mike777, on 2013-December-08, 21:36, said:
as a nonexpert I try to never or almost never lead trump or away from Q or passive....fwiw.
I'm not sure why you're averse to leading away from queens. My general view is that leading away from a king is likely to be a disaster if the opponents hold both the ace and queen. Sometimes there is an exception if both AQ are behind you anyway, but otherwise it seems that you will often give them a trick they can never score on their own. Obviously at MP this is disastrous! The odds that opponents hold both A+Q will be more than 50% (it's about 55% if those cards are equally likely to be in any hand; actual odds will vary a little because opponents are known to have the majority of the missing points but also because partner has relatively few spades). Leading from a queen is fine if partner has any of the A,K,or J, and there are also more times that a queen can't take a trick if you don't attack the suit early (whereas a king more often will take a trick if you just wait for it).
Obviously all of this is MP-centric and things change a little at IMPs where "giving a trick" is not always disaster if the contract is cold anyway etc.
mike777, on 2013-December-08, 21:36, said:
Adam you play great in blue ribbons and other top events.....don't change.
Certainly I play better than a lot of the bridge population (we did make day 3 of the blue ribbons and yet I view this nationals as having been a "bad tournament" for me). However I would prefer to have fewer "bad tournaments" and win one of these things at some point, and there are plenty of players who regularly do better than me.
Adam W. Meyerson
a.k.a. Appeal Without Merit