OUR YEAR

Our club year runs from August 1st.

FEES

The annual membership fee, which is currently £12, is due at the Club AGM at the end of September. Table money is £4 per session and £6 for guests.

START TIME

Tuesday afternoon sessions start at 1.30pm. Please be seated by 1.20pm. On Wednesday and Friday play starts at 7.20pm so you should be seated at a table ready to play by 7.10, thank you.

HOSTS

A host rota is organised for members temporarily without a partner for an evening: you should expect to appear on the list about once a year. This list is posted on the notice board and on the club web site, if you are unable to make the date allocated to you, please arrange to swap with another member. Please arrive by 7.10 when you are host and make yourself known to the director.

CONVENTION CARDS

Please note the club requires each pair to use a fully completed convention card. These can be downloaded in various formats here.

GENERAL

The Club aims to be a co-operative in every sense of the word and we look to all members to share in Club duties. Various other information is available on this website and also via the members section, see below for more details. NB: If you do not want to share your contact details with other members, please read below on how to stop this.

ABOUT THE MEMBERS ONLY AREA

To register please click on the Members Only tab in the main menu on the left and follow the instructions to register for the first time.
You just need to enter your email address and click the Set password button.
Re-enter your e-mail address and click Continue.
An email will automatically be sent to the email address you have entered.
Click on the link in the email and you will be taken back to the log in page.
Choose your own password, repeat it, click on Reset and you will be logged in.
Please see * below if you share an email address. In future if you change your email address or other contact details you can update it by logging on in the member’s section with your e-mail address (old one if changing your email address) then via the Account tab and change the details, click on the Save button after changing them.
If at any time you wish to allow access by other members to your contact details, just go to your Account tab and change the 'no' to 'yes' in the drop down box alongside Opt In of List.
Likewise if you do want to be included in Club emails simply change 'no' to 'yes' alongside Opt In to bulk Email. You will need to do this to ensure you are notified of the Club's activities along with other important information.
Please remember to click the 'Save' button following any changes or updates.
If you keep the opt out of e-mails please frequently check for things like the host list and you will also not receive reminders about signing up for competitions etc. Please do not remove your e-mail address or contact details, as the committee may need these for non informational reasons.

If you are looking for a partner for any session, please click on the 'Find a Partner 'tab when you are logged in.
You can chose to show your email address, phone and mobile numbers by ticking the boxes (you can check and update these details in your Account section) then tick the box alongside the relevant evening.
If you are looking to see if someone is already looking for a partner, click on the 'Find a Partner' tab under the Members Only page of the website and you will be able to see who else is looking.
If there is no one listed for the evening you are looking for then you can log on and add your own request.
You do not need to be logged in to see if anyone is looking for a partner.
Please remember to remove your request when you have found a partner, thank you.

* With shared email addresses, enter this shared e-mail address and the e-mail message you receive will have a link for each of you. Once you have each set your password you must use your EBU number rather than e-mail address to log in.

How random are computer dealt hands?

Computer dealt bridge hands are designed to be random, and aregenerally considered more random than hands dealt by humans. While computer-generated hands are often referred to as "pseudo-random" (computer generated random numbers), the algorithms used aim to create a distribution of hands that is statistically similar to a perfectly shuffled deck, and avoids the biases that can occur with manual shuffling. 

Most bridge clubs, including our own, use computer-generated hands to ensure fairness and avoid claims of bias in the dealing process. 

We got an outright top on a board and yet on our personal score card it is shown as 98.98%. Why not 100%?

When all boards are not played the same number of times, the match points for the boards played fewer times are factored/increased to allow for this. The Neuberg formula is used to do the factoring. However, the effect of the formula is also to 'downgrade' the match points on these boards a bit to allow for the fact that the 'competition' wasn't as good as on the boards played more times.

The calculation is performed as follows:

On each traveller match points are allocated to each pair first. This is done by comparing this pair's score with all the other scores on the board. (Adjustments/averages and missing scores are excluded from this comparison.) 2 match points are allocated for each score that is worse than this pair's score and 1 match point for each score equal to it.

Therefore the maximum number of match points anybody can get on a board is:

Top = (2 * Number of Scores on the Board) - 2

Number of Scores on the Board excludes adjustments/missing scores.

So if there are 12 scores on a board and one of them was an adjustment/average, then the top score on this board will be 20, while with 12 'normal' scores, the top score would be 22.

The Neuberg formula is then applied to the resulting match points.

The Neuberg formula is:

where:
FMpt = the factored match points to be given on this board to a specific pair
MPt = the original match points given to the pair as calculated above
MaxS = the maximum number of scores on any board in the event
ActS = the actual number of scores on this board. This excludes adjustments/averages and missing scores.

So, for example, if a pair gets 12 match points on a board that was played 11 times and the maximum number of times any board was played is 12, then this pair will get 13.18 match points after the Neuberg formula was applied or 59.9% (13.18/22) and not 60% (12/20). Equally if a pair gets a top on a board played 11 times and the maximum number of times any board was played is 12, then this pairs score will be 21.9 match points after the Neuberg formula was applied and not 22, which would be the top score for the board played 12 times. In percentage terms this would be 99.54% (21.9/22), and not 100% (20/20). 

Wish you hadn't asked?