Susanna Gross

Bridge | 29 January 2015

issue 31 January 2015

If you and your partner ever want to improve your bidding system, I can’t recommend Phil King highly enough as a bridge coach. Catherine Seale and I booked him for a few sessions in preparation for last weekend’s Lady Milne trials, and although we didn’t qualify (my mistakes are too embarrassing to mention), we both benefitted hugely from his wonderfully methodical and lucid way of explaining how certain conventions work in practice.

Phil has prepared pamphlets covering every aspect of bidding (slams, defence, competitive auctions etc.), full of real-life deals played by experts, so you and your partner can see how you fare by comparison. It’s pretty eye-opening to find just how many hands there are that leave you stumped. The consoling thing is seeing how often even experts get confused. Take this hand from the US Trials (cover up the N/S hands and bid as E/W):

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