Winning Notrump Leads

This is an incredibly valuable book and a must read for the serious bridge player. The authors report the results of computer play simulations with a sample size of 5,000 deals constrained for hundreds of opening lead hands featuring specific characteristics of interest (e.g., singleton, doubleton headed by 1 honor, doubleton QJ or KQ, long suits headed by 1 high honor, 2 high honors, broken honor sequences, interior honor sequences, and on and on it goes). Frequency of alternative leads to beat the contract at IMPs and the average number of tricks taken at Matchpoints based on the simulation results are reported. Occasionally, corrections to these statistics based on further computer analyses are made for situations when a lead might eliminate a declarer's need to guess in the play of the hand. Clear and well-writen narrative explanations of the simulation results are also presented, allowing the reader to gain insight and train his/her thinking processes. Each chapter concludes with some take-away guidelines for opening leads culled from the results reported.While most of the simulation results were not surprising to me, a sizeable minority were. But the narrative analyses calmed my skepticism by presenting logical arguments that reassured me that the simulation results are to be trusted.So I began applying these new principles and insights at the bridge table. There has been a dramatic improvement in my results and it is NOT my imagination. Based on analyses of my before and after opening lead deal results available online, I found that I defeat NoTrump contracts 22% more frequently than before while surrendering almost 1/3 fewer tricks on defense per deal when I do not beat them. Wow! And those "Nice lead" comments I keep getting from partner every session certainly are gratifying.I have but one request of anyone reading this review: If you choose to read this book, please promise me you will ignore it completely and return to your previous opening lead habits whenever you might play against me!

good

This book and its companion Winning Suit Contract Leads are both great! They completely overturn much of the traditional "wisdom" on what are the correct leads to select against various auctions. To give one example: they show that leading 4th best from your longest and strongest is the WRONG thing to do on most hands. The only thing I found irritating is that when they list the computed score for each possible lead, they order them in the order of the suits, spades, hearts, diamonds, and clubs, instead of what would have been better: in order of how well each lead scored. So for each hand you have to scan through the two columns looking for what lead was best at IMPs and MPs, instead of the best lead(s) always being at the top of each list. Also, in the end of chapter quiz answers, it would have been nicer if they gave a short blurb about why they think the best leads were in fact best, instead of just listing the best and second best leads. In several cases, the "best" lead seems like it should be something else, given the content and conclusions from the chapter, but there's no explanation why. Despite those problems, however, these books are so revolutionary I still think they merit 5 stars!

This is an interesting book in that it gets you thinking about the NT auction, what the opponents are likely to have, what partner is likely to have and so what is likely to work (for example: leading from a 6-card suit is unlikely to be successful because partner rates to have a singleton).The book is created by simulating thousands of hands to fit a particular auction and seeing which leads beat the contract most often (at imps) or blow the fewest tricks (at MPs). There are three caveats however:(1) The analysis is done using double-dummy play. Declarer will take every winning finesse, for example. In real-life, this doesn't happen. Instead, declarer finesses into the "safe hand" once the opponents have a suit they can run.(2) Matchpoint scoring is done using average tricks gained. But matchpoint games are usually won by avoiding zeroes. Short-suit leads will lead to a lot of zeroes. So, the book doesn't work too well at matchpoints.(3) Many times, the lead of an unsupported Ace turns out to be a very good lead. This is not because the lead is good, but that it allows you to look at dummy and make the right switch. Will you be able to do this at the table? Probably not. Remember that this book is based on double-dummy play.As an interesting approach to getting you to think about hands, this book is great. Be careful, however, about actually applying double-dummy-based results into actual play. Advice from Kantar's book on opening leads is probably what you want to apply day-in and day-out.

The authors use scientific computer simulations to study the lead problems against notrump contracts and draw conclusions based on the simulation results. Although the simulation ignores some very important aspects such as whether the current signaling system can still survive under the suggest leading pattern (e.g., if one always leads unsupported Aces, then the current signal system simply fails to work, and I doubt if a good remedy exists), it provides useful hints that would complement the decision making process of an experienced player. To me, the whole book can be summarized to several points (as which types of leads are more preferable than what people used to think and which types of leads are less preferable than what people used to think). Due to the respect to the authors, I shall not talk about the details but will let the readers to find out themselves.

Encouraged to buy this after reading the other book in the series on leading against trump contracts ... this one too does not fail to inform and educate... and will certainly have a major impact on my choice of leads.If you always lead the fourth card of your longest suit ... always choose an active lead ... rarely think to try and establish tricks in your partners' suit ... lead 4th best from KQ**** ... lead the same against 1NT, 2NT and 3NT ... never lead unsupported aces ...... believe that six card suits are good news then you should buy this book.It is not the advice of two expert authors after years of graft at the bridge table. The book provides statistics of success for considered leads on each hand - actual numbers of IMPs and MPs. Test exercises support self study and make the reader realize the depth of thinking required to achieve the best lead in any given circumstance.Although certainly an advanced study of the subject the book will be accessible (and instructive) to beginners and expert alike ...(Disagree with reviewer that says 'Hard work' ... easy to read but difficult to immediately digest ... a 'frequent return to')

Winning Notrump Leads is an essential book for anyone hoping to improve their bridge from my miserable level and is an effective teaching tool, especially if you can get your partner to read it. The basic idea is that the lead should be chosen after considering all the positive and negative inferences from the bidding and anyone who does not follow that method clearly has scope to improve their play. There is a minor caveat in using the actual recommendations directly in Britain where most pairs play Acol rather than Five Card Majors and some of the later bid a club to the sound of their partner crying "may be short". However, that probably only changes the optimum lead slightly and in a calculable way. The issue of whether to use Stayman with a 4-3-3-3 shape is also interesting. Reading this text has caused me to use Stayman whenever I do not hold a stop in the other major.However, the major caveat is that the play after the lead is double dummy. Thus declarer does not make errors in judging where the missing high cards are located. The most surprising aspect of WNL is the very frequent recommendation to lead a high card, which differs from most bridge teaching. It would be very nice to be sure that WNL's recommended leads do not give away too much information. Thus an analysis of a large number of hands played at duplicate by humans with recorded bidding, leads and results would be reassuring.

Gave me a lot to think about. I have been playing bridge for many years now and tried to make up my mind about the best lead in all sorts of situations. Computerized research now helps to find the theoretically best lead. Here we look a particular hand - then try 5000 different deals for the other three hands with restrictions according to the biddings. Marwellous work!Of course you have to realize that the "theoretically worst" lead may actually work better than the other leads.Recommended to every bridgeplayer, intermediate or better.Also good to see how the selected lead scores differently in "imps" vs. "matchpoint"

Interesting book based on mathematical computer analysis, not necessarily what actually happens at the table. Needs to be discussed with partner before embarking on some of the more adventurous leads. Gives little "advice" other than what is mathematically the best average lead. I think a more interesting approach would be to examine the pros and cons of aggressive vs passive leads, perhaps another book could be written based on this. The example hands given are, as stated, only examples, hands can be found to proved that any lead would be right in given circumstances. Personally I could do without the examples.

David Bird is one of the commentators on Bridge Base Online, where he explains things very well. This book is less easy to digest because it shows the reults of a lot of number crunching. However, it is well worth the effort. As another reviewer states, it is best digested in small chunks. Perhaps more so than most books, you will definitely need to get your partners to read it, as your resultant killing leads may well need a little more interpretation by them.