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The local Wellington weather has again provided excellent conditions for bridge. The big event of this period was the 10A Regional Teams event, hosted by the Hutt Bridge Club and attracting 18 teams.  Newell (Peter Newell, Martin Reid, GeO Tislevoll and Michael Ware) went through undefeated to win from the Fisher and Carryer teams.

The Kairangi Bridge Club held its regular Multigrade Teams Tournament the following week, and again there was a good turnout. This time, it was a good day for the locals, the winning Sutich team (Tony and Lorraine, Cathryn Bridge and Russell Burnard) and the runners-up, Mishkin (Rosa, Allan Joseph, Alison O'Dea and Yiyang Wang).

This tournament format has proved very popular, with its mix of Teams Bridge, teams with a designated top pair playing their peer, and a handicap applied for Junior players. The tournament is usually fully subscribed. The following link to the club's page on the tournament describes the format in more detail, as well as having photos of the winning teams.

 Click on here

 New Directors.. and what happened to one who "dropped out".

We held club and tournament director's exams recently. At this time, I have the results for the club directors, and we welcome Julie Ballance, Lorraine Gaffaney, Karen McCarthy, Tina Sims, Alicia Wright and Vicky Young as our latest club directors. Allan Joseph didn't make me feel as guilty as I deserved to be when I dropped out of his course part-way through, but I didn't get a completely free pass as I became the exam supervisor. I now worry this might be a job for life, unless I return to take the exam next year.

There were a couple of tournaments at the end of July, the Paraparaumu Junior and the Karori Intermediate. Tina Connell-Pine and Trevor Smith won at Paraparaumu from Jack James and Mark Noble. Mira Trifunovic and Graham Potter won at Karori from Klaus Dorbecker and John Black.

 

Graham Potter, Mira Trifunovic and Karori manager, Vivienne Cannell

The last local event of July was the Wellington Open, won by Antony Ker and Alan Grant from Peter Benham and Brian Cleaver.

 

 Anthony and Alan

Bridge, Bridge...More Bridge

There's some recent evidence that local players want even more bridge. Perhaps it's prompted by the mobile phone age, with on-demand entertainment. So we find clubs have been trailing and running more social sessions, with Wellington adding “Wednesday walk-in” and “Sunday stroll-in” to its Friday afternoon bridge, and Waikanae with its “Fun Friday”. Scratch any local club on a weekday, and you're highly likely to find somewhere in town or a nearby suburb to play bridge that afternoon or evening. Maybe not quite as "always on" or as immediate as Internet bridge, but with people you can meet and greet in person.

August results

Running through August bridge results to date, we again find Rodney and Sandra Dravitzki taking out a Multigrade, this time in Waikanae, with Graham Cheater and Jeanne Wardill coming in second. Margaret and Graeme Dick won the Hutt Intermediate on the 14th, with a score of 63.9%. Peter McLeod and John Swinson were second.

The Karori Open was held this past weekend with 24 pairs and 64 boards spread over two sessions. The first session was rather tight, with the top pairs being around 57%. The second session stretched out somewhat towards the mid-60s for the top pairs. As at another recent tournament, Graeme Norman and Pat D'Arcy had to sort out who was to make the winners' speech. Brian Cleaver and Derek Snelling were second, just ahead of Lynda Rigler and Peter Delahunty, still fresh from their contributions to the team setting up and running the tournament.

The new Wellington Regional Committee held its first meeting of the year on 19 July. Tony Sutich, elected as the interim chair, welcomed Joan Waldvogel back as secretary, and, through his extensive knowledge of all things pertaining to local bridge, brought out a surprise birthday cake.

 The new Regional Committee, or most of it (missing is Margot Davenport) celebrate Joan's birthday. Only

one candle, Tony? I am sure she is just a little older! Celebrating with Joan are (left) Tony Sutich and (right) Heather Jared and Paul Maxwell. 

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