Norwegian bridge festival by Team Funbridge

Team Funbridge in Norway

Friday : Christian Lahrmann

Saturday : Sofie Graesholt Sjødal

Sunday : Federica Dalpozzo

Monday : Valentina Dalpozzo

Tuesday : Léo Rombaut

Team Funbridge in Norway

New challenge for the Team Funbridge after its first trips of the year to Alpe d’Huez, to the Marit Sveaas tournament in Bodø, Norway and to the Transnational Youth World Championship in Poland in Wrocław. Follow their new adventures in Norway on this page!

Friday

Christian Lahrmann alias
CHRIS

Hi, Christian here, number 1 on Team Funbridge. Today we are going to Norway (Lillehammer) to play mixed pairs for 2 days and mixed teams for 2 days. Leo and I picked up Federica and Valentina at Copenhagen airport, and then we had an 8-hour drive to Lillehammer. We discussed systems a lot in the car to be ready for the tournament. We were all very tired when we arrived at 18.30, but Federica and I decided to play a warm-up tournament of 24 boards starting at 19.00. We started very well and were in the top 3. Unfortunately, the last round was not the best, so we came 4th, but it was a solid start for the mixed.

One funny hand from today. I hold ♠xxxx ♥Q10xxxxx ♦x ♣J. We are green-against-red.

Federica passed in first position, the right-hand opponent bid 1♦, now I thought they would probably make slam, so I tried to psyche 1NT. If partner jumps to 3NT, I have a back-up plan in 4H. Opponents didn’t realise my psyche, and we got to play in 4♥ undoubled -2 when we had 12 points in combined hands.

Saturday

Sofie Graesholt Sjødal alias
SOFIE

We have now finished the first day of play in the Norwegian bridge festival in Lillehammer. All the Funbridge players are playing mixed pairs, Léo is playing with Valentina, Christian with Federica, and Nicolai and Sofie have non-Funbridge partners.

Nicolai started very well and was leading during the second session. He is currently doing the best of the Funbridge players.

We are now done with 2/3 of the tournament, having played 60 boards. Tomorrow we will play the last 30 boards, let’s hope the Funbridge players can climb up to the podium!

Sofie and her partner had a nice bidding up to 7NT in this hand:
The contract was easy to play once the Spades broke 3-1 or better. They were one of 17 tables to bid it.
Sofie has dressed up for the tournament and painted her nails with the Funbridge logo, let’s hope that brings her and the others some luck!

(1) 22-24
(2) cue-bid
(3) Exclusion blackwood
(4) 2 Aces, not including Clubs
(5) All Aces and SQ, need some more for grand

Sunday

Federica Dalpozzo alias
FEDERICA

Today was the last pairs day. Christian and I didn’t finish very well yesterday, we were 71st in the rankings, but Vale and Leo started in a good position. It was only one round of 30 boards.

Between some good hands and bad ones, Christian and I started having good results and climbing in the rankings. At first, we were at table 55, and we played the last match at table 14 or so (I don’t remember the number).

Unlike us, Vale and Leo, who had started in a good position, have fallen due to bad luck and some misunderstandings. At a certain point, there was the definitive overtaking, me and Christian at table 18 and them against Nicolai and Ella at table 19 (but it was not a race 🤫).

Anyway, we saved the tournament even if we didn’t reach the podium and we were happy about it.

After lunch, cooked as a mix of Italian and French style, we just spent our afternoon speaking about the boards and watching the Olympic Games.

A nice board of the day is that one:

♠A8xx ♥KJ10xx ♦xx ♣Qx

These are my cards.

All vulnerable, the bidding went 1♥ on my right. I passed, hoping for a double by Christian, but it never happens of course. Pass on my left and Christian bid 2♣, pass by the opponent and I bid 2NT and he bid 3NT.

After a spade lead I saw the dummy.

♠109 ♥9x ♦AKxx ♣AK10xx

I took the third round and played a diamond to the Ace and 9 of Hearts. The opponent put small, so I played small too and made the trick, I played Hearts again and, unfortunately, he put the Ace, so now I know that I have to guess the Clubs. She played ♦Q, so I supposed she had a 3542 and I had already seen 12 points, so I took with the King and played a club to the Queen. I cashed the King of Hearts and after some hesitation I played a club to the 10. 10 tricks for us and a sigh of relief!

Monday

Valentina Dalpozzo alias
VALENTINA

Hi, Valentina here! Today we started to play the mixed teams event. 76 teams have signed up to play, and today we have 8 rounds of 7 boards.
The line-up for the beginning is Leo and me at one table and Sofie and Nicolai at the other.
We have a good start, losing 0 IMPs but winning only 9, so 13.65 VPs at the end.
Second round, me and Leo were not playing and unfortunately our teammates lost by 11 IMPs.
Third round is a really good one and we mark 37-0, gaining 19.68 VPs and the last round before lunch we have a close win, 22-17 IMPs.
First and second round of the afternoon were not really good, indeed we lost by 8 IMPs and then by 6 IMPs.
We are back winning the 7th round of the day 12-4 IMPs but we finish the day losing again by 8 IMPs. We are 27th right now, but there are still 4 rounds to go!

Here is an unlikely board from round 4 played by Leo and me:

The bidding starts with 1♥ by Leo, pass on my right, I bid game-forcing 2♦, pass, Leo bids 2♥, pass, I bid 2♠, Leo bids 3♦ showing 3-card support, so I bid 3♠ waiting, he bids 4♥ and then I ask for Aces with 4NT, he gives me 1 Ace with 5♣ and I ended the bidding with 6♦.

The opponent leads a small spade. I take with the Ace and then I play the ten of Hearts to the King in dummy. Right now, if Diamonds are 3-2 or if Hearts are 3-3, I make 12 tricks but unfortunately that is not the case.

The only chance to make the contract is to finesse the Jack of Hearts.

Tuesday

Léo Rombaut alias
LÉLÉ

It’s Léo, we are still in Lillehammer for our last day of competition. Yesterday we played 8 matches and we scored 86 VPs, so a bit better than the average. Not so good but could be worse. 4 more matches to play for this second day.

We started the first match of the day with Federica and Christian (I’m playing this event with Valentina); we lost by a little: 12-17. Federica had an unlucky board where she played well, but we lost 9 instead of winning 9. And with Vale we were really fair play with our opponents because on one board I could have played in 1♦XX but the opponent had a slip, so we let him bid something. There are probably 8 tricks in 1♦, so that would have been expensive for them.

We sat out for the second match of the day; I trusted my friends to win a lot of IMPs. They scored a small win by 10 IMPs. For the last 2 matches we had very similar results: we won by 11 and 13 IMPs, which let us finish at the 15th place. With only 15 VPs behind the second it was really close; the bad luck at the end yesterday cost a lot. But we had a lot of fun to play all together, at the end with Vale we started to understand each other better and it was a pleasure to play with her. The Italian system is quite different from the French one; they play the 2♦ opening as 18-19 balanced, no support double, Puppet Stayman over 1NT and, of course, Italian discards!

After we finished, Christian and Nico were playing the pair event, so they ate their lunch fast and restarted to play another event. For the two girls and me it was a free afternoon and the weather was not so bad, so we decided to go to a nice lake only 2 min away from the bridge facility. It was really nice, but the water was too cold for the Italians, ha ha! I was the only one to go in, I train a little for the Olympics diving ha ha!

One board was funny, Vale opened in 2nd seat, favorable vulnerability, a 15-17 1NT with a 17-count and 5 Spades – she played mixed of course, she had really bad 17 and really a hand to play in No-trump. It went pass-pass-pass. I put the dummy down with a 9 for the best card. Vale had just gone three down on the previous board, I said: “I will understand if you do again two undertricks ha ha”. She went three off, she didn’t score her Ace but it was still a very good board because the opponents could bid 4H and make five. So we lost 300, and our teammates came back with 5HX making, +850 and 11 IMPs for us.