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Busiest Player Sets a Record: 3,584 Points by Alan Truscott
The New York Times, April 9, 2001
 Identifying the best players of 2000 would be difficult but there is no doubt about the busiest.
Jim Barrow of Lake Charles, La.started in January with the intention of winning the Barry Crane Top 500, which goes to the player who wins the most master points in a calendar year. By the end of December he had won 3,584 points, shattering the record by 314.
Barrow's book Record Run, written with Kay Blake, is available for 15.95 from Baron Barclay Bridge Supplies, (800) 274-2221. The statistics are remarkable: 93,000 miles, 48 hotels, 47 tournaments; 216 partners and teammates; 18,584 deals.
Barrows best pairs score of the year was 72.9 percent in Colorado Springs with one of his favorite partners, Jim Robison of Las Vegas. On the diagramed deal they were in Montreal and Barrow was North. They climbed to a reasonable six-club slam, and Robison found the way to make it.
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A spade was led, marking East with the ace, and East won with the jack and shifted to a trump. The eight won in the closed hand, and the declarer made his plan. He expected to throw hearts from dummy, and then maneuver to ruff a diamond and a heart.
But when the diamond jack fell on the second round of diamonds he reconsidered. After cashing the club ace, revealing the bad split, he felt sure there was heart length on the right. He ruffed a diamond in dummy, drew the remaining trumps, then cashed the 10 of diamonds, coming down to the K73 of hearts in his hand and the king of spades and ace, 9 of hearts in dummy. He saved his spade ace, and the heart seven scored the last trick in the closed hand to make the slam.
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