It would never occur to me to open four hearts with the South hand vulnerable in second seat in any form of scoring. Yes, the hand is too weak for 1H, the suit is too long for 2H, and the hand is too good a spade dummy for 3H, but the solution to all those flaws hardly seems to bid 4H!

I would have expected the bidding begin more like:

P — 1C

1H – 2S

South would now have to choose between rebidding his suit or supporting spades with three. Whatever that choice, North would likely bid 3N and South would choose the game.

The 4H contract seems the toughest, as the 4-3 spade fit looks like it plays very nicely, and 3N appears cold for at least 10 tricks.

Hi Jim2,

You tend to discuss a variety of bidding choices, all pertaining to judgments on this hand, so I’ll give you my opinion(s).

First, I agree with you about too weak (by a significant margin) for one heart and to bid 4 hearts vulnerable is much too great a gamble. However either a heart weak two bid or more classic three heart preempt suits more to my taste. Because both sides are vulnerable will break the tie in favor of deciding on three. The holding of three spades to an honor would in no way influence my decision since, after all, I am making a preempt and sure, we might instead belong in spades, but bridge being far from an exact science, my choice is to follow through by attempting to make it difficult for the opponents while coming at least close to covering myself with enough offensive potential.

While two hearts may also miss a valid spade contract, it also, because of the seventh heart may possibly mislead my partner as to both my offensive potential and defensive shortcomings.

If you ask for percentages here they are:

3H=100

2H=80

Pass=60

4H=20

1H=10

While I cannot justify the above with any sort of proof, nevertheless those ratings represent my judgment.

Playing bridge, especially at high-levels, in not for the faint of heart and bridge, being a percentage game, needs at least to be played that way with aggressive ahead of passive.

BTW, I will pass on to you my experience in choosing between a vulnerable three or four preempt in a major. With a three bid you allow guessing opponents to wiggle more which can be good for our side since it keeps them from having their backs to a wall and will pass partner’s take out double of a game contract by us, not knowing whether it is right or not, but merely because the level has gotten too high to experiment. It then follows that we need to have a better suit and more playable distribution to come out alive when the opponents have guessed right.

I hope the above makes sense to you and you are definitely right to ask questions about competitive bidding since that subject ranks at the top of the list in determining winning.

The bidding in the column hand previously displayed on my browser as:

South — West — North — East

— – – – – -Pass- – – 4H- – – – Pass

Pass – – -Pass-

I thought the mistake was a mis-positioning of the bidders (South bidding 4H), not that the South bid of 3H was not visible and the 4H was a raise.