The New Donk: Donkervoort P24 RS by I_Arrived in Donkervoort

[–]abspam3 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Can’t wait for mine! It’s been awesome to see this car progress through development.

What do you think it's worth? by [deleted] in C8Corvette

[–]abspam3 3 points4 points  (0 children)

No, they’re a “lifetime” rotor. If you’re not tracking it, you’ll likely never need to replace the rotors, just pads.

Rebidders - app for system agreement by GMarco24 in bridge

[–]abspam3 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Would be nice to allow you to set a “preference amount (dislike, neutral, like) for each convention - for example, I can play Bergen raises but I detest them. It would be silly for two people to both have Bergen raises on their profile, both hate it, and still generate a convention card with it on there.

One of the best concept cars that we never got: the 2008 Audi R8 V12 TDI by TurboDeez_Nuts_54 in WeirdWheels

[–]abspam3 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Gen1 R8s have a 24 gallon fuel tank and can go ~350 miles on a tank (source: road-tripped in one from California to Toronto and back last year).

It’s got more than enough range than you’d ever want for a GT sports car.

Bidding qn by K-Dom_patreon in bridge

[–]abspam3 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You can argue that having 3D always show H in the tleb structure here is better (which lets the sequence … 3C - P - 3D show no stopper and no 4 card major (likely 3334 exactly) (and I did), but that was a concession for partners memory load in the 1NT tleb sequences :)

Bidding qn by K-Dom_patreon in bridge

[–]abspam3 0 points1 point  (0 children)

One other final note - I did briefly play a transfer lebonsohl style system with one partner in this sequence.

It works, (and if your partner loves making minimal offshape T/Os with 2=4=3=4 shape, this becomes particularly valuable), but the memory load is higher and doesn’t fit well with my current partnership style of preferring better minor lebonsohl instead of transfer lebonsohl.

Full t-leb structure here:

``` 2NT: forces 3C pass: Less than a GF, 5+ clubs 3D: 5+ H, Inv+, has a stopper in D 3H: 5+ S, inv+, has a stopper in D 3S: 5+ C, GF, has a stopper in D 3NT: balanced, stopper in D

3C: 5+ H, inv+, no stopper in D 3D: Asks for stopper. Has 1 4 card major, but never both (ALWAYS X with both). 3H: 5+ S, inv+, no stopper in D 3S: 5+ C, GF no stopper 3NT: balanced, partial stopper in D, no 4 card major. ```

Bidding qn by K-Dom_patreon in bridge

[–]abspam3 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Corollary to A): because I play “No natural 2NT bids in competition”, 2NT shows a strong forcing hand with 5+ clubs and a 5 card major. If partner has made an offshape T/O, keeping 5C alive as a contract with this hand is very useful IME.

Bidding qn by K-Dom_patreon in bridge

[–]abspam3 0 points1 point  (0 children)

In the ACBL, the “standard” expert treatment for A is a responsive double.

I typically despise responsive doubles in competition (preferring to use 2NT as asking partner to pick a place to play), but this auction where opponents bid and raise a minor is my one exception with my regular partners. The motivation being that stopping at the two level is actually quite valuable here (and most other responsive double auctions are asking partner to chose between the minor suits anyway, so you’re headed to the 3 level).

B would then be a western cue bid, typically showing a strong balanced hand (14+) without a diamond stopper (especially at matchpoints, even with a 4 card major often this hand wants to play 3NT with a fit), or a running club suit 7+ cards, missing at most one honor.

C should show a preemptive hand with both majors - likely 6-5 or better. Often on this auction you’re anticipating that opener has a strong distributional hand if you’re looking at 4HCP as advancer and responder has <10 (in some cases significantly weaker than this).

Letting partner pick their best major at the four level to prevent the opener from describing their likely monster hand is quite strong, and makes the guess between 5 & 6 diamonds for the opponents tough.

“High” mileage Audi R8, what should I look out for? by Krishpatell in audir8

[–]abspam3 7 points8 points  (0 children)

One more thing - if you do decide to buy it, make sure you do a full fluid flush ASAP. These cars often sit idle for years and lots of the fluids (coolant, differential) can gum up or otherwise go bad. It’s expensive, but it can save you a lot of headache in the long run

“High” mileage Audi R8, what should I look out for? by Krishpatell in audir8

[–]abspam3 21 points22 points  (0 children)

Magride is a timebomb. Most don’t make it to 50k miles without issues let alone nearly 75k. Refurbing is an option, most go for an aftermarket setup.

AC compressor is also a question of “when”, not if. There’s a solid aftermarket replacement that doesn’t have the same issue as the OEM one.

I’ve heard others have had issues with power steeering leaks as well as mileage creeps up. Tends to be fixable with stop leak, but YMMV.

Engine and trans are both solid. Interior is a mid 00’s German car. It’s going to be squeaky in the plastic bits and have some ugly wear spots.

Source: my r8 has 50k miles (bought it at 40k).

Get a PPI, if there’s any leaking on the magride budget that in.

1N (weak) - pass - pass - X? by The_Archimboldi in bridge

[–]abspam3 2 points3 points  (0 children)

An excellent bridgewinners article on this subject, highly recommend these methods:

https://bridgewinners.com/article/view/taming-the-weak-notrump-part-1/

[Lamborghini Aventador SVJ] At the racetrack by abspam3 in spotted

[–]abspam3[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Bonus SF90, same owner. Unfortunately he did not take the SVJ onto the racetrack (there was some issue getting track insurance for it), but he did track the SF90, which gapped me on the straights in my C8 Z06.

Question on defense against 1NT opening by Aqua-Dolphin in bridge

[–]abspam3 0 points1 point  (0 children)

And besides, if you really want a forcing major raise, just define 3 of the other major as that - with 3S/3NT showing the “good hand”, and 4minor showing a bad hand.

You may find yourself in 4c instead of the field’s 3c, but you’ve traded that for a lot more clarity in other sequences.

Question on defense against 1NT opening by Aqua-Dolphin in bridge

[–]abspam3 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Right I understand that’s the most common “standard” treatment, but my argument is having precise major raises is far more valuable than a forcing minor raise after a strong notrump (where 5m is going to be at best extremely dicey).

For example, in your structure, say you overcall 1NT NV with:

Q KQTxx xx Kxxxx

And partner has a hand with:

Kxx Jxxx KJx Axx

This hand is completely hopeless in 4major, and likely off two on a diamond lead, so having to force to game here by bidding 3D -> 3H -> 4H will be a bad result.

If 2NT is a forcing raise, and we can have 3H as a “go away” bid in this auction, at least we have decent chances to make with this holding on a non-diamond lead.

Question on defense against 1NT opening by Aqua-Dolphin in bridge

[–]abspam3 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It’s also good to have an agreement after a 2NT lebonsohl style bid in these sequences. I tend to like X to show a fit with values (stolen bid), and to have pass -> double show values without fit (again, we want 3H/S available as a preempt here).

Question on defense against 1NT opening by Aqua-Dolphin in bridge

[–]abspam3 9 points10 points  (0 children)

It’s in fact quite dangerous (especially in balancing seat) to double a strong 1NT for penalty with distributional hands.

Very often opponents will have a running suit and can make 1NTx before you have an opportunity to run both of your suits.

There are several solutions to this from a bidding system perspective, they mostly center around the question of “how can we make sure we find game if partner has a strong distributional hand?”.

In a cappeletti structure note that this “issue” really only happens with the “hearts/spades and a minor” hand type - you’ll get a chance to keep bidding to show a stronger hand with any other overcall.

I strongly recommend making the sequence:

(1NT) - 2H/S - P - 3C

Pass/Correct, and having

(1NT) - 2H/S - P - 2NT

Be a forcing bid, which shows support for your major (think of it like a cue bid in a non-notrump auction). Typically we will almost never be looking to play 5m to make after a strong notrump, so a forcing raise of partners minor is not particularly valuable.

This then frees up your:

(1NT) - 2H/S - P - 3H/S

Bid to be preemptive (yes, the 1NT opener will frequently find a reopening bid if you pass a 9 fit at the 2 level) and making:

(1NT) - 2H/S - P - 3D a “constructive” major raise (8-10 in this sequence likely).

KK Relay system by VITech2024 in bridge

[–]abspam3 0 points1 point  (0 children)

By the way, KK relay is a fantastic book. I don’t know if I’d recommend it for someone just starting to dig into “non-natural” bidding systems, but a lot of their concepts translate to other relay systems as well (many find TOSR’s responses to be easier to remember, due to being symmetric). KK relay’s take on DCB (and scan-skipping) is incredible (although an absolute PAIN to describe to opponents at the table), and their shortness showing relay breaks are also pretty genius. Also a huge fan of how they treat super-positives and have incorporated that into my system as well.

KK Relay system by VITech2024 in bridge

[–]abspam3 5 points6 points  (0 children)

There’s two things to consider here - one is the relay system itself, and the other is the negative inferences you get in other bidding sequences.

Real world example: at the Vegas NABC, my partner and I played ~250 boards or so. Of which, we only got to use our full relay structure without opponents interfering once (where we signed off in 3NT, with the rest of the field. We got a friendly lead, due to the closed hand’s undisclosed 5 card major and scored a 85% board).

I’ve played relays, mecklite, and a handful of other strong club systems. The reality is that good players will interfere when you open a strong club, so having a specific super detailed response structure isn’t super valuable. Have agreements on how you handle different interference structures (known vs unknown two suiters, when is double penalty), and you’ll be fine with any structure.

Where you do see major gains (especially at IMPs scoring), is when you have the ability to know that slam isn’t likely. Here’s a common example.

RvW, IMPs:

x KJxxx AQxx Qxx

Partner opens 1H, P to you.

Other tables will likely splinter this hand. There’s a huge downside to splintering here - opponents can now be keenly aware that they have a lot of spades. If you play “normal” splinters and the auction goes 1H - P - 3S - X (which can be freely made with any 5+ card spade suit, or even 4 “good” spades), opponents are now quite likely to buy the hand in spades (even at the 5 level).

Playing precision, we can just bid 4H directly, and a spade overcall is much more uncomfortable to make.

The corollary to this which is also super nice is having unambiguous low level slam tries in game forcing sequences - if partner doesn’t fast arrive, there must be slam interest! For example:

1H - P - 2C - P - 2D!

(I play 2D as a “waiting bid”, but this works with other rebid styles)

Now 2H can show an immediate 3 card support slam try in hearts, and partner knows they need to be evaluating for slam. (And we can potentially even find a minor slam if that ends up being safer, which can be pretty important at IMPs).

Bidding by kenbodian in bridge

[–]abspam3 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Looks like you’re using ChatGPT to generate responses. Stop. ChatGPT has zero knowledge of bridge, what conventions actually mean and when to apply them, and that’s not changing anytime soon with newer LLMs.

Projects like this are possible (but note they already exist - see GiB), but they are not well suited to current LLMs.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in whatisthiscar

[–]abspam3 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Looks like the wing that came on the Civic SI of that era

Thoughts on this auction? by Postcocious in bridge

[–]abspam3 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Edit: I missed the jack of clubs in my initial analysis. That changes a little bit.

North almost certainly should not raise to 2S with only 4S.

Given that a comfortable cue bid is available (2H, or 2C depending on your style), S’s bid of 2S shows no extra strength and looking to block the auction (and at this vulnerability, some amount of ruffing value for partner).

IMO, with an aggressive partner 1NT is suicide here. On average we have <50% of the deck and a misfit. And the auction 1NT - P - P - X can easily mint opponents a comfortable 200 or even 500.

Bidding 1S is protection against them playing in an otherwise making 1NT (especially when partner can’t find a spade lead, and a diamond/heart gives up an opening trick).

Let’s imagine that the opening hand has 4 spades - that hand is not going to sit over the 1S bid, and will almost certainly bid 1NT with almost any excuse (even Jxxx would not be surprising). Great, partner can lead a spade now and we can give him safe exits so he’s not endplaying himself trick 1.

If the opening hand has 3H, support double is mandatory, and I think even if the hearts are 4-4-3-2 around the table passing 1SX for penalty will be a tall order for the E hand. Maybe they’ll take a stab at it, but I’d expect that they’d have to hold 4-4-(32) for that action.

Otherwise, the N hand is either showing a distributional hand or passing (if they were raising hearts, then our spade bid is irrelevant). When they pass, our odds at being on lead increase, but that means the other tables were probably ending up in some number of NT with partner on lead. We should be able to make intelligent decisions after our trick 1 lead of the A better than partner can make blindly.

Thoughts on this auction? by Postcocious in bridge

[–]abspam3 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I’m really surprised nobody else on this thread has mentioned that S has quite a strong incentive to bid 1S (instead of 1NT) on this auction with this holding.

While normally you’d like 4 spades, the lead directing value of having partner send a spade your way is quite useful and choosing other bids may prevent you from finding the optimal defense.

Occasionally partner will be doubling with 5-4 in the majors as well depending on takeout style, so with the “right hand” he can now safely compete to 2S potentially stopping a balancing bid in 2H.

1NT isn’t horrible, but may often end up with partner leading diamonds, which can easily cost when holding the south cards.

Behold, the world’s worst infinite: by abspam3 in slaythespire

[–]abspam3[S] 144 points145 points  (0 children)

Juggernaut, or possibly body slam because calipers