Auctions to blow your mind

I'm still pretty exhausted from last week in Greenville. Bridge tournaments wear me out.

Sean and I had several slam bidding disasters, which are unfairly magnified in imps, but otherwise played pretty well. 40 MP for the week is not terrible but it's not up to par either.

Hopefully the Reston regional in a couple of weeks will not drain my energy so much. We'll be flying so no dog to deal with, and I know fewer people there so probably less socialization. I want this to be a more relaxing vacation, but I know it won't be.

Here are a couple of auctions that blew my mind with some added commentary. From the Saturday open pairs:

1NT(1)-P-P-2♦(2); P-2♥-2NT(3)-P; P(4!)-X(5)-P(6)-P; XX(7)-P-P(8)-P

1) 15-17

2) Majors

3) this certainly looks like "pick a minor"

4) I don't know what's going on but I don't think I have to bid.

5) I know LHO wanted RHO to bid a minor so I'm going to give them a second chance because I have a prime 14-count and can double 3 of a minor as well.

6) I know my hand sucks for 2NT but I told you to pick a minor and you didn't so you must have a good reason.

7) I don't know what's going on, p, but 2NTX can't be the best contract. Let me in on the joke.

8) Spite pass with a 2-2-4-5 4-count.

From the Sunday Swiss:

P-P-2♥(1)-2♠; 4♥(2)-4♠-P-P; X(3)-P-P-XX(4); P(5)-P-P

1) 8-13, 5+ hearts (should have 6 hearts if at the low end)

2) 4♥ looks reasonable with AKJ-A and 6 card support.

3) Yeah, my 3 trump tricks are enough to set 4♠. So what if we have a giant heart fit.

4) We need more than 5 imps because we just went for 800 against nothing.

5) The trump split in our 11 or 12 card fit at the 5 level might do us in so I better pass and hope partner has a trick.

Rich Regan is a wild man. As alluded to above, he went for 800 on the first board while we could make nothing, then collected 880 on the second board, this was a couple of boards later. I was declaring 3NT and he led the ten of clubs, I ducked a couple of clubs and he showed out on the 3rd round.

♠KQ

♥KTxxx

♦KQx

♣Axx

♠Axx

♥Q

♦AT9xx

♣xxxx

Clearly if diamonds come in, that's 9 or 10 tricks but if they don't, how do I scrounge up 9 tricks? At trick 4, I led a heart toward my Q, which held. The right play now may well be to take a diamond finesse through LHO. If LHO had ♦Jxxx, this will allow me to score 5 diamonds, a heart, a club, and two spades (can't take all 3 spades because I would need to overtake a spade to get to the last 2 diamonds. But that's quite a strong position to take even if the gut says to do it.

Alas, I cash the ♦K and ♦Q at tricks 5 and 6, seeing the 4-1 split. I can't afford to give Rich a diamond because there would still be the problem of then not being able to take all 3 spade tricks, leaving me a trick short. So, I go into the tank after what so far had been a round played in lightning speed. Rich kept trying to claim down 1, saying his partner has good clubs and the ace of spades and other crap that pissed me off. This time I was able to stay concentrated and figure out how to make it. I cashed the ♠KQ, then came to my hand with the ♦A and cashed the ♠A. Now, RHO who started with ♠xxx, ♥AJxx, ♦xx, ♣KQJ9 was stuck. If she discarded a heart, I could throw her in with a club, forcing her to lead up to dummy's ♥KT at the end. In reality, she pitched the club so I just cashed my little club for the 9^th trick.