The 2026 Australian National Championships (ANC) is starting in Canberra on Saturday 4 July and runs until Thursday 16 July. This year there are nearly 20 events across the Interstate Teams, the Butlers and side events.

In the first week the big event is the Interstate Teams where at most one representative team from each state or territory complete in Open, Women's, Seniors' and Youth categories. Tasmania has three teams competing:

The Interstate Teams start with a double round robin qualification from Monday 6th to Thursday 9th. The finals are played on Thursday 9th and Friday 10th, with a one day Interstate Pairs event on the Friday for those who did not make it into the teams finals.

Please wish our Tasmanian representatives the best if you see them around the club this week, and keep an eye on the website to follow their progress.

Apologies for the delay with this last post. Celebrations, travel home and recovery got in the way. Now I have a few days in Sydney before heading to Canberra for the ANC. Anyway back to the Asia Cup!

We are down to the last day. The finals and bronze medal play-offs in the teams and the finals of the pairs competitions.

The Australian Seniors Team are going for gold against a strong India B outfit. The Australian A Mixed Team are playing off for bronze against Hong Kong China A.

George and I and Fraser and Joe are in the final of the Men's Pairs.

Justin Mill & Jane Rennie and Will Jenner-O'Shea & Vanessa Brown are in the final of the Mixed Pairs.

In the Women's Pairs there is no final just a complete round-robin. Australia is represented by 5 pairs: Barbara Travis & Lori Smith, Gwyneira Brahma & Deana Wilson, Jane Reynolds & Viv Wood, Pamela Nisbet & Carolyn Miller and Karen Creet & Judith Tobin.

All pairs not playing in the finals are eligible for the Friendship Pairs. Australia is represented by Rachel Langdon & Nikolas Moore and Jenny Thompson playing with the event organiser Prasad Keni from India.

The Seniors Team Final: Australia v India B

Australia got off to a strong start in the first of three 16 board sets.

Board 3 was a 15 IMP gain to Australia when David Hudson & Peter Gill defended 4SX for +300 while Paul Lavings & Michael Courtney defended 5HX for +800.

Board 4 Michael & Paul showed good judgment to get to 5C for 10 IMPs in when the Indians stopped in 3C.

After 16 boards Australia gain 25 IMPs (33-8) to lead by 19.5 IMPs including the India B carry-forward of 5.5 IMPs.

The second 16 board stanza saw Terry Brown & Ian Thomson replace David and Peter.

Board 27 was the biggest Indian pickup so far. Ian & Terry sold out to 3S when they could make 4H. 3S could be beaten but made 9 tricks. 11 IMPs to India.

Australia hit back on Board 29 where Ian & Terry defended 3C for 2 down and +200 while Michael & Paul defended 4S for 2 down as well for another +200. Nett +400 was worth 9 IMPs.

At the end of the stanza Australia had picked up another 3 IMPs 31 to 28. Australia had a lead of 22.5 IMPs going into the final stanza.

Australia chose to remain with the same lineup for the last 16 boards.

Board 1 went well for Australia. Ian & Terry did well to make 4S. At the other table Michael & Paul doubled 4S and beat it one trick. I'm not sure what the play was at either table. Double dummy 10 tricks were available but looking at the hand it was not simple. 11 IMPs in and a lead of 33.5 with 15 to go.

The next 10 boards were relatively flat so with 5 boards to go Australia led by 30.5.

Board 11 Ian & Terry played 2H in a 5-2 fit with a combined 26 HCP. 3NT and 5C were both makeable so this was 7 IMPs away when India bid 3NT. Australia lead by 23.5 with 4 to go.

Board 13 Ian & Terry played 4C for +170 when a slam was available in hearts or clubs with a combined 25 HCP. This was a loss of 11 IMPs when India bid 4H for 680. Australia lead by 12.5 with 3 to go. The home town supporters are getting hopeful!

Board 14 was flat.

Board 15 was a part score swing to India for 5 IMPs. Australia lead by 7.5 with one hand to go.

Board 16 was played first in the open room. Ian and Terry bid to 5C and were doubled for -800 when the contract went three down.

When Michael bid 5D the Indian commentators on Viewgraph thought that the Indians had come from behind. These hopes were quickly dashed when West bid 5S. The defence against 5SX slipped a little but still resulted in 800 for an exciting flat board.

Australia hung on to win by 7.5 IMPs. Congratulations to our team. A great debut at this level for David Hudson.

The Bronze Medal Playoff: Australia A v Hong Kong China A

The Hong Kong team had a carry forward of 6.5 IMPs.

The first 16 boards went largely in Australia's favour.

The exception was Board 10. Matthew Thomson & Cathryn Herden for Australia would have been disappointed not to reach slam. The Hong Kong pair bid to the grand slam. This was probably quite a good contract and with a friendly layout 13 tricks were easy. 17 IMPs to Hong Kong.

Despite this Australia won the set 36 to 28 to lead by 1.5 after the carry forward was applied.

The second 16 boards saw 54 IMPs traded but the score was 27-27. Australia lead by 1.5 with 16 boards to go.

The final 16 was very one-sided with Australia dominating 81 to 9 to run out victors by 73.5 IMPs.

Congratulations for the Bronze medal go to Matthew Thomson & Cathryn Herden, Sebastian Yuen & Christy Geromboux and Maurits van der Vlugt & Dagmar Neumann.

Womens Pairs

The Womens Pairs was played as a complete round-robin due to the disappointingly low entry.

Congratulations to Barbara Travis and Lori Smith who won gold for Australia. Full results are here.

Mens Pairs

George & I and our teammates Fraser & Joe both qualified for the finals of the Mens Pairs. Generally in international events pairs from the same country play in the first round to avoid 'chucking' late in the event. So we started against them.

Board 1:

My 2S opening was a bit out there. In favour: Dealer, not vulnerable, good spades, no defence outside. Against: only 5 card suit, 4 of the other major.

On the diamond lead I could have played for 10 tricks by cashing 2 top diamonds and ruffing a diamond in my hand. Drawing trumps ending in the dummy then cashing my winning diamonds. This relied on diamonds and spades both breaking 3-2 with the short diamonds being in the same hand as the long trumps. Since it looked as though they could make at least 9 tricks in clubs I was focussed on not going more than a couple down. I played a heart from the dummy and ended up with 9 tricks.

Hand 2:

Joe's 3NT bid was a little enthusiastic! He won the H lead and finessed the SJ. When this lost he went 6 down for -300!

Hand 3:

We had a slightly convoluted auction to 4H. This turned out to be best for us. In Australia, Joe's 2C overcall is fairly mainstream. In many other countries overcalling 2 of a minor shows a six card suit or a better hand. In this case the overcall warned us off 3NT and resulted in the 4-3 heart game.

Hand 4:

George had to decide whether to play safe for 8 tricks by playing out clubs late in the hand or playing a trump hoping that they broke 3-3. He played a trump - if they had broken 4-2 he would have made no more tricks. When they broke 3-3 he made 9 tricks.

Remarkably this was 40/40 matchpoints for us in the first round. It's pretty rare to score 100% over 4 boards. Later in the event the organisers might have been suspicious!

Strangely we were not able to keep up this rate for the rest of the event. We finished 2nd for a Silver Medal, Fraser and Joe ended in 5th. Full results here.

The Australian Team as a whole performed creditably in the 5th Asian Cup with 2 Gold, 1 Silver and 1 Bronze. The official medal tally on the website shows Australia as second to Honk Kong China however it seems to have missed the bronze medal. If counted Australia finish first! Seems like a steward's enquiry is in order!

update An email to the event organiser from David Fryda at the ABF seems to have done the trick.

The TBA Committee met on June 9th from 2.45pm. Present were Julie Rhodes (P), John Grosvenor (VP), Leigh Blizzard (T), Trish Colles (S), Sue Falkingham, Pam Murphy, Paul Fredheim, Hugh Grosvenor and Laura Bauermeister. The following matters were discussed:

Coming Up – Eastcoaster Weekend in Orford

On August 29th and 30th we’ll be running our fourth Eastcoaster Swiss Pairs event. As the name suggests, it is held at the Eastcoaster Resort near Orford. It is a great opportunity for a different weekend of bridge set on the beautiful East Coast of Tasmania. The entry fee includes morning tea and lunch on the first day as well as three sessions of bridge. We also hold a three course dinner on the Saturday night which can be entered as a separate event on MyABF. Play kicks off at 10.00am on the Saturday and is all over by around 1.00pm on Sunday. There are prizes awarded in all categories subject to the number of entries. There is generally also a lucky door prize donated by the Eastcoaster Resort.

A range of accommodation options are available at the resort from single rooms to 3 bedroom cabins so you can stay with your friends, family or partner if you like. Mention bridge when you are booking with the resort and they will give you a good rate.

Building Extension

As many of you know, we have been working on a plan for many years to improve our club facilities by adding an extension at the rear which will include an office/utility room, a member’s recreation area and a better kitchen. In addition, the Vera Houdek room and existing kitchen will be combined and extended to provide an additional teaching/playing room to provide greater flexibility with scheduling of Beginners Classes or additional playing sessions.

This was costed at approximately $ 800,000 a couple of years ago, and the TBA has (unsuccessfully) applied for several types of government assistance to enable us to progress the work. We have approximately $ 500,000 set aside for the extensions including a bequest of the late Ron Spencer for $ 200,000.

We have recently discovered than an alternative building approach by Tasbuilt involving off site manufacturing may provide an affordable solution for us and are currently investigating this.

If the quote and design from Tasbuilt offers us a viable solution, we will call a special meeting of Club Members to approve the project, as there will be inconvenience from pile driving, and we will need to close the club whilst the new extension is joined to our existing club. We will post the amended design and quote as soon as it is available.

ABF Online Club Knockout event

This event is scheduled to commence in July and the TBA has been quite successful in it in the past. Teams are categorised according to the Masterpoint level of their most experienced member and can participate in the Open, Under 750, Under 300, Under 150 and Under 50 category.

Events are run monthly at night via Real Bridge, and the TBA pays for the team entry fees. Consequently, any winnings are retained by the TBA to go towards the entry fees for next year.

If you would like to participate in this event, please register you interest with Sue Falkingham.

Suggestion Box

There were several suggestions from Members this month and we are responding to each of them :

• We won’t be welcoming puppies/dogs to the TBA unless they are designated companion animals.
• We now have 5 of the specially requested black chairs.
• We will purchase two chairs with arms for people that need assistance in this way
• The TBA has a sophisticated air conditioning system. We should all recognise that it is impossible to provide a temperature which suits everyone You will all realise that some people are wearing a T Shirt at the table whilst others are rugged up! Rather than nag the Director, or complain about the temperature, please ensure your own personal comfort by wearing layers of clothes which you can add or remove as appropriate. This is the Tassie way.

Free Coffee for Dealers

As a thank you for our dealing team, we have decided that if they wish, they can request a coffee machine token from the Director on duty which will be provided free of charge.

A reminder that you can purchase coffee machine tokens if you don’t have a $ 2 coin in your pocket!

Youth Bridge

We are going to establish a Youth Bridge program over the next 12 months, leading up to the ANC in July 2027 which will be held in Hobart. If you have a young person in your life who you think would like to learn bridge, please contact myself, or Sue Falkingham, and we will endeavour to include them in this program.

New Members

We welcome the following new and reactivated members to our club and wish them all the best on their bridge journey : Mel Croft, Liam Croft (Youth), William Keyte and Jan Sheen.

Bridge Etiquette – Kindness (Again!)

Just a brief reminder to be kind and respectful to everyone at the table. We want people to enjoy their visits to the club and to tell their friends how fantastic bridge is as both as a brain stimulating hobby and as a family.

Julie Rhodes
President