The NABC Summer Nationals – Dispatches From the Front

BRIAN GLUBOK

Brian is a highly accomplished American bridge player hailing from New York City. Glubok, an alumnus of Amherst College, has consistently excelled in North American Bridge Championships, securing numerous titles, including wins in the Jacoby Open Swiss Teams, Reisinger, and Spingold events. In addition to his domestic success, Glubok came close to victory in the World Mixed Pairs Championship in 2010, finishing as the runner-up.

Brian will be writing for IMP about the Summer NABC in Minneapolis. This is the fourth of the series.

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For details about the Summer NABC in Minneapolis, look here.

MINNEAPOLIS, July 18

YOUTH TRIUMPHS

Takin’ Care of Business

I’m super short of time this morning, but I wanted to get this written and off to our Dutch publishers at IMP – Bridge.

Today is the second Saturday of the tournament – middle day of the Three-Day Roth Swiss, and sixth day (semi-final round) of the seven day Spingold.

University of California at Berkeley took top prize in the Mitch Dunitz Collegiate Bowl – it was great to see dozens of young players assembled for this event – they each received a $900 subsidy for participating, to defray their costs.

I’ll echo a suggestion made by someone else: Double that subsidy! We are a league with plenty of billionaire sponsors, $900 doesn’t even cover the hard-money costs of attending a tournament like this (travel, hotel, meals) – certainly it doesn’t cover the lost income they might suffer, if they have to go absent from a summer job they have (or maybe lose the job altogether).

This would be fair: If they want the extra money (an additional $900, say) require them to write a substack or blog about their experience as Junior Bridge Warriors. 

Writing an essay on the tournament isn’t too much to ask – after all, I write these….

For extensive coverage of all the events, including the high qualifiers in the Roth Swiss, the semi-finalists in the Spingold, and more on the Dunitz Collegiate Bowl, click here.

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For some highlights – the young team of Lien, Kaplan, Kolesnik and Luba – 5/8th Yids, if you’re curious – beat defending champs Wolfson yesterday in decisive fashion, to gain a semi-final berth against the Goodman Team.

The Goodman Team reached the semi-final by beating Nickell a few days ago, in the round of Sixteen, the day after Nickell beat us in the Round of 32.

Lots of serious rivalries festering below the surface – my partner Hamman played on the Nickell Team for a couple of decades and won heaps of championships with FTN – one of the players on the Goodman Team recently played for Nickell as well – Goodman only added the player at the very last minute when one of their younger members got turned away at the border, in NYC – word on the street is he gave the wrong answers when asked by Customs/Immigration:

  A) What’s your job in Italy?

  B) Why are you coming to America?

  C) What sort of visa are you traveling on?

I’d love to write more, and share some bridge deals too, but – the Roth Swiss starts soon, and I’m booked to play the first match with Hamman.

So:

Gotta hop – 

Barely time to insert a link here, but since this has been a banner week for Canada, let’s go with this BTO classic, Taking Care of Business:

  *****

  Your Man in America – 

  Glubok