Back to reality

The return trip from a long bridge tournament is always sad. At NABCs (and most mid-Atlantic regionals) I can't keep still and rest. It's ten days of non-stop social activity and mental stimulation. Tomorrow resumes a much more mundane life but I still have a lot going on in August including 2 bridge tournaments and a tennis tournament.

Personal totals for the tournament:
26 sessions of bridge, including 8 midnight games
208 deals in matchpoint games
336 deals in imp scoring
32 masterpoints won (3 platinum, 22 gold, 7 red)
3 different partners (6 deals each with Josh and Shaz, the rest with Sean)
34 alcoholic drinks
5 visits to Chipotle
4 meals of Indian food

We managed 2nd place four times (in a bracketed KO and 3 midnight games) but did not win anything so did not come back with any of the maple syrup section top prizes.

A wise top-notch bridge player (jlall) has said that in matchpoints when the auction goes 2NT-P-P, you should double. When the opponents have 20hcp opposite a near yarborough, they go down much more often then they make because of having to lead from hand so often. In side games on the last day, I got a chance to try this theory out twice. Both times dummy hit with a nice 4-count and we wound up giving up an extra overtrick in desperation, scoring -1090 and -690. Maybe next time we'll get +800.

We now have at least one more person on board the Swedish Canape train. Yay.

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Coming in at the 4 level in a 4 card suit

In my Swedish Canapé bidding system, 2♣ is an opening bid that is one of the most awkward bids in bridge - however, the awesomeness of many of our other bids make up for this slight drawback. The 2♣ and 2♦ responses to a 1♣ opening are just about as awkward. But, they do allow for some inferences that might otherwise not be available to a standard bidder. 2♣, either as an opening bid or a response to 1♣, shows 6+ clubs or 4+ clubs with a 5 card major. As an opening, it is 11-16 hcp; as a response it is 8-11 hcp when one-suited and 12+ when containing a 5 card major.

In the BAM Saturday night in Gatlinburg, I held ♠Kxxx, ♥x, ♦xxxx, ♣Txxx at favorable vulnerability. Sean opened 2♣ and RHO bid 2♥. I passed and LHO raised to 4♥. Knowing that we either have a 10 card club fit or a double fit in spades and clubs, I took a 4♠ sacrifice. This must be a pass or correct situation because I could have made a negative free bid of 2♠ earlier (or made an insinuating double with a decent hand or a forcing hand with spades). It’s kind of cool to come in at the 4 level on a 4 card suit and it be totally right. Sure enough, Sean had a 5-2-2-4 hand with ♠A and ♣AKQ. If the black suits split 2-2 and 3-2, we would be making while 4♥ goes down, but if either opponent had a black suit singleton, 4♥ would make and therefore make 4♠ a good sac.

System wins and losses

My tournament in Gatlinburg started out badly for me. In the first six boards of our KO match Friday afternoon, I managed to go down in 3 makable games - not double dummy makable but legitimately makable. We won that match and the next one by huge margins and it's hard to find a clear error on my part after that but we only won 6th in the bam and 1 out of 2 in a compact KO.

Anyway, Friday night I picked up ♠AQ8xx ♥9 ♦KQxxx ♣xx in first seat both vul. I opened a canape 1♦. Sean bid 1♥, rho bid 1♠, Sean dutifully reopened with a double. LHO made an SOS XX with his 1-4-4-4 1-count, which was left in. We dropped a trick and only beat it 1 but still felt good about +400. We just didn't think it would be a win 18. Our teammates defended 4♠X and collected 1400. System win.

In the bam at favorable vulnerability I held ♠AK9x ♥x ♦K ♣KQJxxxx and opened a canape 1♠, which was passed out. The good news was that the opponents had missed their 9 card spade fit. The bad news was that they couldn't make game and we could make 5♣. Sean's hand: ♠ ♥QTxxxx ♦xxx ♣ATxx. System loss.
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Unusual Penalty Doubles

These deals from last weekend in Wilmington, all involving strange penalty doubles, were rather amusing and contributed a lot to our winning.

Sean and I play a Gambling-like 3NT opening. It always shows a solid 7 card minor but in first and second seat it could contain 2 outside controls and possibly even more in 3rd seat. Friday night Sean dealt and held: ♠JTx, ♥T9xxxx, ♦Txx, ♣x. The auction went: P-P-3NT-4♦; P-4♥-X-P; P-P. It's hard to imagine how I could have a double but even with this crappy hand, leaving the double in when they're bid his 6 card suit was no problem. I held 7 solid clubs, plus the ♠A and ♦KJ so I just wanted to let him know I do have some defense and he can do something smart. We only beat it 2 but it was good for almost all of the matchpoints.

Saturday afternoon, Sean held another beauty: ♠97, ♥T97, ♦7632, ♣Q765. The auction, with me as dealer: 1♣-P-1♦-P; 1♥-P-1♠-X; XX-P-P-P. Here's a quick lesson on part of our Swedish canapé system.

1♣ was either a weak NT or any 17+.

1♦ was any 0-7 or 12+ w/o a 4 card major.
1♥ was 18-20 bal or 23+ bal or 17+ 4+♥ unbalanced and possibly canapé.

1♠ was any 0-5. Redouble was undiscussed and I am glad we were both on the same page in thinking that it's a business redouble. I had a 24-count that's canapé with longer spades: ♠AKQ43, ♥AKQ4, ♦Q8, ♣A8. We were probably getting to 3NT or 4♠ going down. Good thing she made a lead-directing double on her T8652 suit with 2 jacks outside. In case you were wondering, 1♠ redoubled making 2 is 1120.

Saturday night, I made yet another penalty double and Sean had a crappy hand. This time my LHO dealt and Sean held ♠QJ4, ♥T5, ♦QT83, ♣AT53. Our auction: P-P-1♥-P; P-X-1♠-X; 2♥-P-P-X; P-P-P. Since we do not play strong NT overcalls (1NT would be takeout showing 4 spades and a 5 card minor), he is aware that I may well have a strong NT but just have no bid. Therefore, balancing on lighter values is probably a good idea, but in this case, he has a decent balancing double at the one level by a passed hand whatever your system. As it turns out, all I had was a 4-3-3-3 hand with A-AK-K and 3 small hearts and would have never doubled 2♥ if the opponents were not vulnerable in matchpoints. With trump leads at every opportunity, we prevented a diamond ruff in dummy and set it one for +200 and a top. The rest of the scores on that board were pretty evenly divided between +100 and +130.

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Pre-Alert: Canape, Variable 1C Openings

Last weekend, I sat at the bridge table with the Feagins 3 times - once as a kibitzer and twice as an opponent - and each time (over a mere 14 boards) they had a bidding misunderstanding. This is easily one of the top 3 or 4 pairs in Georgia and a pair that has been playing together longer than I have been alive, maybe even twice that long. So, bidding misunderstandings happen even for the best and most experienced partnerships. The one against us in the Sunday Swiss epitomizes one of the main difficulties of playing against a mulit-meaning 1C opening such as Polish or Swedish and some problems with the ACBL pre-alert system.

We got to the table and, per ACBL procedures, pre-alerted that we play canape. I also mentioned we play a variable 1C opening and they quickly agreed to treat it as natural. I normally don't mention the 1C opening in a pair game because it's not a pre-alertable and can take up a lot of time, but in an 8 board match, I generally try to mention it to them as a courtesy. A couple of boards into the round, Sean opened 1C, alerted and explained as balanced 12-14 or unbalanced 17+ or any 18+. Jack overcalled 1H, I passed, and Claudia bid 2C. What happened with the rest of the hand is unimportant. The point is that they didn't know whether 2C was natural or a cuebid showing heart support, even after agreeing before-hand that they would treat our 1C as natural. In my opinion, and the opinion of most people, you should play "imaginary cuebids" to show a good heart raise. Opener is very likely to have a weak balanced hand, and you definitely need constructive bidding available. There are several specialized defenses to multi-purpose 1C openings, but I don't think any of them are worth playing - just assume it's a "could be short" 1C and bid naturally.

ACBL laws and most directors I have asked clearly state that canape is pre-alertable but any system with 1C as a forcing opening is not pre-alertable, whether it is precision, polish, swedish, or some similar variant. Most good players know what methods they use over a big 1C opening, over a standard 1C opening, and over a "short" 1C opening, but I have found that most do not know what they do over a variable 1C opening even though such systems are fairly common worldwide. In Poland, 1C is a typically a balanced 12-14 or 15+ with long clubs or any 18+. In Sweden, it is a balanced 11-13 or any 17+. In the Asbury-Gannon Swedish Canape system, it is a balanced 12-14 or unbalanced 17+ or balanced 18+.

The purpose of pre-alerting is to allow the opponents to discuss how they will defend against a system or convention that is highly unusual. Canape is definitely unusual and the fact that we can frequently open the bidding and conceal a 5 card side suit is unexpected (which therefore could never be alerted in the bidding), but there's not really anything the opponents could have to discuss about their bidding. Bidding is still natural (opening 4 card majors is and never will be any sort of an alert). The canape rebid of a 5 card side suit is definitely alertable, but there's still nothing the opponents should do different from standard, at least in what their bids mean. A variable 1C opening seems to need a pre-alert more than canape, at least in the US where most players are unfamiliar with such systems. Without a pre-alert, the opponents will be caught off guard and frequently do not know whether to treat 1C as "could be short", natural, or big, opening up many potential cases of mis-information, bad alerts, failures to alert, and general confusion.

I sometimes want to tell people what our 1C opening is and then tell them that they need to decide how they are going to defend against it but that is very time consuming, especially when playing only 2 or 3 board rounds. And sometimes I think that when I alert one club and explain it I should suggest some defense or tell them they can discuss what they play over it at that time even thought neither of those are technically allowed. But it would eliminate the need for a director call for misinformation or having all of us at the table just unsure about whether he had a takeout double of 1C, or the majors, or a strong hand, or just clubs. In a way, though, the lack of an agreement probably keeps many people from entering the auction and gives us a slightly unfair advantage, even though I'm sure we are following the alert procedures properly. The fact that our 1C could be a flat 12 count probably keeps out some of the ragged nuisance overcalls and preempts that people often make against a strong club because you don't want to deceive partner who may well hold a very good hand if we have the weak NT variety.

Making the Proper Inferences from Canape Bidding

The notes I wrote on my personal scorecard during the Rosenblum are surprisingly not filled with notes and score estimates and marks for which ones might be blog-worthy despite playing at a slower pace than ever before. I guess that should mean that I was concentrating on actually playing rather than winning the post-mortem or finding something interesting to write about on here. I guess we just played some solid defense - and we did have to play a lot of defense. I declared a miniscule 16 hands over the 96 for which Sean and I were in, and he declared only 17. Here is board 20 from the 8th qualifying round against the China Geely Auto team.

The declarer north should have been able to make this 4SX contract against us, given the bidding (and the appropriate alert explanations). Granted, if south had not jumped straight to game, I would have bid hearts and then making the proper inferences would be easier.

Dealer: S Vul: EW	North ♠ AKT95 ♥ J532 ♦ 32 ♣ 85
West ♠ 64 ♥ AQ974 ♦ AQJ4 ♣ QT		East ♠ QJ ♥ K86 ♦ T9876 ♣ J74
	South ♠ 8732 ♥ T ♦ K5 ♣ AK9632

West	North	East	South
1♦	1♠	X	4♠
X	Pass	Pass	Pass

It's not an easy hand under any circumstances, but our bidding certainly helped us here. Partner correctly led a diamond. I took the Q, A, and the heart A and then led another heart, forcing dummy to ruff. How do you plan to take all the tricks from that point. 1D was showed an unbalanced hand with 11-16 hcp, 4+ diamonds, not exactly 4 of either major, but possibly a 5 or more in a major. The double showed 6+ hcp and 3+ hearts. On my side of the screen, I was asked but I don't know about the other side, which included the declarer.

When north played the ace of spades, partner dropped the Q. Obviously, playing the other high spade will lead to victory but that's definitely not right. He then played the ace of clubs, under which I played the Q. I was kind of thinking that I need him to play me for a stiff club and Jxx of spades (assuming he also knows I am 5-4 in the reds) and to next finesse into partner's now stiff J. But he continued with another high club. Now I was sure he would get it right. I am marked with 2-5-4-2 shape, and with north-south only having 18 hcp, it's nor unreasonable that I doubled on high cards rather than a possible spade trick. But he continued playing me for Jxx of spades by ruffing a club (as I parted with a diamond), then ruffing a heart to lead another heart, attempting some sort of coup since he could not set up clubs and get to them or trump all the hearts and pick up trumps if I had 3 trumps. That would have worked if I started with something like 3-4-4-2 or 3-3-5-2, neither of which are possible distributions for a 1D opener in our canape system. Maybe he didn't ask about the alerts on his side of the screen.

Note that standard bidders don't really have any chance to defeat 4S as I would open 1H and get a heart lead, so this can kind of count as a win for canape. We would never get a diamond led through the K and declarer would surely disobey the rule of restricted choice just to avoid letting east in to lead a diamond.

Montreal Relay - Not Something I'll Be Promoting Any Time Soon

As many of you know, I have a certain fascination with Montreal even though I still have never been there. However, I very much dislike the Montreal relay convention. I had heard of it before but had never played it and it may well be my new least favorite convention in bridge. I was coerced into playing last night. I rarely play in the Wednesday game in Macon but there was supposedly a very good player passing through who wanted to play and they called me to partner her, but she insisted on Montreal relays but called it by another name, Kennedy. Maybe it's a south florida thing. Here is the summary:
After a standard 1C opening (or a could be as short as 2 but natural):

1D is normal response values but artificial promising no 5 card major and at least one 4 card major. Thus, opener must bid a 4 card major if he has one next and minor suit lengths are still ambiguous.
1M response promises 5 and 1NT denies a 4+ card major.

Yes, it is true that this system will get opener playing your 4-4 fits and you will find 5-3 fits sooner. That is what people seem to think is the advantage of this little convention. However, it really slows down the process of finding the 4-4 fits, especially when they bid over 1D. Now you are kind of clueless as to whether this is a total misfit hand or youhave a fit and need to be competing. Are 5-3 fits really that hard to find after a normal 1C-1M start? With so many ways to check back for 3 card support and support doubles, responder promising a 5 card major at the 1 level seems very unnecessary. Getting the opener to play the hand may be a very slight advantage when you wind up in a partscore, but by the same token, you get responder playing 1NT when you don't have a fit. And when responder has a stronger hand, who gets to declare is pretty irrelevant, so that little plus is a wash.

A couple of rounds into it, I picked up AKTx, AJT, Jx, AQxx and dutifully opened 1C and she bid 1D (alert). I would hate to bid 1S and then have her play NT even though she specifically said that a NT rebid by opener would deny a 4 card major. So I bid 2NT anyway and, yes, we missed a spade fit. 2NT is rarely passed. Why not checkback for a 4 card major, even bid 3S if you're not sure 3 of a minor would be forcing?

This is like the anti-Walsh convention, and I like Walsh. Walsh is little more than bypassing any number of diamonds to bid a 4 card major in response to 1C. That way opener can then bypass a 4 card major after 1C-1D because responder either has no 4 card major or has enough points to bid it now, over 1NT. You get the bigger hand playing 1NT more often, which is probably more useful than getting the big hand playing 2M. And you find out about possible fits sooner so that interference doesn't cause such a problem.

Obviously I'm going to like Walsh better because I like canape and Walsh is kind of canape-ish. True canape would bid a 4 card major before a 5 card diamond suit regardless of suit strength (not only with minimum responses as in Walsh), and true canape would bid a 4 card a diamond suit before a 5 card major in response to 1C, which isn't such a bad idea if your partner is in on it too.

If you haven't figured it out yet, I'm all for finding out the 4-4 major suit fits as soon as possible so any system or convention that delays bidding 4 card majors isn't going to rank very high on my list.

Polishish Canape Issues: Determining if Opener has a weak NT or a Strong Hand

When I first toyed with adopting a polish-like structure with canape about 3 months ago, I was really concerned that we would have difficulty distinguishing between the 12-14 balanced hands and the big hands in competition. That actually hasn't been a problem. With the 12-14, opener can just pass his rho is the one interfering or can raise partner's 1M response to 2M. With a big hand, opener should do something - anything - to show one of the big hands: cuebid for a strong takeout, jump raise or jump-shift to show support and a big hand, bid NT if balanced w/ a stopper, or bid a new suit. The only real difference from standard bidding is that a cuebid would not show support as a jump to 3M and all jump-shifts (fit-jumps) would be gf with support. I think we also decided that opener should be able to make a support double with a weak NT, so 1C-P-1H-2C-X = 3 card support, just as if it was a standard auction.

If lho of the 1C opener interferes, that's actually a little easier to deal with. Responder just bids as if partner opened a standard "could be as short as 2" 1C. Negative doubles are all on, negative free bids are on (for majors only), but 2C and 2D are both natural 1 round forces. Opener rarely has the big hand when lho and partner both bid, but there are still plenty of ways he can show a big hand - jumping and cuebidding, normally all below game and in a game-forcing situation.

If lho preempts, we even more bid as if we opened a weak NT. Lebensohl applies and opener bids over a signoff only if 17+ and obviously doesn't accept the relay to 3C is he has a big hand. But natural bidding takes over and we have yet to have any real problems that are worse than standard. I must say, in probably 25 sessions of playing this face to face, lebensohl after a 1C opening never came up.

Polish club is substantially superior to a strong club, in my opinion, because opponents don't so much go out of their way to make nuisance bids because they have to bid more constructively because it is still reasonably likely to be their hand. I probably should learn the Polish standard system WJ05, something I might be able to play with someone without weeks of discussion and practice.

Canape System Win

This hand, from the Under 21 US junior trials today, shows a system win for canape. Granted, this hand is a bit lighter than I would open but the point is still there. After a 1H opening by north (John Marriott, in this case), east cannot bid NT like he would over a normal 1D opening so the choices are X and 2C, and I think he chose correctly. Then west, with 9 points and 4 card support, could make a limit raise, but given the wide range of the 2C bid and the insinuating double from south, I do not disagree with the simple raise.  Anyway, 3NT was reached fairly easily at the other table after a 14-16 1NT opening, and I think it would be equally reachable after 1D opening and 1NT overcall.

Balancing Doubles in Canape

Another thing I’ve been thinking about is what does a balancing double in a canapé system show. Like 1D-(2C)-P-P-X? In standard, you would tend to have almost any non-freak hand without length in clubs. Maybe 3-4-4-2 or 4-4-4-1 or 4-3-5-1 shape, possibly even 3-3-5-2, and it could be an absolute minimum. In canapé, when 1D guarantees having not exactly 4 in either major, but guarantees an unbalanced hand, double as takeout doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. None of the 4 hand shapes I mentioned above are possible after a canapé opening. I mean, 4-3-5-1 is a possible shape but with 4 in the suit already bid, so 5-3-4-1 in this auction would be a possible holding. Do we really want to suggest that partner bid either major when we are 5-3?

 

But using insinuating doubles (basically negative doubles that only guarantee 3 in unbid majors) and negative free bids (1D-(2C)-2M = constructive w 5+), the need for opener to show any sort of major suit length when it is passes back to him isn’t so important. Perhaps it should be a penalty double but that doesn’t make sense because on the hands where you will want to defend 2CX, partner will have made an insinuating double. Maybe it should imply canapé with 5 in the suit below the overcaller’s suit plus tolerance (2 or 3) in the other suit. So, after 1D-(2C)-P-P, X can be 5-2-4-2 or 5-3-4-1 or 5-2-5-1. And After 1S-(2D)-P-P, X = 5 clubs (4-3-1-5 or 4-2-2-5). I think I’m gonna go with the latter for now. I think.

Polish Club Canape

Yesterday I felt inspired to tweak our system (the canape precision system Sean and I use) by introducing a two-way 1C opening and to incorporate canape into the responses and rebids to a 1C opening. So, after brief discussions with Shaz and Bryan, I set out to write up a system that would accommodate these things, not to be played with them but. I used no reference material and I don't think these system notes now look anything like any other system but I do have it so that auctions follow basically the same form as our canape structure for the minimum opening hands. After a couple of hours, I had a couple of pages of sequences that made sense at the time but for all I knew could be quite horrible. Then a couple of hours at the partnership bidding table and we realized this actually makes a lot of sense and allows us to bid the big hands in much the same was as we do the intermediate ones.

There are 2 downsides that I see. Opening NT is 15-17. Okay, not really a downside. It's just totally normal while nothing else in this system (when we get to open the bidding) is normal. and the auction 1C-1D-2D is too difficult to handle. In this case, opener is 17-21 with long diamonds or (4 diamonds and a longer side suit), a lot like our 1D opening which is 11-16 with long diamonds or (4 diamonds and a longer suit). Responder could have up to 11 if balanced, 7 if unbalanced, and may be fearful of bidding on without significant values. We may find ourselves in an inferior diamond fit when everyone else has no problem getting to the 5-3 or 5-4 major suit fit.

Our 1D through 2C opening bids are basically the same as before, but now the max is 16 hcp instead of 15 - they all are one-suited in the suit bid or 4 in the suit bid with a longer side suit. 2D is still mini-roman, now 13-16 instead of 12-15. 2M openings are 8-12 with a 6 card suit. 1NT is 15-17 instead of 12-15. the big change is that 1C is now either 12-14 balanced OR 18+ balanced OR 17+ unbalanced instead of any 16+.

There are a couple of big upsides in that it's fun and the opponents may not know how to react. I suppose most will or should treat it like a natural 1C, but I don't really know. I don't recall every actually playing against anyone playing a Polish club system.

Teaching a Computer to Bid part 1

My latest little project, started about a week ago, is to write a computer program that can bid my canapé system. It's a rather interesting process but I'm afraid this will be another thing that I will give up on after a month or two. But if I succeed, I expect it would improve my bidding. Just going through the process of thinking about exactly how to evaluate hands and quantifying everything should make me a better bidder. I suppose the main point of this would be to practice the system and maybe teach other people this bidding system. I have succesfully gotten it to get through 3 bids (at least for 1 level openings, responses and most rebids) with no interference - that part is pretty easy because it's so formulaic. Based on hcp and distribution, the bids are really straightforward. Beyond this, and even more when opposing bidding is added, more analytic skills are needed. The formulas can only go so far before there get to be too many possibilities to explicitly mention. I haven't quite decided how to implement this.

If there's one thing I've learned from working as a software engineer and redesigning an old and incredibly unorganized piece of software for the last few years is that knowing your requirements and having a detailed plan are essential to writing good code. Yet I jumped right in and started coding because I wanted to see some results right away.

I have also realized something about my programming interests. I dislike programming GUI's. I guess I actually knew this before. I never liked doing any kind of interface programming but I enjoy the algorithms and logic parts of software. So, this project is gonna be all text on the console unless someone else volunteers to write a GUI. I don't even want to think about programming a computer to actually play bridge - that has to be way harder than bidding.

2♣ Opening in Canapé Systems

So, about a week ago I bought Ken Rexford's book on his Modified Italian Canapé System. If you know me at all as a bridge player, you are well aware of my interest in canapé bidding systems for a number of reasons, mainly that is fun and while it is actually a very natural system, it still confuses the opponents by frequently concealing your best suit for the first round of bidding. So, I spent a good bit of time thinking about how to improve my system, which I use with Sean and Ramesh but am interested in teaching it to and playing it with anyone else who is interested. There are definitely a few kinks that I have yet to work out but lately I've had more and more success with it. Anyway, if you are interested in a good book on the theory of canapé, check out this book.

There are some things I dislike about Rexford's system, mainly the fact that the 1♦ opening could be on a void. In my canapé system, the 1♦, 1♥, 1♠, and now 2♣ openings are the same: either one-suited in that suit or 4 in that suit with a longer side suit. hands with 5M and 4♣ are awkard to bid after opening 1M because of the difficulty of accurately showing the second suit (having to treat it like a one-suiter or a balanced hand), so I finally gave in to testing the effectiveness of 2♣ being a possible canapé hand instead of just single-suited with clubs, and the problems seemed to be relatively few.

The structure Sean and I came up with yesterday for how to bid over 2♣ as 11-16 hcp with either a canapé hand with a 5+ card major or single-suited with clubs is as follows:
2♦: artificial 1 rd force, may be any strength; if game-forcing, no 5 card major
     2M: 5 card suit
          raise: invitational
          cheapest bid in other major: mixed raise
     2N: max w/ long clubs
     3♣: min w/ long clubs
2M: 5 card suit, constructive but not forcing, usually tolerance to play 3♣ opposite a one-suiter
2NT: artificial game force w/ a 5 card major
     3♣: no 3 card major
     3♦: at least 1 3 card major
     3M: 5 card suit

The other option for dealing with the 5M and 4♣ hands in canape is to use 2M openings to show these hands, which really is easier to handle, but the value of a 2M preempt is too good to use for something else. Now, if we could use 2♦ as a weak 2 in either major, then I wouldn't be opposed to this treatment, but then this wouldn't be a general convention chart system.

Edited Sept 1, 2010:
The rest of our opening bids are now:
1♣: balanced 12-14, any 17+ unbal, any 18+ bal.
1♦/♥/♠ :11-16, 4+ card suit, could have longer side suit (1M could be 4441 w/ shortness in other major)
1NT: 15-17
2♦: 11-16, 4-4-1-4 or 4-4-4-1
2♥/♠: good weak 2 (9 to 12) in 1st and 2nd seat. 3rd seat much less disciplined
2NT: 5 to 10, 5-5 minors

Please see my other atricles on canape bidding.

This Weekend's Bridge Results

So, this weekend included almost nothing but bridge, watching golf, and baseball. It was kind of nice, actually, once I got over the disastrous first 3 rounds Saturday morning at the Macon club. I'll blame it on being in the morning. Anyway, here's a defensive hand that I should have beaten but did not. I led 4th best spade against 1NT, declarer taking partner's Q with the A. She then cashed 3 hearts, and led a club. Partner inserted the J and declarer won. I paused for a couple of seconds, thinking that maybe it's right to play the K, but followed low. Next was a diamond to the Q and a diamond back to the K. Now I had no choice but to play K and another spade, giving declarer her 7th trick with the SJ. Yes, declarer could have played the hand better but I should have figured out to unblock the CK. Normally splitting the honors there wouldn't be right with a likely diamond entry to dummy but partner knows that I need to know how he could get in again to lead spades through declarer, and that should help. Declarer has shown up with 3 aces and the presumes SJ so must have the missing DK and maybe or maybe not the DJ. And I don't want to be on lead anyway. If another club comes next, I would be forced to break diamonds, which gives declarer a trick, or lead spades, which also gives declarer a trick. And if he plays diamonds next, I would have to take air with the first diamond or take the 2nd and 3rd round of diamonds and again have to lead a spade into declarer's jack. So, thinking it through a little more, it is clear to play the CK under the A. It seems like a strange time to have to stop and think for awhile, but I guess it's appropriate.

Final tally: +55 imps in 172 hands: 44 hands with Sean, 13 w/ Val, 30 w/ Carol, 8 w/ Harlan, 19 w/ Ramesh, 17 w/ Gideon, 12 money hands with robots, 21 w/ Bob, and 28 w/ Emory. And this time the best results were with Emory (+69 imps in 28 deals), as should be the case. In addition, much time was spent at the partnerhsip bidding table testing out new methods for our canapé system and sort of teaching it to others.

Anderson sectional

So, after a late night being a bad wingman in Atlanta, Ramesh and I
left at 7:30 to play in the Anderson, SC sectional on 4 hours of
sleep. Round one of the KO goes okay and we were fortunate to draw
owen/Warren again in the 2nd round (we played them in a 3 way the 1st
session). Disastrous.
A few more beers later, ramesh and i put together a nice 61.46% game.
It was the biggest jump i've seen in the last round - from about 56 to
over 61%, and our last round was only 16 out of 24 matchpoints.
Sunday, the good bridge continued as Ramesh (godot79) and I and Jim
Gentry and his partner came from behind to win the Swiss. Our system
worked well for us this day and slipping defenseive tricks was kept to
a minimum. One thing I like about our system is that it sort of makes
us, my partners especially, be disciplined. Our 1NT is 13-15 so
basically you have to pass all flat 11 and 12 points hands. And due to
the canape style, it at least seems harder to cheat a little on your
point count or distribution.
My favorite hand was when we got to double the opponents in 1S. I
opened a big club with AQT8x, Ax, Qxx, AJx. LHO stuck in a 1S bid and
partner doubled, showing any 5-7 hcp. All pass and she scraped up 4
tricks for 500 to us. At the other table, my hand played 4SX, also
down 3 for 500.

Are You Serious?

In the midnight game Friday night, we were playing against a pair of sober guys, but at least they were accepting of the laughing and some silliness that is natural at midnight games. We had just been laughing about something and on about the 4th board, I opened 1H, Sean bid 1S, alerted by me. After a couple of seconds, rho asks did you alert? yes. what does 1S mean? he promised only 3 spades. (slight hesitation, still a lot of giggling going around) are you serious? yeah. okay. A couple of hands later, I open 1D, partner responds 1S, alerted as promising only 3, and I rebid 1NT, alerted. the opponent asks again what it means? he has exactly 5 hearts and at least 2 spades. (another couple of seconds hesitation) are you serious? yeah. that's our system. that was amusing.

Reasons I Like Canape-style Openings

I am strongly in favor of a bidding system that is easy to follow. Standard American and 2/1 game forcing are relatively simple but lack a lot of things. The most obvious fault with Standard American is making slam tries because it is too hard to create a game-forcing auction. The main problem with 2/1 is in showing invitational hands without support for partner?s major suit opening. Previously I decided to use jump shifts from 1M to 3m as invitational with a long minor but then realized a lot of these hands are still better off in the major or notrump. And big club systems can get complicated quickly if you put in a whole bunch of gadgets. So, I will attempt to describe why I like a simple precision system with canap? style openings.

I began creating this bidding system a couple of years ago with Ramesh, taking bits and pieces from other canap? systems that have system notes on the internet. Some things are still a bit fuzzy like how to bid 5-5 hands and how responder can use canap?. I wanted a system that would be good for matchpoints since that is my favorite type of scoring (well, BAM actually is my favorite but those games have gone out of style for the most part).

Anyway, back to what I like about this system. It is largely a natural system. Opening 1D/H/S promises a 4 card suit at least. Bidding a different suit at your next bid show 5 in the 2nd suit and exactly 4 in the first suit. This has kind of a preemptive effect as you more frequently shut the opponents out by bidding his 5 card suit. I love the auctions that go 1H-1S-2D-P and the opponents have an 8 card heart fit. While at standard bidding tables, it may go 1D-(1H)-X-(2H)-all pass or something similar. Responder rarely has to take a preference back to the first suit because the second suit is guaranteed to be longer than the first. So opener can ?reverse? with any hand safely. With 5 hearts and 4 diamonds, we open 1D, then over the expected 1S response, we can bid 2H even with a minimum and not miss out on a 5-3 heart fit. We learn about 4-4 major fits sooner than in standard bidding and the 5-3?s are still easy to find because we are not afraid to reverse into a 5 card suit at the 2 level. There isn?t much use for 2/1 game-forcing since opener is limited to 11-15 hcp. Responder will have a much better idea of slam prospects that opposite a regular opening with a 12-21 point range.

The weak notrump is also something I like a lot, even though 12-15 is a bit of a large range. But, again, it is effective at shutting the opponents out of the auction. I tried for a while to use an 11-13 NT range and use the 1D opening for the 14-15 or 14-16 range, but we found ourselves opening 1D much more than anything else and ideally, you would like all the opening bids to be used about the same amount.

Our big club structure is effective and mostly natural. 1D response is 0-7hcp. 1H through 2D responses are transfers, showing a game forcing values with 5 cards in the next suit. Opener only accepts the transfer with support. 1S over 1C shows any balanced hand with game forcing values. That way opener can bid 1NT and then responder can use puppet stayman. After 1C-1D, 1H is any 20+ hcp and responder rebids 1S with a real bust hand (no A or K or 2 queens). If they overcall, we play stolen bid through 1S, otherwise double is 5-7, pass is 0-4 hcp or a trap pass.

Canape Bidding System

Last weekend was an interesting experience. I played at the sectional in Athens with Sean Gannon, a 17 year old who seems to be about as good as I was when I was 17. It's nice to be on a team where I'm not nearly the youngest person. We had several interesting hands - you're bound to have some interesting times when playing 144 hands over 2 days. Our results were mediocre - lost in the finals of the K/O with Megan and Patrick and did horribly in the Sunday Swiss but with another round or two probably would have made it back to average after having 16 out of a possible 80 VPs after 4 rounds. Then, to get the bad taste of the Swiss teams out of our mouth, we played at the Atlanta club Sunday night and came home with a decent 59% game for 3rd overall.

We played an interesting bidding system - strong club with canape style openings. I basically picked out various parts of other systems and then tried to work out the kinks to have everything decently covered. Here is the system summary:
1C - 17+ hcp balanced, 16+ unbalanced, with transfer responses (no further relays)
1D - 14-16 balanced OR 11-15 unbalanced w/ 4+ diamonds and possibly a 5 (but not 4) card major
1H/S - 11-15 hcp, 4+ card suit. if only 4, has another 5+ card suit
1NT - 11-13 hcp
2C - 11-15, 6+ clubs, no 4 card major
2D - any 4441 or 5440 w/ 5 of a minor
2H/S - weak2
2NT - 5-10 hcp, 5-5 minors
Negative doubles after 1M-2m show 3 card in OM, negative doubles after 1m-1M show 4, negative doubles after both majors have been bid show 3 card support in opener's major.
I've decided that the 1D opening occurs too frequently. At least it felt like it happened too much. So, I think next time I play this system, I'll change the NT range to 12-15 or 13-15. 1D becomes a totally natural bid (although it could still be a 4 card suit with a 5 or 6 card major).
The hands where canape style openings don't work so well is with 4 clubs and a 5 card major. We decided we had to treat it like a major one suiter or a balanced hand, but some other systems use 2H/2S to show that hand. I think weak 2's are too important. Another option is to use 2C as either 6+ clubs or 4 clubs with a 5 card major. That one may be midchart, though, and I don't want a system I can only play in flight A events.