2019 Las Vegas NABC – Daily Updates

Team Blass (Bas Drijver, Jacek Kalita, Jacek ‘Pepsi’ Pszczola, Michal Nowosadzki, Sjoert Brink, Blass NPC) won the Spingold Knockout Teams. In the 60-board final they defeated Team Zimmermann (Pierre Zimmermann, Franck Multon, Michał Klukowski, Piotr Gawrys, Tor Helness and Krzysztof Martens) by 57 IMPs.

Bas Drijver, Jacek Kalita, Jacek ‘Pepsi’ Pszczola, Michal Nowosadzki, Sjoert Brink. Photo: ACBL

USA’s Summer National started on July 18 in Vegas and numerous BBOers are attending. Vugraph on BBO started on July 22, with the Spingold Round of 64. Don’t miss these excellent transmissions enhanced by expert commentary and live video.

Monday, July 29

Team Blass wins Spingold KO, defeating defending champions team Zimmermann. The match was close (4 IMPs) at half-time, but Blass had a good third quarter. Three major swings in the last set (36-16) resulted in a comprehensive win for the Polish-Dutch combination.
Gaylor Kasle scored 137.87 victory points to win the Roth Open Swiss Teams: Bartosz Chmurski, Wlodzimierz Starkowski, Piotr Tuczynski, captain Gaylor Kasle, Michal Kwiecien and Joshua Donn. Second in the Roth Open Swiss with 130.34 VP was the Alison Wilson‘s squad: Mikael Groenkvist, Alison Wilson, Ida Groenkvist, Magdalena Ticha, Richard Ritmeijer and Kent Mignocchi.
Winners of the 0–6000 Mini-Spingold KO Teams: Greg Michaels, captain Martin Harris, Miriam Harris-Botzum and John Botzum.
Winners of the 0-10,000 Mixed Swiss Teams: May Sakr, Nikolaos Delimpaltadakis and Benedicte Cronier
Jacek “Pepsi” Pszczola earned the most masterpoints in Las Vegas to win the Fishbein Trophy, awarded annually to the player who accomplishes the feat at the Summer NABC.

Sunday, July 28

Spingold final:

The No. 1 seed led by Pierre Zimmermann will face the original No. 3 seed with Josef Blass as non-playing captain in the final of the Spingold KO Teams.
Zimmermann and partner Franck Multon, both of Monaco, are playing with Tor Helness, also of Monaco, and Poles Piotr Gawrys, Michal Klukowski, and Krzysztof Martens.
For Blass are Jacek Pszczola of Chapel Hill NC, Poles Jacek Kalita and Michal Nowosadzki, and the Dutch duo of Sjoert Brink and Bas Drijver.
In the semifinal round, Zimmermann defeated the all-French team led by Eric Gautret, 110-86 after trailing slightly in the first half.
In the other semifinal bracket, Blass defeated Warren Spector and company 108-88.

Mini-Spin 6000 final:

The teams captained by Martin Harris and Arti Bhargava meet today in the final of the 0-6000 Mini-Spingold KO Teams.
With Harris of Chicago are Miriam Harris Botzum and John Botzum of Orefield PA and Greg Michaels of Cleveland.
Playing with Bhargava of Mill Valley CA are Igni Agnarsson of South Burlington VT, Marl Leonard of Long Beach CA and Gudjon Sigurjonsson of Reykjavik, Iceland.
In the semifinal round, Harris defeated Kerry Cotterell’s team, 121-78 in three quarters of play. Cotterell, of Freeland WA, played with Richard Underwood of Vorheesville NY, Katherine Pollock of East Amherst NY and Joel Schiff of Calabasas CA.
In the other semifinal bracket, Bhargava dominated Monica Angus and company 97–17 in two quarters. Angus led an all–British Columbia squad of Alex Hong, Kai Zhou, Sidney Yang and Guoxu Zhang.

Saturday, July 27

Spingold Semis: Zimmermann vs. Gautret, Spector vs. Blass. The semifinal pairings in the Spingold KO Teams feature the top-seeded Zimmermann squad vs. the giant-killing Gautret team (the original 37 seed), while Warren Spector and company (No. 2) meet Josef Blass npc (No. 3).
Berkeley wins Collegiate Bowl. The University of California at Berkeley successfully defended its title in the Collegiate Bridge Bowl Championship, defeating the University of Chicago in the final, 78–57.
The squads led by Scott Nason and Jordan Lampe face off today in the final of the 0-2500 Mini-Spingold KO Teams.
The matches in the semifinal round of the 0-6000 Mini-Spingold KO Teams are Kerry Cotterell vs. Martin Harris, and Arti Bhargava vs. Monica Angus. Cotterell won their quarterfinal match against Hank Youngerman’s squad by a single IMP to advance to the semifinal, 113-112, while Harris defeated Craig Henderson in the quarterfinal 143-114.
The team captained by Mikael Rimstedt sits atop the Roth Swiss Teams entering the second day of the three-day contest. They have a carryover of 89.09 victory points. Trailing them is all-Moscow Gromov squad with a carryover of 84.65. Bramley starts the day in third.
Mary Peters and Thomas Peters of Dayton MD topped the qualifying round in the Bean Red Ribbon Pairs. In close second place is the San Diego pair of Marjorie O’Malley and Charles O’Malley. Third place is occupied by Steve Hirsch and Gregory Thorpe of Brea CA.

Friday, July 26

The No. 2 seed in the Spingold Knockout Teams – the perennial powerhouse captained by Nick Nickell – was defeated by the No. 15 seed led by Warren Spector, 122-109.
Hemant Lall and company (No. 8) is also on the sidelines after losing to the No. 9 seed led by Tim Verbeek, 122-90.
The defending champions – Pierre Zimmermann’s No. 1 team – had no trouble against Mike Levine’s No. 16 squad, winning 133-64.
The all-French team led by Eric Gautret (No. 9) defeated Bart Bramley’s No. 12 squad, 118-96.
Rose Meltzer (No. 4) crushed Joyce Hill’s No. 13 squad 160-54 in three quarters.
No. 7 Lavazza stayed in control of the match against No. 10 Andrew Gromov, winning 162-118.
After a huge first quarter win, No. 6 Andrew Rosenthal had an easy time against No. 11 Alison Wilson, advancing 188-79.
Blass npc (No. 3) had an even match against No. 14 Daniel Zagorin in the first half of their match, but Blass pulled away in the second half,
winning 106-66

__________________

The squad captained by Thomas Paske won the Freeman Mixed Board-a Match Teams by one board, edging out the team lead by
Glenn Robbins. Paske, of New York City, played with Migry Zur Campanile, also of NYC, Christina Madsen of Denmark and Veri Kiljan of the Netherlands. After qualifying tied for eighth place, they scored 20 wins in the first final session and 15 in the second to claim the victory. Their foursession total with carryover was 37.60.
The Robbins squad finished with 36.60. Playing with Robbins of New York City was Jiang Gu of Mountain Lakes NJ, and Wenfei Wang and Shen Qi of China

Winners of the Freeman Board-a-Match Teams: Veri Kiljan, Christina Madsen, Migry Zur Campanile and Thomas Paske.

The Michigan duo of Bob Bitterman and Mark Bendure won the Wernher Open Pairs, finishing a half board ahead of runners-up Frederic Pollack and Kamel Fergani of Quebec.
The winners, who qualified 65th in Wednesday’s opening round, scored 59.17% in the first final session and capped it with a 63.95% in the second final to win the event.

In third place were Eitan Orensten and Aba Kalish of Israel with 2855.17.

Winners of the Wernher Open Pairs: Bob Bitterman and Mark Bendure.

Thursday, July 25

Several high seeds exited the Spingold KO Teams in Wednesday’s round of 32. The No. 4 seed captained by Marty Fleisher is out of the event after losing 151–144 to Rose Meltzer‘s team, the No. 29 seed.
The No. 5 seed led by Steve Robinson was pummeled 136–45 by the No. 28 seed, the all-French squad captained by Eric Gautret, in three quarters of play.
Jimmy Cayne‘s No. 10 seed was roughly ousted from the Spingold 204–95 by Andrew Gromov (No. 23).
George Mittelman (No. 12) was shown the door by Bart Bramley (No. 21) 144–115, and Jim Mahaffey‘s No. 13 seed got the boot from Joyce Hill (No. 20), 110–81.
Nick Nickell (No. 2) survived a scare against Eric Leong (No. 34), advancing 144–135 after trailing late in the match.
No. 3 Blass also trailed their opponents late in the match, but won to advance. Blass defeated Bruce Rogoff‘s team 139–127.
Team Lavazza (No. 7) fought to a 120–120 tie against Paul Lewis and company (No. 26), but Lavazza prevailed in overtime, winning 152–131.

After yesterday’s three-way matches in both flights of the Mini-Spingold KO Teams, each contest will feature all-day, head-to-head matches beginning today. The field in the 0-6000 Mini-Spingold KO Teams has been reduced to 16 teams, while eight teams remain in the 0-2500 Mini-Spingold contest.
The squad captained by Danny Miles topped the qualifying round of the Freeman Mixed Board-a-Match Teams. The Miles team posted 20 wins in the first session and 18.5 in the second for 38.5 wins total. In second with 35.5 is Ellen Kent’s team. Three teams are tried for third with 35.
Californians Iftikhar Baqai and Subba Ravipudi are leading the qualifiers in the Wernher Open Pairs after yesterday’s opening round. They scored 66.76% in the first qualifying session and 56.64% in the second. Their carryover is 264.61. In second place are Canadians Frederic Pollack and Kamel Fergani with a carryover of 253.77. Third place is occupied by Eric Sieg and Thomas Devine of Washington state with a carryover of 241.11

Wednesday, July 24

Although most of the top seeds cruised in yesterday’s round of 64 in the Spingold Knockout Teams, there were several notable upsets. Jeff Wolfson and company, the No. 9 seed and the defending Vanderbilt champions, lost to the No. 56 seed led by Walter Lee (BBOer Winkle) by the surprising margin of 153–61. Also on the sidelines is the No. 11 seed captained by Stan Tulin. They lost to the No. 54 team with Alison Wilson at the helm, 91-85.
Bronia Jenkins of Vero Beach FL and Benedicte Cronier of Paris, France, won the Wagar Women’s Pairs. Jenkins and Cronier finished a board and a half ahead of the second-place pair, Gabrielle Sherman of Tucson AZ and Laura Dekkers of Amsterdam, Netherlands.
The squad captained by Steve Bruno won the Truscott/USPC Senior Swiss Teams, posting a final score (with carryover) of 132.96 victory points. Playing with Bruno of Oceanside CA were Ben Blacik of Phoenix AZ, and Tucson players Martin Schiff Jr. and Sundaresan Ram. This was the first NABC victory for the team members. In second with 118.48 victory points was Amos Kaminski of New York City and teammates Adrian Schwartz, Shalom Zeligman, Eitan Orensten and Yeshayahu Levit, all of Israel. Narrowly in third place was the squad captained by Mark Lair with 117.43 VP.