
Members flocked to commemorate and thank our wonderful Chief Director, Verl Lawrence, on Saturday 29 April, after she announced her retirement from directing. As well as holding the role of Chief Director for the past 17 years, Verl has held almost all of the office-bearer positions in the Club.
Our president, Sarah Young, thanked Verl on the Club's behalf and presented her with a floral tribute. She also announced in honour of Verl and her husband's past contributions to the club a new competition, to be called the Lawrence Competition, to start in June on Tuesday nights.
Verl thanked the club for the recognition and more importantly for the key role it had been in her life and the support she had received over the years.

The May NSWBA eCongress newsletter profiles the club's Swiss Teams Congress held at Peninsula Bridge Club in March.
Annegrete Kolding provided the NSWBA with expanded coverage of the event accompanied with the photos that are displayed in the profile's photo gallery. Annegrete is the channel coordinator of the various NSWBA and Australian Bridge Federation's publication options - please contact her if you think you would like to discuss these options or have some information that could be suitably profiled in one or more of the NSWBA's or ABF's publications.
This is part of an expanded emphasis on streamlining and expanding the internal and external communication channels available to the club.

Thirty six pairs competed for the Michael Marks Shield on Saturday 1 April. Winners in 2017 were Catherine Whiddon and David Farmer ahead of Colin and Una Mingay and in equal third place, Sue and Len Evershed and Joan Murdoch and Pauline Haynes.
The full results can be found on this site for the near future. The session was well directed by Sue Falkingham.

Joan Butts led a workshop on Entries for improver and intermediate players on Saturday 8 April.
Forty players found the workshop to be really helpful - they are all keen to put their 5 tips into action ... & bid & make 7S!.

It is with regret that I am resigning from my position as Director and Chief Director at our wonderful club.
My last day of directing duties will be on 29 April.
I joined the club 27 years ago and have served as Tea Lady, Master Point Secretary, Vice President, President and for 17 years as Chief Director.
The 27 years have been most enjoyable and interesting.

Peninsula players won the Best Restricted Team at the Trumps' Easter Teams, with the team of Annegrete Kolding, Susan Jensen, Sandie Rooke and Ray Hurst taking this prize. Sandie and Ray did particularly well coming 13th out of the 36 pairs across the whole field which included a large number of strong pairs.
Other Peninsula players of note were Linda Abbenbroek and Carolyn Dowling who came 5th on the Butler pairs ranking and Alan Davies and Vivien Eldridge who just made it to the top half of the field. Check the full results including Butler pairs rankings on the Trumps website.

Congratulations to Lyn Smith and Cath Whiddon for making the final field and being first of all the Peninsula Pairs who played in the Trumps Good Friday Pairs Congress. A great result - no wonder they're smiling!
Lyn and Cath came 8th in the final field ahead of another Peninsula pair Ian Bailey and Lynn Baker who came 11th. Sixty four pairs competed on the day overall.
Check the results for the final field and you can check the results for the morning session and other fields on the same site.

Bruce Neill, President of the ABF, attended the Teacher Training Program Day at Peninsula Bridge Club on 9 April 2017 as an interested observer.
He expressed his support for the successful Bridge Education Program that operates at Peninsula. "The lifeblood of any bridge club is its education program, and is key to the growth of the bridge community."
He praised the wonderful work that Cath Whiddon does for the game of bridge, as director of bridge education at Peninsula and as a teacher trainer conducting Teacher Training Program days. "Part of the ABF Strategy is to ensure that bridge teachers are well trained and use modern teaching materials and methods."