I’m writing this from O’Hare Airport Monday morning after four fun days at the US Team Trials—aka the United States Bridge Championships.
This is by far my favorite bridge event. The conditions are ideal:
Everything is played on Chromebooks using the LoveBridge platform
This eliminates a lot of UI issues
It also means that every bid and play is recorded accurately, making for a great VuGraph experience, both “live” (there is a 30-minute delay for security reasons) and later going back to study the hands
Time penalties are strictly enforced, and the electronic environment means you know exactly how much time each pair took
LoveBridge produces all sorts of great statistics
Every match plays the same boards, so you can compare with other great pairs
It’s played two players per room—you and your “screenmate”
You’re in a hotel room with just the other person, each of you at a table with a laptop
This creates an incredibly social atmosphere—as long as you have a friendly roommate! I was very lucky and had a great time with the four friends I shared the room with: Kevin Bathurst, Marty Fleisher, Jacob Morgan, and Charlie Wilkins
You can get up and stretch and use the bathroom when you’re the dummy
The competition is elite
There were only 16 teams, all of them there to play against the best
The atmosphere is incredible
Everyone is very friendly
There are almost no concerns about ethics or security
They are very strict about no electronic devices in the room
The penalties are draconian
They even come in randomly with a wand and search you!
The USBF, led by Jan Martel, puts on a super event
There is incredible hospitality
They organize breakfast and lunch for everyone
They have a top-notch crew of tournament directors
All system information is disclosed ahead of time
They’re very proactive about facilitating everything the players need to make it a great tournament
A lot of what makes this tournament great doesn’t scale, so most tournaments can’t run like this. Two people in a hotel room works when there are 16 teams, not when there are 60 or more, like the Spingold.
We were the 15 seed, so we drew the 2 seed, Fleisher. They’re one of the toughest teams in the world. Joe Grue and Brad Moss are in the running for top pair in the world. They play a cool dual system: Precision when they’re not vulnerable and standard 2/1 when vulnerable. Kevin Bathurst and John Hurd have won this event and represented the US in the Bermuda Bowl. They’re incredibly good players and fierce competitors. Marty Fleisher and Chip Martel are both ACBL Hall of Famers (Marty was just elected this year. Congratulations!) Marty sponsors the team, but don’t think he’s a weak link—he’s absolutely world class.
We were huge underdogs in this match. Fleisher might have been the favorite to win the event. Over a two-day, 120-board match, the spread probably would have been about 100 IMPs.
We played them very close. We won 5 of the 8 segments. Unfortunately, our wins weren’t as large as our losses, and we ended up losing by 24. They were not on their A game—they had a few bidding misunderstandings—even the best in the world sometimes miscount their keycards!
We played pretty well. There were plenty of things we could have done better. Some were just close decisions we got wrong. I made a bad bid or two, I forgot system a couple of times, I got lazy on defense. No one expects perfection, especially against a team of this caliber. Overall, I was very pleased with our play and the result. No one expected the match to be this close!
This year’s USBC is double elimination, as they need to choose two teams to represent the US in the Bermuda Bowl. So our first-round loss to Fleisher put us in the bracket for USA2. We drew the Kovachev team. Val Kovachev, a great and very nice pro, playing with Charlie Wilkins, who was on my podcast. Their teammates were Jacob Morgan and Venkatrao “the Colonel” Koneru. (He was an officer in the Air Force.) They are both great players, though not a regular partnership.
We did not play as well in this match. We got a lot of close decisions wrong and made a few silly mistakes. We lost the first segment by 2 and then the second by 56 and trailed the rest of the way. We had a few good segments, and mounted a small comeback at the end, but it wasn’t enough.
They couldn’t have been nicer or more fun to play against. I roomed with Jacob Morgan 7 of the 8 segments, and we had a ball. He’s a really great guy, and we had a lot of fun. It’s a serious event, and we shut up and concentrate when we’re playing. But there’s lots of downtime, and it’s great to have someone who can enjoy life with you.
I’ll be doing an in-depth review of all the boards over the coming week. For now, here are my immediate impressions:
Overall, I thought I played pretty well. Detailed analysis may prove that wrong! But I had a good count on most hands and Anant and I were on the same page defensively most of the time. There were a few hands I could have played better, and there were certainly some inferences I missed. But there were only a couple of hands I really wanted back. Over 240 boards, that’s not bad.
I forgot system a couple of times, which frustrated me. I was a system nut in my youth, but as I get older I’m coming around to Larry Cohen’s philosophy of less is more. A great agreement is no good if you forget it even once. And not being 100% confident in your knowledge of the system seeps into the rest of your game.
My focus was pretty good. I got plenty of sleep and made an effort to stay hydrated. I meditated before the morning session and during the lunch break. I made sure to have a little snack during the short breaks between the first/second and third/fourth sessions each day. I never felt fatigued or not ready to play.
If I had to generalize a weakness, it was not being aggressive enough. This was particularly true in making penalty doubles. We missed a couple of vulnerable games, which is a sin at IMPs.
I’m looking forward to going over all the boards in depth. I encourage you to do so as well. The more feedback, the better.
I also encourage you to keep watching the USBC. I’ll probably do some of the “live” commentary of the finals. Rob Barrington is doing a daily wrap-up, and Rob Brady streams every day on Twitch. If you can’t watch in real time, you can go through the archives. All the kibitzing information is here.
Funny/sad that we feel very much the same way even down to my key takeaway (that I told my team before day 4) being tk be more aggressive especially with penalty doubles. Three times I was playing too scared, did not make the double, and watched them go -3.
Other than one verdammte misclick that cost a vulnerable game, that was my significant regret.
in a first-time partnership we had very very few system uncertainties, our defense was really very good. I felt as though I was not so much an imposter as maybe I expected, and definitely that next year I would expect to be solidly there.
Vexing that both of our matches were both winnable and should have been won. But ending the first morning +80 and on the very top of the Butler was a nice high. (Take that, "200IMP underdog" commentators 😝)