Notrump Blog

Summery Fun!

2009-05-07T15:17:00.000-07:00

Hi Everyone --

Now that 2009 is fully in gear it's time for a big summer trip. I'm starting a 2009 Big Summer Trip Tomorrow...

Las Vegas -- Cavendish (well actually WBP Pairs)
Atlanta (a small vacation...)
Aspen (teaching)
Denver Regional
Palm Beach Gardens Regional
Vicksburg Regional
Road Trip to Portland Oregon (another fun trip with some stops for bridge, of course...)
Penticton Canada Regional
Las Vegas Regional
Deerfield Beach Regional (South FL)

I'll post some hands and give some interesting stories from the road... Wish us luck in the Cavendish this weekend!

***Hands from Gatlinburg and Ft. Lauderdale (Southeasterns) to be written up on the plane this weekend...

TES Notes Update

2009-03-25T12:47:00.001-07:00

Just to let you know, I've finally updated the TES notes. They are on the www.notrump.org website under System. These are version 3.3 -- let me know if anything is unclear...

Races 2008 and start of 2009...

2009-03-07T05:13:00.000-08:00

Well, let me start 2009 by congratulating one of my brightest young students (Raphael Schreiber) for his amazing year in 2008. Raphael won both the mini-McKenney and Ace of Clubs for the 50-100 MP category. I am very proud of him and his progression as a player...

Additionally, I like to state a point of pride for myself. I played with a great number of Mini-McKenney winners last year.
Allison Howard (20-50)
Raphael Schreiber (50-100)
Michael Myers (200-300)
Garth Yettick (300-500)

I'm happy that I can be an influence on excited, interested, and talented improving players!

On to 2009. I'm not going to attempt to get caught up on a detailed blog with interesting hands from every tournament I played in the first two months of the year (hopefully I will do that for my future tournaments this year...) Let me just give you a quick list of what takes me from the start of the year into the nationals in Houston next week....
Orlando, FL Regional
Denver, CO Sectional
Charlottesville, VA Regional
Destin, FL Regional
Bermuda Regional -- where I won my first overall regional title!
Aspen, CO Teaching
Palmetto, FL Regional (Sarasota)
Panama City Beach, FL Sectional
Indianapolis, IN Regional
Aspen, CO Teaching
Bermuda Teaching
Houston NABC

This is quite a tour for just 2 months and I hope you will forgive my lack of typing up interesting hands, etc.. (see the Sunshine Bridge News for a few articles I did write during these travels...)
http://www.district9acbl.org/SBN/SBN_Index.htm

Later in the year I'm going to do a post dedicated just to Bermuda and the Bermuda Regional. I'm hoping to convince as many people as possible to come back to this tournament next January. It is the single greatest tournament I have been to in the ACBL (by far...) -- and it deserves to grow into a large spectacular event...

2008 Pictures

2009-03-04T15:51:00.001-08:00

Here are some pictures from my bridge adventures in 2008...

House from the Hilton Head Regional

View my room my room at the Biloxi Regional -- The Gulf Coast!

The playing site for the Detroit Spring 2008 NABC. It was a beautiful, yet cold place to play...

View from the playing site in Jyvaskyla, Finland

One of the playing rooms at the Jyvaskyla Easter Bridge Festival -- Finland!

View from our house in Gatlinburg, TN -- "The Fourth National"

Jesse Stern and Jourdain Patchett with a great performance at the YNABC in Atlanta, GA.

Las Vegas -- A great place for a nationals (Summer NABC)

More Las Vegas... (beautiful)

Our winning team from Ft. Wayne, IN Regional
( back --Jade Barrett, Me, Richard Helams, front -- Karen Barrett, Anne Dawson, Jim Looby)

Seaside, Oregon Coast -- Seaside Regional

Seasdie Regional Playing Site

Mike Dorn Wiss at the Seaside Regional (Author: "The Shadow")

Chris and Tammy at the Seaside Regional

Denver Airport -- I spend a lot of time here...

Palm Springs Regional -- Spectacular in December

Palm Springs Regional Playing Site

2008 Summary

2009-03-03T14:37:00.000-08:00

The end of 2008 and beginning of 2009 have been a complete blur. Time has flown by. The beginning of March is the first time I have had a chance to sit down and reflect on my first year as a full time bridge professional...

2008 was an amazing year. I played in 17 Regionals, 15 Sectionals, and spent another 8 weeks at special events (NABCs, International/non-ACBL Events, and Teaching.) That's a total 40 weeks of bridge tournaments. This is much more than I expected to do when 2008 started. Amazingly, as 2008 ends and 2009 begins I find myself even more energized and optimistic for future great bridge adventures. (The 2009 outlook will be in another blog post.)

Some 2008 Highlights

Orlando Regional -- new partnerships with Les and Gloria Bart...
Hilton Head Regional -- First Bracket 1 Regional KO (Thanks Capp, JR!)
Hilton Head Regional -- Match vs. Meckwell (First of many to come...)
Detroit NABC -- Finals in all pairs events (Silidor, Mixed, Red Ribbons...)
Finland Tournament -- Win introductory Pairs at International Event!
GNT FL District Final --Win Flight B (my team) and Flight C (my students team)
Palm Beach Gardens Regional -- First Bracket 1 Regional KO win!
Omaha Regional -- First tournament on a Tournament Bridge Services Team...
Clearwater Regional -- First win over Meckwell!
Ft. Wayne Regional -- Team won the regional MP race (well done, Anne Dawson!)
Ft. Wayne Regional -- new partnership with Jim Looby...
Seaside Regional -- First tournament played with Jade
Chattanooga Regional -- First Full Regional with a student from home (great job Raphael!)

The year was just amazing.

Won over 1556 Masterpoints (had only about 1500 masterpoints to start the year...)
18th on the Barry Crane, (list of most masterpoints won each year in ACBL)
Won the Silver Life Master National Race...

I'd like to thank so many people for all their help, but the list could go on forever... Let me just say, thank you to everyone that helped make this amazing year possible -- you know who you are!

I'll hopefully post a few pictures from some of my favorite events of 2008 soon!

Chattanooga and Daytona Regionals

2008-11-20T05:46:00.000-08:00

Once again, the insanity has won out and I have not updated this blog as much as I would like.

The last several of weeks have been very exciting. I played in two successful Regionals with two of my students. First, I played in Chattanooga, TN with my star "young" student from home (Tallahassee.) We did not have any prearranged teammates and just set things up as we arrived. The tournament was a wonderful experience and I was very proud of my partner -- he played well throughout the week and grew and developed each time he faced new situations. Notably, we reached the finals of a bracket 1 KO and won a bracket 2 KO -- totaling about 55 Masterpoints.

The next week, I played in the Regional in Daytona, FL with a new student out of Jacksonville, FL. The tournament was filled with top level teams and many world champions. In spite of this, my partner and I managed to have good success. My partner and I had very little experience playing together, but she did a great job adapting and learning. I attribute much of our success to partner striving not to make the same mistake twice. In a new partnership with a relatively inexperienced player there will always be many mistakes and misunderstandings, but not repeating the same mistakes is a great predictor of success. We won over 32 Masterpoints and my partner is now shortly to become a Life Master. I was also very proud of her!

I am now off to Boston for the Fall NABC. Exciting updates from the Nationals will follow shortly!

Mobile blog post

2008-10-23T04:39:00.001-07:00

I've just installed software on my phone to update this blog from my phone. I'll now be able to take lots of pictures with my phone and upload comments and stories directly from the bridge trail to the blog. I hope this makes the stories more enjoyable and timely.

I'm headed out of LA to Denver for a few days to work with one my sponsors. Then I'm off to the Chattanooga and Daytona regionals. I'll report more from those regionals in the coming weeks.

LA Regional

2008-10-22T00:32:00.000-07:00

The 2008 LA Regional was my first time to play in what use to be the famous LA Bridge Week.

In the distant past, this event rivaled an NABC in both size and skill of the players. It was a bit disappointing to see that this once great event is no longer even a "normal" sized regional. Additionally, the playing schedule had difficult starting times that made it awkward and exhausting to play 3 sessions per day.

In spite of the small turnout and other difficulties, the Pacific Palms Resort was a beautiful playing site, the organizers were gracious hosts, and opponents strong competitors. I hope that in the future the LA area can regrow it's bridge attraction and return to providing a truly spectacular bridge event on the west coast.
**If you have any ideas or suggests please feel free to email them to me.

The New Blog

2008-10-20T19:05:00.000-07:00

Hi Everyone.

I've done a horrible job of keeping the www.notrump.org website up to date. With all the traveling, playing, and teaching of bridge I've been doing this year I just haven't made it a priority. But that is about to change! I've decided to start using some blogging software (www.blogger.com) to post to my website and allow me to update information easily from the road.

I hope that everyone enjoys all the bridge stories!