February 2008 - 61

Winsome & Loathsome
Tales of the Trail

Motown rocks!
Competition: It built Detroit, then
devastated it.
Now competition - sports competition - and the success of Detroit's
professional sports teams are helping
to rejuvenate the city's pride and its
image. The professional sports teams
have all been championship-caliber
teams and the city has hosted the
Super Bowl and the Major League
Baseball All-Star Game. Soon it
will play host to still another major
competition: (FANFARE!) The North
American Bridge Championships!
Here's why you should go. In
1981, the last time Detroit hosted
an NABC, the district did a great
job - but image rules, and few
came. It was held in the spectacular
Renaissance Center, as fine a facility
for a bridge tournament as one could
imagine. The playing conditions
were superb, the architecture was
interesting, the interiors playful and
there were enough eating places and
bars within the facility that you never
had to leave the complex! Detroit's
intriguing Greek Town was close by
for those who chose to leave. It was

 Bridge with the Abbot
the play? If the jack is covered, you
pick up the suit. If it is not covered,
you rise with dummy's king and
again pick up the suit. It is what the
text-books call a 100% safety play."
"Quite so," replied the Abbot. "You
played it very cleverly."
"It is disappointing that the technique is not well known here," the
Monsignor continued. "It is fully described in Cardinal Montaglio's book
on card play."
"We have it in the monastery
library," the Abbot replied. "I believe
it's one of our most requested volumes."
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February 2008

all terrific, but few came.
Now Detroit is starting to come
back, and bridge is coming back to
Detroit! The city slowed its decline
in the mid-Nineties. A complete
turnaround is yet to be achieved, but
1996 was a watershed year. General
Motors bought the Ren Cen and
made it corporate headquarters.
GM and the co-habitant Marriott
Hotel have since spent hundreds of
millions of dollars on renovations,
dramatically improving an already
superlative complex, within which lie
many options: You can preview GM
vehicles; eat in a huge food court;
dine 72 stories above a breath-taking,
panoramic view of the Detroit River
or raise a glass in romantic seclusion. The hotel has more than 1000
refurbished rooms and an enormous
lobby along with many other attractive bonding areas. A place to bond, I
submit, is key to the social success of
any tournament.
Meanwhile, Compuware, the
principal sponsor of the Detroit
NABC, has built a gleaming new
headquarters downtown. A new park
in front of it provides a lush gateway
to the area, and three new casinos
invite tourists to leave their money in
Detroit in exchange for a great time.
An elevated "people mover" circles
downtown to points of interest.
The tournament committee is doing
an amazing job. Three university
professors, Bill and Sandy Arlinghaus
and Ron Horwitz, are co-chairing,
and they're utilizing their professional skills to organize the tournament
much like one would organize a
modern city. They've raised a ton of
money, and in the Motown tradition
there will be outstanding hospitality
and entertainment, like the Contours
and the Miracles! The tournament
will again be held in the Renaissance
Center, certainly among the best

Zeke Jabbour
jabbour@comcast.net

tournament sites in America. They
even asked me to reprise the show I
did in Motown more than a quarter
century ago. Don't panic, I respectfully declined, but I will reprise one
deal from the old notes I found of a
lecture I gave there in 1981.
As South, you arrive at a very good
6 contract. This is your dummy:
Q 10 9 6 5 4 J 5 4 3 K Q 2.
Your hand is:
A K 6 A K Q J 10 9 A K 6 2 -.
A trump is led and you draw three
rounds, West failing on the second
round. You test the diamonds, but
once again, West fails on the second
round. Gadzooks! Looks like you've
got two diamond losers. Now what?
Let me guess. You know that West
had started with 11 black cards. If
they include the J and the A,
you are home! You cash the A,
lead your low spade to the 10 (!), and
cross your fingers. When the 10
wins, you call for dummy's K, on
which you dramatically jettison your
K (you always did have a certain
panache) and when West wins, he is
helpless! He is forced to lead a black
card and your two losing diamonds
go away on the two black queens.
Making six! Well done! You're clearly
ready for the NABC. See you in
Motown!
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61
Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of February 2008
