Learning, or Lack Thereof

Saturday night, before I went to bed, I checked the BBO Beginner/Intermediate forum, and came across this problem. It took me until the next morning to figure it out.

6 hours later, I played this hand, and completely forgot the lesson I'd learned.



Sad part it, it's the same bloody problem. I was just in too much of a hurry to think it through.

*sigh*

We had our third narrow loss in the Sunday morning teams match. This time, the key hand was my mistake, and it was a rookie one. Really awful play by me, as I saw the risk, miscounted, and talked myself into making the mistake. Sad part is, there's probably no upside to the way I played it anyways (or at least very VERY little).

Still, despite being only 1-3, we're third in an 8 team league, only 9 VPs out of first. Of course, we're only 4 VPs out of 7th. :)

The Science of Selling Yourself Short

If I have one regret over the past 2 years, bridge wise, it's this - a while back, I was in the same tournament as a player who I consider to be at least high expert, possibly world classed. We talked a bit after the tournament, and the expert said "we should play a few hands together sometime". I never followed up on that offer.

It's not that I wasn't thrilled about the prospect of playing with a far better player. It's just that I lacked, and still lack, confidence in general. I'm no expert, but I'm not really a rank beginner anymore. I'm especially pleased with my improvement over the last 12-15 months - I'm not exactly pulling off complex squeezes yet, but my awareness and even my judgement (gasp) have vastly improved over that timeframe. If I continue to improve at this rate, goodness only knows what I'll be capable of by next year.

That said, I still get intimidated by situations and people all the time. I'm a bundle of nerves at the club games, and figure the better club players could clean my clock (probably true, but untested). In situations where a partner or better player compliments me, I tend to shrug it off.

The real problem arises when I reach a difficult spot in the bidding or play of a hand. Rather than trusting my judgment, or my ability to work out a difficult problem at the table, I shy away, and make some snap decision based on fear or uncertainty. The post-mortem often shows that the solution was easier than I'd thought, or that I'd made the same mistake before and should have known better.

I'm not sure what it's going to take for me to start playing and approaching bridge in general with confidence, but I really look forward to that day.

Beyond High Card Points

Playing 2/1 this week, I had to decide how to respond to 1 spade with:



I took a moment to consider, but decided that I was worth a game forcing 2 hearts raise. I solicited a few opinions on this decision, and have met with nothing but approval.

It does take a bit to break away from the high card point mindset, but I'm getting there.