Latest News
The four week 2018 Jean Stebbins Trophy event finished on Monday 29 October with Patric Stark emerging as the overall winner. What is perhaps most remarkable is that Patric won while only playing three of the four possible weeks, thus not having the option to drop his worst score. Congratulations Patric!
The full results of eligible players were as follows:
Our club is diverse but our website doesn't always get all the best stories. If you have an ear for a story and would like to help these stories find an appreciative audience via our newsletter, then please help.
What's involved? Keeping an ear, an eye and/or a nose out for a story that would be of interest to our members - could be profiling one of our volunteers or new members or old members. Compile a short easy-to-read story and ideally grab a photo to go with it. And send it in.
If you'd like to try, let me (Simon Hunter) know on 0451 130 330 or at
Joan Butts will be running four one-hour workshops on various types of Doubles In November.
Two on Tuesday, 27 Nov, 2.30-4.30pm and two on Wednesday 28 Nov, 9.30-11.30am.
There will be a 10 minute break between the two sessions on each day so that you can come and stay or come and go - and choose precisely what aspect of doubles you would like to learn/refresh.
There are strong rumours that Halloween will come to the Tuesday night session on 30 October.
Don't be afraid you'll miss out! Come along and enjoy it. And of course a good game of bridge as well. There are even volunteers offering to provide transport if you are unwilling to drive at night so close to Halloween.
This photo was from the Tuesday night session in 2017.
The Tuesday night session brainstormed a number of ideas to generate more interest from other players in the session. After discussion, and restricted to where someone was prepared to do any coordinating work, the session decided (with the Committee's concurrence) to trial the following six initiatives. Hopefully one or more of these interest you - you would be very welcome to the session!
Offering transport to/from session - Offering transport to/from Tuesday (and other) night sessions for those not comfortable driving at night - see separate article.
Turning off the Bridgemate results display - Trial for a month (Tue night session only) to see if it has a good effect on timing and friendliness at the table.
At its meeting on 24 October, the Committee discussed the problems that the club and new members, particularly those in supervised sessions, face when there is a delay in their receiving ABF numbers that are then recognised in our Bridgemate devices and scoring program. Part of the delay is caused by our current new member process where an application might have to wait for up to five weeks before it is approved with this stage happening before we seek an ABF number. In part to avoid this issue, the Committee has decided to change our new member process, probably effective 10 November, to the following:
Those who complete a membership application and pay the required fee will be termed Provisional Members. We will expeditiously seek an ABF number for them if required and include them in Pianola as Provisional Members. We will accord Provisional Members the right to play at our events and sessions at member rates in the period prior to their being subsequently approved by the Committee as Members of the Club.
After spending some time investigating our budget options for 2019, the Committee is pleased to advise that its does not currently see a need to change table and membership fees. As you know the Concession membership category was removed in January 2018.
As promised in May, we have successfully identified some additional cost savings, such as arranging for discounts on our electricity bills, waiving of bank fees, lower cost purchasing arrangements for kitchen supplies, as well as incorporating other suggestions made by members throughout the year.
About a dozen Peninsula members played in the weekend events (20-21 Oct) at the Sydney Spring Nationals. The best success was achieved by Heidi Colenbrander and Ray Hurst who came third in the Restricted Pairs category (<300MP). Annegrete Kolding and Sandie Rooke came 5th in the Novice Pairs. Congratulations to both pairs.
Our Peninsula expeditionary group included a range of our players from an enthusiastic rookie (learned only a couple of months ago) to those with a fair bit more experience. Most of the pairs in the open competition experienced doses of humility while enjoying some challenging boards. The weekend events were Swiss matchpoint pairs - the rest of the Spring Nationals is teams-based and some of our members are playing there as well. Anne Small and Hans van Weeren did well coming 18th in the open teams. You can see all the Spring National results. Thanks to Annegrete Kolding for the photo.
