District 25 News for October 2005

Buzz from the District 25 North American Open Pairs Finals

Over the weekend of October 15-16, 2005, in four grueling matchpoint sessions at Sturbridge, MA, District 25 determined its representatives for the North American Open Pairs to be held at the 2006 Spring Nationals in Dallas, Texas. Click here for high finishers. For this event, your district website is providing full score sheets for those given to brooding over what might have been. Your webmaster would appreciate feedback on this format. He doesn't promise this for all regional pair games unless it proves popular.

In all three flights, the first-place finishers ran away with the event. In particular, Frank Merblum and Doug Doub won Flight A by about three full boards. In recent years this Connecticut partnership has repeatedly represented New England, and won many events at District 25 regionals. Watch out for them !

Since the NAOP finals is District 25's toughest matchpoint game (and our only four-session matchpoint event), it's a good chance to judge the state of New England skill. Unfortunately, it's often hard to tell how good a field is by scanning scoresheets. For example if West made a tricky four spades, did he find a great line of play or did the defense just goof? Fortunately, however, the final session provided two slam deals that do tell us something about the state of New England slam bidding technique, because one side was at the mercy of their opponents.

On Board 21, North dealt himself A10x Kx K109xxxx x. South held Kx Axxx AQ AKJ9x. The diamonds weren't four-zero, so the hand is cold for seven diamonds or no trumps. All deals were played 7 times in Flight A, 14 times in B, and 10 times in C. Since the tops were different, I'll convert the matchpoint scores to percentages. In Flight A, one North-South pair was +2220 for 100%, two pairs were +2140 for 75%, three pairs were +1470 for 33%, and one pair was +1390 for 0%. In Flight B, five pairs were +2220 for 85%, three pairs were +1470 for 54%, 2 pairs were +1390 for 38%, 3 pairs were +720 for 15%, and 1 pair was +190 for 0%. In Flight C, one pair was +2220 for 100%, 4 pairs were +1470 for 72%, 2 pairs were +1390 for 38%, 1 pair was +1370 for 22%, 1 pair was +720 for 11%, and one pair was +640 for 0%.

On Board 25, East dealt himself Jx 10x KJ10xx AQ9x. West held Ax AKxx AQ9x KJx. Since EW were vul and NS not, some Souths stuck in a spade preempt at their first turn on K10xxxx. Since diamonds still weren't four-zero, there's nothing to the play here either - EW make 12 tricks at notrump or 13 at diamonds. Nobody in any flight found the diamond grand slam. In Flight A, 2 pairs were +1440 for 83%, 3 pairs were +1390 for 50%, 1 pair was +690 for 15%, and one pair was -200 (7NT doubled, perhaps?) for 0%. In Flight B, 2 pairs were +1470 for 92%, 4 pairs were +1390 for 76%, 1 pair was +1370 for 54%, 1 pair was +720 for 46%, 2 pairs were +690 for 39%, 1 pair was +640 for 23%, and 3 pairs were -100 for 8%. In Flight C, 1 pair was +1470 for 100%, 3 were +1440 for 78%, 5 were +1390 for 33%, and one pair was +1100 (4S doubled?) for 0%.

Are you impressed ?

Other News

The next District 25 regional is the Ed Gould Masters in Portland, Wednesday November 9th to Sunday November 13th, a great warm-up for the Denver Nationals the following week. This will be Maine's first regional in several years, and Maine's most prominent player Dick Budd assures me, you'll be glad you came. Notice that the schedule features main events at 10AM and 3PM and side games at 7:30. The ACBL used this schedule in Atlanta, and it proved popular. Try it - you'll like it.

Attaboys and Attagirls

Congratulations to New England players who achieved milestones , moving up in rank during September 2005.