Mom and I played bridge for most of last week in the Mid-Atlantic Memorial Day Tarheel Regional in north Raleigh, NC.
We started out playing in my first Knock Out event, which is where you play in a team of four or more players against one other team for a three hour match. The winner advances to the next round and the loser is knocked out. Two from our team play the north-south cards against two from their team playing east-west, while the reverse happens at the other table, and we swap cards half way through so both teams end up playing the same hands from both sides. We had great teammates and won our first two matches, but lost the third by a small margin.
The next day we switched to pairs events, where it was just us against a bunch of other pairs playing the same hands. We came in first once thanks to some major gifts by our opponents and placed a couple other times. This was the last hand of the Friday afternoon session. My mother opened a 2â™ showing about 6 spades and 5-11 high card points.
| Mom | Xan | |
|---|---|---|
| â™ AQJ9652 | â™ K4 | |
| ♥ J632 | ♥ A | |
| ♦ 8 | ♦ QJ1072 | |
| ♣ J | ♣ AKQ54 |
I could see slam was quite possible, but I still don’t know if there’s a right way to bid it. I responded 2NT, which we play as the Ogust convention asking about opener’s bid quality. She rebid 3â™ to show a good suit and a good hand, though I might expect an outside honor for a “good hand”. Presumably, 4♣ by me would be a cue bid to see if she could bid 4♦ to show a first or second round diamond control. But lacking confidence to bid scientifically, I gambled and bid 6â™ directly.
The slam made after a spade lead without only minor communication difficulties between the hands. However, we didn’t get a top score. Two other pairs bid the slam and got doubled, earning a bigger score.
You could have written this in Greek and it would made the same amount of sense. In the future, could you refer to the Ogust convention as the Ogust gambit? That sounds cooler. Sounds like you did pretty well, congrats.
So you bid 6 Spade (a 7 would have been a grand slam, right?) and made it but your oponents believed you whereas the other pair’s oponents challenged them with a double and thus they got twice as many points… That’s what happens when you’re not only good but your oponent is also aware of it.
Seems that playing the same cards isn’t as ’same playing field’ as it seems.
One defender had AK of diamonds and KQ of hearts, and I assumed that’s the one that doubled at the other tables. I guess our somewhat scientific bidding may have discouraged the double.
Yes, 7 would be a grand slam. 6 is a small slam.