🥈2025 Seoul Club Invitational Bridge Tournament🥈

It was an honor to be invited to the 1st Seoul Club Invitational Bridge Tournament, hosted by Ivy Bridge Club in Seoul, Korea.

Heartfelt gratitude to our gracious and brilliant sponsors

There's even an official video!

This prestigious event brought together 16 teams from 5 countries: 6 teams from the host country Korea, 2 from Japan, 3 from Hong Kong, 4 from China, and our Singapore-Taiwan team.

Details such as schedules, team rosters, results, and photos are available on the official website: https://ivybridgeclub.com/the-1st-seoul-club-cup......

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January 15-17, 2025: A tournament right after Japan's Asahi Cup

After finishing the Asahi Cup in Tokyo, I flew straight to Seoul, from a country 10 degrees colder than Taiwan to one that's another 10 degrees colder.

Aside from the honor of participating, I was thrilled to team up with Fong Kien Hoong and Zhang Yukun, the 2018 Asian Games Men’s Team Gold Medalists 🤩. (With my POOR facial recognition skills, I hope I can finally remember my teammates next time 🤦🏻‍♀️🫣🙄).

The three-day event consisted of a 15-round round-robin over the first two days, with each round featuring seven boards. The top 4 teams advanced to the semifinals, followed by 24-board knockout matches in both the semifinals and finals.

 

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A tough start with a strong comeback

Our “luxury lineup” was once sitting at 2W3L and third-to-last 🫨. I felt this seven-board format, reminiscent of NABC team matches, really didn’t suit me. But no worries—just like in SCBL, we planned to crouch before jumping high again (?!)

(For reference, SCBL is Swiss, while this tournament is round-robin....)

Day 1 featured 7 rounds. The hosts conveniently grouped the scores in sets of 5 rounds, leaving us with a faint memory of being third-to-last after the first 5 rounds 😂. 

On Day 2, we started with another 2W3L record, but thankfully, the losses were small, and we didn’t get another 0 🤣. With 8 rounds scheduled for the day, we unexpectedly scored the full 20 VPs in the final round, landing us in the top 4 for the first time during the entire 15-round preliminary stage! We finished the day on a high note ❣️

Semifinals: Narrow victory

In the semifinals, we faced the Japanese team led by Chen Dawei, who is fluent in Chinese, English, and Japanese. Luckily, while his language skills might have overshadowed mine, his bridge luck didn’t. We gained +16 IMPs in the first half and lost -4 IMPs in the second, barely advancing to the finals by a one-board margin.

Finals: A bittersweet ending

Our final opponents were the China team “Geely” led by the famous Wang Wenfei, the top female player in China. In the first half, we trailed by -16 IMPs—the same score as the semifinals, but with the roles reversed.

In the second half, our opponents bid aggressively: a 35% slam and a less-than-50% grand slam, making me wonder who was actually in the lead 😂. My teammates, however, stayed level-headed and bid the makable grand slam while skipping the low-probability unmakeable small slam.

6♠ requires ♠HTx onside and hearts splitting favorably

7♥ needs ♦K onside and decent splits in red suits

Despite our teammates' excellent performance, we only managed +14 in the second half and lost the finals by a heartbreaking 2 IMPs, finishing as runners-up. I deeply regret letting my team down 😔.

Reflecting on 2025’s first tournament

Starting the year with a close loss is tough, especially when it feels like I lost it for the team 😣. On the bright side, crawling from third-to-last to the runner-up spot at least proves my abdominal surgery didn’t mess with my brain (no one said that).

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Highlights

1. "Concern" from a Korean Friend:

At the end of Day 2, when we finished on a high note:

"How’s your condition? Are you getting better? You looked so tired and pale yesterday 🥺"
"She said she’s never seen you play this badly before 😏" by Kelvin in Chinese. 
Thanks for translating! I fully understood it just fine myself 😒🙄

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2. Dinner banter with the Japanese team:

During the closing ceremony dinner with the Japanese team, someone asked about the result:

“Isn’t it obvious from our expressions? 😂”
“Bronze medalists are usually happier than silver medalists.”
“Why?!” asked my teammate.
“Because silver is the loser in the finals, while bronze at least won the playoff.”
“Well, I’d rather take silver—who wants to miss out on prize money? 🤨.”

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3. A rare 5M PRE:

In one round, Kelvin, sitting North, preempted 5♠ after my 1♠ opening, putting maximum pressure on the opponents.

East (Bubble) pointed to 5♠ and asked: "??"
Qrious: "No agreement."

Bubble doubles

Qrious: "Do you believe me if I say it’s an invite? 🤨."
Bubble: "No! 😟."

Then why did you ask? 😎

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Official website：https://ivybridgeclub.com/the-1st-seoul-club-cup......

Diary link (private)：
Day0：https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1A23G2F5c9/
Day1：https://www.facebook.com/share/p/18QCzcCQD6/
Day2：https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1Bjr2mQGnb/
Day3：https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1DDUjtiZNw/