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Welcome to Hondo Bridge |
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About This Page
Howard Schutzman is a teacher and expert player on Bridge Base Online (www.bridgebase.com). His nickname on BBO is hondo717. He has been playing duplicate bridge for more than 40 years. Over the years, he has developed articles and notes on learning to play bridge. This material is presented here, and is available for anyone to download at no charge.
Howard also maintains an email list for interested students. He sends out periodic emails with his teaching schedule, movies from his mentoring sessions, a bridge puzzle column that he writes, and any other material he feels would be of interest. If you would like to be added to his email list, click here
The following material is available on this site:
| Tutorials | |
| Bridge Puzzles | |
| 2 Over 1 Lesson Series | |
| Weak NT Lesson Series | |
| Example Hands | |
| Mentoring Session Notes | |
| Hondo's Email List Signup |
Howard runs several free weekly teaching sessions on BBO. Kibitzers are always welcome at these sessions, and encouraged to chat with Howard. He runs an open mentoring session on Tuesdays at 10:00 PM in the BBO Intermediate and Advanced Club; if you wish to participate as a player, leave a BBO chat message with Badmonster. He also runs two mentoring sessions in the Beginner and Intermediate Lounge (BIL), one on Sunday at 9:00 PM and the other on Wednesday at 9:00 PM. (All times are Eastern.) Students are encouraged to mark Howard as a BBO friend, and welcome to watch him play and ask questions any time he is online. He will also gladly answer any questions sent to him via BBO email.
Also pictured are Ava and Taffy.
Ava is Howard's lifelong partner, in bridge and all his other endeavors. She is an accomplished player in her own right. Her bbo nickname is ava17.
Taffy is our family kibitzer. She is welcome at several local duplicate clubs, and loves attending our sessions, particularly when snacks are available. She is very good at "ruffing".
Ava and I run a monthly informal supervised play group.
One year, I prepared a series of tutorials on various bridge topics, including bidding, play, and defense.
As you will see if you download any of them, I tend to favor teaching general principles rather than specific rules.
Ava calls my approach "Big Picture Bridge". My personal favorites are Introduction To Constructive Bidding
and Counting Declarer's Hand on Defense.
You might want to download these first to see if you like my approach.
I write a bi-weekly bridge puzzle for the Beginner and Intermediate Lounge on BBO.
It is based on actual hands I have played, and presents a bidding, declaring, or defensive problem.
It is aimed at intermediate level players, although both advanced and beginning players should find it interesting.
| August 08 Puzzle 1 | Declaring |
| July 08 Puzzle 1 | Bidding |
| June 08 Puzzle 2 | Declaring |
| June 08 Puzzle 1 | Declaring |
| Previous Puzzles | |
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All 2008 Puzzles All 2007 Puzzles |
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The 2 Over 1 System is preferred by most experts. Fortunately, it is very similar to Standard American, with only a few relatvely small modifications, so it should be easy for most players to learn.
Click on the links below to download the associated tutorials.
| Part 1 - Game Forcing Auctions | |
| Part 2 - Auctions Not Forcing to Game |
Since the vast majority of players open 1NT with 15-17, that is what I usually teach. However, Ava and I have always played the weak NT. We feel it gives us a significant bidding advantage.
Playing the weak NT is not simply a matter of changing your 1NT opening range from 15-17 HCP to 12-14 HCP.
It represents a significant systemic change, with different implications for many auctions.
I have prepared a series of 3 lessons to explain the weak NT system.
| Part 1 - Auctions Starting with the Weak NT | |
| Part 2 - Auctions When Opener Holds a Strong NT | |
| Part 3 - When The Opponents Interfere | |
| Zip File With All 3 Parts |
I sometimes predealt two hands for use with our supervised play group,
and wrote up an analysis. These were used to demonstrate the lessons from the tutorials.
These hands were from actual deals I played at our local duplicate club.
Below are several of the writeups, including a brief description of the topics that were demonstrated.
During my mentoring sessions, I play with 3 of my students, commenting on whatever hands happen to come up. One of my students, Kia (bbo nickname nome), produces a BBO bridge movie consisting of the hands annotated with my comments. This involves a great deal of effort, and Kia has generously agreed to share his work by allowing me to post the movies on my web site.
If you have trouble displaying a movie file, or have trouble downloading it as an email attachment,
click here for some tips to help you resolve your problem.
| August 2008 | ||||
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August 21, 2008 New Suit Forcing By Overcaller's Partner Self sufficient suits Opening lead in partner's suit Lead partner's suit Slam tries over 1N Coded 10s Game try vs. competitive raises Avoid leading unprotected aces Show 4 card support immediately Value of weak 2s Competitive bidding principles overview |
August 7, 2008 Misfits Basic transfer bidding Informational signals 4th Best vs.unbid major NT lead Hand Re-evaluation based on auction Rasing a weak 2 Rarely lead opponents' suit Attitude vs. count OBAR bids Bergen vs. Reverse Bergen raises Reponses over a takeout double |
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| July 2008 | ||||
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July 31, 2008 Planning the Play DONT Criteria for Takeout Double Prefer Raise to New Suit When Not To Further the Preempt When Not To Reverse Maximize Your Chances Responses to Takeout Doubles New Minor Forcing Sacrifices Stolen Bid Doubles Over Cue Bids |
July 24, 2008 Prime Values Using the Bidding To Declare Michaels at the 5 Level Prempting with a Strong Hand Using the Bidding to Defend Bids After a Takeout Double Restricted Choice Using Rule of 20 For Game Force When Not To Bypass Diamonds Defensive Planning Weak Jump Overcalls When to Pass With a 9 Card Fit Rule of 11 Value of Singletons in Opponents' Suit Double and Correct |
July 17, 2008 Visualizing Partner's Hand 2nd Hand Low Forcing Declarer to Trump Takeout Double vs. Overcall 1NT after Takeout Double Cue Bid as Limit Raise Bidding Tactics Simple Squeeze Technique 2N Ask Over Michaels Passing a Takeout Double Playing Short Suit Honors First |
July 10, 2008 Overcall vs. Takeout Double Responding to Takeout Double Jump Shift vs.Jump Rebid Gambling 3N Fast Arrival Bidding to the 5 Level in Competition Unusual 2NT 4th Suit Forcing When to Lead Trumps Partnership defense Reverses Evaluating Honors in Short Suits Upgrading Hands Based on the Auction Responder as Captain of the Auction |
July 3, 2008 Captain of the Bidding Opener's rebids Passing one of a minor Bidding over Michaels When not to draw trumps Weak 1 level overcalls 1N after overcall Furthering the preempt 2nd hand high if setting trick Requirements for takeout double Deductions from the bidding |
| June 2008 | ||||
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Listen to the Experts 6/29/2008 DONT Rabbi's Rule Pushing the Opponents Losing Trick Count Garbage Stayman 2nd Hand Low Preempts |
June 26, 2008 Playing a nine card fit, missing the K and J Inviting vs. forcing to game by opener Guidelines to making and responding to takeout doubles Rule of 20 New suit forcing by responder to overcaller Competing in "live" auctions When to sacrifice Definition of a reverse Raising responder's major with 3 card support When to compete to the 3 level Ogust over weak 2s Honor sequence leads against suits Cue bid as stopper ask |
June 19, 2008 Balancing Showing Remaining Count Looking For Major Suit Fits Over 1NT Openings Preemptive Raises of Overcalls Competing Over Unusual NT Opening in 3rd and 4th Seat Rule of 15 Suppport Doubles Definition of a Reverse Power of Double Fits Scoring Cuebids Over Artificial Bids |
June 12, 2008 Simple squeeze technique Followup after a transfer When a double is takeout Responses to takeout doubles Carding in partner's suit Defensive ducking Honor leads in NT New Minor Forcing |
June 5, 2008 Balancing Cue Bid with 3 card support Rule of 11 Leading Dummy's Weakness Opening 1N with 5 card major Quick Tricks DONT |
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Previous Mentoring Sessions All 2008 Mentoring Sessions All 2007 Mentoring Sessions |
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