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Ivy Dahler Restricted Butler Pairs winners, Derek Bartosh and Jan Bennett, from Auckland. 

Haste need not mean waste.

Firstly, congratulations to the mixed Kiwi- Australian team which won the Gold Coast Teams at the weekend winning the 64 board final by a rather nervy close 10 imps. The winners are, from our side of the Tasman, Michael Ware, Hugh McGann, Tom Jacob and Brian Mace, and from the other, Pete Hollands and Matthew Thomson. Michael Ware partnered Pete Hollands and Hugh McGann partnered Matthew Thomson.

We will take a look at a board from the final tomorrow but today’s board comes from the Ivy Dahler Swiss Pairs (board rotated). You reach 6NT the fast way. This is the third best slam available but even though you would rather be in a suit when dummy appears, you still have good play for your contract.

 

 

2 was both majors less than an opening hand and your response was swift, certainly too swift when you saw dummy. West leads Q. Where do you win trick 1 and which card do you play to trick 2?

Our declarer got it half right which meant the contract had to fail. They won in dummy with K and played 5 rounds of spades before turning their attention to hearts. Unless one opponent held QJ doubleton, South could no longer score 12 tricks. That was not the actual lay-out.

 

It would seem that South got the harder of the two questions right because it might seem more normal to win the opening lead with the A to preserve the K as the entry to dummy when a heart trick was lost. However, because South’s hearts were AKT, that entry would be used up before the third heart had been cashed (or else, if East played low on the first round, declarer did not have a way back to dummy (though 3 heart tricks would have given South their contract) but, of course, there was no entry to the North hand in hearts at all.

When South turned his attention to the heart suit, East could insert Q and South was stuck in their hand with a minor and a heart loser, down 1.

Thus, it is better to win trick 1 in dummy and to play on hearts first since then the spade suit will provide an entry to dummy after a heart was lost. When East follows low, as they must, South inserts 10. The heart suit is blocked but South takes 5 spade tricks along with 3 hearts and a pair of minor AKs: contract made. The entry back to dummy was vital. If  the spade break was 4-1 (and declarer fails to guess that correctly or if East had Jxxx), declarer would have needed 4 heart tricks for their contract.     

Interestingly, 11 Open pairs (out of 100) played in 6NT and only 2 made their contract. In the Intermediate, Restricted and Novice sections, only one pair played in 6NT and they too failed to make their contract. There were rather too many pairs playing in 6 of a major who failed to take the safety play in the heart suit (small to the 10) and they too recorded a minus score where hearts were trumps.

Top Kiwis in the Teams and Swiss Pairs

These were the most successful Kiwi teams/pairs in the Teams/ Swiss Pairs competitions at the Gold Coast (top 6 finishers Open teams)/ top 5 finishers in other events.

	Gold Coast Teams		Australians in italics
	Open
1st	Michael Ware		Pete Hollands		Matthew Thomson		Hugh McGann
					Brian Mace		Tom Jacob
	Ashley Bach was in the team which finished 2nd.
	Under 1500
4th	Candice Smith		Kinga Hajmasi		Monica Cheng		Andrew Michl
	Restricted
1st	Jo Hampton		Caroline Caseley		Megan Eddy		Bridget Willcox
4th	Emma Russell		Bigi Cameron		Rochelle Van Heuven		Tim Rigter
5th	Pamela Jensen		Jude Wood		Matthew Tiplady		Michael Mandeltort
	Novice
1st	Tracey Gleck		Sandra Close		Jamie Luxton		Jeff Veling
	Ivy Dahler Butler Swiss Pairs
E/W	Open
2nd	Jack James		Jeremy Fraser-Hoskin
5th	Blair Fisher		Liz Fisher
	Restricted
1st	Derek Bartosh		Jan Bennett
3rd	Graham Cheater		Peter Farley
4th	Thorsten Stanley		Bob Ure
	Novice
1st	Jody Burchall		Susan Macken

 

   
Jo Hampton, Caroline Caseley, Megan Eddy and Bridget Willcox 

The win by the Christchurch/Hawke’s Bay Hampton team in the Restricted Final produced most unusual scores. The final head-to-head matches were played over 4x 12 board stanzas. After the first stanza, Hampton led 54.1-1 imps but after the second stanza, they led just 56.1 to 54! The 0.1 was given to each Swiss winner to break a tie. Hampton won a less dramatic 3^rd stanza 27-20 and then won the last stanza 45-24 to win overall 128.1-99.

The Novice Team winners trailed by 4.9 imps with one set remaining but ended victorious 82.1-73.  

Richard Solomon

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