[uijallen]

As a newish player, one of the things I think that helps me the best after a duplicate game is the ability to go back and review certain bidding/playing situations that I have questions on. Currently I usually circle the hand when we're done with it. However, when we're done 3 hours later I oftentimes find myself struggling to figure out what I was wanting to review. So, my question to you is, what have you found is the best way to take notes on things as the game goes on (obviously only after the hand is over, I'm not going to write a novel during the play (although that would likely help me)) so that when you go back to review it afterwards (or in the coming days if you have to run off immediately after the game) you know what you wanted to look at.

Thanks!

[The_Badger]

It's always helpful to play with someone better than you who can analyse the boards with you. Note down the boards that you want to analyse: Bidding, Play, etc. And they can also make a note of the boards where advice is needed.

It works well with a friend - intermediate level - who I play bridge with occasionally on here. It's an exercise in constructive analysis, and it's good if you have someone who recognises their own mistakes - as I do - and who's friendly because the last thing you want to be told as a newish player is 'this is wrong, that is wrong, why did you do this, etc...'

[silvr bull]

uijallen, on 2017-July-26, 08:52, said:

what have you found is the best way to take notes on things as the game goes on

I have a similar problem when I play a F2F duplicate session. After the session, I could not remember most of the hands or auctions that seemed worth discussing. the best memory aid I could use was to write down my hand, and maybe my partner's hand too. A convention card has spaces to record your plus or minus score. By writing very small, I could fit my hand into one of those spaces, and the auction or another hand into the other space. With practice, I could do that quickly at the table, so I did not need to find the hand after the session to make notes about it. Looking at my notes and hand later was usually sufficient to remind me why I thought the hand was worth the effort to make notes about.

[Tramticket]

I strongly recommend that, if possible, you find a club in your area that can produce computer-dealt hands. With the hand records and a very brief notation on the convention card, you should be able to analyse the issue later. The notation might be something like: "4C??" = "Should I have competed to four clubs" "Bad trump break" = "look back at the hand to see if I could have guarded against the bad break".

I would recommend only selecting a few deals - but review in detail.