CABC now meets at The Chepstow Club, 10 Moor St, Chepstow, NP16 5DD

We are a friendly, enthusiastic club, offering a warm welcome to new members of any standard.

The Chepstow Club is a venue in the heart of Chepstow that offers opportunity for refreshments during and after our duplicate sessions.

To avoid the tedium of hand-shuffling, as well as enabling subsequent analysis of the hands, we deal all our boards with a computer.

We meet every Monday, starting promptly at 6:45 p.m. and playing between 24 and 28 boards.

Do come and join us. If you need a partner, begin by getting in touch (e-mail archwaysec@outlook.com) – we will find you a partner.

There is some free on-site parking available, but drivers MUST register their cars at reception.

12 pairs enjoyed playing in the ECats Children in Need Simultaneous Pairs on Monday.

The results from the evening are available on the ECats web site:   here.

And commentary on each of he boards is available:   here.

We were pleased to raise £200 to pass on to ECats for the Children in Need charity.

Thank you to the ECats team for organising the event.

Congratulations to Graham and Richard, and their team members for being joint winners of the CABC 2024 Summer League.
 

Aces and spaces?

Bridge has a number of well-known phrases. You may be familiar with ‘six-five, come alive’, ‘the five level is for the opponents’, and ‘aces and spaces’. But what are your thoughts on the latter?

According to leading bridge theorists Aces are undervalued by the Milton point count (Ace =4 points, King=3 points, etc.) - a value of 4.5 is a better representation of an ace's true value. But what about all those spaces? If you want the view of an Australian bridge pro, take a look at board 3 from his efforts in the BBO weekly free tournament (his play on board 3 starts just over 9 minutes in to this 28 minute video and the Aces and Spaces comments follow after he has played the board.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_F26LbEY_yI).  

Caroline and Richard win the mixed pairs

Congratulations to Caroline Gawler and Richard Stevenson, winners of the Mixed Pairs, held on Monday 7 October. Scored using cross-imps, this pair picked up their most significant scores by bidding a thin vulnerable game when holding the minority of the points, and doubling one partscore. While not a regular playing partnership, Caroline and Richard have honed their bidding – playing 2-over-1 – with the application Cuebids (https://cuebids.com/). Not that far behind were John Mayo and Hugh Green.

On 11 June, Chepstow Bridge Club had the pleasure of hosting Monmouth Bridge Club. During the evening, 16 representatives from both clubs participated in four teams matches over 24 boards, with a break half way through to sample the results of Chepstow’s master baker, Caroline. The players from Chepstow benefitted from more experience in the intricacies of team scoring, gained through the running of intra-club teams’ competitions over the last few years. Consequently, despite some excellent card play from the visitors, Chepstow emerged victorious, although all matches were close. Let’s hoped that this match is the first of many between Chepstow and other local bridge clubs.   The boards from the match are available on the Results page. 

On Monday 24 June, Ray Mardon and Shelia Montgomery defended their cross-IMPs crown, winning this 28-board competition with a very healthy 46.2 IMPs. In this form of scoring, which favours replicating the approach taken in team matches, this winning pair put in a very solid performance, with a win that’s not attributed to simply substantial success on a handful of boards. They bid no slam (no slams were bid and made that night), but were involved in four doubled contracts that produced noteworthy swings and netted them a total of 15.1 IMPs.

Congratulations to Richard, Greg, Pat and Caroline

Congratulations all.

Congratulations to Sheila and Ray on winning the Face to Face Mixed Pairs Competition. 

Results available on the Results page.

Archway 2023 League 7 Winners - Sheila, Ray, Sue and Liz

Archway 2023 Online Ladies Pairs - Grace and Sue

Archway 2023 Online Men's Pairs - Richard and Greg (absent for the photo)

Congratulations to Jean Chuter, John Mayo, Mary Mackenzie and Gerry Gowling. (Mary and Gerrt, not available for the photo call).

Congratulations: Pete, Liz, Pat and Caroline

Congratulations Sheila Montgomery and Ray Mardon - winners of the 2023 Open Pairs Competition (Match Points).

Archway Teams Mens Pairs Competition was won by Dave & Richard. Well done both.

Archway Ladies Pairs Competition was won by Pat & Caroline. Well done ladies.