Week 2 is in the books! I’m not quite meeting all of my lofty goals—there are just not enough hours in the day! But I’m working hard to arrange life to carve out time for all of this training.
The big-ticket item this week was reviewing hands from the Reisinger with my partner Anant Rathi. It was a useful exercise, though it would have been better sooner after the event—it’s been almost two months, and it’s hard to remember all of the details of 26 hands. We recorded it for you, so I’ll be posting the review of the first session later this week and the second session next week.
One thing on my list has been drilling my counting skills. I’m not great at mental arithmetic, and it’s always good to practice identifying 13-card shapes. There are a tools out there that do this, but they’re all visual—they show you the numbers and you have to add them up or fill in the missing number. I find that I think very differently when I see something versus when I hear it or have to imagine it. So I asked Claude to make me a couple of games where the numbers are read out loud. I have found them useful. I hope you do, too.
Addition game
Shape recognition game
I also recorded the first episode of my podcast! It will be a few weeks before I’m ready to start publishing them. I want to have a few in the can, and I need to teach myself how to edit them. But I’m excited by the opportunities this affords. A huge thanks to Helen Osborne for giving me podcasting advice!
A reminder that I have put together a Leveling Up partnership desk to help folks coming along on this journey with me to find partners interested in a similar level of dedication. If you're interested in working on your game this year and want to find a partner similarly committed, fill out the form, and if I find someone who looks compatible I will let you both know.
Here’s what I did this week:
VuGraph
I continued looking at 2024 Open USBC, using the Kibitz feature to watch my good friend and mentor Steve Weinstein. I got through three segments. I find this really, really instructive. Especially since I can text Steve and ask him about things he did differently than I expected. A huge thanks to Steve for his help. I’ll share some of the questions I’ve asked him when I’ve amassed enough of them for a post.
This is so far the most valuable part of my training. I’d like to get up to four or five segments per week. They’re each taking around 45 minutes, so that would be 3-4 hours per week. That seems about right.
Robots
IntoBridge started their new “season” this week, so everyone was reset to the seven of diamonds level. I understand why they do this, but as someone who isn’t grinding out hours a day, who is taking his time and using this as a learning and training tool, it’s frustrating to have to start all over again. I want to advance my ranking so I’m getting comparisons against top, top players. It’s hard to move up the ranks quickly. So many deals are pushes. And I’m not trying to manipulate the robots or do anything crazy, which is often what you need to do to win these boards. I’m just playing like I would in real life. Still, it’s a valuable tool, especially the five boards against the daily expert.
Duplicate
I played three duplicate games this week with students. Reviewing and tracking the results as I go and logging them in my spreadsheet is a useful exercise. Just playing isn’t good enough—it’s the study afterwards that makes it really useful.
Reading
I finished my first book, Play Bridge with Mike Lawrence. I’ll be posting my thoughts soon. (I’m waiting for Greg to finish it, too, so we can record a short conversation about our takeaways.) I’m so glad that so many of you are reading along with me! Sorry that I picked something that was out of print and hard to obtain. Thanks to all of you who have commented on my reading list and made great suggestions. I haven’t read a bridge book in so long, I forgot how much I love it and how much I get out of it. I’m really looking forward to this aspect of the training this year. If this month is any indication, hopefully I can get through more than the one per month I had set as a goal. Though the Lawrence book is fairly short and very fun and easy to read, so it might not be the best indicator.
I started to read Counting at Bridge by Dianne Aves, but quickly realized it’s aimed at a beginner/intermediate audience. I skimmed through it and it looks really good if basic counting is something you struggle with.
I’m working through an old issue of The Bridge World—I’m so far behind, it’s from 2019!! I’ll probably be starting next month’s book a little early. It’s a lot thicker than the Lawrence book! February’s book is Method Bridge by Matt Granovetter.
I encourage you to share your progress in the comments. We’re all in this together!!
Have a great week.
I like the spreadsheet template idea ... I think, if used diligently and with correct analysis, after some number of sessions (10-12, 200 hands?) it will identify repeated weaknesses that can then be focused upon.
I would add a column showing Vulnerability and Seat (to help find too aggressive or too conservative preempts) - but this may be because I just read your book on Preempts and Overcalls!
I like the Shape Recognition Game, especially playing with sound on, but I found what worked best was to stare at my keyboard and listen rather than staring at the numbers being displayed on my screen.
IMO the addition game isn't very useful for the bridge-related quick math skills you want to drill.