Victoria players out in force at Whistler

JP Weber Tournament Results, Tournaments and Events

The Whistler Regional ran from November 3-9 and was well-attended by Victoria players. Twenty-nine of us made the trip, braving snow and ice on the way up.

The Michael Hargreaves/Gordon McOrmond partnership came in second overall, each garnering 120.49 MPs. The complete list of Victoria players and their score is shown at the bottom of this page.

With a substantial number (21) of up-island players also showing up to do battle,  Vancouver Island was very well represented as shown in the pie chart below.

 

NameTotal MPRankGoldRed
Gordon McOrmond120.49# 2 / 311120.490
Michael Hargreaves120.49# 2 / 311120.490
Michael Ainsley45# 22 / 31143.461.54
Madeleine Tremblay24.63# 73 / 31122.42.23
Esther Wiebe24.63# 73 / 31122.42.23
Jill Plasteras24.63# 73 / 31122.42.23
JP Weber24.63# 73 / 31122.42.23
Evelyn Goedhart17.88# 114 / 31116.781.1
David Reid16.11# 131 / 3119.676.44
Donald Berry16.11# 131 / 3119.676.44
Holly Boudreau14.84# 139 / 31111.543.3
Margaret Skinner14.84# 139 / 31111.543.3
Danielle Goulet14.59# 141 / 3119.674.92
Eleanor Gibson14.59# 141 / 3119.674.92
Catherine Mustafa13.81# 155 / 31112.021.79
Al Romanchuk13.76# 159 / 31111.542.22
Mel Zimmerman13.76# 159 / 31111.542.22
Ted Heck12.39# 163 / 31111.810.58
Shelley Burnham8.57# 198 / 3114.973.6
Ruth Davies6.56# 209 / 3112.963.6
Nigel Williamson6.45# 210 / 3113.143.31
Mary Ellen Fisher4.38# 250 / 31104.38
Thomas Braybrook4.06# 260 / 3112.961.1
Bill Worobets3.69# 266 / 31103.69
Janet Worobets3.69# 266 / 31103.69
Adrian Leitch2.9# 279 / 31102.9
Jonathan Mears2.48# 283 / 31102.48
Lucile Mears2.48# 283 / 31102.48
John Heck0.58# 308 / 31100.58

Seaside wrap-up

JP Weber Tournament Results, Tournaments and Events, What's New

The Oregon Coast Regional in Seaside is always a popular destination for Victoria bridge players. This year was no exception with eighteen of us making the trip south. Another six players from up island were also present.

Sandra and Doug Fraser scored big with 66 MPs, coming in 24th and 25th out of a field of 682 players.

Here are the scores and ranks of all Victoria attendees.

RankScore (MPs) NameCity
2466.12Sandra FraserVictoria
2565.22Doug FraserVictoria
3655.27Michael AinsleyVictoria
3655.27Sheldon SpierChemainus
5048.62Jon PrestonVictoria
9631.23Donald BerryVictoria
9631.23David ReidVictoria
16619.3JP WeberVictoria
16619.3Esther WiebeVictoria
18617.4Jill PlasterasVictoria
18617.4Madeleine TremblayNorth Saanich
22614.32Michael HargreavesVictoria
27811.63Mark RaymondVictoria
28011.55Debbie HargreavesVictoria
31310.61Margot YoungVictoria
3379.47Janet WorobetsVictoria
337
9.47Bill WorobetsVictoria
3828.09Ruth DaviesVictoria
3828.09Andrea MillerVictoria

Duplicate Light – a schedule update

JP Weber What's New

As Robbie Burns put it, the best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men gang aft agley (often go awry)

Regrettably, scheduling conflicts and space limitations right now at the Monterey Centre have resulted in our having to postpone the start-up of Duplicate Light.

We are continuing discussions of the options with the Monterey Centre management this week and will communicate the outcome with you as soon as possible. We may consider playing alongside the Saturday noon game rather than Tuesdays, but will let you know. Check back on the website (bridgevictoria.ca) under “What’s New”.

Sincere apologies for this mix-up and delay.

Jill

250 686-4747

D-lightful to be back!

JP Weber What's New

Welcome back to Duplicate Light, a weekly game where social bridge players are gently introduced to the art, mechanisms and protocols of duplicate bridge.

Participants will become familiar with using bidding boxes, numbered pre-dealt decks in boards, electronic registration of scores, and they will get to know a number of other keen players.

Games will be held Tuesdays, starting October 25, at noon, at the Monterey Rec Centre, 1442 Monterey Avenue. We will be in a side room next to an open duplicate game, and we will play about 18 hands at a comfortable rate.

The cost is $5 per participant, kindly subsidized by the Victoria ACBL Unit to encourage the growth of bridge here.

Registration is in the large room overlooking Hampshire Road, near the cafeteria.
Until the Monterey Centre prepares D-Light tickets for sale, please be prepared to pay by cash.

Very successful Victoria Fall Sectional!

JP Weber Tournaments and Events

After 3 years, Unit 431 returned to tournament play with the Victoria Fall Sectional on September 16 to 18 at the Mary Winspear Centre.

The tournament was very successful thanks to the team of volunteers who worked to organize and pull off the event. Kudos are also due to Tournament Director Bruce McIntyre who masterfully ran the three-day sectional which attracted higher than expected turnout.

It was great to bring together our local players and welcome out of town visitors from up-island, the mainland and the US. The final tally for the weekend of 189 tables was 71% of the 2019 total, a phenomenal turnout! The main decrease in attendance was in the limited masterpoint, or non-life master games, which has been the case across other ACBL tournaments. A challenge across the bridge community is to continue to attract newer players to our clubs and tournaments.

Congratulations to Sandra and Doug Fraser, who, playing together all weekend, were the overall winners with 38.83 silver masterpoints.

If you like bridge, you’ll love this podcast

JP Weber What's New

Dear Victoria bridge player,

Like me, you have probably received an email or three concerning Sorry, Partner, a very entertaining and informative bridge podcast.

And perhaps, like me, you had yet not found the time to take a listen, or were not quite sure how to go about it.

Well let me tell you it’s definitely worth your while. The latest episode featuring an interview with Jeff Meckstroth is dynamite. Not only does he give great bidding advice but you’ll find out the shocking truth regarding the demise of the famed Meckwell partnership.

Now if you’re someone in my demographic (over 75), you might not be too familiar with this newfangled podcast thing. Relax, it’s very easy. If you have a tablet, computer or smartphone, you can get set up in no time.  Better still, you can listen to it in your car during those long drives to our far-flung local clubs.

If you need them, you’ll find some instructions on listening to podcasts here.

JP

p.s. I always try to post interesting stuff on the website but rarely get feedback, so it’s hard to tell if anyone actually reads it or finds it useful.  Please help me gauge interest by leaving a short comment. Just click on the comment bubble near the top of this article. It looks like this:

Penticton Regional Roundup

JP Weber Tournaments and Events, What's New

The Penticton Regional Tournament was held last week, from June 13 to 19. You can read all about it on ACBL District 19’s website.

With respect to our little island, 48 players from the Victoria area (Unit 431) participated in the tournament, with another 42 coming from up-island (Unit 429), for a total of about 12% of attendees.

Perennial tournament chair Marv Norden was happy with the turnout (table count of 1655.5), a bit over 50% of 2019’s.

He also reported five cases of Covid, one of which from Victoria. If you attended and are exhibiting any symptoms, please test yourself and check with your partners and teammates.

Don’t forget our face-to-face bridge survey!

JP Weber Members, Unit Board, What's New

We sent out an email to all Unit members on Saturday morning, asking you to take a whole minute (and maybe two, if you’re adding comments) of your time to help us understand why people were’t coming back to the bridge table. Then maybe we could try to do something about it.

So far (Sunday 9 pm), we’ve received only 21 responses from our 456 paid-up Unit 431 ACBL members.

Pretty paltry, right? Surely we can do better!

So, if you care about the future of duplicate bridge in Victoria, please click here and take the one-minute painless survey.

No personal information is collected in the survey and we’re not trying to sell you anything. You have nothing to lose and you’ll feel good about doing your part to maintain duplicate bridge in our area.

If you have any qualms or misgivings, feel free to reach out to our president, Maureen Trappe by emailing her at president@bridgevictoria.ca.

Thanks!

The Unit 431 Board.

How to find other Victoria players now that clubs are open

JP Weber Contact, Members, What's New

All three ACBL-affiliated local clubs have reinstated face-to-face bridge! You can find their schedules here.

You may be looking for a partner to play with. One easy way is to use our online directory, accessible to all registered Victoria players, whether they’re ACBL members or not. In April 2021, I sent all players their personal username and password to allow access. You can also use your email if you have forgotten your username.

First, go to our website, bridgevictoria.ca. Once you’re there, you can reach the directory by clicking on the “Log in” item in the top menu. As soon as you’re logged in, you will be taken to the directory.

If you have forgotten your password, no worries, you can request a new one at this point.

Note that the directory is searchable. Just type a few letters of the person’s first or last name in the directory search box to narrow down your search. It’s a lot easier than scrolling down.

Before you leave, here are a couple of tips you might find useful:

1) Getting the latest news automatically

The website consists of pages and posts. Pages contain relatively permanent information, such as the list of board members, games on BBO, Masterpoint Milestones, etc. They are updated regularly, but unless you go onto them, you won’t know.

This is where posts come in. Posts are short announcements, found under “What’s New”. They will inform you of new developments such as new events or updates to pages. If you don’t want to miss any, you can choose to receive them by email by clicking on the Subscribe button, at the bottom of each page. Currently, over 300 Victoria players are subscribed to this service.

Posts have a publication date, author and other info in the header, as in this example:

Notice the publication date (March 16, 2022), the post author and categories. If you’re logged in, you can add a comment, by clicking on the speech bubble ( ) which currently shows two comments for this post.

2) Finding anything on the website

There is a Search box on every page. Just type in a relevant word or short phrase. For example, “Christmas” to look at pictures of past Christmas parties.

3) Your questions and comments

If you have any questions or comments for the board, or need any help using the website, just click on a “Contact Us” button, found on every page. We’ll get back to you as soon as we can.

Victoria team strikes gold in Leavenworth

JP Weber Members, Tournament Results, What's New

Leavenworth, Wa successfully reinvented itself as a Bavarian town in the 1960’s after logging petered out and the railroad moved out of town. It was never known as a mining town, yet there’s gold to be found in them thar hills and our four plucky miners struck the mother lode!

Congratulations to Gail Richardson, Danielle Goulet, Jill Plasteras and Madeleine Tremblay for their win in the Edelweiss Knockout which gave them 14.58 gold points. Coupled with another 6.08 in the Alpenhorn KO, and sundry points from other events they collected well over 20 points, all gold. Well done, ladies!

Eddie Crews of Sidney was another successful prospector, garnering 9.86 gold in Gold Rush events. 

Victoria Spring Sectional Cancelled

JP Weber Tournaments and Events, What's New

Due primarily to the Omicron situation and with no face-to-face Bridge happening in our Unit at this time, the Unit Board has regretfully decided to cancel the Spring Sectional which was to be held March 18-20, 2022.

However, the Board will explore the possibility of rescheduling an event for the late Spring or early Summer should the COVID situation have improved sufficiently by then.

If you wish to add a comment, just click on the Comments bubble near the top of the page. This is what it looks like:

What makes a good bridge partner?

JP Weber What's New

Ask different people and you’ll get different responses, although some common themes are apparent.

Some answers might be found in Bridge Confidential, a musical under development. It is an inspirational and engaging story about partnership, community and overcoming personal obstacles. This show exposes the world of bridge and highlights players’ life journeys as they prepare for THE TOURNAMENT. If you enjoy musicals, check out this excerpt.

If you wish to add a comment, just click on the Comments bubble near the top of the page. This is what it looks like:

ACBL announces new convention card

JP Weber Governance, What's New

We’ve been using the same convention card for years, now. In the meantime bridge has evolved with new conventions being introduced, among other changes in bidding practices. ACBL is launching a new, more relevant convention card in mid-2022. However you can take a look at it right now.

You’ll find it, as well as many other items of interest, in the Fall 2021 National Directors Report, just received from Region 13* Director, Tim White.

* If you weren’t aware already, ACBL is rationalizing its governance structure and the board of directors will include 13 regional directors, replacing the 25 district directors, with the process completed by 2024.  Region 13 comprises Districts 18 and 19. Tim was formerly our District Director. You’ll find more information on the subject by going to ACBL.org. You can also check the December issue of the Bridge Bulletin (page 18).

If you wish to add a comment, just click on the Comments bubble near the top of the page. This is what it looks like:

It’s Your Call Victoria has come to an end

JP Weber It's Your Call, What's New

IYC Victoria has been running for over 5 years. In recent months, participation has declined significantly, so after polling Victoria players as to their interest in continuing the game and receiving no responses, I felt it was time to pull the plug.

Congratulations to Duncan Smith for winning the December round with 460 points out of 500. He receives a free game valid for face-to-face play at any Victoria club.

Find the complete list of participants and scores under IYC Monthly Results in the It’s Your Call section at the top of the page. For quicker access, follow this link. 

The race for top annual player was won by Sheldon Spier, with Shelley Burnham and Don Copeland coming in second and third respectively. To see the top ten players, go to the Leaderboard.

For past results and statistics, hover your mouse over It’s Your Call (at top of page) to see a pull-down menu of choices.

Reminder — commenting on this or other posts:

If you feel moved to express yourself, please click on the Comments bubble near the top of the page. 

The backwash squeeze & other improbable feats

JP Weber What's New

I don’t usually do book reviews on Unit 431’s website, and this isn’t really one.

However I had fun reading The backwash squeeze & other improbable feats, written by Edward McPherson back in 2007, so thought I’d share it with other Victoria players. Subtitled A Newcomer’s Journey into the World of Bridge, it’s an account of the author’s journey from total newbie to his participation in a NABC. Along the way he delivers some interesting anecdotes about several bridge greats including Omar Sharif, Bob Hamman and Zia Mahmood.

You can find it at GVPL as soon as I return my copy (they only have the one). 

Oh, and about that title backwash squeeze. Well, most of you probably do it in your sleep, but if not, here’s the explanation from the Official Encyclopedia of Bridge:

“a unique type of trump squeeze in which both menaces are in the same hand and the player sitting behind the hand with the menaces holds both guards plus a losing trump, and is caught in the ‘backwash’ of a squeeze by means of a ruff taken in the hand holding the menaces.”

So next time you’re at a table, look for an opportunity to try it out.

If you feel like leaving a comment on this or any other post, just click on the comment bubble, below the title.

 

ACBL Unit 431, Victoria