The 8th match was pivotal to our chances. There were a number of interesting hands, but the opponents had most of the decisions from our perspective. This was one hand that I took a big chance on: KJ8654 T982 6 82

This was the auction at our table:

LHO	Bill	RHO	Me
1(1)	1(2)	1N	4! (3)
X	All pass

(1) The opponents played a strong club system, this was forcing and artificial.
(2) Natural! - yes, Bill/I actually do have some non-alertable bids
(3) At favorable vulnerability (opps vul, we're not) I chose to exert maximum pressure I was pretty sure opps could make game. The strong club system can be at a disadvantage against high preemption with no room to describe their hand. My bid is aggressive, but we needed to generate some IMPs and this would put the opponents to the test. I hoped they would make an incorrect high level decision. LHO chose to take the money and double.

Bill did not exactly have the hand I was looking for: 7 AK54 J94 J7543

I was hoping for a spade fit as well, with the opponents possibly having slam in a minor. Bill did quite well to hold his losses to down 3 (500). Our teammates did make game and we saw a small profit. The more decisions an opponent has to make, the more likely they are to make a bad one. We kept the pressure up all match, and did see some dividends later in the match.

Here's a hand where our system causes problems for the opponents. This is our opponents hand (RHO below): K AKT42 JT7 KT96

This was the auction at our table:

Bill	RHO	Me	LHO
2(1)	X	P	2N (2)
P	3	All pass

(1) Our intermediate 2 bids (10-14, 6-7 spades)
(2) Lebensohl - this requests the doubler to bid 3C usually showing a weak hand
Our opponent faced a difficult decision at his first turn. He felt he should take some action (with strength and spade shortness I agree). 3H is unilateral, while double is more flexible but could lose a 5-3 heart fit. There is no right answer. As it turned out, the best he could have done was sell out to 2S. 3C did not play well and we set it 3 tricks. Not a blockbuster result but a series of small swings can add up. Most systems will open Bill's hand 1S. The extra level makes a big difference as 2H is a standout bid now. The 2H bidder can double back in if the auction suggests it later. In fact, that is exactly what happened at the other table. Teammates overcalled 2H and wound up playing 2H doubled. This could have been defeated but as often happens it was difficult for the defense and 2H X made turning a small plus into a big one.

One final key hand. Our opponent again (LHO) held the key hand at our table: --- AQJ632 A95 AKT5

And once again we got in his way.

Me	LHO	Bill	RHO
1(1)	1	1	P
2	X	All pass

(1) Almost always 12-14 balanced, possible a strong 2 with an unbalanced hand.

Our opponent had a pretty good idea which type I held. I'm a pretty heavy overcaller but this hand looks too big to just overcall 1H. Sure, partner will probably bid spades if we double. We are strong enough to overcome that, game could be on opposite a yarborough (all cards 9 or lower), even slam in extreme cases. As it turned out, the play was not particularly noteworthy. Bill finished down 2 for -300. Upon seeing the entire hand this didn't look too bad when the opponents could routinely make 6C! Bill had made an aggressive bid, forcing the opponents to make decisions at a higher level. Our teammate also overcalled 1H, passed back to my hand. Opener could have passed it out but reopened with a X. Teammates quickly found their way to game in clubs for another small swing.

As we only compared every 2 matches, we didn't know how we'd done. I suspected we had lost the first one by a moderate margin and won the 2nd by a small margin. I was close on the 1st guess but thanks to the 3 boards above and some other good results our 2nd match turned out to be a big win. Heading home for the night we were in qualifying position with 3 matches left. We had our bye coming up (in the 2nd of the 3 matches). Everyone got average for a bye (10 of 20 VPs) so we'd at least get something tomorrow. We figured we'd need to be about average over the next 3 total to advance; maybe we could do a little less and squeak in. Of course, we were aiming to get as many VPs as we could to boost our carryover into the 2nd round.

We played 1 round of 1 match (each round was 2 matches yesterday) and then 1 round of 2 matches. Given that the carryover was I don't think that would happen anyway but with teams not knowing where they stood heading into the last match (except us ironically since we had a bye), everyone figured to play straight up.

Our first match of the day was against a local team, but one that was playing well. They were well up on the leader board. Through 6 boards things had seemed pretty even. The defense gave me a chance to make a game they could have quickly set on several occasions. The auction and defense had made my line almost 100%. They eventually found the chink in the armor and set me 1 trick. I quickly returned the favor finding the right lead to beat 3N on this hand but not the right play at trick 2. My hand: QJ97 AK3 9 KT764

A quick auction:

RHO	Me	LHO	Bill
1	X	3	P
3N	All pass

3D was preemptive. What would you lead? Partner does not figured to have much and we need 5 tricks. I think the HK is the right choice for two reason. 1) We might be able to run 5 heart tricks and this does not give up the lead and 2) If a switch is necessary, we will have a better idea what to switch to. Tempo is not likely to be a factor. If we can't get 5 tricks pretty quickly (losing the lead at most once), we're not likely to set. Dummy tabled: 85 65 KJ873 Q953

Looks like we will have a chance; I was worried dummy had a 6th diamond. Partner encourages with the 8 and declarer played the 9. I then began to think some more (always dangerous). If partner has Qxxxx of hearts, we can take them now or later, there is no immediate urgency. If partner does not have HQ, I am concerned that declarer will get his heart trick, take 5D, the SA, CA, and lead up to the CQ for his 9th trick. Partner will not have an entry to his hearts. Catering to this contingency I switched to the SQ. This figured to set the contract whenever partner had SK or HQ (our 2 best chances). As it turned out partner had HTxxxx and an entry - the DQ! This seemed very unlikely because he'd need the T to go with it (he did). If not, declarer would finesse him after my double. I needed to continue hearts to ensure the set. Would partner encourage in hearts with the SK? Hard to say, my spades don't have to be this good and I could have 4 hearts too. Declarer had to decide what to do and had a difficult guess in the end game. Did I have a 4th heart to cash when in with my CK? Or could I be endplayed in spades? Ultimately he went wrong and we dodged a bullet.
Since we were vul on the game I went down in and they were not; that was a slight edge to them. Heading to the last board I guessed we were about even. It was a wild last hand, though it didn't appear that way at first (opps are vul): JT953 Q742 6 AT3

RHO	Me	LHO	Bill
1	P	1	2
P	4	4	5
P	P	X	All pass

I perked up a little when LHO bid 1S and more so when Bill bid 2H. I have a decision at my next turn. I could bid 4D (splinter) but I decided against it for 2 reasons. 1) Bill will play me for a better hand and 2) I wanted to generate a 4S bid (more likely over immediate 4H) and did not want opponents to get an extra chance to bid over 4D. The tray came back and my eyes lit up when I saw the 4S bid. I was a little disappointed to see 5H but not surprised; Bill can't know I have this hand. RHO alerted his pass as forcing. I knew we were in great shape now. I will double 5S or 6D (leading a spade - Bill has to be void) and we will collect a nice penalty. Given the wild distribution, we have a good chance to make 5H too. Bill's hand fit nicely ---- KJT953 A7 Q8752

The clubs were favorably located, just about any method of attacking them would succeed. Bill lost 1H and 1C and we scored a nice 650. We compared (only 1 match this round) and found we had won another small victory. My fears about 4D were well-founded as my counterpart chose that bid and our teammates competed in diamonds and Bill's hand envisioned more and bid slam.

We were now 5-4 and while still below average in victory points, we were currently in position to move on to round 2. The bye would give us a little break and we would be rested for the final match of the round robin. There was a surprise on the scoresheet this round. 2 of the higher seeds had sat in the wrong direction in one room causing both sides to receive a score of 0! This was in our bracket too which helped as that means fewer victory points were available (effectively lowering the "average"). As long as we avoided a big loss, we figured to advance but were playing another top seed.

After 3 boards nothing exciting had happened, I didn't see any hands on which we figured to lose IMPs, possible gains but most likely it was 0-0 (actually turned out to be 1-0). Then I picked up: A543 Q2 QJ842 J6

Not a particularly inspiring collection but the auction became interesting:

Bill	RHO	Me	LHO
P	1	P	P
1	2	P	3!
P	P	?

When Bill passed I expected the opponents to climb quickly to game. Here they were bidding and raising my suit. It looked like a juicy penalty was waiting. Should I double? At most forms of scoring, I think it is correct. Even in this event, I would double most of the time. The danger is that the double will tip off declarer and he might make a contract he will go down in normally. I think it's unlikely but I chose to pass anyway. The reason is that the only way we could fail to qualify was to lose by a large margin. I reasoned that if we just avoided disaster here (i.e. 3D X making) there were not enough boards left for us to get a big loss. As it turned out, the X would have worked just fine. Nothing declarer could have done, down 2 was the result. We scored 200 instead of 500. A lost opportunity perhaps but a prudent decision.

My thinking on that board turned out to be somewhat justified as board 5 was a routine game. I expected we had a small lead going into the last 2 boards. I would take middle of the road actions where I could. The penultimate board swung the match. Bill held the key hand on this one: AJ74 A65 AK53 A2

Quite a mittful, we were NV, opps were Vul. The auction took an unexpected turn pretty quickly.

Me	LHO	Bill	RHO
3	X!	P	3
P	4!	X	All pass

Bill thought Christmas had come early. Note his pass over the X. This gives him a number of options depending on what LHO does. When the auction gets back to him he can bid 3N (if possible). The delayed 3N should indicate that he expects to run clubs in order to make. An immediate 3N should not be removed by the preemptor (except in rare cases). Also note that even at favorable vul, in this situation Bill knows I'm not opening on 6 clubs to the T and out, I will have a reasonable hand in 1st seat (I had a decent preempt QJT98xx with 7411 pattern). It was indeed Christmas as we had an easy 800. Bill defended a little conservatively (perhaps thinking along the lines that I had above against 3D) and we settled for 500. A likely gain. The last board was a touch and go 3N which the opponents gave Bill a chance to make but he misguessed a suit. Still, it figured to be enough.

Teammates were anxiously waiting to compare. The 500 against 4H X was a big swing for us and enough to win a close match. We had advanced.

There were several surprises as 3 of the higher seeds (including both groups) failed to advance to round 2. We would be playing the surviving 8 teams from the other group. There were still plenty of big names remaining there: Greco-Hampson, Welland-Fallenius, Grant Baze's team (and many more), and we would be playing all of them. First, it was time for a welcome lunch break. There would be 1 session after the break (4 matches) and 1 more the following morning (the final 4). That would make 126 boards in 2.5 days. Of the remaining 16 teams , only 9 would advance. We were in 11th place going into the 2nd round robin and needed to make up some ground.

The diary continues in part IV.