Bridge Club News

Many Peninsula pairs played in the State Mixed Pairs Championship on the weekend of 26-27 May, with Margaret and Michael Draper the most successful. Margaret and Michael, who were representing Manly Leagues Bridge Club, were 6th in the North-South field at the end of the Qualifying round and so earned a place in the 7 table finals. In the Finals they were placed a creditable 12th, with two pairs tying for first place: Kevin ROSENBERG - Susan HUMPHRIES and Warren LAZER - Pauline GUMBY. Some of us will remember Susan Humphries tag teaming with Liam Milne as our Swiss Pairs experts on Tue 22 May.

Other Peninsula members who made the top 20 in each direction in the qualifying event included:

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Fourteen teams fought it out over three weeks in this qualifying event for the State Open Teams championship. Congratulations to the Farmer team (Alan Davies, Vivien Eldridge, David Farmer and Catherine Whiddon) for winning, ahead of the runners-up Draper team.

Difficulties of a technical nature prevented the final round results from the State Open Teams qualifier on Thursday 24 May appearing on our normal website display or via Pianola. Consequently we have taken a scan image of the printed results for you to see. 

The event was directed by Brian Soutter.

International players Liam Milne and Susan Humphries were our guest experts fpr our May Swiss Pairs. They led the PBI at 5 workshop on "When to respond 'light'", and then followed with a pre-session talk on guidelines when low-level doubles would logically be for penalties. The workshop was well received with a number of players from North Shore making the journey to hear them speak. It will be interesting to see how many light responses appear at the club.

The Swiss Pairs showed some interesting - read difficult - boards. The first board at our table had the following bidding: 4H (5D) 5H (6D) P P 6H X All pass - down one when 6D makes. In fact 7D makes when played by the other hand but fails on an unlikely spade lead and ruff. Needless to say Cath Whiddon and I were on the wrong side of this board playing against Susan and Liam.

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Derrick Browne was our guest expert at the Swiss Pairs on 24 April. His pre-session talk on the "Power of the Closed Hand" was very well received, and a number of players were seen trying to practice the deception technique during the night. Join us for the next Swiss Pairs on 22 May when international players Liam Milne and Susan Humphries will be our guest experts. The pre-session talk will address how to distinguish the doubles partner intended as penalties from those intended as takeout.

The winners on the night were David Farmer and Catherine Whiddon, ahead of Peter Clarke and Hans van Weeren, and Marieta Borthwick and Annegrete Kolding.

Nine tables played on the night which was directed by in-house directors Alan Davies and David Farmer.

During April Annegrete and Marita entered a bridge competition and received a Bridge Shop voucher as winners! Fortunately for our library, they decided to donate the voucher to our Peninsula Bridge Library.

We have purchased 2 copies each of Demystifying Defense and A Second Book of Bridge Problems. Both publications are by Patrick O’Connor. These books will be of particular interest to those attending the Defence lessons this month. Look out for them at the library.

Thank you Annegrete and Marita.

Members may not be aware of the KEORIDE transport option available for those living on the Northern Beaches north of Narrabeen.

This option was introduced as part of the B-Line service, and provides on-demand transport between your home and the nearest B-Line bus stop. There is of course a B-Line bus stop right outside the bridge club.

Member Julie Daniels writes:

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Fifty members and two guests attended the workshop on defense given by Joan Butts this morning. Everyone walked away so pleased with what they had learnt and ready to put it into practice.

Joan stepped in at short notice when Cath Whiddon, who is leading the remaining Killer Defence lessons on Mondays in May (9.30am), was unable to take the class.

Thanks Joan for making a difficult concept seem so logical. Remember the Rule of 11 next time you’re at the bridge table!

Peninsula participated in Bridge for Brains today and we all had a great day with lots of delicious food and a good bridge game. We offered the 3 rookie tables the choice to join the main game but they preferred to stay where they were so they sat on the side and played 3 rounds of 7 boards.

Thanks very much to Sue Riley and Gayle King for organising and co-ordinating the day and thanks to all those who contributed to the raffles, bought lots of tickets and brought food for the fantastic afternoon tea.

Check your results at http://www.nationwidepairs.com.au/bridge_for_brains.html