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Bob Fearn.

A Visitor from Seattle.

There was a special guest at the inter-club Pairs competition last Tuesday evening held at Thames Bridge Club between the Thames and the Te Aroha Bridge Clubs. That was Bob Fearn, the developer of the Compass Scoring System, who is making a long overdue visit home to New Zealand. It was also rather appropriate that Bob should play with Mary-Ellen Newton that evening.

Bob says he started playing at the Tokoroa Club in 1976 and played there for some 22 years. This club had a good pedigree with Zelda Morris a former player while Mary- Ellen and Rod Dravitzki learnt the game there too. Bob also recalls Bruce Marr, Leo Duyvestyn and Peter and Liz Bristow from his days at the club.

Bob moved to Auckland and played bridge at the Akarana Club in 1998 and 1999 and then in 2000, he and his wife, Marie,  moved to a new life in Seattle. Bob says that, for him, playing Bridge came before software development. When home computing became available in the 1980s, the scoring side of Bridge was a natural for software development. In the last 25 years, Bob has not played any club or tournament bridge in all that time.

He is in the middle of a to-date 2 year Compass rewrite from scratch. It is in the initial testing stage and should be ready for full roll-out for 2026. That rather than playing the game is Bob’s passion. He is though always so willing to help clubs with any problems they might have despite time differences between Seattle and here. He is too so helpful in the background with respect to the annual New Zealand Wide Pairs event and is very much instrumental in producing the national results so quickly.

However, at Thames, it was back to playing the game. His first board, against yours truly, was a routine 4 game. “Routine” is a carefully chosen word as bidding and making it was worth 82% on X Club and 95% at Thames that night. It simply required finding an ace in one opponent’s hand! Welcome back, Bob!

However, moving on and in Bob’s own words: “ Bob’s rustiness was apparent early on, when he left in a take double of 3 and went for -870. A little later, an interesting hand turned up.”

 

 

 

 Sitting North, Bob opened a game-forcing 2.  Mary- Ellen upgraded her (“very crumby”) 5 points and bid 2.  After the obvious 3 from Bob rebid, Mary Ellen tried signing off in 3NT. This suggested a misfit, but the Gods were kind when Bob’s next bid of 4 led to a great 6 contract. 

This would have been easier had East not started with A and a second spade. Reduced to 3 trumps in his own hand and soon less in dummy, Bob needed a 3-2 trump break and a reasonable heart break to succeed.

He ruffed the spade continuation and played A and ruffed a heart. A diamond back to hand was followed by a second heart ruff (with K had it been necessary). Three round of trumps followed by his remaining 3 high hearts and K saw this slam home a result achieved by only one other pair (out of 128) on X Club. All has not been forgotten in the past 25 years.

(Even if Mary- Ellen had not upgraded the South hand, the slam should be reached once North shows their second suit.)

Bob said he had a wonderful time getting back to club play and hopes to play at other clubs as he travels around New Zealand in the next month or so. Welcome home, Bob.

Richard Solomon

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