand,
say like this:
♠ AKJxx ❤ K10xx ◆ x ♣ Kxx
Then after the same auction
?
you’d bid 2❤, showing your second suit
and interest in proceeding further.
When you’ve got a weak hand with a
good suit (just like a weak two-bid, re-
member?), then you enter the auction
over an opponent’s one of a suit with a
jump bid. This is called a pre-emptive
jump overcall. Here’s an example of a
pre-emptive jump overcall over an open-
ing 1♠ bid by an opponent:
♠ xx ❤ x ◆ xxx ♣ AKJxxxx
With this hand, I recommend a bid of 3♣
over the opponent’s opening 1♠ bid,
showing a good suit in a weak hand.
August 1995
f o r f u t u re
The Elementary Squeeze
b af ro br ar re as
Forrest Smith was an ACBL Bulletin contributor in the 1980’s, he lives in CT.
S queezes come in a variety of guises.
Even if we sidestep double, criss-
cross, progressive, and three-suit squeezes
for the nonce, and discuss only the ele-
mentary two-suit squeeze, there is still a
great variety.
Some offer a substantial risk if
you’re wrong, while others offer no risk
whatsoever: the squeeze may or may not
be on, but you aren’t hurt for giving it a
try. Some represent your only hope of an
extra trick, while others offer you a 50%
shot that is simply an alternative to the
finesse that every novice in the room
might be taking successfully. Some re-
quire exquisite visualization of the op-
ponents’ cards, while others require only
that you keep your eyes peeled for one
card. If you see it, you’ve got your extra
trick; if you don’t, you try the other suit,
and if the squeeze has worked, you get
your extra trick there.
This article is dedicated to the prop-
osition that some squeezes are hardly
more challenging than a simple finesse
— if you’ll get into the habit of counting
your winners. This hand is in the last-
named category above, i.e. you need to
watch for just one card.
(see top of next column)
When this hand was played in a Sectional
tournament, the contract was 6NT. 7♣
would have virtually laydown, of course,
but 6NT making would probably have
been worth a lot of matchpoints, too.
The opening lead was West’s fourth-
best heart, won willy-nilly in dummy,
after which declarer rattled off her eleven
top winners and lost the last two tricks.
Canadian Master Point
e x p er t s
t s es am gi tr ha m
North
♠ AQ1065
❤ A
◆ 76
♣ AQ1065
West East
♠ 984 ♠ KJ73
❤ J9865 ❤ Q72
◆ 953 ◆ J1084
♣ 82 ♣ 74
South
♠ 2
❤ K1043
◆ AKQ2
♣ KJ93
Why didn’t she at least take the spade
hook? We can see it doesn’t work, but
she didn’t know that. Was it because the
♠AQ were opposite a singleton? My
theory is simple: she didn’t count.
What should she have done? Well,
surely she has to take that spade hook. If
it wins, she has twelve tricks; if not, she
has a chance that a squeeze may be on.
Anyway, the finesse loses, and bar-
ring a ♠KJ tight, which she will certainly
test for, a squeeze is the only hope. Cash
out the ❤K, run your clubs, cash the ♠A
and keep your eyes peeled for just one
card: the ♠J. You don’t have to speculate
on who’s likely to have it or count the
distribution or anything else. You just
have to watch for that one card.
If the ♠J is pitched, you’ve obvi-
ously got a twelfth trick with the ♠10; if
it’s not, go to your diamonds. You don’t
know at this point that the squeeze is
working, you only know you’ve done
everything you can. But here you would
have the pleasant experience of finding
that the deuce of diamonds makes the
slam.
North
♠ 106
❤ —
◆ 76
♣ 5
West East
♠ 9 ♠ J
❤ J9 ❤ —
◆ 95 ◆ J1084
♣ — ♣ —
South
♠ —
❤ 4
◆ AKQ2
♣ —
fore rectification of the count, but most
cannot. So try to lose tricks early, up to
the point where there is still exactly one
up for grabs, and then look around for
squeeze potential.
There’s one other housekeeping
chore: cash out extra winners. You must
keep communication between the two
hands, but you must also remove the easy
discards from your opponents. In this
case, the heart suit doesn’t provide trans-
port: your entry is in diamonds. So cash
out all the other winners, come to the
clubs, run them along with the ♠A, and
watch for that one card: not seeing it, turn
to diamonds.
So was it too much to say “you’ve
only got to look for one card”? Well,
that’s up to you. And I might remind you
of the things you don’t have to do: you
don’t have to figure out the opponents’
distribution, or who might hold the card,
or the odds for or against the squeeze, or
whether or not it’s going to work. It’s
now out of your hands — except for
looking out for that one card!

This would be the end position:

It doesn’t have to be exactly this, of
course, since East has a choice of leads
after winning the ♠K. In any event, you
can see that East has no safe discard on
the last club. Since declarer can pitch a
low heart with impunity, this squeeze
would work against either opponent.
Now — having said you need only
look for one card, I’m going to backtrack
a little. There are a couple of housekeep-
ing chores before starting to look for that
one card, and of these, the most important
is to count your winners versus the num-
ber of cards you have left. What you
need to bring about is a situation where
you are able to win every trick but one, a
process commonly called “rectifying the
count”.
Some squeezes can be executed be-

October 1995
 A history of conventions (2)
t h o D m a a vs i md .
H arold Vanderbilt
did two things.
Firstly, and most im-
portantly, he codi-
fied the scoring table
for contract bridge
and had enough in-
fluence to get it ac-
cepted by the powerful private clubs,
from where it filtered down through to
the masses. He also was the first to use
an artificial strong one club as a conven-
tional opening bid. It was left to others,
such as Ely Culbertson, to promote con-
tract bridge and teach their systems to the
public.
It would be an exaggeration to say
that Ely Culbertson was well liked by his
peers in the bridge community, in part
because he was a showman in the mould
of P. T. Barnum. He was also, however,
a great contributor to bridge theory. It
was during his second visit to England to
play a challenge match against
Lieutenant-Colonel H. (Pops) Beasley’s
team that, upon study of the hands, he
discovered that many points were thrown
away by missing slams. The immediate
result of this study was his development
of the Culbertson 4-5 Notrump
Convention.
The Culbertson 4-5 NT was a com-
plex control-asking convention, which
also showed a certain minimum number
of controls. The player bidding 4NT
guaranteed at least two aces and the king
of a naturally-bid suit. Failure to bid 4NT
in a slam auction thus carried negative
inferences. Responder could show aces,
and kings of naturally-bid suits, but some
judgment was also involved. As can be
Canadian Master Point
Sg io lr v
d ae nr i e r
imagined, this complexity led to confu-
sion and misuse by even the most expert
of players but the salient points are that a
certain degree of power was needed to
initiate the bid and that it used the “key-
card” concept of counting an important
king as equivalent to an ace. In Britain,
4-5 NT grew to be more popular than in
the U.S.A. and became part of the Acol
system.
A second slam-going convention
invented by Culbertson was the Grand
Slam Force which is a direct bid of five
notrump to ask responder to bid the grand
slam in the agreed trump suit if he holds
two of the top three honours. In Europe
this was commonly called Josephine, as
it first appeared in 1936 in Culbertson’s
Bridge World magazine under his wife’s
byline.
A third method of slam exploration
developed by Culbertson in 1936 was the
use of Asking Bids after a trump suit had
been agreed: a series of questions by
opener and answers by responder could
not only uncover aces and kings but sin-
gletons, voids, and possibly queens and
doubletons.
Ely Culbertson, despite his person-
ality faults, promoted himself into a posi-
tion as the first great teacher of the
contract era. The first printing of his Blue
Book, published in 1930, sold out within
twenty-four hours of publication.
Culbertson was also the first to discover
that one of the most important aspects of
contract bridge is accurate slam bidding.
Although most of his methods are no lon-
ger used, he paved the way for Blackwood
and Gerber to develop conventions that
proved easier for the non-expert player.
 Reviews
The 1996 Daily
Bridge Calendar
(Alder et. al.) Ashlar
House/Copp Clark
Pitman. $12.95
Reviewed by Linda
Lee
T he 1996 Daily Bridge Calendar is
out. Most of you will have seen one
of the previous editions— in fact, the
1995 version was handed out to lucky
participants at the New Orleans Nationals
recently. Once again this handy desk
calendar lives up to a high standard with
a bridge problem for every day of the
year and a useful listing of tournaments.
A nice gift for bridge players of all levels,
even your Aunt Elizabeth.
Bridge Buff 3.0
C$129.95 (upgrade
$59.95) Reviewed
by Linda Lee
D o u g B e n n i o n ’s
Bridge Buff soft-
ware now sports a
snappy Widows interface, and has ad-
dressed all the issues we raised in our
review of version 2.0 . The standard of
play is quite high, and this is one of the
first bridge programs that comes close to
simulating the feel of playing against
people. It doesn’t often make absurd
bids, and it doesn’t finesse dummy’s 6
from AKQ106 when partner fails to split
from 9832. It also offers a professional
user interface with an attractive card lay-
out. One of my personal favourite fea-
tures is that when you play teams it
immediately shows you the result, bid-
ding and play at the other table: you
don’t have to watch it to play the hand, or
wait for it to do so.
The program is quite flexible, and
provides a choice of play (pairs or teams)
and a reasonable set of convention
choices (weak or strong NT, checkback
Stayman, etc.) Some regularly played
conventions such as negative doubles are
mandatory. Bridge Buff does allow for
“hints” — suggestions during the auc-
tion, or explanations of what a bid would
mean — and it can also analyze the hand
and give you some idea of what the best
contract might have been. However,
there is no “alert” procedure, and the sys-
tem does not provide information about
the meaning of partner’s or opponent’s
bids.
There is, however, one very annoy-
ing feature: you must click an icon to get
the computer to bid or play each time for
each opponent. You can hit “auto” and
have it complete the auction, but then you
can’t bid your own hand. One other prob-
lem is the non-checking claim feature,
which simply accepts your statement and
scores up the hand. While you might not
cheat (often), you might easily claim or
concede tricks in error.
Overall, though, this is a very fine
program. If you buy it, you should have
many hours of playing fun. The quality
of Bridge Buff gives us real hope that
soon computers will be playing bridge
better than humans.
Meadowlark
Bridge 1.09
Reviewed by Ron
Bishop
Time and the com-
petition have caught
up with Meadow-
lark’s once ground-breaking interface,
October 1995
and while still attractive, it’s no longer
ahead of the field. The range of conven-
tions available, selected through a simple
check-off chart, is still one of the more
extensive, and you can review your sys-
tem easily during the auction (for both
your bidding and your opponents). You
get to choose your opponents’ system too,
but there are some standard systems
available that make this quite simple.
I found the bidding selection box a
touch small, and easy to make errors on
(although Meadowlark is not alone in
this). Lower-level auctions went quite
well, but higher levels created problems.
It also “forgot” Michaels on one occa-
sion, and we played ignominiously in our
5-0!
The best feature of the program is
still the ability it gives you to play in a
tournament with pairs or IMP scoring
(you and a friend can play the same hands
and compare results). Extra disks are
available with hands and comparison
scores from actual World Championship
and Regional play. Being able to see
your tournament score after each hand
(rather than just your raw score), would
improve this however, as would less
delay between hands. The game com-
putes your full session’s core only after
all the boards have been played, and this
again was rather slow.
Two problems of the earlier release
are now fixed: hand rotation to make
North declarer is much less confusing,
and there is now a claim feature, although
it is non-checking.
In all, a playable and enjoyable
game, although the overall standard of its
bridge continues to be below average.
BridgeMate 2.0
$US59.95 Reviewed
by Ray & Colin Lee
Get past the text-
only interface
(which is neverthe-
Canadian Master Point
less clean and neat), and Bridge Mate is
a contender for best bridge software title.
It allows you to choose your playing sys-
tem by filling out an ACBL convention
card, and boasts more than 200 play and
bidding conventions and treatments avail-
able for play. Several pre-built cards are
included (Standard, 2 over 1, Precision,
K-S, and so on), so you can just play one
of these, or design your own. This sounds
like the ultimate in flexibility, and it’s
certainly fairly easy to use, but there are
some quirks. One that tripped us up, for
example, is its insistence that you play
the same structure over 2NT as over 1NT;
we often play two-way Stayman over
1NT and transfers over 2NT, but we had
no way to implement this.
The standard of play is high (it
cheats noticeably on play and defence,
which will annoy some), and the auction
includes alerts where the ACBL card in-
dicates that an alert would be appropriate.
Bidding is more problematic than play,
and it seems to have special trouble with
doubles (takeout or penalty?); however,
we know a number of humans who expe-
rience the same difficulty! Various scor-
ing methods are available, and a limited
“Director” feature give explanations of
bids, conventions, and other help.
One feature that as far as we know
is unique to BridgeMate is an anlysis
function that allows you to judge your
own play. Are you better as declarer or
defender? Do your pre-empts strike fear
into your opponents, but your slam bid-
ding leave something to be desired? The
software keeps a running tally of com-
parative data for all the hands you play,
giving your score against the computers,
so you quickly zero on the parts of your
game that might need improvement.
If performance rather than glitz is
what you seek, take a good look at this
package. It’s not as well known as many
of its competitors, but is right up at the
top in playing strength, and certainly rep-
resents excellent value for money.
 Bridge on the Net
by Ray & Colin Lee
Canadians looking
for real-time bridge
games on Internet
presently have only
two options, since
Sierra’s Imagination Network is not yet
available here. The newest on-line ser-
vice is Bridge Player Live, which is at
www. londonmall.co.uk/bplive. From
this web site you can get information
about the service, register as a subscriber,
and download the interface software
you’ll need to join in. The front-end is a
Windows-based interface which is fairly
easy to learn, and the club itself includes
a practice room where you can get used
to the controls without annoying people
who are trying to play.
Once registered with the club, vari-
ous rooms are available to you, which
contain impromptu rubber bridge games
and tournaments. A special room (no card
fees!) is reserved for students — a nice
touch. Only members can start a table,
but guests can be invited to join one by a
member. Players from all over the world
will be found on-line, but this service
seems to have attracted a large number of
Canadians in its early days.
We found play rather slow, and the
system had a tendency to stop altogether
for two or three minutes, which made
play somewhat agonizing. Compounding
this problem is the lack of any claim or
concession feature, so that every hand
has to be played out to the last card. Chat
facilities are also primitive — your re-
marks are broadcast to everyone on-line,
and you get all their comments too, which
is distracting. The result of this is the ab-
sence of any alert or explanation feature
during the auction. There seems to be as
yet no standard convention card that is
played on BPLive, and while there must
be a scoring method, we couldn’t find it.
There’s certainly no obvious attempt to
keep cumulative or comparative statis-
tics.
You can join BPLive as a guest for
free, with quite restricted privileges.
Membership costs US$80 (sign-up fee)
then US$149 annually, on top of your
Internet charges (students pay a little
less).
The grandfather of bridge on-line,
OKBridge, is still by far the best, al-
though the interface is archaic (even with
the new OK Screen utility, which at least
adds colour to DOS screens). Forget the
shortcomings of BPLive — OKBridge is
like walking into your home bridge club.
You can claim or concede any number of
tricks — if your opponents both agree.
Scoring is by IMP’s or matchpoints,
against everyone who’s every played this
hand, with weekly ratings and cumulative
rankings of every player. Tournaments
are a regular feature, including the now
famous KO Teams events.
The standard card is ACBL Yellow,
but you can agree to play anything you
like. Etiquette requires you to alert your
own bids (partner doesn’t get this mes-
sage, or any subsequent explanations).
OKBridge not only has a kibitz mode
(watch from “behind” one player) as has
BPLive, but it also has a “spectate” mode
which allows you to see all the hands.
The first time we logged on, a about a
year ago, 200 spectators were crammed
into one room to watch a team game in-
volving Paul Soloway, Steve Robinson,
and a group of similar calibre players. A
fun way to while away a few hours!
Get to OKBridge either by Telnet
(vanderbilt.okbridge.com) or via the
Bridge on the Web page. All information
and necessary software is available there.
OKBridge offers a free 30-day trial; its
annual fees are US$70 per year (less for
students).
Bridge players the world over are
getting involved in on-line games; the
last three Nationals have featured parties
where people who have met on OKBridge
can finally get together in person. Try it
— you might like it!
October 1995