Wednesday, August 18, 2004 1:13 AM
Control Asking Bids
PITBULLS:
An
established partnership has a huge advantage if they have asking bids in their arsenal. Control
Asking Bids have been around for decades. No , they are not the Barton type of
“control asking” bids which is
just a different form of Blackwood. These bids ask partner if they control an
unbid or bid suit . Spades are the
agreed trump suit and the opponents have bid diamonds . A jump to 5♠ asks how you control diamonds. A pass says I do not . 6♠ says I
have a 2nd round control , 5NT says I have the king of diamonds
& 6♦ says I have 1st round control. This understanding
also occurs if all three suits have been bid or Q bid. 5 of the agreed trump suit or a jump
to 5 of the agreed trump suit asks to describe the controls in the unbid suit
with the same responses as above.
The 2nd most common control asking bid is
after partner pre-empts 4 of a major.
Say partner opens 4♥ and you
bid 5♣ . Obviously you are not rescuing a pre-empt . You are making a control
asking bid in clubs. 5♥ by
partner says I can not control clubs , 6♥ 2nd round control of clubs , 5NT the club king and 6♣ 1st
round control. In a Q bidding auction , if you jump to 5 of the trump suit , it
is an asking bid in the unbid suit with similar responses. A 4♠ bid after 4♥ opener is not a rescue but an asking bid in the spade
suit.
The
5NT bid is a control asking bid in
the trump suit which is the grand slam force in normal auctions. After a 4 of a major opening
, the bid is modified to
show the solidarity of the trump suit. 6 of the trump suit is
the death response , a bid of 7 means my suit is solid opposite a void , a 6♦ bid says my suit is solid opposite xxx or the queen.
A 6♣ bid is very interesting and says I have a solid suit opposite 2 small
& possibly after a stiff. Partner now bids 6♦ with a stiff , 7 of the trump suit with two small
and 6 of the trump suit with a void. With the “normal” Grand Slam force , we
modify it a bit by having the trump suit as the death response. Ace or King as
the first step & the queen as the 2nd step. Of course the jump
to a grand slam shows two out of three top honours..
If
partner pre-empts a weak two or three bid , 4♣ is usually reserved for a
control asking bid (4♦ over
clubs ) with responses involving controls . Since you are a disciplined
pre-empter, you will not have an
outside ace after pre-empting at the 3 level
but you could have an outside Ace
after a weak 2. Since 10 HCP’s is the maximum for a weak two , we will
only have to consider up to two controls To keep the treatments consistent for both pre-empts , the
responses after 4♣ involve the trump queen & consider the Ace or King as a
control 4¨=0/0 or 0/1;4©=1/0;4ª=1/1;4NT=2/0;5§=2/1 . The 4♦
asking bid if clubs agreed as the trump suit is similar.
Another
control asking bid ( using Kantars
lingo ) is the specific suit asking bid.
Tom & I use this bid only in two circumstances . After a 2♣ opener , a jump
rebid of a suit establishes the suit and partner is required to show a control.
A suit bid after that asks for partners holding in that specific suit. A return
to the trump suit is always the death response and you just go up in steps. Aces are taken out of the equation so steps are defined around the King and Queen 1st
step response shows the queen
, 2nd Kxx , 3rd Kx and raise of the specific suit shows both king & queen .
Kantar has specific suit asking bids with KCB which
is the 2nd circumstance that Tom and I use these bids. He has some rules 1) always thru
4NT first 2) A suit bid that is not the Queen ask is the SSA 3) You forego
specific kings if you go this route 4) the death response to the SSA is
returning to the trump suit . The steps are same as above & if the King has been denied ( via queen
ask ), the responses defined
around the queen and the jack can be thrown in , 1st step shows
the queen and raising the suit shows the QJ of the suit
Bridge should not be a burden of memory work . However , the above is an exception that all established
partnerships should have memorized. The stakes are high in these auctions so
the strain on your memory cells is worth it. A Hollywood starlet can memorize
an entire script so you should be able to memorize the contents of one e-mail
!!