Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Ace-Asking

So as Andre has pointed out recently there are many parts of standard bridge that people seem to skip over or never get to. I’ve witnessed a lot of confusion about 4NT being quantitative or ace-asking – especially after a 1NT opener. When asked about some auctions after a 1NT opener the only person under the age of 18 who knew the correct answer was Adam Kaplan; I guess juniors are the worst at trying to skip steps, and in the process missing a lot of important concepts.

I’ll start with transfers: 1NT-2D;2H-4NT. This should be a quantitative 4NT with a 5 card heart suit. Opener can now choose to pass or sign off in 5H/6H/6N. To ask for aces in Hearts a Texas Transfer and then bid 4NT.

The principle is also the same for Stayman. Bidding 4NT before a major has been agreed on is quantitative and shows the other major. 1NT-2C;2H-4NT shows a quantitative invite and a 4 card Spade suit. 3 of whichever major opener did not bid is artificial agreeing on opener’s major and at least mild slam interest. This bid is where all of the polled youths were not sure of the correct meaning. 4NT after 3 of the other Major is now, of course, ace-asking.

This bidding is simple, yet I see it confused at the club quite frequently. I know there are some advanced standard bidding concepts that I know, but this is a very good example of how people need to fully learn some detailed rebids.

Anyway, Andre and I are off to play in Charleston with a couple of Atlanta juniors.

4 comments:

  1. Last night at the regional in NYC our opponents had the following auction: 1NT-2C-2S-4C-P. Responder's hand was 9xxxx A Q AKQTxx, and opener's hand was AKQx xxx AKx xxx. If they were going to have an accident like that, I'm glad they did it against us, vulnerable, in an IMP pair game; -190 is a pretty useful score. Afterward responder apologized for not bidding 4NT ace- (or maybe keycard-) asking.

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  2. Where was my invitation to visit and play with you in the NYC tournament?!

    And whether or nor they know what 4C means, it's hard to imagine anyone thinking it's not even forcing.

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  3. Come to Jersey City anytime. I can't guarantee a bridge game with me, though--we only went to this one because it was within walking distance of work.

    Despite playing pretty poorly (mostly me), we won the two-day event. We were +29 IMPs on the last three hands last night (+1100 for 15 IMPs on the last board, which was about the margin of victory!)

    Speaking of Gerber, another key board was when I bid to 6S with AKQT9x KJxx x Ax opposite xx AQ KJTxx QJxx. The bidding was 1D-1S-2C-2H-2NT-4C-4H-6S. Megan thought she should have bid 3NT instead of 2NT, but it wouldn't have mattered. Lefty's opening lead was...his stiff spade--ouch. Later he flew with the AD and made my life extra easy (the KC was offside). +980 was 11.43 IMPs even though only one other pair was in the slam.

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