Bridge Boards - where would we be without them ?  Boards - those slightly strange shaped pieces of plastic that contain the cards for each bridge hand - make up a large part of the behind the scene activities at our Bridge Club

Did you know your Club deals around 10,000 hands each year for our regular Club play ?  Hands dealt for our Tournaments come on top of this again

So how does all of this happen ?  Prior to the start of each year the folks who run X-Club produce a set of deal files - one for each day or evening for every day of the year. These they then make available to the Club for use in our Dealing Machine to produce the boards for playing the board and then for Compass / Bridgemates to score the boards after you have played them. The programme the Club decides on at the start of the year requests from X-Club the deal files for the appropriate weeks of the year and these arrive throughout the year at the Club in time for the boards to be dealt
For those who have not met a Dealing Machine up close it is a rather complicated box full of electronics and a camera capable in around 20 seconds of taking a pack of cards and sorting it as per the Hand Record. When its going well its close to being one of the wonders of the modern world but when its unhappy its as frustrating as hell !  The Club owns a "Dealer 4" which we wouldn't be without but with a price tag of over $5000 requires more than a little TLC.....

Tournament hands are handled differently because the regular X-Club hands are potentially available to a large number of people prior to the hands being played which could be unfair. Hands for our Tournaments are both created and dealt locally to make all as fair as possible

So we now have the hands available and the programme for the year in place so what now happens - the Club has a number of "dealers" who use our Dealing Machine to produce the hands specified by X-Club for the required session. Currently we have 6 "dealers" who give up some of their time each week to deal the hands for a particular session - they don't deal the hands for a session they play !  If you would be interested in helping here the Club is at times looking for new dealers so have a talk to Cathy Nolen, our current Dealing Steward to see if you can help. It doesn't take long to deal a set of boards so it's not an onerous task.....

Alongside the actual dealing of the boards there is a little housekeeping required - labeling of the dealt boards, printing of the hand records etc.
Sometimes things in this process go awry - the wrong boards are dealt for the week, the boards are labelled incorrectly, cards get out of sequence etc etc. but considering the number of boards we deal each year the number of mistakes is very small !


Getting it wrong can be rather frustrating for all but on occasion it can have an unexpected outcome -

Recently club members Barbara Daly and Graeme Hope competed in the East Coast Restricted Pairs which they won with a score of 65% - congratulations to you both. This happened at an event where only 30 scoring boards were able to be played due to a labeling error when the boards were dealt meaning the first 18 boards played had to be discarded!

So next time you pick up your cards to play a hand do think of your dealers

The Club's AGM is to be held on Sunday 22 November at 2pm

The AGM starts the afternoon off - Club reports will be present the election of the Officers for the coming year and concluding with the presentation of trophies for the events that were run this year.
This is followed by a session of "fun" bridge. Christmas Dinner concludes the evening - all this for a really low price of $10 !

Labour Weekend 2020 and Hamilton was able to host its first ever Restricted Open Pairs Tournament run alongside the Hamilton Congress Pairs. 22 Pairs took part in the Restricted with 36 Pairs in the Open - a great result for the Club after all the trials Clubs have been through this year with Covid.
Many thanks to Metlifecare, our sponsor for the weekend which let us run an improved weekend for all.....

Winners & place getters of the Hamilton Congress Pairs -

Winners - Hamilton Restricted Open Pairs

• 1st 118.5% Andrew Michl & Candice Smith
• 2nd 115.6% Jenny Myhill & Ross Petersen
• 3rd 114.5% Trini Lin & Catherine Cameron

Waikato Bays Provincial Teams

Join us TUESDAY 3 November @ 1pm for.....

♦    a sweepstake on "the race"
♦    a hat competition with different categories –
       stunning
       wacky
       au naturel
♦    quick draw raffle
♦    bridge - prizes for gross and handicap
♦    a wonderful afternoon tea
♦    live screen streaming of “the race “
♦    Kay’s famous chocolate eclairs
♦    and other wondrous things…..

Cost $6

Nominations for Life Membership

The Club Constitution states that recommendations for Life Membership to the Hamilton Bridge Club can only be made by the Committee and must be voted on at the Annual General Meeting. The Committee has adopted a procedure for nominations for Life Membership to the Club. The guidelines for this procedure are available from the Secretary. Any financial member can nominate a member for Life Membership. This nomination must be submitted to the Committee for consideration and, if approved, the recommendation will be made at the Annual General Meeting.
If any member intends to make a nomination for the Committee to consider, obtain a copy of the guidelines and register your interest with the Secretary - this interest will remain confidential and will avoid multiple members researching information regarding the same person.

Ella Gray
President