Sitting East, I picked up the following hand at a recent club game:
| ♠ Q J 10 6 3 |
| ♥ A K 9 |
| ♦ K Q |
| ♣ K J 7 |
Much to my surprise, my partner opened 1NT. I knew immediately that we had slam. I transferred to spades.
What to do next?
At this point, many partnerships would simply bid 6NT without considering the possibility of a grand slam. Even if my partner was on a maximum of 17 points, our combined high card points were at most 36 – not considered to be enough for a grand slam. Some methods of hand evaluation would add one point to my hand for the 5 card spade suit. However, The value of that fifth spade is dubious if my partner only has two spades. With 36 combined high card points, we could be missing an ace.
So, I bid 4NT, Roman Key Card Blackwood1, asking for aces in our system. My partner responded 5♣. Playing RKC 1430, my partner’s bid showed 4 key cards. At this point I knew we had all the aces and kings. My decision to bid a grand slam was based on my solid spade suit, which is not always reflected in the points necessary to make a grand slam. I knew my spade suit would allow partner to discard any losers in her hand.
At IMPs, I would have bid 7 spades, the safer contract (knowing that partner must have at least AK♠.) At Matchpoints, however, I bid 7NT. It was a laydown. Most pairs got to the grand slam in NT. Some reached just the small slam.
Here is the full hand:
| Dealer: W Vul: Both |
North ♠ 87542 ♥ QJ8 ♦ 1086 ♣ 82 |
||
| West ♠ AK9 ♥ 762 ♦ A972 ♣ AQ4 |
East ♠ QJ1063 ♥ AK9 ♦ KQ ♣ KJ7 |
||
| South ♠ ♥ 10543 ♦ J543 ♣ 109653 |
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| Bidding: | |||
| West | North | East | South |
| 1NT | Pass | 2♥ | Pass |
| 2♠ | Pass | 4NT | Pass |
| 5♣ | Pass | 7NT | Pass |
| Pass | Pass | ||
Quantitative NT Slam Try2
Note that this would not have helped us. Using quantitative NT, my 4NT bid would have asked my partner whether she was on the top end of her bid – irrelevant, since I already know we have more than the 33 points needed for a small slam. And there was no point in bidding 5NT, which asks my partner to bid 7NT if on the top end of her bid, because it does not appear we have a grand slam, based on high card points alone.
Gerber3
Many partnerships would use the Gerber convention instead of RKC Blackwood.