Elevate Your Bridge: Lebensohl – with Curt Soloff
We play bridge in an era of highly aggressive bidding! Knowing the value of nuisance overcalls and preempts, today’s players will gladly bid over your strong 1NT openings and preempt fearlessly.
One of the best tools available to you on many of these auctions is Lebensohl.
Through these four accessible lessons, Curt will provide you with a fundamental understanding of how and when to use the convention to improve the accuracy of your bidding.
(Already included for members of Curt’s weekly class. Learn more here…)
Join via replay or live. Presented live on:
- Tuesday, July 7 at 2pm, NY time
- Tuesday, July 14 at 2pm, NY time
- Tuesday, July 21 at 2pm, NY time
- Tuesday, July 28 at 2pm, NY time
We play bridge in an era of highly aggressive bidding!
Knowing the value of nuisance overcalls and preempts, today’s players will gladly bid over your strong 1NT openings and preempt fearlessly with weak two bids, jump overcalls, and the like. By taking away your bidding space and your valuable NT systems like Stayman and Jacoby transfers, the opponents force you to guess at the best contract. How do we combat this challenging interference?
One of the best tools available to you on many of these auctions is Lebensohl, an outstanding convention with just enough complexity to make you a bit nervous – but you need not be scared of it! With practice, you can learn and play Lebensohl with your regular partners and use it to maximum effect to combat interference from your opponents and reach good contracts.
Through these four accessible lessons on Lebensohl, Curt will provide you with a fundamental understanding of how and when to use the convention to improve the accuracy of your bidding.
Lesson 1: Contending with Interference of your 1NT Opening
To understand the full value of Lebensohl, we must start with a discussion of the opponents’ interference with your 1NT opening. We expound on the role of the negative double and the critical need to do away with the problematic “stolen bid” double by responder.
Lesson 2: Lebensohl Essentials
We delve into the actual Lebensohl relay, how and when responder uses the bid. Additionally, we explore the role of responder’s cuebid to seek the best game contract.
Lesson 3: Stopper Showing
We continue with more Lebensohl auctions, highlighting the role of responder in showing or denying stoppers in the opponents’ overcall suit.
Lesson 4: Lebensohl after Doubles of Weak Two Openings
In our concluding segment, we shift gears to explore a completely different but incredibly valuable application of Lebensohl: resolving problems with auctions in which the opponents open a weak two bid and partner makes a takeout double.
About Curt Soloff
Curt brings more than 30 years of competitive duplicate bridge experience to the table. A Diamond Life Master who provides professional bridge teaching services in Colorado and online to students around the globe, Curt previously served as the manager of the Castle Rock Bridge Club from 2009 until 2020. He was a columnist for the District 17 Scorecard and his playing career includes numerous regional and sectional tournament event victories.
He was the first recipient of the Denver Unit’s Jan Janitschke Award in 2020 for outstanding teaching and mentoring.