Felixstowe Congress
This year's Felixstowe Congress surprised even its most steadfast supporters. After an upswing last year most were cautious about this but there were again more people playing bridge in a great atmosphere and a well run tournament. Testimony to the organisers, Jeff Orton behind the scenes as congress secretary and Malcolm and Barbara Carey who ran the weekend.
The first match of the seven round Swiss Teams started with an exceptional seven boards, more than half of which were slams. This one should have been easy to bid but was missed at some tables:
Dealer North
- A1085432
- A
- AK9
- K9
- 976
- 1093
- J2
- J7652
- J
- QJ8642
- 108653
- 4
- KQ
- K75
- Q74
- AQ1083
North won the club lead in hand with the nine; how do you play the grand slam?
Just to distract you, does anything strike you about the auction? East-West were very quiet. For the eventual winners of the Swiss Teams, Peter Gemmell overcalled three hearts as East and his partner Peter Sutcliffe bid four over South's three no-trump. North called four spades and South seemed to have forgotten the opening bid and passed – one team was off to a useful start.
Back to the play. At trick two, before you start drawing trumps you should cash the heart ace – why? Swap the knave of spades to the West hand for a club (say). Now when you discover that trumps are 4-0 you can ruff two hearts and a club and finally get to dummy at trick twelve to pick up West's trumps. But only if you unblock the hearts first – you will be an entry short if you do not.
| Swiss Teams (Sunday, seven matches) | ||
| 1. | Maria Allnutt, Debby Sutcliffe, | |
| Peter Gemmell, Peter Sutcliffe (Ipswich) | 123 VP | |
| 2. | Victor Milman, Nadia Stelmashenko (Cambridge), | |
| Sybil Bragadir, Michael Ranis (London) | 94 VP | |
| 3= | Gabriel Ip, Giles Ip, | |
| Paul Darby, Steve Dannell (Norfolk) | 93 VP | |
| 3= | Roger Tattersfield, Jill Tattersfield (Essex) | |
| Eric Newman, Rick Hanley (Colchester) | 93 VP | |
| Pairs Championship Final (Saturday, two sessions) | ||
| 1. | Rod Oakford / Sue Oakford (Cambridge) | 61.05% |
| 2. | Victor Milman / Nadia Stelmashenko (Cambridge) | 60.14% |
| 3. | Norman Less / Andre Gray (Bury, Ipswich) | 58.87% |
| Consolation Pairs | ||
| 1. | Pauline Hanson / Con Hanson (Ipswich) | 65.72% |
| 2. | Catriona Lovett / Mike Harbour (Essex) | 63.64% |
| Suffolk Coastal Shield (Open Pairs) | ||
| 1. | Ian Smith / Dennis Ellis (Essex) | 58.34% |
| 2. | Val Mollison / Judith Moorman (Essex) | 57.48% |
Published Saturday 17.Oct.2009