BRIDGE (4) 

I have just spent the weekend playing in the finals of the Danish national Mixed Pairs bridge championships, which took place in Vingsted, a small place in the middle of Jutland, not far from Billund Airport. This coming week is a whole festival of bridge, as our tournament is followed by the women's pairs, open pairs, junior events etc etc.

120 pairs showed up for the contest. Saturday afternoon was spent in a qualifying tournament of 46 boards, in which the top 40 would go through to the A final, leaving the lower 80 in the B final. In the first session, my partner and I didn't really gel together and ended up 85th, a score which included a penalty when my partner wrongly interpreted one of my bids for the opposition, and I didn't correct her before the play started. Not a good start.

In the second session, we perked up, and came 40th, A-final standard. That performance included one pure top, which was also the cause of a challenge from the opposition. My partner opened 1 no trump, and then forgot that we transfer to minor suits as well as to major ones, interpreting my 2 no trump response as "bid three if you are maximum" instead of "bid 3 diamonds". So we ended up in 6 no trumps instead of the more normal (and laydown) 6 diamonds, which my monster diamond suit would have brought. It was only when my hand went down as dummy, showing lots of diamonds and a void in spades, that my partner first looked puzzled, then remembered the system, then alerted the opposition. However, they had already played their first card, a club; so after the hand was finished and we had our 12 tricks, they called the tournament director over to say that if they had known our system, then they might well have led a spade. Fortunately, as the cards lay, there were 12 tricks in no trumps, whatever was led. So the challenge was denied, and we got our pure top, 6 no trumps giving marginally more points than 6 diamonds. I have to admit that I enjoyed that moment!

The good second session still only brought us up to 67th overall, so we went into the B final. This was played over 78 boards, in 4 sessions. In the first one, last night, we were again up and down, ending up in 35th place. I made a 3 no trumps with only 22 high card points for a top, which was very satisfying; and a good sacrifice of 5 hearts over a laydown 4 spades for another. But I also made a complete mess of another three no trumps for a bottom; and underbid another one for another (three no trumps is the most common contract in bridge, so you see it an awful lot). I was knackered when we finally stopped for the night at 11.15pm.

I don't know what was in my sister-in-law's breakfast cereal, but we were awesome in this morning's second session. We had eight positive rounds in a row, and quickly moved up to seventh. Nothing spectacular, just good, solid bridge. We bid and made the one slam on offer, doubled the opposition and got them down when we had to, restricted them to one less trick than the norm when they had the cards. We then had a couple of wobbles, but still went into lunch handily placed in 12th place.

The first hands after lunch included a 4 spades bid and made on a 4-3 trump fit, which is always pleasing; and a crushing of the opposition's overambitious three diamonds, so that they went down 5! Now we were up to 10th and cruising. Unfortunately, it proved to be the highwater mark of the day. A couple of neutral rounds later, we found someone sitting in our seat at the start of a round. After pointing this out to him and moving him to the correct table, we dealt and bid the first of the two hands of the round, and only then realised that the man in the wrong seat had also pulled out the wrong cards. Playing the wrong hand with the wrong people is just about the biggest mistake you can make in a duplicate bridge tournament, since it messes up the whole scoring; and we were duly punished with bottom scores. We rocketed down to 43rd place, though after a couple of good results at the end, finished 40th, exactly in the middle.

It was a great experience, and I learned a number of things from it.

1. First, mental stamina matters. The times we played best were when we were freshest; the times we played worst were late in the evening or at the end of the day, when we weren't. 

2. Secondly, it really helps to know the penalty rules (which I don't), and to make sure that you don't fall foul of them. It is unlikely that a pair will win if they have incurred penalties along the way.

3. Thirdly, small differences in play make for big differences in points. As an example, my partner on one contract took an unnecessary finesse which went wrong, so that she only made 4 spades + one instead of + two. A tiny lapse of concentration; but enough to turn a joint top into a joint bottom.

All in all, considering it was only the fourth time we had played together, I thought it went really well. There were periods where we didn't play that well, and there were periods where we played brilliantly. Best of all, we managed to get through the whole thing without shouting at each other, which is not something that could be said of every pair. I am already looking forward to next year.

Walter Blotscher