Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Thursday evening in-person unit game at Ohr Kodesh is suspended until further notice.

The WBL and the NVBA hold a weekly Thursday evening joint unit game on Bridge Base Online, with open, flight B (under 2500), 499er, 199er, and 0-20 sections.  The 499er, 199er, and 0-20 games start at 7:05 pm, and the open and flight B games start at 7:15 pm. WBL and NVBA alternate running the five sections of this game.

The WBL also holds a weekly online unit game on Monday evenings, with a 999er game starting at 7:05 pm and an open game starting at 7:15 pm.

Other clubs are holding online games as well.  See the online club games page for schedules.WBL games on BBO (including the joint WBL/NVBA unit game) are sanctioned ACBL club games that award black masterpoints.  Click here for more details, including how to register and play.  If you are new to BBO, new to BBO tournaments, or need more specific instructions on participating in the game, click here.  For special instructions on registering to participate in our online limited masterpoint games, click here.  Tutorials on using BBO from the ACBL website are available here.  For more information about how to disclose your bidding and carding methods to your opponents during online play, click here.

The ACBL has cancelled all tournaments through the end of July 2021.  After that date, ACBL will start allowing units to hold sectionals subject to a number of requirements about local conditions and tournament safety procedures.  Regionals will resume at a later time.  All District 6 regionals are cancelled through the end of 2021.

At the annual meeting of the Washington Bridge League (WBL) on September 9, we will elect four officers (president, vice president, secretary, and treasurer) to serve one year terms plus three additional members to serve two year terms on our Board of Directors.

The members of the current Board believe that the organization would benefit from new volunteers with fresh perspectives to serve on the Board. We especially encourage members to run for office who (1) play in limited masterpoint games (Flight B, Flight C, and novice games) and are familiar with the concerns of less experienced players, (2) play frequently in club games, and/or (3) are eager and able to help market bridge to newer players—members with these qualities are underrepresented on the current Board. Candidates must be committed to the WBL’s objectives and willing and able to contribute sufficient time to the WBL’s work (e.g., attending monthly Board meetings, serving on Board committees, and helping out with logistics at WBL Sectionals).

Interested members are invited to contact one or more members of the current Board for further information about Board activities and to attend a Board meeting.  A list of current Board members can be found on the WBL website; Chuck Dearolf, who is not running for reelection, is coordinating the Board’s effort to recruit new candidates for Board positions and would be happy to speak with any of you who are interested in running for a Board position or help you to contact any other board member.

Members who choose to run for a Board position should send a brief statement describing their background, qualifications, goals, and priorities for serving and identifying the position for which they wish to run (officer position or Board member).

I hope all of you are safe and well. It’s been great to see so many of you at our online club games.

We held our annual meeting on zoom on Thursday, September 10 th. About twenty people attended the meeting. It was nice to see some faces I hadn’t seen in a while. Bob Bell was elected as our new secretary, joining returning officers Hadi Abushakra (vice president), Herb Schulken (treasurer) and me. We also reelected board members Alex Gretsinger (our webmaster), Lloyd Rawley, and Mary Tenenbaum. After the election and the other usual items, we had a good discussion, mostly about various topics related to online bridge. Draft meeting minutes are available here. I know this is a strange and different holiday season, but I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving with whatever family and friends you can celebrate with.

Linda Marshall

Edith McMullin, long-time local bridge educator and director, and author of the Easybridge! series of books, passed away on October 13, 2020. Read more about Edith here and here.  Edith was a long-time contributor to Children’s international, and her family has requested that donations in her memory be made to that charity.  Donations may be mailed to Children International, In Memory of Edith McMullin, PO Box 219055, Kansas City, MO 64121 or online at www.children.org.

Congratulations to the winners of the 2020 WBL Round Robin!  Fred King, Lyle Poe, Dave Ruderman, Dick Wegman, Brad Theurer, and Bob Bell won Flight A.  Peter van Zijl, Mike Berard, Murat Berk, Hakan Berk, Richard Wissing won Flight B.

Check out the winners of the 2019 Mini-McKenney and Ace of Clubs.

Congratulations to Peter Boyd on his election to the ACBL Hall of Fame!

Congratulations to our 2019 new Life Masters:  Sharon A. Bates, Brian L. Childers, Michael Cooperman, Barbara Devaney, Myron Goldstein, Mahmoud Katirai, Clyde Lantz, Reina Lerner, Barbara Levine, Ronnie Loeser, David Marchal, Wendy Morrison, Robert O’Connor, Shala Panbechi, Rolf Swenson, and Carole Stringer

Congratulations WBL 2019 Trophy Race winners Brad Theurer, Paul Block, Neil Cowie, and Hank Jiles.  See the awards page for more information.  To see where you ranked, go to the standings links on the awards page.

Don Berman received the Nadine Wood Service Award for his many years of volunteer service as WBL webmaster.  Read about it on the awards page.

Hakan Berk, president of the University of Maryland Bridge Club, has sent us an update on the club's activities.  Read it on the news page.

Unit Game results

2020 Unit Game schedule

Partnership information

Old unit game results (before March 2019)

Play bridge with our friends and neighbors at the other Washington bridge organization, the Washington Bridge Unit of the American Bridge Association.  As with the ACBL, the ABA have moved entirely online for the foreseeable future, and is running online games on BBO.  Check out their schedule of online ABA events here.