Hamilton Contract Bridge Club
20 Richmond St, Hamilton
Phone: (07) 839-4547
[email protected] www.contractbridge.net/hamilton
April 2015
Hello fellow members,
As the temperature dips, the settings on the air-con units will be changed
to keep us comfortable as we head into the cooler months.
The excellent playing numbers continue in our Club sessions, which shows
that members are enjoying the company of others and the benefits of
membership. The lessons groups are both busy and a good mix of people
are learning.
I am delighted to announce that Committee Member, Catherine Glyde, has
accepted the role of Club Captain for the remainder of the year. The main
role of Club Captain is to encourage members to play in tournaments, both
at the Club and elsewhere and to be a liaison person for our newer players
who are finding their way. It is so important that new players have support
around them so that they feel comfortable as members which helps us to
retain them for many years to come. Catherine will do an excellent job in
this role so please support her.
Just another reminder that our Restricted Tournament will be held in the
Club on Sunday, 26th April. We welcome and encourage players from all
playing groups to register for the tournament. Details can be found on the
website. It’s a very enjoyable Tournament to play in so please enter.
Finally, a general thanks goes to all those people who are making
contributions to the smooth running of the Club and also to those who have
offered their time to assist when needed. I am very grateful for your
help.
As always, your comments and suggestions are welcome.
Happy bridging.
Mark Thomson
Club President
Hamilton Restricted Tournament
Sun 26 April
Open to all grades and prizes for all categories. And this year we
have a special section for our novice players. Always a popular
tournament and lots and lots of fun.
Want to Play?
Haven’t got a partner?
Want more information?
Contact our new Club Captain Catherine Glyde,
She will be happy to assist.
Another Night With Barry
Friday 8th May 7 – 9 pm
Want to Improve Your Game?
The easiest and most effective way to do that is to defend better!
Think about it!
On average you will defend about 50% of hands, declare 25% and be
dummy for 25%. Yet most players work less on their defense than
anything else. No wonder they find it the toughest part of the game.
The lesson will cover
 Opening leads
o Good leads, bad leads
o Leading against suit contracts, against NT contracts
o How to read the bidding
o Counting the hand
o When to make an attacking lead
o When to make a passive lead

Signalling
o Signalling when you discard, what does it mean
o How to show partner what suit you want
o How to show how many cards you have in your suit
o When to signal
o When to lie
o What does partner need to know
Come along to our next Improvers Class in May
Tournament Successes
by our club members
East Coast Bays 3A
1st
Blair Fisher & Steve Boughey
Te Awamutu Restricted 8B
1st
Elaine Raynor & Yuzhong Chen
Auckland Easter Congress
10 Pairs
2nd
Blair Fisher & Mike Curry
10A Teams
3rd
Barry Jones, Jenny Millington, Carol Richardson & Steve Boughey
Te Awamutu Junior Tournament
1st
rd
3
Mike Brown & Roger Gunning
Catherine Cameron & Catherine Glyde
Waikato Area Pairs Cambridge
1st
Cynthia & Ian Clayton
Waikato Area Pairs Overall after two rounds
Rank Name
Club
Average
1
2
15Feb 22Mar
1
Gary Foidl & Yuzhong
Chen
Waik/Hami
130.26
130.26
0.00
2
Nick Whitten & Janice Bell
Morr/Morr
121.05
121.05
0.00
3=
Herman Yuan & Michael
Neels
Camb/Camb
116.56
133.00 100.12
From Lindsay
A very experienced player (he’s a previous NZ Teams winner) Lindsay Reid
is a familiar figure at the club and always willing to lend a helping hand. If
you know Lindsay you have probably heard some of his entertaining and
very funny bridge anecdotes. Lindsay plans on sharing some of these with
us so watch this space!
4 Club Gerber Excitement
Many years ago in the Te Aroha Contract Bridge Club a well known, capable
and fiery couple were playing one night in the Club when an interesting
bidding situation rose. They soon found a hand combination that had slam
possibilities so the Wife decided that she would ask for aces and duly bid
4 clubs. As the Husband had found the bidding a bit confusing he felt
best to pass. Well, the sky fell in and partnership feelings ran high for
the rest of the evening. The rumour mill kicked into gear with suggestions
that they slept in separate rooms that night.
As you can see Gerber can be very exciting.
Local Up and Coming Events
Sat 18/4
Waihi 8B
Waihi
Sun 19 April
Waikato Area Pairs
Waikato
Sun 26 April
Hamilton Restricted Hamilton
Sat & Sun 2 -3 May Taupo 5A
Taupo
Tues 5 May
Hamilton Ladies 3A
Hamilton
Tues 5 May
Hamilton Ladies 5B
Hamilton
Sat 9 May
Matamata Junior
Matamata
Sat 16 May
Cambridge 6’s
Cambridge
Developing Counting Skills
An Introduction
Ever wonder why good bridge players seem to
be able to see through the backs of your
cards? Why they are so successful in finding
the right lead, locating missing honours,
guessing the distribution of their opponents’
cards? The answer is that they are usually not
guessing. Whether they’re defending or
declaring, good players are constantly gathering clues from the bidding
and play and using them to make logical assumptions about the location of
the unseen cards.
This exercise – some call it a talent -- is often called card reading, and it’s
a skill that even beginners can develop. It involves determining the overall
layout – the length and strength (honour holdings) of each suit in each of
the two hidden hands. The first and most important step in card reading is
counting the hand, which focuses on figuring out how many cards each
player holds in each suit.
At its most basic level, counting involves keeping track of the cards your
opponents play as you’re leading one suit. If you're declaring a suit
contract, you use this simple count when you’re drawing trumps. If you’re
declaring a notrump contract, the first suit you count is the usually one
that offers you the greatest number of potential tricks. This is probably
your longest fit, and the suit you lead first.
As declarer, there are two main techniques you can use to keep count of
the cards remaining in a suit:
(1) Count up from the number of cards you and dummy hold in
the suit. If you have a total of 8 cards in a suit in your hand and
dummy, you would start your count at 8 and then mentally count up
to 13 as the opponents play their cards in the suit. If both
opponents follow to the first lead of the suit, you would count 9-10,
then 11-12 on the next trick. Subtracting the last number from 13
will tell you how many cards the opponents still hold in the suit.
(2) Count down from the number of cards that are missing.
With an 8-card fit, you would start your count at 5 and then
mentally count down to 0. If both opponents follow to your first
lead of the suit, you would count 5-4. The next number in the
sequence is the number of cards the opponents still hold.
Most players find #1 the easiest, but it doesn’t really matter which
approach you use. Anything you're comfortable with will work fine.
You can use the same counting technique as a defender, with only minor
variations. Start your count with the number of cards you and dummy hold
in the critical suit. In some cases, you'll already know how many cards
partner holds in that suit (from his lead or from the bidding), so you’ll
have a full count on the suit before any cards are even played.
Happens all the time and it’s part of the
game – at all levels. ...
During the course of any Duplicate Game or Social Bridge you and your
partner will likely have 1 or 2 or 3 hands where your result was far less
than it might have been because of an error by your partner or simply bad
breaks.
Trying to assign blame at the table is not a good idea; it usually has a
negative impact on the partnership causing a loss of confidence and
rapport, leading unnecessarily, to further problems.
In other situations the opponents get lucky and happen to do something
right – or - get a very favourable result after a stupid auction.
So what to do?
I suggest you take a deep breath, get over it and move on. Any attempt at
teaching, criticizing, or complaining will not affect what just happened –
and it can only lead to more bad results.
The best partnerships in the world don’t discuss problems at the table –
waiting until well after the Game is over to quietly and non-judgmentally
try to figure out what happened during the round that led to the bad
result. Perhaps a system problem that needs to be corrected, somebody
forgot something, or a lapse in concentration?
Happens all the time and it’s part of the game – at all levels.