Blog 56 - 75th Anniversary Simultaneous Event

As you have hopefully seen on our home page and through our social media channels, we are celebrating our 75th year in one final flourish with a special set of Simultaneous Pairs events next month. So that everyone can have a go, we will be playing on the weekdays of Tuesday 8th to Friday 11th May and Monday 14th May 2012.

I am really looking forward to taking part in the Simultaneous Pairs, because I’ve seen all the work that the team have put in to it (although only at a glance, or otherwise I would not be able to play!), and it sounds very interesting. It will be fun seeing how we do compared to how things were done 75 years ago - it was a pretty "convention free" environment I would think. For this reason we have produced special 75th anniversary booklets which will be available at your club after the game.

It has been an interesting 75th year especially with our brand new National Grading System kicking in a couple of months ago. I am very proud to have been involved in so many aspects of this great celebratory year.

Please sign up your club today, and help us to celebrate our anniversary in style! Sign up as your club here: https://www.ebu.co.uk/members/

PS - While you are at it, clubs can sign up for our future SIMS at any time. If you are not sure how, please call our office and someone will guide you through it!

Blog 55 - Simultaneous events - SIMS now "in house"

After two successful trial runs, the last with 114 clubs playing, from April 1st 2012 the English Bridge Union is administering its own Sim Pairs events and the British Simultaneous Pairs (formerly known as BGB Sim Pairs).

For the Sims to be more accessible, we will be making most of them available on five days of the week with a different set of hands on each day. So clubs can offer one session each day in either the morning, afternoon or evening – but not all three! If your club plays just once a week, you won’t have to miss out due to the Sims being on the wrong days.

In order to streamline the process and save on postage and printing, we are moving as much administration as possible online. If you have seen the latest price increases coming from Royal Mail, you will understand why this is a good idea! Once you have indicated that you wish to play, all necessary files and documentation will be available for clubs to download from the EBU website. The entry fee has been reduced to £2.50 per player (except for the Stratified EBU Sims where the fee is £2). This is for provision of electronic commentary, booklets, travellers and hand records. Paper commentary booklets can be provided by post on request at £8 per pack of 20 booklets. Normal P2P rates apply as well.

These events are open to all EBU affiliated clubs, but club heats must be of at least three tables, and each player must play at least 18 boards. Affiliated clubs that wish to participate should register online via their EBU Members Area.

Why not look at your Club Calendar of Events now to see if you wish to take part in any additional events. Club players looking to improve their game really appreciate the commentaries and, if they do well, they benefit from the enhanced Master Points available to the top third of the field, which include Green Points if you do REALLY well.

• Full Instructions and Sims Calendar for Clubs

Contact Ian Mitchell on Ian@ebu.co.uk for more information.

Blog 54 - NGS Takes off

I am delighted and proud to announce that the EBU's long awaited National Grading System is now ready for the world to see! Having said that, it has all happened in something of a rush, so we are not quite as ready on the web site as we would have liked, but we are not waiting any longer.

If you go to your members area, and clear your browser cache (check with your browser's help to see how), you will see new information about your NGS grade. There is much more navigation information available at this link.

which will hopefully answer all of your navigational questions. Club administrators have extra information available in the Club's members area.

The point we have reached is the culmination of more than three years work, mainly by our volunteers, and I am delighted to say that this new grading system puts us in the forefront of the world's bridge federations, few of which have such a facility but most of which would like one! I have been continually thanking our volunteers for the huge efforts they have made in getting us where we are today, but I must once again thank Mike Christie who has developed the software and the associated database using the technology base that was put in place by our own Michael Clark for the universal membership development. Thanks also to the scoring system software providers who have helped us along the way.

It is quite possible, indeed almost certain, that some of our members will find little gremlins; if that happens please send your comments or questions to ngsqueries@ebu.co.uk.

Finally, the project suffered some body blows during its development with the passing of Dr John Carter who was Chairman of the Working Group and the serious illness of John Probst, who provided large amounts of technical input before he was unable to continue.

I am quite sure that John is looking down on us with a big beaming smile today...

Blog 53 Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

The SIMS test run earlier in December was a success, and we are very grateful to those members who took the time to help us identify those aspects of the processes that needed improvement or correction. We will (or already have) acted on that input and we would like to run another test SIM in February, on the 27th, a Monday. As for the last one, it will be free of any extra fees, although normal P2P charges will apply. In addition, this time we will provide paper commentaries and hand records to any club that wants them at a cost of £8 per pack of twenty. We hope as many clubs as last time play and help us get things as near perfect as possible!

The new year will see the National Grading System kicking off after a long period of development. Look out for the next edition of English Bridge which will provide more information.

All of us at the EBU wish our members the very best seasons greetings, and a Happy New Year.

BLOG 52 Sims 2012; Price Reduction confirmed at £2.50

I have some good news; it has now been confirmed that when we start running the Sims events from April next year our per player fee for members of our affiliated clubs will be reduced from the current level of £3 per player to £2.50. This will cover provision of commentary booklets electronically, thus saving us all a lot of expense, especially as the Royal Mail are increasing postage rates quite substantially very soon. We will continue to provide paper booklets for those clubs that prefer to get them that way and the cost will be £8 per pack of 20.

We will also be making each event available three sessions per day (but a player may play only once a day!) and five days of the week so all our clubs and their members can take advantage of this new service from the EBU.

For more information about booking your places after April 2012 contact Krys (krys@ebu.co.uk), see the website in due course, or call the office.

We are delighted that on December 6th we will be running a simultaneous event to test our new capability. Around 90 clubs (including some from the Scottish and Welsh Bridge Unions) have signed up to help us and to take part in our event while testing our new system; we are very grateful for that help. Indeed, some web site errors have already been found by a few clubs which is, of course, just what a test is for!

We have produced a slightly different and innovative commentary for this test event, which will become evident when you see them after your game which we hope you will enjoy.

We will be maintaining direct contact with our clubs with updates on the new sims process.

Blog 51 - Simultaneous Pairs

Some of you may know that after many years of having our simultaneous pairs events run (extremely well!) by ECATS, we are now in a position to bring the running and administration of these events inside the EBU.

We have tested the software "in house" but we wish to do a full "system" test in December so that we can test run every aspect of the event.

We will be inviting all affiliated clubs to participate in this event, at NO COST! We will provide commentary details electronically and local points will be awarded according to the usual scale, but no green points.

The scheduled date for this is Tuesday December 6th.

Please put this in your diary remembering it is FREE, and help us ensure that our in house SIM management gets off to an error free start after April 1st 2012.

It is not too early to book your place. If you wish to participate please send an email to Ian Mitchell at ian@ebu.co.uk.

Please note that by "free" we mean free of a Sim Pairs charge. The sessions will still incur a regular P2P charge.

Blog 50 - Technical update...

Just a quick message to advise members that a revised "members area" is now live.

Especially good news is that we once again have the facility for members who wish to play in our tournaments to enter online. For the time being we are using PayPal, which is an internationally recognised way of making payments to suppliers. It is NOT necessary to have a PayPal account to use it, as the facility will accept credit cards in the normal way.

The new members facilities will also allow us to make further progress in the implementation of the National Grading System. There will be further details of the NGS and how it will work in due course.

You can see a brief video about how to make online bookings below, or jump in by going to the members area.