— Bal l ina Br idge Club —

Newsletter February 2016

Our newest Grand Master

Play Committee Report Thursday Evening Teams — Teams night will now be the 2nd Thursday of each month, with a 6:30 start. Enter on the yellow sheet, as a pair, on the Noticeboard for 11th

February.

New Players & System Cards — Newer members may refer to their own system card at any stage during the

bidding & play.

Monday Bidding — will remain as is. Please remember to explain your bids, especially to newer members. You may not use Multi 2s, Brown sticker conventions, or transfers over 1C opening. Be kind, patient & generous with our

newer members — they are the future of Ballina BC!

2016 Pairs Championship

The Restricted & Novice (new) Championship will be conducted on the first Thursday of each month from February to November. Open & B Grade Championship will be conducted on the first Saturday of the same months. Page 6 of the Programme Book outlines the format. NB — On the first Thursday of these months, players may NOT come without a partner, as the Director will NOT be available to

play.

MasterPoints are as at 1/1/2016. Novice – Under 20 MPs per person. Restricted – Under 100 MPs per person.

B Grade – Under 300 MPs per person.

You will need to play with the same person a minimum of six times over these months to qualify for the Club Pairs

Championship.

Ballina Swiss Pairs Congress

In an attempt to reduce the costs of Congress events for players, we have included a BYO lunch. This event is all day Saturday 19th to approx. 1 pm Sun 20th March. Nibbles & drinks will be provided at the conclusion of play on the Sunday. Cost: $50 per person. Enter in the usual way

through the club’s internal post box.

— Judy Forsyth

70% Club Achievers Congratulations to ERIC HURLEY and RUSSELL BURFORD

who scored 74.60% on Saturday 5th December 2015.

From our President Firstly my thanks to Michael KUTER who has taken on the job of compiling our monthly newsletter while Winston

Guymer takes a few months leave of absence.

We have had the usual busy start to our calendar year with three teams events happening, Supervised Play on Friday mornings recommencing, and of course all of our memberships due for renewal and the admin work that that

entails.

We will be making changes to the Dealing Room to make more space for our administration, taking that out of the small corner office currently shared by the directing team

and our administration — usually all at the same time!

In consultation with the head of the dealing team, our head director, the head teacher, and the mahjong group spokesperson, we will reorganise the room so that better use may be made of it. We will also tidy up the books for sale area with better storage to display the material, freeing

up space at that end of the room.

I must thank Howard Jeffery and Bill Powell for the countless hours they put in to making our new pairs scoring program, Compscore2, work as well as it does. (See ‘Pairs Scoring’ on page 2.) Directors have been training in the new program with the help of a manual expertly written by Howard, and

directors are easily coping with the change.

Bill has devised original programs to enable the directors to get the results up to the web in a very easy to use form. I love the new results format and I am hearing, every day, from

players who are also liking the way it is now presented.

— Rebecca Rogers

Congratulations to HOWARD JEFFERY who recently

achieved the venerable rank of Grand Master.

S low-ow. . .P lay-ay Probably the greatest scourge of

bridge clubs is the habitual slow

player. They force others to play at

an unreasonable rate and cause

frustration for those waiting to get

to their table. Curiously, when you

address a table about their slow

play it is never their fault. I have yet

to hear, “Fair cop, Guv. We’re

slow; we should get an average mi-

nus for this board”.

For playing directors, management

is an impossible task. You can’t

keep an eye on all tables in a room,

on all players waiting etc., and play

bridge as well. The result is that

those who must describe family

history, illnesses and travels, before

writing on the bidding pad, will

continue to do so.

The solution: it must fall back to

the players themselves to manage

it. My experience has been that

courteous requests, “Can we talk

about that after we have played the

hands?” rarely get a gracious re-

sponse, but it does get a message

across. Indeed, it will often be ex-

plained to you that, despite all evi-

dence to the contrary, they can

talk, sort cards, record the last

contract and prepare for their bid

— all without loss of time.

To open? Or not? Andrew Robson is one of England’s

finest players, a great bridge writer

and a regular contributor to Country

Life where he edits a bridge column.

He posed the hand below to illus-

trate the value of shape in deciding

whether or not to open.

With South as Dealer, most systems

would either pass this hand or open

a weak two. For example, if you fol-

lowed the rule of 20, this would dis-

count opening; the number of high

card points (9) added to the number

of cards in the two longest suits

(6 + 4 = 10) is less than 20. Robson

writes that, given the great controls

in the side suits, this hand is too

strong to open 2H; rather it should

be opened 1H.

Huge applause for caterers, helpers and providores. Hiccup of thanks to sommelier-en-chef, Chris McDowell.

Bal l ina Br idge Club Chris tmas Par ty 2015

Pa irs Scor ing We have introduced a new scoring

system for Pairs events. It’s been

done for a number of reasons —

one of the main ones is the simplici-

ty of setup for Pairs events. It is

quite straightforward and means

games can start quicker, particularly

when a number of sections are be-

ing run.

The new system has changed the

Web display quite a bit. Everyone I

have spoken to prefers the new for-

mat. We are indebted to Bill Powell

for his work in massaging results

from an unfriendly file output to the

new suave output — it required a

large effort.

The handicapping system has

changed but is still based on a sepa-

rate handicap score for each day

played. Your handicap is based on

your individual result over the last

eight sessions. Your top and bottom

scores are removed and the average

of the other six scores is used to

determine your handicap.

This means handicapping will be a bit

wonky until most of us have played

eight sessions.

— Howard Jeffery

Page 2

Left: Judy Forsyth, Rebecca Rogers and Dorothy Brumley presenting the annual Ballina Bridge Club Awards and Prizes Centre: Dorothy Brumley presenting the Brumley Award to Charlotte Harrison Right: Winners of the Harvey Norman Women’s Pairs, Maureen Baker and Liz Jeffery

Christmas Par ty 2015 — Presentat ion o f Awards Page 3

Left: Winners of the Harvey Norman Mixed Pairs, Howard Jeffery and Marjorie Askew Centre: Winners of the Harvey Norman Restricted Pairs, Judy Forsyth (L) and John Rogers (R)

Right: Winners of the Harvey Norman Men's Pairs were Jack Pierce and Gary Lynn (absent)

Left: Winner Open Teams, Marjorie Askew & Eric Hurley (absent, John Paynter & Bill Powell)

Centre: Runners-Up Restricted Teams, Margaret Faulks & Ted Walsh (absent, Mary & Paul Blanch)

Right: Winners Restricted Teams, Jenny & Chris McDowell, (absent, Damien Kennedy & Ray Ghioni)

Left: Runners-Up in the Restricted Pairs, Peter Forsyth (L) and Russell Burford (R) Centre: Runners-Up in the Open Teams, Howard & Liz Jeffery, Eileen & Jack Pierce, Right: Runners-Up in the B Grade Pairs, Betty Clark and Anne Riley (absent)

Ballina Bridge Club

Officeholders

President

Rebecca Rogers

Vice-President

Chris McDowell

Secretary

Sue Burns

Assistant Secretary

Judy Woodward

Treasurer

Judy Peiti

Assistant Treasurer

Helen Pearce

Chair of Play

Judy Forsyth

Committee Members

Chery McCallum Maureen Bake

Lorraine Bryant

Contributions to your newsletter Contributions to and feedback about your newsletter are always welcome. For enquiries, or to submit material for upcoming

editions, please contact (your new and very temporary editor) Michael by email: kuteredit@gmail.com (phone 0416 197 385).

The newsletter is published monthly; copies are available on the BBC website: http://www.users.on.net/~bbclub/index.html

No Punch without Judy; no Christmas

without at least one of the three

wise men

Page 4

President Rebecca Rogers admires the ele-

gant table decorations

A close-up of some of the table

decorations

Chief cook and bottle-washer, Beverley

Peart-Kuter, says ‘Thank you’ to all who

helped in setting up the Christmas Party.

Wise Words

“Bridge is for fun. You should play the game for no other reason. You should not play bridge to make money, to show how smart you are, to show how stupid your partner is, to prove that you are the greatest teacher since Socrates, to show off the latest fad in bidding, or to prove any of the several hundred other things that bridge

players are so often trying to prove."

Charles Goren

Liz and Howard Jeffery, Ballina Bridge Club

Pairs Champions for 2015. Ngaire Wills and Terry Lowe, winners of

the B Grade Pairs

Oh Christmas Treeeee…

(Appropriately at the North Pole)

Somebody apparently thinks that Bridge is

the most fun you can have while laughing

The Great Prawn of Ballina dropped in to

the BBC Christmas Party, well equipped

for a game

Page 4