District 25 News for February 2006

2005 in review

Astute readers have already noticed that final rankings in our District 25 masterpoint races for 2005 were posted two weeks ago. I believe Lloyd Arvedon has set a new record for most masterpoints ever won in a year by a District 25 member. Congratulations, Lloyd!

The single biggest achievement of the year by New England players has to be Steve Gladyszak and Pat McDevitt winning the six-session Life Master Pairs at the Summer NABC in Atlanta. With his victory, Steve became New England's seventh Grand Life Master.

Buzz from Cromwell

District 25 held its six-day Knockout Regional at Cromwell, CT February 15-20, 2006. The high finshers, recaps, and tournament masterpoint races can be found under results. I counted 1207 table-sessions, with 897 different players winning about 6252 master points. As in prior years, Cromwell attracted quite a few good players from New York and other eastern seaboard states, including best-in-show Eugene Saxe of Briarcliff, NY, who won 68.99 points. Gene finished first in both the Wednesday-Thursday Flight A Knockout and the big Sunday Flight A Swiss.

Many strange and wonderful deals could be reported from this tournament, but the best was surely this one from the Sunday final of the Flight A Knockout:

............S-AKQJxxxxx
............H-x
............D-J10x
............C-

At one table, this hand had to respond to partner's strong club opening. At the other table, Victor King responded one spade to his partner's one diamond, and heard her jump to two notrump. King bashed to seven spades! West led a heart, and unfortunately dummy was:

............S-xx
............H-Jxx
............D-AKxx
............C-AKQJ

Down one. And what happened at the big club table? They stopped in four spades, making six, to win 13 Imps, the match by 4, and the event.

Other News

Your webmaster is saddened to report the passing of Tom Belle of Andover, MA. Tom was a fixture at New England tournaments for many years, playing with many different partners. I had the pleasure of playing one sectional pair game with Tommy in 2005. What struck me then, as always, was how nice a person Tom was, whether he won or lost, both at the table and away from it.

Our next New England regional will be the five-day Senior Regional held in North Falmouth, MA April 26-30, 2006. There are sectional events for the youngsters, so if you've reached the age of reason, plan on coming to the cape.

The webmaster solicits New England bridge-related written matter of suitable quality for posting. District 25 web site material is volunteer only, but you'll see your name in lights. Short is best.

Attaboys and Attagirls

Congratulations to New England players who achieved milestones , moving up in rank during February 2006.

Previous congrats:
January 2006
December 2005
November 2005
October 2005
September 2005

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December 2005
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September 2005
August 2005