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A quick reminder that you have your BridgeWhiz class on Saturday at 9:00 AM PDT. I’ll still be at Mountain Shadows for the lessons, but you can also participate from home. From home, you can access the class 15 minutes before your class time.
If you are joining us from home, we will be using ZOOM this week.
JOIN ZOOM MEETING Saturday, November 4, 2023 at 9:00 AM-10:30 AM.
Once see you get to class, click on “JOIN MEETING” to access audio and video.
Make sure to log into the BridgeWebs portal for access to the lesson handout, the lesson videos for review, the drills, and if you missed the lesson there is a recording of the full session that you can watch.
Before Class Activities:
Filling Out the Convention Card
Filling out a convention card with a partner is part of the fun of playing duplicate bridge. Whether you prefer a simple approach or a system with lots of bells and whistles, the convention card is a great way to keep you and your partner on the same wavelength.
Many clubs require both members of a partnership to have completed convention cards available as a courtesy to the opponents. Your convention card allows other players to get an over-view of your methods at a glance.
Convention Card Editor – you might want to create an account on your computer/iPad to use this in class on Saturday.
For a final suggestion, I use the excellent convention card editor available at the site Bridge Winners. Once you and your partner create Bridge Winners accounts, you can share and collaborate on a convention card, with both making edits to it. Bringing a nicely printed convention card to a bridge tournament is a great sign to the opponents that maybe you know what you're doing!
What Does It Do?
This program allows you to create your own customized convention cards and print them using a color or black and white printer (the ACBL approves of cards printed in black and white as long as you highlight the alertable areas in red and the announcable areas in blue).
Using the program, you can fill out the convention card the same way you fill out the paper one now. You can write text into the blanks, fill in check boxes, and circle suit symbols and opening leads. After you have filled out a card you can save it in a convention card library where you can retrieve it at a later date to modify and print.
https://bridgewinners.com/accounts/login/?next=/convention-card/edit_acbl_legacy/
Filling Out the Convention Card
Filling out a convention card with a partner is part of the fun of playing duplicate bridge. Whether you prefer a simple approach or a system with lots of bells and whistles, the convention card is a great way to keep you and your partner on the same wavelength.
Many clubs require both members of a partnership to have completed convention cards available as a courtesy to the opponents. Your convention card allows other players to get an over-view of your methods at a glance.
The Conventional Wisdom series will focus on assisting new players (and even some experienced ones!) with the proper use of the ACBL convention card.
After Class Activities
Overview of the Standard Convention Card:
The right half covers constructive bidding (our side opens)
- The left half upper two-thirds cover competitive bidding (their side opens)
- The left half lower portion covers defensive signals and carding
Each of the major areas are divided with titles that explain themselves fairly well, for example:
- Notrump openings and responses
- Major suit openings and responses
- Minor suit openings and responses
- Two-level openings and responses
The competitive bidding section on the left isn't quite as organized as the constructive section, but then competitive bidding is messy too. :)
You'll find that it's really valuable to sit down over coffee with your favorite partner and step through the card. Perhaps the most counter-intuitive part of the process is that you start on the upper right, instead of going left to right.
At the game I'll have blank standard convention cards, some ACBL Yellow Cards, and a straightforward card called the "Fat Free" card that pretty much covers everything from Bridge Basics 1 through 3. You can download and print your own copy with that link.
For a final suggestion, I use the excellent convention card editor available at the site Bridge Winners. Once you and your partner create Bridge Winners accounts, you can share and collaborate on a convention card, with both making edits to it. Bringing a nicely printed convention card to a bridge tournament is a great sign to the opponents that maybe you know what you're doing!
Handouts
ACBL Convention Card: Download a PDF file and print a blank card. You may also save the file to your computer and edit this card for your personal use.
ACBL Classic Convention Card: Download a PDF file and print a blank card. You may also save the file to your computer and edit this card for your personal use.
Basic 2 over 1 Convention Card: From Larry Cohen’s Conventional Wisdom Lite series featured in the ACBL Bridge Bulletin. Download the completed card. To view the Conventional Wisdom Lite series, click here.
ACBL “Fat Free” Convention Card: Download a completed card with a basic system for you.
Standard American Yellow Card (SAYC): Download a PDF of the card as well as full instructions for using this popular convention card in single-page format or paginated format. A Spanish version of the instructions is available at Bridgear.com.
Videos
KEEP PLAYING!!!
If you really want to get better, you must practice. You can’t just attend lessons once a week and expect to be a great or even a good bridge player. You must spend time outside of class playing and practicing bridge. There are many opportunities to play bridge on your own or with others. The good thing is that if you have just 5 minutes, you can go online to bid or play a hand!
You can practice bidding with robots at http://www.saycbridge.com/bid
This is a great way to practice bidding. Bidding is like any language, the more you practice the better you become.
ACBL offers endless deals with bidding or just declarer play. An excellent way to practice. You can practice playing hands at Just Declare this is a great way to spend ten minutes or more practicing playing hands. If you want to practice both bidding and playing you can go here: https://acbl.org/just-play-bridge/
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