[AL78]

mikeh, on 2024-July-24, 18:26, said:

I do recognize that my situation differs from yours in many ways…the most important likely being that in my town (population along 400,000) we have two thriving clubs averaging around 29 tables 4 times a week. We also have 7 grand life masters (neither I nor my partner amongst them) and 10 players with one or more national titles. We’re I playing in a 3-4 table game with zero good players, id probably quit and go online. But that is irrelevant to the idea of trying to decide ‘what the right result should be’. It’s not possible unless everyone always has identical information at every decision point and that often wont be the case pm nor should it be. We open 1N, nv, on a balanced 10 count. Two days ago, in a NABC team game I held A10xx Kx Jxx Qxxx. Partner opened 1N and we played 1N xx making on a strip-squeeze endplay for +560. At the other table. Our teammates played in 1N the other way, making. Was that luck? How would our hypothetical luck remover deal with this?

I admire your ability to laugh off any bad luck but that is an emotional weakness of mine, I'm finding frustration gets too much and I am allowing the game to bring the worst out of me, so it is time to put an end to it by getting myself out of that environment. The very high variance in results despite trying my best leaves me wondering what the point is. When I get over 70% in one session then 36% in the next session with the same partner it all seems pointless. There are parallels with allotment gardening where I started off getting decent productivity during the first few years but have since had seven consecutive years of very poor cropping, the UK's weather frequently throwing out locked in weather patterns which play havoc with my seedlings through drought or slug infestations from prolonged wet periods, and as such I am considering if it is worth the effort any more.

[pescetom]

AL78, on 2024-July-26, 10:59, said:

I admire your ability to laugh off any bad luck but that is an emotional weakness of mine, I'm finding frustration gets too much and I am allowing the game to bring the worst out of me, so it is time to put an end to it by getting myself out of that environment. The very high variance in results despite trying my best leaves me wondering what the point is. When I get over 70% in one session then 36% in the next session with the same partner it all seems pointless. There are parallels with allotment gardening where I started off getting decent productivity during the first few years but have since had seven consecutive years of very poor cropping, the UK's weather frequently throwing out locked in weather patterns which play havoc with my seedlings through drought or slug infestations from prolonged wet periods, and as such I am considering if it is worth the effort any more.

Unless you are obscenely agile you should have noticed some health benefits from your efforts in the allotment.
Club bridge does for your logic and memory what gardening does for your back and hands, I suggest it would be foolish to give up either just because the produce seems random.

[barmar]

AL78, on 2024-July-22, 06:49, said:

Some of the running monthly competitions at my club are handicapped and that is a small bone of contention with me as sometimes I get the impression the handicaps are overly biased towards weak players winning. I say this (partly) because in one of these competitions a couple of years ago, my partner and I had a handicap of -8 whereas our combined NGS was much less than 58% and my partner's NGS had been on a downward trend. This meant that in a field of three or four tables, there were occasions on individual sessions where we needed a gross score near 70% in order to win, which pretty much makes winning impossible.

That's the whole point of handicaps. The good players have to play exceptionally well to overcome the handicaps.

Why have handicapped games? Imagine an amateur tennis player is playing against Serena Williams. If she's able to play her normal game, it will be a total bloodbath. The amateur will probably not even be able to return any of her serves. So to give the amateur a fighting chance, we give her a handicap: make her play left-handed, force her to use a loosely strung racket, etc.

Another way to view this is that it rewards players for playing above expectations. If the handicaps are perfectly calculated, you'll get a tie if everyone plays at their normal ability.

This type of thing is also used when calculating ratings in chess. If a grandmaster beats a beginner, their rating doesn't go up much (if at all), since they were expected to win. But if the beginner wins, their rating goes up significantly.

[barmar]

AL78, on 2024-July-22, 06:42, said:

I wish. I have to bust a gut to get over 50% at my club which is a very mixed field with four or five tables usually when I play, although that possibly indicates I am at the lower end of the distribution of standards.

Unfortunately, small games like this have very high variance. We say that luck gets factored out in the long run, but things don't match expectations as much with small numbers.

This is why important tournaments play more boards with larger fields. As the numbers go up, luck falls into the noise. There are occasional upsets in major team tournaments like the Spingold, but the underdogs practically never make it very far into the event. Actual talent always wins out, and by the time you get to the quarter-finals, there are no nobodies left.

[helene_t]

awm, on 2024-July-21, 08:41, said:

The best solution to this problem is to play more team games. This tends to remove the "strength of the field" component since it's all about what you and/or your teammates do at the table.

Yes but then a big part of your score will be down to the luck of drawing good teammates, and that is something that doesn't even out even if you play gazzilions of boards. People talk about the strengths of pairs and individuals. The strength of a team is generally less interesting, partly because bridge isn't really a team sport (the score of a team is rather like the aggregate of the two pairs), partly because pairs change teammates all the time.

As for reducing the variance in pairs event: One thing that is sometimes done is comparing the table score to an external frequency table, usually by playing boards that have previously been played in a strong field but I have also seen it using computer play as frequency tables, or the organisers just make the frequencies up. It doesn't remove the randomness that is due to opps (and partner's !) silliness but it does remove most of the field randomness. You probably wouldn't use something like that for serious competition, but it makes some sense for educational events.

For evaluation of your own progress, the score from a single 24-board session is too random to be useful. The robot events on BBO are less random but MikeH says that robot bridge isn't real bridge and of course he has a point. You can then play BridgeMaster and bidding contests. That isn't real bridge either but it does capture some specific aspects of bridge which you might want to focus on for some training sessions.

Also, the post-mortem in the pub is an essential part of bridge if you want to use the sessions for training, and for that purpose the score doesn't matter.

[mycroft]

On mistakes: anyone who makes 2 or fewer mistakes in a session of bridge is a prodigy. Anyone who *averages* two or fewer mistakes in a session of bridge will likely be a world champion one day - because world champions make more, effectively every session.

Now, people who make 2 or fewer mistakes *they recognize as mistakes* - yeah, that happens a lot. It's still impressive, and a laudable goal to aim for. 2 mistakes that mattered, even.

But it's likely, at least at club level, 2 or fewer mistakes *a hand* is more likely. Now, maybe that mistake is "should have played the 9 instead of the 7, but didn't matter this time" or "better to tell partner about the shift suit than the led suit" or "It was fine this time, but if partner had had ... we would have been down. I could have ... and found that out". Or even "this time it would have been better to blast and put the defence to a guess."

And that's not counting the "oh, should have counted the diamonds" or "what heart did partner pitch?" or "did I see the 7?" that *should* have gone away after 20 years, but is a big reason why the pros win against the club champions.

In fact, I tell newer players with promise that "there will come a time when it feels like you're going backwards - that you're making more mistakes than you did last year. That likely won't be true; what is happening is that your ability to notice mistakes is going up faster than your skill at not making them. You'll be making fewer, and higher quality, mistakes than before - but you'll be seeing things you currently don't think are wrong."

[mikeh]

Tge way I’ve described one’s journey as an improving bridge player is to liken it to going on a hike…you start off climbing a hill….from the starting point, the crest appears to be the highest place there is…so you become satisfied as you approach the crest…maybe you’re starting to consistently reach or break average at your club.

But when you reach the crest,you see another hill ahead….a higher crest…up you go….as you near that crest, maybe you’re beginning to win the occasional club game and maybe some of the stronger players are chatting with you and maybe even offering to play a session.

But of course, as you reach each crest, there’s another hill ahead. Very few reach the final crest…Hamman, on being asked what it felt like to master the game, reportedly said: I’ll tell you if I ever do. That from the p,Ayer widely regarded as the GOAT, asked when he was at the height of his powers.

Part of the beauty of the game is that no matter how good you are, you can strive to be better, yet at the same time every player has the chance to enjoy reaching the peak of the hill they’re currently climbing. And for many, it’s the scenery…the company, the social aspect…not the hill climbing…that’s important.

[johnu]

helene_t, on 2024-July-28, 01:16, said:

For evaluation of your own progress, the score from a single 24-board session is too random to be useful.

I'll never forget the time I played with a friend of mine who is an excellent player in a 2 session pair game. We didn't make any obvious mistakes, had some luck that went our way, and my friend thought we had a 60+ percent game and would be among the leaders going to the 2nd session. When the scores came out, we scored in the low 40's. My friend was outraged and thought our scores had been messed up somehow. I was just amused.

I agree about the post mortems. If you don't recognize that you have weak spots in your game, you can't work to strengthen them. And it helps to have more unbiased viewpoints other than your partner to tell you where you went wrong, or offer alternative lines of strategy.

There's a quote attributed to the famous American football coach Vince Lombardi that goes “Practice does not make perfect. Only perfect practice makes perfect.” This quote has made its way into the golf world, where millions of golfers around the world spend hours banging balls at the range without a real clue about what they are trying to accomplish, in the meantime reinforcing their bad swing techniques.

[mikeh]

johnu, on 2024-July-28, 20:02, said:

I'll never forget the time I played with a friend of mine who is an excellent player in a 2 session pair game. We didn't make any obvious mistakes, had some luck that went our way, and my friend thought we had a 60+ percent game and would be among the leaders going to the 2nd session. When the scores came out, we scored in the low 40's. My friend was outraged and thought our scores had been messed up somehow. I was just amused.

I agree about the post mortems. If you don't recognize that you have weak spots in your game, you can't work to strengthen them. And it helps to have more unbiased viewpoints other than your partner to tell you where you went wrong, or offer alternative lines of strategy.

There's a quote attributed to the famous American football coach Vince Lombardi that goes “Practice does not make perfect. Only perfect practice makes perfect.” This quote has made its way into the golf world, where millions of golfers around the world spend hours banging balls at the range without a real clue about what they are trying to accomplish, in the meantime reinforcing their bad swing techniques.

My golf coach says ‘practice makes permanent*. Unfortunately I’d practiced my horrible swing far too often😀

[johnu]

mikeh, on 2024-July-29, 04:56, said:

My golf coach says ‘practice makes permanent*. Unfortunately I’d practiced my horrible swing far too often😀

Right, I could also have used "Practice does not make perfect. Practice makes permanent. Repeat the same mistakes over and over, and you don't get any closer to Carnegie Hall." the first part of which I first heard years ago from a golf instructor at a weekend clinic. But I don't get the chance to quote from Vince Lombardi very often.😀

Another quote "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.", sometimes incorrectly attributed to Albert Einstein, also applies to golf, and bridge, and a lot of other things.

[AL78]

 pescetom, on 2024-July-26, 15:47, said:

Unless you are obscenely agile you should have noticed some health benefits from your efforts in the allotment.
Club bridge does for your logic and memory what gardening does for your back and hands, I suggest it would be foolish to give up either just because the produce seems random.

It is not foolish to at least consider giving up if it is now a grind and something to endure rather than being enjoyable as it used to be, which is what bridge has become for me. The quality of the game has dropped to the point where it is difficult to enjoy it in the way I used too. I'm not yet planning on giving up gardening, my failures there are partly due to several years of adverse weather conditions alongside self inflicted factors.

[AL78]

 mikeh, on 2024-July-28, 19:23, said:

Tge way I’ve described one’s journey as an improving bridge player is to liken it to going on a hike…you start off climbing a hill….from the starting point, the crest appears to be the highest place there is…so you become satisfied as you approach the crest…maybe you’re starting to consistently reach or break average at your club.

But when you reach the crest,you see another hill ahead….a higher crest…up you go….as you near that crest, maybe you’re beginning to win the occasional club game and maybe some of the stronger players are chatting with you and maybe even offering to play a session.

But of course, as you reach each crest, there’s another hill ahead. Very few reach the final crest…Hamman, on being asked what it felt like to master the game, reportedly said: I’ll tell you if I ever do. That from the p,Ayer widely regarded as the GOAT, asked when he was at the height of his powers.

Part of the beauty of the game is that no matter how good you are, you can strive to be better, yet at the same time every player has the chance to enjoy reaching the peak of the hill they’re currently climbing. And for many, it’s the scenery…the company, the social aspect…not the hill climbing…that’s important.

Interesting hiking analogy. One of my hobbies is hiking up hills/mountains and there are some similarities to bridge, although I am a lot better at hiking than bridge. If I am aiming for a summit, it might be a bit tough during the ascent but I at least have the knowledge that the climb is well within my capabilities; however, if the weather should take a turn for the worst, I have no problem with abandoning the hike and turning around. The hill will be there for another day and I find it somewhat pointless to slog up a hill just to get a view of the back of my hand. Bridge had gone somewhat like that, there are occasions when it is fun but many times it is really not enjoyable and I want to get out of there and back home, but unlike hiking I can't do that. At least a bridge session is a lot shorter than a hike. COVID has all but destroyed the social aspect hence 3-4 table club sessions, and one or two of those who do turn up I find antagonistic.

[mycroft]

Heh. I like the other quote attributed to Hamman (the way I heard the story, in court as a witness): "I am not a good bridge player. I am a bad bridge player. It's just that everyone else is worse."

Hiking: School hiking trips and summer camp ruined my knees at 16. Going up hills is just fine. Tiring, but fine. Going *down*, however, hurts - and if I do too much of it, it will stay hurting for a week. So I walk, sure, but avoid hills I will eventually have to descend.

[pescetom]

 AL78, on 2024-August-09, 06:07, said:

Interesting hiking analogy. One of my hobbies is hiking up hills/mountains and there are some similarities to bridge, although I am a lot better at hiking than bridge. If I am aiming for a summit, it might be a bit tough during the ascent but I at least have the knowledge that the climb is well within my capabilities; however, if the weather should take a turn for the worst, I have no problem with abandoning the hike and turning around. The hill will be there for another day and I find it somewhat pointless to slog up a hill just to get a view of the back of my hand.

 mycroft, on 2024-August-09, 09:24, said:

Hiking: School hiking trips and summer camp ruined my knees at 16. Going up hills is just fine. Tiring, but fine. Going *down*, however, hurts - and if I do too much of it, it will stay hurting for a week. So I walk, sure, but avoid hills I will eventually have to descend.

Maybe because I am much better at riding or even running up mountains than playing bridge, but I fully identify with the analogy of mikeh. Respecting the weather or your knees is fine, but the aim is to get to the top and while the recognition that the peak is higher than it appeared is not welcome, it is not a a deterrent either.

[AL78]

 mycroft, on 2024-August-09, 09:24, said:

Heh. I like the other quote attributed to Hamman (the way I heard the story, in court as a witness): "I am not a good bridge player. I am a bad bridge player. It's just that everyone else is worse."

Hiking: School hiking trips and summer camp ruined my knees at 16. Going up hills is just fine. Tiring, but fine. Going *down*, however, hurts - and if I do too much of it, it will stay hurting for a week. So I walk, sure, but avoid hills I will eventually have to descend.

I have reached the age where this happens to me, specifically in the knees on the descents. If I am hiking up hills/mountains I now always use poles, they work wonders for reducing the force going through the knees on each step downhill.

[AL78]

 pescetom, on 2024-August-09, 15:35, said:

Maybe because I am much better at riding or even running up mountains than playing bridge, but I fully identify with the analogy of mikeh. Respecting the weather or your knees is fine, but the aim is to get to the top and while the recognition that the peak is higher than it appeared is not welcome, it is not a a deterrent either.

For me, the initial aim is to go for the summit but overriding that target is the requirement to avoid taking dodgy risks and to enjoy the walk. If either of those requirements are not met, I turn back. The summit will be there for next time.