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Advanced Lesson 28, Bridge Leads versus Suit Contracts

June 26, 2020 By Leave a Comment

At long last (for now at least), this will end our series on Opening leads as we complete our series on opening leads versus Suit Contracts.

And yes, our “CIA” (Counting, Inferences and Analysis) judgment is still very much “the game” as we consider making an Active or a Passive lead. So one more time, let’s try our hand playing Bridge hands at BridgeHands…

Part 1 – warmup drills, chalk talk and Hand 1 – 36 minutes
Part 2 – Hands 2 – 3 (multiple variations), 37 minutes

Part 3 – Hands 4-8, more bidding/play scenarios – 44 minutes

As always, we here at BridgeHands have Bridge hands complete with narration and animated card play for everyone (regardless of who is the declarer and defender). Our emphasis is to get inside the minds of the “Big Why,” the rationale behind everyone’s bid or play, including an analysis on hand evaluation, bidding and animated card play. As a Premium and ULTRA member, you are welcome to enjoy the entire three-part lesson segments with lots of hands, plus an opportunity to view future shows during your membership subscription period.   And as always, be sure to check out the hundreds of hours of videos in our archive that is growing by leaps and bounds, by clicking “Index to Videos” on the navigation above or simply click this link.

Bridge Teachers – you may download your personal copy of our copyrighted video lesson here:

Advanced Lesson 28 – Part 1

Advanced Lesson 28 – Part 2

Advanced Lesson 28 – Part 3

Thank you for supporting BridgeHands – over the last 10 years, you have helped to make us what we are today!

Filed Under: Advanced, Advanced Play

Advanced Lesson 27, Part 4

June 16, 2020 By Leave a Comment

Okay, it’s time to pivot away from Notrump contacts and tackle leads when the opponents are in a suit contract – enter the world of trumps! Regardless, either way we are still pondering whether the “CIA” (Counting, Inferences and Analysis) calls for an Active or a Passive lead. So let’s try our hand playing Bridge hands at BridgeHands…

Part 1 – 10 illustrative bidding scenarios to practice our leads – 37 minutes

Part 2 – Hands 1-3 and multiple bidding and play scenarios – 27 minutes

Part 4 – Hands 4-5 with more bidding and play scenarios – 27 minutes

Part 4 – Hands 6-7 with more bidding and play scenarios – 31 minutes

As always, we here at BridgeHands have Bridge hands complete with narration and animated card play for everyone (regardless of who is the declarer and defender). Our emphasis is to get inside the minds of the “Big Why,” the rationale behind everyone’s bid or play, including an analysis on hand evaluation, bidding and animated card play.  

As a Premium and ULTRA member, you are welcome to enjoy the entire three-part lesson segments with lots of hands, plus an opportunity to view future shows during your membership subscription period.   And as always, be sure to check out the hundreds of hours of videos in our archive that is growing by leaps and bounds, by clicking “Index to Videos” on the navigation above or simply click this link.

Bridge Teachers – you may download your personal copy of our copyrighted video lesson here:

Advanced Lesson 27 – Part 1

Advanced Lesson 27 – Part 2

Advanced Lesson 27 – Part 3

Advanced Lesson 27 – Part 4

Thank you for supporting BridgeHands – over the last 10 years, you have helped to make us what we are today!

Filed Under: Advanced, Advanced Bidding, Advanced Play

Social Bidding and Play 23 – Confidence at the Bridge Table

June 9, 2020 By Leave a Comment

Welcome Bridge Friends!

Confidence at the Bridge table – sometimes easier said than done!

First off, let’s reflect on the Dallas Aces 7 Deadly Sins:

•1. Bidding without values
•2. System violations
•3. Unilateral actions
•4. No-win Declarer plays
•5. No-win Defensive plays
•6. Impulsive plays
•7. Mechanics

To this, let’s add #8 which includes:
•Being Street Smart,
•Awareness,
•Partnership Vibes,
•Concentration/Attention/Mindfulness,
•Confidence/Anchoring/Choking,
•Fitness,
•Study (including Laws, etc),
•Time on your Side,
•Arbitrage (Vulnerability risk/reward)

Being confident “In Your Wheelhouse” is important, too, including:
ABILITY:  An ability is a repeatable action which you enjoy because you do it well.
DRIVE:  A drive is something within you that motivates action.  Drives are like internal fuel moving you to make a difference in the world.
NEED:  A need is any issue in want of a solution or response (pain mitigation).

In this lesson, we’ll address your Adrenaline & Cortisol, your breathing, positive/negative attitude factors, stress, fatigue, etc.

Confidence, Part 1, All about you/partner/emotions (31 min)

Confidence Part 2, Hands 1-4 (46 min)

Confidence, Part 3, Hand 5-9 (50 min)

BridgeHands Members, here are our links to peruse through our hundreds of videos:
Hands Of The Week,
Social,
Advanced,
Polling You and
now our exciting BridgeHands Live Streaming videos!

Here at BridgeHands all of our Bridge hands are full of commentary (regardless of who is the declarer and defender) and analysis on hand evaluation, bidding and animated card play. As always, our hand discussion offers a refreshingly rare glimpse of Bridge inside the minds of all four players at the table as play progresses, bid by bid, card by card.

Bridge Teachers – you may download your personal copy of our copyrighted video lesson here:

Social Lesson 23 – Part 1
Social Lesson 23 – Part 2
Social Lesson 23 – Part 3

Happy Trails,

BridgeHands

Filed Under: .Social, Advanced, Advanced Bidding, Advanced Play, Social Bidding, Social Play Tagged With: , , ,

Advanced Lesson 26, Opening Leads Part 3

June 9, 2020 By 1 Comment

Here we go again with more hands for us to discover the best opening lead playing against Notrump contracts. Of course, going beyond viewing our cards to listening carefully to the auction is a start. Then comes the “CIA” – Counting, Inferences and Analysis of what was said, what wasn’t said, considering everyone’s assets (length, strength and honors). Whew, while all this may sound daunting, it’s also fun to play Sherlock Homes so off we go!

Part 1 – Hands 1-2, 30 minutes
Part 2, Hand 3-4, 34 minutes
Part 3, Hands 5-8, 41 minutes

As always, we here at BridgeHands have Bridge hands complete with narration and animated card play for everyone (regardless of who is the declarer and defender). Our emphasis is to get inside the minds of the “Big Why,” the rationale behind everyone’s bid or play, including an analysis on hand evaluation, bidding and animated card play.  

As a Premium and ULTRA member, you are welcome to enjoy the entire three-part lesson segments with lots of hands, plus an opportunity to view future shows during your membership subscription period.   And as always, be sure to check out the hundreds of hours of videos in our archive that is growing by leaps and bounds, by clicking “Index to Videos” on the navigation above or simply click this link.

Bridge Teachers – you may download your personal copy of our copyrighted video lesson here:

Advanced Lesson 25 – Part 1

Advanced Lesson 25 – Part 2

Advanced Lesson 25 – Part 3

As always and until our next show, Happy Trails until we meet again!

Filed Under: Advanced, Advanced Play Tagged With: , ,

Advanced Lesson 25 – Hands of the Week

May 15, 2020 By Leave a Comment

This week it’s time for a Bridge brush-up to practice and reinforce our skills and put our knowledge to work with a variety of hand. Better yet, we will have several bidding and play variations of these hands to reinforce the Good, the Bad and the Ugg!

Part 1 – Hands 1-2, 43 minutes
Part 2, Hand 3-5, 30 minutes
Part 3, Hands 6-7, 35 minutes

As always, we here at BridgeHands have Bridge hands complete with narration and animated card play for everyone (regardless of who is the declarer and defender). Our emphasis is to get inside the minds of the “Big Why,” the rationale behind everyone’s bid or play, including an analysis on hand evaluation, bidding and animated card play.  

As a Premium and ULTRA member, you are welcome to enjoy the entire three-part lesson segments with lots of hands, plus an opportunity to view future shows during your membership subscription period.   And as always, be sure to check out the hundreds of hours of videos in our archive that is growing by leaps and bounds, by clicking “Index to Videos” on the navigation above or simply click this link.

Bridge Teachers – you may download your personal copy of our copyrighted video lesson here:

Advanced Lesson 25 – Part 1

Advanced Lesson 25 – Part 2

Advanced Lesson 25 – Part 3

As always and until our next show, Happy Trails until we meet again!

Filed Under: Advanced, Advanced Bidding, Advanced Play

Advanced Lesson 24 – Leads vs NT Contract, Part 2

May 9, 2020 By Leave a Comment

Advanced Lesson 24 – Opening Leads vs NT Contract, Part 2

We are at it again with more not-so-glorious hands where the opponents are in a game or slam contract – boring, eh? Well, in most all cases on this lessons it’s up to the opening lead whether or not you and partner can set the contract.

Part 1 – 36 minutes: Let Counting, Inferences, Analysis Be Your Friend
Part 2 – 34 minutes
Part 3 – 33 minutes

If you like commentary, great! Here at BridgeHands all of our Bridge hands are full of narration for all players (regardless of who is the declarer and defender). So we will get inside the mind of each player, explain why each bid or play was made, including an analysis on hand evaluation, bidding and animated card play.  

As a Premium and ULTRA member, you are welcome to enjoy the entire four-part lesson segments with lots of hands, plus an opportunity to view future shows during your membership subscription period.   And as always, be sure to check out the hundreds of hours of videos in our archive that is growing by leaps and bounds, by clicking “Index to Videos” on the navigation above or simply click this link.

Bridge Teachers – you may download your personal copy of our copyrighted video lesson here:

Advanced Lesson 24 – Part 1

Advanced Lesson 24 – Part 2

Advanced Lesson 24 – Part 3

As always and until our next show, Happy Trails until we meet again!

Filed Under: Advanced, Advanced Play

Advanced Lesson 23 – Opening Leads vs NT Contract

May 1, 2020 By Leave a Comment

Advanced Lesson 23 – Opening Leads vs NT Contract

You pick up your lackluster hand and the bidding takes off with the opponents winning the contract. So you’re on lead opposite a Notrump contract, now what? Do you lead your long suit, maybe a short suit in hopes to help your partner, a safe passive lead, an active lead, a sequence suit lead? Geesh, maybe this Bridge play isn’t so easy after all. No problemo, let’s play some hand, listen to the commentary and we’ll soon have the hang of this! The following is from our new Livestreaming “webinar” show! In addition to the 10 hands we also will play several variations to illustrate The Good, The Bad, and The UGG!

Part 1 – 27 minutes: Essential Strategies – Counting, Inferences, Analysis
Part 2 – 36 minutes: Hand 1-5
Part 3 – 16 minutes: Hand 6-8
Part 4 – 25 minutes: Hand 9-10

Here at BridgeHands all of our Bridge hands are full of commentary (regardless of who is the declarer and defender) and analysis on hand evaluation, bidding and animated card play.   As always, our hand discussion offers a refreshingly rare glimpse of Bridge inside the minds of all four players at the table as play progresses, bid by bid, card by card.  

As a Premium and ULTRA member, you are welcome to enjoy the entire four-part lesson segments with lots of hands, plus an opportunity to view future shows during your membership subscription period.   And as always, be sure to check out the hundreds of hours of videos in our archive that is growing by leaps and bounds, by clicking “Index to Videos” on the navigation above or simply click this link.

Bridge Teachers – you may download your personal copy of our copyrighted video lesson here:

Advanced Lesson 23 – Part 1

Advanced Lesson 23 – Part 2

Advanced Lesson 23 – Part 3

Advanced Lesson 23 – Part 4

As always and until our next show, Happy Trails until we meet again!

Filed Under: .Social, Advanced, Advanced Play, Polling You, Social Play

Social Lesson 20, Part 2 – Counting

March 31, 2020 By Leave a Comment
Counting. Sounds simple enough, right? 
 
But as any emerging Bridge player will attest, it’s not quite so easy in the swirl of bidding and related inferences, leads, play strategies, signals and yes, surprises that frequently arise before the dust settles. 
 
We begin with a quick review of helpful analysis of the odds of suit splits, common percentages associated with common Bridge holdings and even offer some tips on how to be a good partner.  Then it’s off to the Bridge tournament and it’s time to start tossing cards… after careful thought, of course!
 
BridgeHands Premium and ULTRA Members, here are the  links to watch over two hours and 14 hands helpful to improve your counting skills…

Bridge Teachers, you may download a copy of our videos here for lessons with your local students:

Part 2.1
Part 2.2
Part 2.3
Part 2.4
Powerpoint and Slides

Many thanks for supporting BridgeHands with lots more online recorded and now Livestreaming real-time webinars coming to you – wherever you are, we will be there!

Happy Trails,

BridgeHands

Filed Under: .Social, Advanced, Advanced Bidding, Advanced Play, Social Bidding, Social Play Tagged With: , , , , ,

Advanced Lesson 15_, Slams, Penalty Doubles and Excitement

April 11, 2017 By Leave a Comment

Here we go again with eight more exciting hands taken “from the table” with red-blooded Bridge players!

We start off pondering the bids to scope out slam (or grand slam) contracts.  But what if you’re running a tad short to make a 6 Notrump contract – now what do we do.  Are you into counting the shape of the opponents suit when you are winning sure tricks?  Well, if you want to make the contract, now is a good time to see how it’s done by making and endplay instead of trying a fateful, feeble finesse attempt.   And while making a slam contact in a suit contract seems simple enough, are you up to cuebidding controls to find the almighty grandslam contract?  So far so good – now ponder how as responder with a 6-6-1-0 shape, should we shoot for slam after partner opens 1 Notrump.

Then we shift to playing doubled game suit contracts – do we enjoy extra points for the insult or go down the tubes?  Of course whether you are declarer or defender, as always the play is the thing!

All audiences – Part 1 – count, Count, COUNT to make slam – 16 minutes
Free, Premium an ULTRA audiences – Part 2, Dare try another slam and grandslam?
Premium and ULTRA Members – Part 3, Bid and make 5 game contracts – 46 minutes

Here at BridgeHands all of our Bridge hands are full of commentary (regardless of who is the declarer and defender) and analysis on hand evaluation, bidding and animated card play.   As always, our hand discussion offers a refreshingly rare glimpse of Bridge inside the minds of all four players at the table as play progresses, bid by bid, card by card.  Visitors are welcome to view the Part 1 series of our video lesson with nuances that will lead to quick and sound bidding without guesswork.  Those with the Free BridgeHands  membership may also watch Part 2 where we play more hands with provocative play tips and strategies, as well as way to improve skills by critiquing student players. As a Premium and ULTRA member, you are welcome to enjoy the entire five-part lesson segments with lots of hands, plus an opportunity to view future shows during your membership subscription period.   And as always, be sure to check out the hundreds of hours of videos in our archive that is growing by leaps and bounds, by clicking “Index to Videos” on the navigation above or simply click this link.

Bridge Teachers – you may download your personal copy of our copyrighted video lesson here:

Advanced Lesson 15 – Part 1

Advanced Lesson 15 – Part 2

Advanced Lesson 15 – Part 3

Filed Under: Advanced, Advanced Bidding, Advanced Play, Polling You

Advanced Lesson 16, Responder Rebids – #11-20 with Analysis, Commentary and Numerous Bridge Hands

October 25, 2014 By Leave a Comment

We are back with more of our analysis, commentary and illustrative Bridge hands to bid and play in response to our survey questions regarding responder rebids!

As you will recall, responder rebids are based on a significant number of dependencies:
– Opener’s bid
– Responder’s first bid
– Opener’s rebid
– Possible interference bids

Not worry, as always BridgeHands is more than willing to take on the beast with insightful responses to the survey questions.

We will take a look at various forms of the Fourth Suit Forcing bid, jump suit 2 level opening bids in the fourth seat after three passes, passing and making a jump rebid after partner opens, Jacoby Transfers with opponent doubling or making interference bids, unusual rebids after partner makes a Stayman call and more.

All audiences – Part 1, hand 11 with two variations – 18 minutes
Free, Premium an ULTRA audiences – Part 2, hand 12 with five variations – 16 minutes
Premium and ULTRA Members – Part 3, hands 13-16 with six variations – 40 minutes
Premium and ULTRA Members – Part 4, hands 17-18 with 7 variations – 32 minutes
Premium and ULTRA Members – Part 5, hands 19-20 with 7 variations & recap of entire show – 45 minutes

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Advanced
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