Two Hands from BBO

I played on Bridge Base Online this evening with my friend Anne. Anne was the winningest female player in the ACBL last year. She ended up the year with 1,419.97 masterpoints-- just ahead of Melanie Tucker with 1,419.86! Check out the tight race here. We held two hands that illustrate the importance of accuracy with high-level competition.

Dealer: South Vul: N-S Scoring: IMPs

♠ K963 ♥ J3 ♦ AKT ♣ K954 ♠ 7 ♥ AQT9742 ♦ Q52 ♣ 86 ♠ A52 ♥ K865 ♦ 976 ♣ QT7 ♠ QJT84 ♥ none ♦ J843 ♣ AJ32

1♠(2♥)4♠(5♥) P (P) X (P) 5♠ (6♥) X (All Pass)

Anne and I play a system that allows light openings with good playing strength and the spade suit. The South hand certainly has both, so I had an easy 1S opening. Lefty bid 2H, pard bounded to 4S, and righty bid 5H. Now, 4S by us is sort of a 'two-way' bid. It shows either a minimum game-force in high cards and a fit, or a preemptive raise to 4S. So my pass to 5H wasn't forcing. When pard doubled 5H, by agreement this said "I was bidding 4S to make", so with my undisclosed playing strength, I bid to 5S. LHO made the good decision to continue on to 6H (would you bid one more after being doubled in 5?), and partner's double ("Please don't bid any more, pard") ended the auction. On most lies of the cards, we would be on for 5S but not 6, and the opponents would be -500. With both minor-suit finesses on for our side, though, 6S was on, and 6H went -800. This was a well-judged hand for both sides, bidding to the single-dummy right spot. We figured out what was going on by good partnership and good understandings. West did it from a good (educated) guess.

On the very next board, we picked up

Dealer: West Vul: E-W Scoring: IMPs

♠ 987 ♥ QT9764 ♦ 6 ♣ 752 ♠ KQ6 ♥ A85 ♦ Q742 ♣ 863 ♠ AJT543 ♥ none ♦ AJ85 ♣ QJT ♠ 2 ♥ KJ32 ♦ KT93 ♣ AK94

(P) P (1♠) X (3♠) 4♥ (4♠) 5♥ (P) P (5♠) X (All Pass)

My RHO opened 1S in third chair, and I had an automatic takeout double. My lefty made a limit raise in spades, and pard (bless her-- great bid!) was in there with 4H. Righty bid 4S, and it was my guess. At IMPs, it tends to be percentage to bid one more, so I pulled out 5H. This would've gone for 300, but righty had heard of the 'bid one more' principle also, and bid to the doomed 5S. I didn't want my partner to worry about re-saving in 6H, so I doubled. We collected our two clubs and a diamond for +200.

These were both big pick-ups. Sure, there are hands consistent with the auctions that would have worked out poorly for our actions, but I think all of our bids were 'right'. Thanks again, Anne, for playing! (And nice 4H call!)