That crazy computer!

Posted by Rakesh Kumar on Thursday, 30 October 2014 at 08:44

Day 1, Round 2 of the Spring Nationals Open Teams, and the dealing computer was having fun. Weird distributions were everywhere! There were 3 hands with 6/5 distributions (East had 6/5s on two consecutive hands!) and 1 with a 7/5 shape. Voids were endemic.

Board 2 produced perhaps the widest variety of results. One factor in that is how East might have chosen to open her/his hand as dealer. What would you do?

If East bids 1♥, the unfortunate person sitting South is very likely to overcall 2♣

That's what I did, and West, who had a 6/5 complementary to East's holding, doubled to show spades. Partner thought this could get interesting, and passed. So did East, salivating mildly. But on the lead of the ♥J, declarer is able to throw East in repeatedly and make 2♣X. The bad news was that this lost 10 IMPs, because 3NT or 4♠ are cold for NS.

On the next Board, partner had to negotiate a 5-0 trump break to bring home 4♠. He had plenty of company across the field, including one NS pair whose score was the rarely seen +880 for 4♠ redoubled!

There was more action a little later on Board 8. At our table, West boldly opened 4♠ and partner doubled, unambiguously for penalties, but I pulled this to 5♥, which is a safe contract.

Elsewhere around the room, several NS pairs achieved the somewhat remarkable feat of making 6♥ or even 6♣, but there were quite a few pairs who reached slam and duly failed. 

Some of the other wildly distributional hands didn't produce quite such variable outcomes, and the computer then had a bit of a rest, generating only one 6/6 hand in Round 3. Perhaps that means it will be "no holds barred" again tomorrow!