I have been dipping into an old book by George S. Coffin, Sure Tricks (2nd edition, 1950). Our copy once belonged to H. Kunimura (any of you recall that name?). Somehow the club obtained it over the years. I googled and was surprised to find the book listed at Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Sure-tricks-George-S-COFFIN/dp/B000M8HNSC
It contains lots of fun double dummy puzzles. Also play problems in which you are challenged to make your contract by visualizing the worst possible lie of opponents’ cards (thus the title of the book: Sure Tricks).
Here is a sample of his double dummy puzzles:
You are South in 6NT. Lead is the queen of Hearts*. How are you going to make your contract against any defense?
*Typo: Lead corrected to queen of hearts rather than queen of diamonds 6/9/20.
Here is the solution if you give up: Coffin1 Solution
Steve
June 3, 2020 at 8:39 am
Harry, This one I couldn’t get. I can see how to squeeze W in ♥️ and ♠️ to either win the ♥️4 or promote the ♠️10 when W is forced to cover the lead of the ♠️7. But I couldn’t figure out how to prevent E from defeating this line by baring his ♠️A and discarding no more than 2♦️ so he has a winning exit card if S plays his ♦️winners before leading his ♠️7. If S plays only 1 or 2 rounds of ♦️s before the ♠️7 I can’t see any way to force W to discard the card I need him to. Because of the placement of the ♦️honors he will always know whether to pitch a ♥️ or ♠️ at trick eleven.
Did I miss something obvious or does “against any defense” really mean “against anything less than a double dummy defense”?
Steve
Harry
June 5, 2020 at 9:09 am
Steve, did you try keeping the 10 of diamonds in hand? Try that as you are coming down to a 4-card ending in which you are about to lead your last club.
Steve
June 6, 2020 at 9:40 am
Harry, I finally got it. If East bares his ♠️A then has to play to have 2 ♦️ entries to dummy when he leads his last club from hand at trick 8. He then crosses to dummy and leads a spade to the A and J. West’s ♦️ return is won in dummy with the J and the ♠️K is the parking place for S’s losing heart. I didn’t see the necessity of starting ♠️s from dummy in this scenario. Thanks, Steve
Harry
June 6, 2020 at 8:07 pm
It’s not necessary to start spades from dummy. Did I make an error in the solution?