[awm]

I think Arend means "one in 60" and not 60%. In fact the odds are 1/64 but "one in 60" is close enough.

There is a general question about swinging in long pair events. When you play in such an event, is your goal to win the event or is your goal to do well in the event, and what is doing well anyway?

If your goal is to win and you don't really care if you finish 2nd or 20th or 200th because they are all losing then it makes sense to take a lot of swingy actions. After all, even if you are in fact the best pair in the field your chance of placing first is not very good (well unless all the other pairs are really bad). You will need a lot of luck to go your way.

On the other hand, there is something to be said for consistently high finishes, especially in important or prestigious events. It's not clear that given the choice between placing in the top ten 20 times in a row (but never winning) versus winning once and being far down in the rankings the other 19 times, that we'd all choose the one win. After all, winning once could be the result of luck whereas being in the top ten every single year almost has to be based on skill. Then again, if there is a big cash prize for winning (but nothing for second) maybe it's better to win once...

In any case, there is nothing wrong with taking anti-field actions at MP. Sometimes these actions are even "right" in that you are more likely to outscore the field than to lose to the field. But any time you take an unusual action, you should expect a near-top or near-bottom result (yes there will be other outliers who did something bizarre, but you will generally get a different score from the majority of the field). If your unusual action is "right" you will get a near-top more often than a near-bottom and if it's "wrong" you will see the opposite, but in any case there is luck involved. Whether you want to increase the amount of luck in your score depends on what you want to do and what you expect to manage by "playing down the middle." But in any case, it should be no surprise that if you take an anti-field action and it doesn't work out because you went down in your pushy game, or the close contract you doubled made, or the close game you avoided by being conservative was cold... you will get a near-zero. That's not to say anti-field actions are necessarily to be avoided in all circumstances, because when they do work out you should expect the near-top. It's all a game of percentages.

[kenberg]

If I overbid and go down am I apt to get a bad score? Let me do a little research on this and I'll get back to you. Right now I am working on: If I drive 90 mph down a highway without wearing a seatbelt and crash my car, am I apt to get hurt?

I think we are being played.

[mycroft]

Please note that Phil is simply saying if he takes a few coin flips in 100 boards, and he's up 6, he has a shot at winning.

That's not a 6-way parlay. It could be 7 of 8, 8 of 10, or otherwise.

That's more than 1.6%. Still not good, but hey, if your goal is to Win The NABC+ Event against The Best, and your chance of doing it playing straight up is zero.whatever%, play for the 3,4% chance. After all, for GrandLM you only need one...

Michael.