[awm]

I've found that the Bridge Master hands are a wonderful resource for players wanting to improve their skills. Recently I've talked to several advancing players who use BBO fairly regularly, and who were not aware of the existence of the Bridge Master hands. I told them, obviously, about the hands.

But it struck me that there may be a large number of bridge players using BBO who would like to improve their play and are unaware of the Bridge Master hands. An occasional ad for these when people log in could be a great service to the community, and might also make a bit of money for BridgeBase (since some of the people who use the Bridge Master free hands will go on to purchase more hands).

[mike777]

ok...my play is at best int. level...

What should I buy and how much does it cost..and does it work and how does it work?

I mean this seriously....how do I know if it is improving me?
In other words, how do I measure it?

[PedroG]

mike777, on Jan 13 2008, 09:41 PM, said:

ok...my play is at best int. level...

What should I buy and how much does it cost..and does it work and how does it work?

I mean this seriously....how do I know if it is improving me?
In other words, how do I measure it?

Hi Mike,

This is independent on Level... and checking it properlly also independent on Bridge Master...

I use the Offline version...What I did is I went over all the hands and made them reading the comments so trying and when wrong or right reading comments on the hands...

Then I go back and do all the hands at once, like if they were presented to me on a table, no undo's the only advantage is no time constraint...

First the first step to the second I waited something like 15 days, you can buy several re-charges if you don't want to wait, or divide or move to level above... The thing is not reading one day and making it in the other, to fresh memories at least for me.

U see how many hands you get wrong, if no wrong's, it's perhaps best to move up a level.

If u get some wrong, do that level again with a 15 days interval, and see how many at that time

I keep a excel spreadsheet with the results, what hands I went wrong and the reson why, this will give me a ideia of what areas to work on...

I sometimes do the same thing but with subject related...

I'm waiting on my recharges

One thing I would like was that the deal bought on-line and off-line could be interchanged, meaning that If I had bought a off-line I could play them on-line...

TY
PEdro

[awm]

The bridgemaster hands are nice in that most of them have a "theme" that you can recognize. The key is being able to recognize these themes at the table. Themes can be things like:

L1: Count the high-card points from the bidding.
L2: Keep the dangerous hand off lead.
L3: Play a particular suit-combination correctly.
L4: Execute some type of squeeze.
L5: Execute a "devil's coup" to avoid any trump losers.

The hope is that by practicing these hands, you will have seen these themes before and recognize them when they pop up at the table. Often if your play is improving, you will get a hand at the table and think "hey this is a hand where I need to XXXX" where XXXX could well be a theme from the bridge-master hands. They also get you thinking more about "what could go wrong" (finesses never seem to win, suits never seem to break, etc) rather than just assuming a moderately likely "favorable" position of the cards and playing for it.

One thing that a lot of people miss is that most of us can solve hands which are given to us "as problems" that are substantially more difficult than the things we'd get right in actual play. Sometimes it helps to do the same bridge master hands over again a few times (hopefully with a few months in between so you don't just "remember") until the themes become second nature rather than "something I could do if given a hand as a problem."

[mike777]

Thanks for feedback...anyone else use this and if so how?

[Codo]

I used them for myself and the low levels for my wife, a total newby. They are great and instructive for nearly all levels.

Okay maybe level 5 is too easy for Justin.

I play the hands about twiche a year or so, in this time some are forgotten, so it is like a new task. And it helps to improve my declarer play, because it helps to focus on counting, seeing themes, getting ideas.

[Gerben42]

Level 5 is hard for anyone, I am sure of that.

What is nice about bridge master is that even as a great player you should sometimes go back to the hands that are below your level to keep your mind sharp. I heard that some do. I know I do even though I am not a "great player", and I find it very useful.

Nice Bridge Master hands are also in Martens' Virtual European Championship books. I'm not someone's marketing advisor but I see an opportunity here

[vuroth]

Thanks for the tip. Tried levels 1-3 last night.

What I really discovered is that, as soon as there's more than 1 plausible approach, I'm not very good at sorting out the best line from the inferior ones. On levels 2 and 3 I had a hard time seeing the superiority of the given line.

V

[kfay]

Mike-

Bridge master is amazing. I have used it for a few years now.

I'm not a very good declarer by any means but I've purchased all of the level-5 hands because they're so much fun. Frankly, they've introduced to me at least 8 or 9 coups or ways to think about declaring a hand that I never knew existed.

I really think I'm much better off for having used this program.

Kevin