This past weekend was GNT weekend. GNT stands for Grand National Teams. This competition takes place every year at the summer bridge nationals.
We go to tournaments all the time, and usually a tournament has a large variety of events you can enter at will. There are a few events, though, like the GNT, where you must qualify in order to enter. First, we had to qualify at the local club (This is not difficult to do). The next step is to qualify at the district level (that was this past weekend). There are 24 districts in the American Contract Bridge League (ACBL). Ours is District 7, and covers North Carolina, South Carolina and parts of Georgia (including Atlanta). For each flight and for each district, one team is sent to compete at the national level.
There are four “flights”: A, B, C and Championship. They represent exactly what you would guess they do. A, B and C is the bridge world’s way of trying to identify how much experience you have. Flight A consists of a lot of good players, but most of the well-known bridge personalities are over-qualified for it.
Ten teams showed up to compete for the District 7 Flight A spot. This is quite a paltry showing, considering we cover most of 3 states. But, the district final was held in Greenville, SC. I guess people don’t always want to travel to play in these things.
We did. Weeks ago, Lance and i planned to make a long weekend out of it. Greenville was hosting a sectional bridge tournament at the same time, so we decided to go a day early and warm up. The district finals would take place on Sat/Sun, but there would be bridge events on Friday. It would be a fun trip for just the two of us. Sure, we’d have friends there, but we’d get to go back to the hotel room alone and talk about hands and share the king-sized bed.
Or so i thought.
In the week or so leading up to the tournament, we were very excited. Played some online BBO and had chat sessions with teammates. Our teammates are two friends who are also excellent players. One is 23 and the other is 28. Lance and i are 33 and 31. One teammate has played bridge professionally and represented the US in some Junior events years ago. The other is still technically a Junior and is somehow a better player than all of us despite having only played for a year or two. This is a very young team, compared to most of the other teams, and a very good team. We might even have been the favorites to win going into it.
[Flight C was also having their district finals competition at the same time. I mentioned our team was young, but some of the Flight C's were younger. One kid was only 9. Two teams of all kids competed for the final spot on Sunday afternoon. Congratulations to those players, who are the future of bridge.]
The day before we were set to leave, i suddenly get a ping at work about whether it’s OK if we have a roommate. Our 61-year old buddy M was also going to compete for the District 7 spot on a different team, and it worked out that he would have to get a hotel room just for himself, which he didn’t want to do. I was not particularly pleased about this. Suddenly our bridge weekend which i had semi-romanticized didn’t seem so great if this guy (who has been known to tax my patience after spending significant time with him) would be tagging along and we would never have any privacy. Despite not being thrilled about it, i agreed.
All went as planned; we got to Greenville safely after a 4.5 hour drive. M was pretty well-behaved the first night. Lance and i got up to play bridge in the morning session at 9 am Friday. We played all 3 sessions on Friday, with nothing of note to report.
During lunch, M, Lance and i went on the hunt for food. We just went in one direction, looking for something, anything. It was an empty stretch of road. Until, we came upon a dingy little brick building with an old sign that said “Carolina Fine Food Restaurant”. It was the only thing in sight, and i had a feeling this place would be “my people.” Sure enough, this dive had the atmosphere of a hometown BBQ restaurant. We went back to this place for most of our meals throughout the weekend. I highly recommend it if you’re ever in Greenville.
Friday night was once again uneventful. M behaved and we got a decent night’s sleep. Well-rested before going into “battle.”
Saturday the GNT competition started. It would span two days. On the first day, we played a round-robin, where every team played against every other team. It would eliminate the field from 10 teams to 4. The final four would play a knockout to determine the winner.
The first half of Saturday, it seemed like we couldn’t really do anything wrong. In our first 5 (of 9) matches, we won big thrice and lost small twice. We felt confident at dinner. But then right after the dinner break, we lost big. The good news is that the team we lost to was not one of the teams in contention. Which is both good but also a little embarrassing. All of a sudden, we were back in the middle of the pack, with 3 tough rounds to finish the day. We managed small wins in all 3. We ended the day 6 and 3.
We finished 2nd overall for the day, which means we would get to advance to the final four. The 1st place finisher got to choose their opponent, and they chose the easiest team left. That left us to play M’s team in the semi-finals.
Saturday night, we celebrated. Someone had a cooler of beer and we polished it off while talking about hands. Our teammates had arrived that morning, and were planning to drive across the street to a cheap motel that charged half-price after midnight. They didn’t have a reservation. I told them if they were unable to get a room (or it was too scary), they could sleep on our floor. Somehow, that translated into them not even trying to get a room. Everyone went upstairs and before i realized what had happened i was in a hotel room that had gotten very small, and i was sharing it with four men.
At first i thought this would be fine, but then the guys fired up their computers and started playing poker. They were loud and a little bit drunk and telling jokes and one of them was singing. It was amusing for awhile. When everyone started to calm down, most of us were trying to sleep, except for one teammate who wanted to stay up and play on the computer. Between the singing and the arguing about who should be going to sleep, i don’t think i got to sleep until 3 am. And M, who had been so well-behaved the first two nights, was causing most of the ruckus.
Still, there is a certain camaraderie that comes from sharing close quarters with people. We were mostly in good spirits the next day despite a rough night.
Sunday morning rolled around (too quickly), and two teams from Raleigh squared off, very likely the two best teams that were there. We had hoped for a dramatic end and to get to play them in the final match. This way, though, at least one team would get a head start on the long drive home.
At the half we were up on them, but they rallied in the second half. Still, we managed a win of 9 IMPs. It was a swingy set of bridge hands, and any one of them could be called The Swing Board. This hand was one of them.
The final match was grueling, particularly at our table. The pace was extremely slow. Our teammates finished the first half and we still had five (of twelve) hands to play. The result? We were down 10 IMPs. Not a large margin – as i said above, any one hand can produce enough of a swing to turn the tables. After a pep talk from a teammate “We didn’t come this far to lose in the finals, guys,” we went back to finish the set. Again, the pace was slow and grueling. Every decision felt like it would matter. Honestly, Lance and i did not have a particularly good set the second half. Our opponents did a lot of things right.
The good news is, our teammates did a lot of things right, too. They had enough to cover our butts. And in the end, we won. By 7 IMPs.
So. We will be representing District 7 in the GNT Flight A competition in New Orleans at the end of July. We were planning to attend the tournament anyway, but we wouldn’t have gotten to play in this event. (In fact, it starts two days earlier than we had planned to arrive, so i had to adjust my travel plans. I couldn’t assume we would win; that might have jinxed it!) The district gives us each $450 to help offset travel expenses. The event will start with 24 teams and will last five days. I hope we’re still there on the fifth day!
Tags: bridge
