GNYBA Winter League FAQ: Register While You Can

Posted on October 21, 2020 by Lee Lin

We have an amazing 20+ teams confirmed for the Winter League, with many more teams still forming. For now, we are welcoming all registrations, but we may need to limit entries in the coming days. A few frequently asked questions and answers…

How do I register a team for the GNYBA Winter League?

Go to this registration form. You may make changes to your roster all the way until the October 28th deadline, so there is no reason to delay. If you have a team ready to go, then claim a spot while you can!

What skill level are the teams that have registered?

The current teams represent a very good spread of skill levels. We will definitely have a bracket for Gold Rush and lower Mid-Flight teams. We have a bracket of teams competitive in Mini Spingold events. And we have a few teams with NABC+ level players!

Is there a partnership desk?

For now, we are taking names of individuals and pairs who do not have full teams, but we haven’t begun match-making yet. We might do so to fill out brackets near the deadline.

Are members from Long Island / Unit 242 invited?

Yes! Please register your teams. If we must limit teams eventually, teams with GNYBA members will receive priority. However, our friends in Unit 242 are very much welcome. To ensure a spot, register asap – you can still make changes to your roster later.

Who is organizing and directing the tournament?

GNYBA is sponsoring the tournament and fully subsidizing the cost. We have hired the same organizers that run world class online bridge tournaments. We will announce the vendor and partnership shortly.

Will winners receive ACBL Masterpoints?

Probably not this time. However, we plan to hold future tournaments in 2021 and we will seek an ACBL sanction for those events if possible. Teams that play in this tournament will likely get priority in our future events. Maybe even discounts to winners from this season…

What is the maximum number of teams?

Good news – the GNYBA board last night voted in favor of increasing the original budget given the high demand! We will eventually still need to limit the maximum team count to keep everything manageable for both our tournament vendor and the GNYBA organizers.

What’s the catch? Why is it free and who’s idea was It?

In our first post-pandemic GNYBA Board meeting, there was one seemingly innocent proposal and discussion (June 19th, 2020):

That was then, and this is now. First, let’s give thanks to Uday Ivatury, who had the initiative and foresight in early June to propose a friendly yet competitive online tournament. While we all hoped life would return back to normal by now, there have been very few options to play online teams – especially for casual players.

Next, Katherine Todd has shared her valuable experiences playing in the Online World Teams event. Also, our conditions of contest, vendor selection, and marketing efforts would not be possible without her hard work. Almost everyone first heard about the tournament through her e-mail flyer (if you didn’t get it, double check your ACBL privacy settings and address).

Of course, David Moss is always a treasure trove of wisdom for all things bridge, both in New York and around the world. In addition to giving advice on every aspect of the league, he ensured the idea would gracefully comply with GNYBA goals (ensuring our funding), as well as all things ACBL now and in the future.

Lastly, I am also one of the organizers, providing as much geek squad support as I can both on this page and offline. First off, we apologize ahead of time for the somewhat clunky registration form – sometimes we just need something that works with the lowest possible hassle, no need for overtricks! Team captains will be hearing quite a bit from me as we prepare brackets and matchups to our tournament vendor.

As always, reach out with your questions.

What are the conditions of contest?

We will default to general ACBL KO conditions of contest with a few exceptions.

To keep the games friendly and efficient, we will be very flexible regarding substitutes and playing time.  There are no playing requirements except that a player may only be on the official roster of one team.

We plan to allow ACBL Open+ Chart in the upper brackets and Basic+ in the lower brackets.

The regular season is 5 weeks long, each week consists of one round of a 5-round swiss. Each round is a 20-board match, IMPs scoring into a continuous 20 VP scale. Substitutes are allowed after the 10th board, but no player may switch compass directions. The first round is a random draw, future rounds follow typical swiss matchups with no playbacks.

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ACBL Side Game Overalls Not Stratified

Posted on October 18, 2020 by Lee Lin

My Howling Winds side game adventure, aka the 9:15pm side game, has been very educational and lots of fun! I could have played with a different partner daily, but for this regional, I was lucky to have 3 sessions with the same always-upbeat partner and friend.

Only Single Sessions Are Stratified

We can finally de-mystify how the side games work. It’s simple and a little unfortunate for limited players. Only the individual sessions are stratified. If your pair average masterpoints is under 500, then you are Strat C for the session. However, winning strat C, overall 1st across all sections, will only net you red points.

As usual, to win ACBL gold masterpoints, you need to win the overall award across multiple sessions, or win a section top in one session.

Unfortunately, overall awards are NOT stratified for a side game series. I can see why it is complicated – if I play twice with a pro and twice with a fellow non-life master, then which strat am I in for overalls?

A Good Source Of Red Points, Poor Source of Gold

For those trying to decide between Side Games and the normal Gold Rush and Mid-Flight events, here is my recommendation. If you don’t care about the pigments, side games are a reasonable source of red points. However, if you require gold points, you are better off with the Gold Rush or Mid-Flight event.

In strat B or C, you can win more than one red point with a score in the low or mid 50s. Two single-sessions pay more than one 2-session event, per the ACBL Masterpoints formula. And with each session independent, you get a great chance to rebound (we started the week with a 40.44%).

As stated above, overall awards are not stratified. You will not win gold unless you win a section top or achieve overalls among pros and world class players.

A Proposal to Stratify Overalls

Let’s go back to the example of playing four sessions in the side game: twice with a pro, once with a Strat B friend and once with a strat C friend. Say my results are:

Pro: 61%
Pro: 56%
B-friend: 55%
C-friend: 59%

In theory, the tournament could generate overalls for A, B, and C. Then players receive whichever overall gives them more points.

For Strat A, use 61% and 59%, my two best sessions.
For Strat B, use 59% and 55%, my two best B sessions.
For Strat C, I am not eligible, because I do not have two C sessions.

If I would have won more under the strat-B overalls, then give me that! For the series, if my single-session total is more than my overall scores, then give me the single-session total, but still award the partial gold that comes from the overall award.

Brush With Greatness (not really)

Finally, congrats to GNYBA members Shelley Mendelsohn and Amy Schottenstein for winning gold today with both overall first in C and section top in A. We also had a chance to “play against” Jeopardy James, who was also in our North-South field.

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GNYBA Winter League: Swiss Teams + KO Playoffs

Posted on October 15, 2020 by Katherine

We have some great news!

To help you cope in these COVID times, the GNYBA is bringing the excitement of team bridge to the comforts of your home. We are thrilled to announce the formation of the GNYBA Winter League!

The Winter League is a series of team matches that will take place on BBO over the course of several weeks. The first edition will begin November 1. Five matches (20 boards each) will determine which team(s) advance to the KO.

The hands will be pre-duplicated, hand records will be available afterwards, and you will hopefully recognize some (screen)names of your opponents — just like the old days. Act fast and get your team together!

*** GNYBA WINTER LEAGUE ****** NOVEMBER EDITION ***

What: 5 team matches, with a longer KO for qualifying teams; Each match will be 20 boards, starting at 7p Eastern.

Who: You and your friends. All levels welcome, in teams of 4-6 players.

When: 7p on Sundays November 1, 8, 15, 22, and 29

Where: BBO (where else?)

Why: Um, do you really have somewhere better to be? Don’t you need a break from matchpoints?

How: Pre-register your team HERE. We will bracket as best we can, so please sign up ASAP to help with this.

Pre-registration deadline: October 27, 2020

Cost: FREE. This one is on the house, GNYBA’s treat. You’ve been through enough this year!

Questions? Shoot ‘em: email thegnyba@gmail.com.
Alert: Details may change based on entrants

GNYBA looks forward to seeing you @BBO. Let the games begin!

Posted in ACBL News, Events | Tagged , | 5 Comments

More ACBL Gold Points: Oct 15-18 Fall Into Bridge

Posted on October 15, 2020 by Lee Lin

The second last online regional for 2020 begins tomorrow, with the usual stratified two-session pairs events each day, as well as many single-session side game series and newcomer games. And for those who like team games, stay tuned. In fact, check your email and this website in the next few days…

Here is a link to the Fall Into Bridge ACBL Schedule

Attempting The Side Games

This time around, the regional will be very different for me. Instead of my usual mid-flight and super mid-flight games, I will be trying the side-game gambit. As I mentioned, I recently switched to Asia hours, which makes a two-session event during US hours especially hard. Instead, my partners have agreed to play the 9:15pm ET side-game series, conveniently allowing me to play it as a morning game when there is a 12-hour time difference.

Technically, my series is the “Howling Wind Side Game Series”, and I appreciate the creativity from the tournament organizers. However, most of my partners just call it the 9:15pm side series. Hope to see folks there! Based on the past few regionals, the side game series is actually very hard to win – many world class pros seem to play it. I’m hoping the 1500 and 500 strats give me some relief.

Quick Primer On Side Games

A side game series combines your best two sessions by matchpoints percentage to determine overall award eligibility. For this regional, all side series are exactly 4 sessions, horizontally stacked at the same time from Thursday through Sunday.

Each starting time is a separate series. Your performance from 10:15am session does not impact your 2:15pm session. Instead, you need to play at least two of the 10:15am sessions to qualify for the overalls. If you play all four, you have a slight advantage, because you have four chances and they take your best two sessions.

Individual Performance Not Partnership Performance

Also, overalls are based on INDIVIDUAL performance. You can switch partners throughout, if you use the same partner each time, you should win together. However, if you play four sessions with two different partners, you might get a 65% and 40% with one, and a 63% and 50% with another. You would almost certainly win gold points because only the two best sessions count. However, your partners would not, unless they also played more sessions with other partners.

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Team Milman Wins GNT Flight A

Posted on October 9, 2020 by Lee Lin

We realize we left everyone in suspense for the GNT Flight A finals in our last four-flight GNT update. As a reminder, GNT Flight A is open to all District 24 residents as of September 2019 who had fewer than 6000 masterpoints, and uses the ACBL Open Chart for allowed methods and conventions (Flight B uses Basic+, and Flight C uses Basic).

Congratulations to Igor Milman, Oleg Rubinchik, Albert Shekhter, and Florin Neamtu for winning the 2019-2020 GNT-A Season. Each player will receive 40 gold pigmented masterpoints and a blue ribbon qualifier. Under the current CoC, defending champions also receive favorable seeding for next year.

For placing 2nd, the team of Bill Dinner, David Joseph, Dina Schechter, and Bart Cirker will each receive 30 gold pigmented masterpoints and a blue ribbon qualifier.

Normally, the winners would have represented New York City and Long Island in the national finals! However, due to the Montreal 2020 NABC cancellation, we will hold a new GNT District Final for next year. We welcome all teams to compete again!

More On Defending Champions and Favorable Seeding

In practice, the District GNT conditions of contest intentionally minimize the importance of seeding. However, there are cases where seeding matters. When exactly 8 teams show up, the conditions call for a 3 round KO in the championship flight. In all flights, when there are exactly 10 teams or 12+ teams, the teams are split into two groups of equal strength, with either 2 or 4 teams surviving in each group.

How do we determine groups of equal strength? For the championship flight, the director in charge and GNT coordinator formed a seeding committee that was familiar with the approximate strength of each team. In the lower flights, the director in charge and GNT coordinator seeded teams by team avg masterpoints. Seed 1, 3, 5, etc were in group 1, and Seed 2,4,6 etc were in group 2. However, when there were an odd number of total teams, the last seeded team was placed in group 2 (therefore, group 2 eliminated more teams after Day 1).

The GNT Committee for the 2020-2021 will review seeding rules and adjust as appropriate. Ideally, seeding would have zero impact by holding a full round robin in the opening round. However, full round robins require a match between all teams in the field, and squeezing in too many rounds into one day is impractical – either the day drags on too long or the rounds are too short. The national finals has 25+ teams on the opening day, and they choose an 8-round swiss with no playbacks to seed 16 KO survivors. We will discuss the pros and cons of each method in greater depth over the coming weeks, and we welcome feedback!

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Team Merlo Wins GNT Flight B

Posted on October 5, 2020 by Amy

The two teams remaining teams in the Flight B District Finals completed their final 52 board knockout last week. This marks the end of the entire 2019-2020 GNT season for our district!

Congratulations to Stefano Merlo, Jin Hu, Jordan Lampe, Chris Moh, and Robert Forster for winning the 2019-2020 GNT-B Season. Each player will receive 33.5 gold pigmented masterpoints and a blue ribbon qualifier. Under the current CoC, defending champions also receive favorable seeding for next year – but the new GNT committee will review seeding rules.

For placing 2nd, the team of Norman Trabulus, Charles Bilich, Barry Walfish, and Robert Kuhnreich will each receive 25.13 gold pigmented masterpoints and a blue ribbon qualifier.

As with Flight C, normally both teams would have represented New York City and Long Island in the GNT national finals during the summer NABC, with the winning team receiving a $1000 travel subsidy. However, with Montreal NABC and the national finals for 2020 cancelled, the district plans to run a new tournament for 2020 and 2021. All teams will be eligible again for next year to play in Flight B, even if the players now have over 2500 masterpoints. We hope to see many returning teams as well as new players – stay tuned for details.

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Team Liebhaber Wins GNT Flight C

Posted on September 28, 2020 by Amy

The two teams remaining teams in the Flight C District Finals played their final 26 board knockout last weekend, completing the 2019-2020 GNT season for non-life masters with 0-500 masterpoints.

Congratulations to Aaron Liebhaber, Adam Siegel, Lee Lin, and Frank Dinoff for winning the 2019-2020 GNT-C Season. Each player will receive 20 masterpoints, half gold half red, and a red ribbon qualifier. Under the current CoC, defending champions also receive favorable seeding for next year – but the new GNT committee will review seeding rules.

For placing 2nd, the team of Damon Suden, Anthony Chiocchi, Mary Ann Oehlerking, and Marla Lawson will each receive 15 masterpoints, half gold half red, and a red ribbon qualifier.

Normally, both teams would have represented New York City and Long Island in the GNT national finals during the summer NABC, with the winning team receiving a $1000 travel subsidy. However, with Montreal NABC and the national finals for 2020 cancelled, the district plans to run a new tournament for 2020 and 2021. All teams will be eligible again for next year. We hope to see many returning teams as well as new players – stay tuned for details.

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GNYBA Board Meeting 2020-09-22

Posted on September 26, 2020 by Bill Sigward

The GNYBA Board of Directors met on September 22, 2020. Go to the meeting minutes page for this and all prior board meeting minutes.

In Attendance (by ‘Zoom’)

V. Apter, J. Bayone, D. Garber, B. Gellas, J. Hu, U. Ivatury, P. Lentz, F. Levine, S. Levine,
L. Lin, Mark Mariaschin, J. Meyers, G. Miniter, R. Moller, D. Moss, A. Parrish, A. Rhodes,
A. Rudary, W. Sigward, A. Silverstein, K. Todd, N. Trabulus, J. Wank.

President’s Report
B. Gellas began with two ACBL-related items:

ACBL has announced they will not sanction in-person tournaments thru at least
February 2021 (regional tournaments). This decision does not restrict local bridge
clubs from opening or operating, if they choose to do so.

ACBL may begin to limit the number of regional tournaments that are held in a
calendar year. However, the ACBL will not interfere with 2021 tournaments a
particular district has already contractually scheduled. As a practical matter, it will
be in 2022 and beyond that the new limitations may be imposed. District Rep D.
Moss stated that there is ongoing discussion at ACBL on this topic, and there is a
sense that there are too many regionals being held. Due to pandemic-related
cancellations, the GNYBA at present has no future regional tournaments scheduled.
Tournament Report

Bonnie requested S. Levine to update the Board on the status of our tournaments and
relationship with the Hilton. Steve reported that we have successfully cancelled the
November 2021 Regional, with no financial penalty. In addition, the Hilton has agreed to
return our $13.5 thousand deposit which they have been holding following cancellation of
the May 2021 Regional. (The deposit is expected to be returned within the next two weeks.)
Steve also reported that GNYBA remains on very good terms with the Hilton; and that at
present we have no contracts in place with anyone.

Secretary’s Report / Nominating Committee Balloting

The Secretary reported results of the recent balloting to create the five-person Nominating
Committee which will develop a slate of candidates to work on the GNYBA Board in 2021.

The following Board Members were selected for the Committee:

Bonnie Gellas
Lee Lin
Gillian Miniter
David Moss
Adam Parrish

The two alternate members of the Committee will be: Amy Rhodes and Allison Rudary.
District Representative Report

D. Moss updated the Board on developments at the ACBL –

The ACBL’s ‘Future of Bridge’ Task Force concluded that the future would feature a
strong emphasis on on-line bridge; with face-to-face bridge accorded relatively less
importance. David stated the ACBL Board did not react well to the latter finding.
More to follow.

There have been no announcements regarding the scheduled NABC in St. Louis in
March 2021. The same is true for the Providence NABC in July 2021.

David stated that whereas not much has been done with respect to 2021 GNT’s, we at
GNYBA should assume there will be a GNT at Providence and proceed accordingly.
One key issue is whether our GNT should be face-to-face competition, or conducted
on-line (we will “wait and see” for now). David also expressed his thanks to A.
Rhodes for her terrific work managing the pandemic-impacted 2020 GNT’s.

Financially, the ACBL is doing fine; however, the future holds challenges. Among
them is the fact that membership in ACBL has been declining, and has declined
further since July of this year. As a result, there is a need to stabilize or reverse that
trend. Getting more people to play on-line would help.

Creating a group to promote bridge would also help. In subsequent discussion, A. Parrish suggested that holding an on-line New York event would be something worth trying; and the NYC bridge community might respond well to some kind of organized team event for New York participants. U. Ivatury volunteered to look into the feasibility of GNYBA
sponsoring such a team-oriented NYC event.

Other Business

Announcement was made of the result of the recent election for the District’s 2nd-Alternate
position. The winner was GNYBA Board Member Lee Lin. Lee will thus become a voting
member of the ACBL’s Board of Governors, and will also serve on the ACBL’s Master-point
Committee. D. Moss commented that Lee was one of two people he knew who best
understood the intricacies of ACBL master-point awards. Congratulations, Lee!

Next Board Meeting

The next Board Meeting will be held on Tuesday, October 20th.

Respectfully Submitted by
Bill Sigward,
Secretary of the Board September 24 , 2020

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All For One Gold Point Week Speedballs

Posted on September 21, 2020 by Lee Lin

I was excited for the special Gold Point Week for virtual clubs, less so for the points and more because it would bring back the extra special evening speedballs. In fact, we have stratified speedballs now:

Late night session:
 There will also be three late-night $10 18-board speedballs:
  0-499 starting at 9:00 pm. 
  0-1,250 starting at 9:05 pm.
  Open Game starting at 9:10 pm.

No More Speedball Love?

During the last silver linings week, the 9:30pm speedballs were incredibly popular and fun. As many of you know, I’m currently on Asia hours and these games are pretty much the only ones that fit my schedule.

Alas, for some reason, Day 1 does not bode well for the evening speedball. With 5 minutes to go, there are no entries in either All For One or the Alliance Game. Maybe it’s time to start hiding the number of entries, otherwise the appearance of a lack of critical mass makes people drop out?

But The Evening 0-1000 Game Was Huge

Turns out there was a big game, it just started 2 hours prior. An impressive 23 tables in the 0-1000 Gold game. Once again, we have a party in the James game. I wonder, how do we carry some of that energy over to the speedballs? Maybe the 9:30pm start time was actually better, because anyone who finished the evening game had a chance for a redemption speedball?

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Colony Club Wins Interclub 2019-2020 Playoffs

Posted on September 15, 2020 by Lee Lin

The Inter-Club Bridge League finished their 2019-2020 season today with a 5 round BAM playoffs. Congratulations to Kristen Swenson, Hee Jung Moon, Kitty Stanton, and Anna Haas representing the Colony Club, winning the playoffs with a score of 15.5 boards.

Final Playoffs Standings (Top 6 out of 19):

Colony Club
Harvard Club
University Club
Cosmopolitan Club
Regency Whist Club
New York Athletic Club

Shortened Season with Virtual Finish

Although the pandemic cut the regular season short by 2 matches, the league proceeded with playoffs qualifying the top 6 out of 19 teams from the season. Normally, the prior year winning club would host the playoffs event (University Club). However, like all things post-Covid, the league migrated from paper travelers to BBO, skipping the Bridge Mate phase entirely.

Board A Match

Bridge Base has only limited support for Board-A-Match. For those who haven’t played it, it’s an interesting mix of team play and matchpoints. You have a team of four and face off against another team of four across two tables with common boards. So far that’s just like swiss or KO that we know and love.

But instead of scoring it as IMPs, it’s scored like matchpoints – with only one other pair in the field. For any board, you either win, lose, or tie, for a score of 1, 0, or 0.5. Every board is either a top, bottom, or push (and sometimes the results at your table are inconsequential). More than ever, every overtrick matters, as well as the 10 or 20 point differences we so often see with -100 vs -110, or +430 vs +420.

Unfortunately, a few blown overtricks can lead to an unrecoverable loss

Limited BBO Support For Teams

It’s been on our wish list for a while – better support for team games. Right now scheduling multiple rounds of teams is very cumbersome – all 8 people must be online and ready to play, each round requires another setup session, and there is no good way to chat with all the players prior to the game starting, between rounds, or after the game ends. There could be many more casual team games played with just a few minor changes.

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