This revised and expanded edition examines bridge auctions where the opponents bid something and you have the opportunity to either let them have it or to balance. The cost of not balancing can be huge, but you must weigh the cost of passing against the cost of bidding and getting a bad result. Lawrence's discussion of hand evaluation and planning a balancing auction goes beyond generic rules. Hundreds of examples help you develop judgment
What do Martina Navratilova, Bill Gates, and Warren Buffet have in common? They're all bridge fanatics! The card came is popular again--at home, online, and in schools. Whether readers are learning bridge from scratch or looking to improve their game, this book is the ultimate contract bridge manual. Bridge master Brent Manley takes you step by step from the rudiments of bidding to the more advanced principles of tournament play. You learn how to: Play a contract and keep score Gain confidence in competitive bidding Recognize good vs. bad leads Successfully communicate with their partners Win tricks more frequently This book provides readers with all the skills and tips they need to play this highly social and totally addicting card game! This edition includes completely new information on: Important bridge terminology Bidding accuracy and judgment Online bridge
A comprehensive guide to the classic card game of bridge, including an overview of the basics, tips and techniques how to play—and strategies to win; perfect for new bridge players and experienced pros alike. Bridge is all about memory, bidding, and skill. It is one of the most popular card games in the world, and is played by millions of people worldwide in tournaments, clubs, and cruises, as well as online. New to the world of bridge? No problem! Learning any new game can be challenging, especially one as complicated as bridge. But mastering a complex game can be very rewarding. Whether you are a complete novice or a casual player looking to brush up on your skills and techniques, The Little Book of Bridge can help you play your cards right and get ahead in this classic game. With a comprehensive breakdown of all the cards involved in the game, detailed information on scoring, tips on how to improve your skills, strategies for winning, and a tear-away cheat sheet, this guide will have even the newest bridge enthusiast winning in no time flat.
Overview of the American Bridge Series The American Bridge Series is designed as a sequential set of bidding courses, suitable for self-study or classroom-style study under the guidance of a professional bridge teacher. Volumes I through III include declarer play and defense skills as they relate to the bidding skills taught in each text. Volume IV is reserved for true experts; thus, declarer play and defense lessons would be an insult and are not included. The entire series takes about five years of study and practice to complete. Volume I, The Basic American Bidding System was written for beginners and for social players who need to brush-up on basic bidding skills prior to tackling modern bidding methods. It features 5-card major suit opening bids, strong twos, and some basics of Forcing and Non-Forcing Stayman, Blackwood, Gerber, and few other things designed to form the framework for further study. Volume II, The Intermediate American Bidding System makes the transition to modern methods including weak two openings. It teaches all of the pieces of "Standard" American in a way that integrates all of the varied forms of same. Don't be thrown by the term "intermediate." Many duplicate players think that they have reached that level when they can no longer play in novice games. Not so. "Intermediate," as defined by the authors, can vary from folks with zero ACBL masterpoints to 2500 masterpoints. It's not the points that count, it's the skill level. Volume III, The Advanced American Bidding System presumes a complete understanding and skill with all of the material in Volume II. However, some of the Volume II material is repeated for intended redundancy, since the authors suspect that many folks who shouldn't be attempting to study Volume III will do so anyway. After all, "I'm a Life Master, I must be Advanced." The authors suggest that anyone not comfortable playing in Flight A at an ACBL regional or national tournament, or the World Bridge Federation (WBF) or other governing body equivalent thereof avoid purchase and study of Volume III until they have mastered all that is taught in Volume II. Volume IV, The Expert American Bidding System, (NOT YET RELEASED) presumes two years' experience with the bidding techniques taught in Volume III, and expert declarer play and defense skills. This is not a "Mom and Pop" book. It is for those who wish to successfully compete in such ACBL events as Flight A Grand National Teams, the Blue Ribbon Pairs, the Life Master Pairs, the Spingold, Vanderbilt, and Reisinger teams, etc., and International events like the Bermuda Bowl and Venice Cup, The London Times Pairs, the McCallan, etc. It features 4-card majors, the TEAS responses to no trump openings, weak no trumps, and a variety of other bidding methods which will get bidders to the optimum place but will require expert declarer play or defensive skills to maximize results. All four books emphasize sound, disciplined bidding and an underlying philosophy of "You bid your cards, I'll bid mine, we'll get to the right spot." By the time students complete study and practice of Volume III, they should be able to know what cards partner holds almost to the spot at the conclusion of an auction. In fact, Jerry and one of his partners were once accused of cheating when they got cocky and did this after an auction. The comment was: "How can you know what cards your partner holds?" Jerry's answer: "Isn't that the whole point of the bidding?"
This book contains an innovation that makes it much easier to bid slams. This innovation will enable the bridge community to dramatically increase its bidding of grand slams. This book incorporates the 2/1 Game Force bidding system for major suit opening. This book also expands the Game Force system to partners holding 5 spades and an opening hand. The forcing response when R has 6-12p and a spade response is modified to show if O has 3-card spade support. The traditional 2/1 system is modified by the mechanics of a fast arrival convention to show game-level points. In addition, a simple worthless suit convention using a single bid is employed to show a worthless suit as opposed to the more complicated control system used in traditional 2/1. For minor suit openings, the book presents a simple method for using reverses. The book also shows how to use the Jacoby Transfer mechanism to show R’s 5-card major. The book then shows how R can effectively use inverted minors to hamper the opponents’ bidding. The book next shows how to bid overcalls of a 4-card heart suit to hamper the opponents from finding their spade suit. The book outlines the Kantar slam bids and shows how to locate the trump Queen after a 4NT bid. Finally, the book shows how to improve slam bidding using the Minorwood convention. Ken has published 5 core books on how to play bridge: “Beginning Bridge” (5th ed. 2023), “Tournament Bridge for Intermediate Players (5th ed. 2021), “Advanced Bridge” (4th ed. 2021), “Bridge Defense” (4th ed. 2020) and “Bridge for Notrump Contracts” (4th ed. 2020). Ken served as a Russian interpreter during the Vietnam War and then spent over 30 years practicing as a tax attorney. Ken also has an MBA in accounting and a CPA.
Learning bridge isn't like learning poker or blackjack, where the basic rules can be explained in a few minutes. Entire books have been written on the bidding aspects alone, and learning the language of bridge can be intimidating to new players. But 60 million bridge players worldwide is evidence enough that people don't seem to be discouraged by the game's challenging rules and concepts. And why should they be when there's The Complete Idiot's Guide® to Bridge, Third Edition, to teach them the game in a fun and easy-to-understand format? This new edition includes modern bidding techniques and examples to make learning the game even easier, a pull-out reference card for beginning players to have at the table with them as they learn the game, and bonus chapters online that cover some of the more advanced aspects of the game.
The 2/1 Game Force System is an improvement over the Standard American System that has been in effect and played by bridge players for many years. The advantage of the 2/1 System is that it allows the partnership to know that game is possible with only an initial single bid. This book is about bridge that incorporates conventions that allow partnership’s to reach game or slam. In this regard, I have incorporated modern methods for hand evaluation developed by Marty Bergen called the ADJUST-3 Method and Zar points, new bidding conventions like SARS (Shape Asking Relays after Stayman) and Quest transfers, and an overview of “Bridge Rules and Laws” that I hope will improve your approach to the bidding structure you may use today. Also included is the bidding structure are Bergen, Reverse Bergen, and Combined Bergen major suit raises, inverted minor suit raises with crisscross and flip-flop, cue bidding, modified scroll bids, and many more methods not used in Standard American or Precision. The bidding conventions in the previous editions have been enhanced, corrected, expanded upon, and reorganized with new ones added. Given the release of the new ACBL convention charts, the chapter with the modifications to Fantunes, in my prior edition, is no longer needed. Fantunes may now be played using the Open Convention Chart. The Mid-chart no longer exits. Hence, I have deleted the chapter and replaced it with a new chapter on Bridge Tips, and Agreements. New conventions include a Modern Splinter Bidding Convention, the Zirconia Convention, Unusual 2-level bids, Jump Transfer bids, a new Two-Way Check-back Convention, 1430 Modified Jacoby 2NT*, additional Bridge Rules with more examples, Four-Way Transfers with the range ask bid and more are included in this edition. Also included is an update of the Minorwood and the Roman Keycard Blackwood Conventions, Two-Way New Minor Forcing with modified Wolff Signoff bids and new bidding sequences using Mini/Weak Notrump. The topic of Offense to Defense Ratio (ODR) is included in this revision as well as expanded bidding sequences when opening and responding to the bid of 2 playing the 2/1 Game Force System and many new Bridge Rules have been added to Chapter 10. A copy of this book is on the web site www.bridgewebs.com/ocala. A hard copy is available from the publisher or from Amazon.com – search on neil timm.
