Palo Alto Bridge offers silver earning opportunities with three upcoming sectionals (Thursday – Sunday, October 22-25, and two in November). Then attend and wear a costume to our popular annual Halloween game for spooky fun!
In addition, we continue to offer more learning opportunities with our various classes, celebrity seminars, our popular Pro-Am game and our enhanced Mentor Program.
Upcoming events for you at Palo Alto Bridge Center:
“Special Events” and Learning Events in October/November:
- Chris Chung’s Fall classes: “Card combinations for Sane People”. Tuesday evenings; start October 6 – register: Bridge classes
- Celebrity seminars via Zoom by Michael Berkowitz: “Count Me In”. Counting as Declarer on Saturday, October 10; Counting as Defender on Saturday, October 17. 9:30AM-11:00AM. Register: Celebrity Seminars
- Pro-Am Pairs game: Thursday, October 15. An aspiring player is partnered with a more experienced player – sign up online: Pro-Am game
- Palo Alto Bridge Unit October Sectional: 4 days of Silver on Thursday 10/22 – Sunday 10/25. Oct Sectional
- Mentor Program Four-Over-One (4/1) sessions: Fri. 10/9, Wed. 10/28, Thu. 10/29 – register: Mentor Program
- Halloween game: wear your spooky costumes, enjoy loads of Halloween goodies, and join in the fun! Friday, October 30 at 10:45AM. SignUp
- Silicon Valley Unit Fall Sectional: more silver on Saturday 11/7 – Sunday 11/8. U507 sectional
- District 21 Sectional Tournament at Clubs (STaC) week: Monday 11/16 – Sunday 11/22.
Regular Events:
- Daily Monday – Friday club games: Bridge Center is open every weekday. SignUp Free Post-mortem sessions for certain Tuesday (next October 20) daytime and Wednesday evening club games. Online (BBO) game on Wednesday evenings at 6:50PM.
- Newcomer EZ games: Relaxed and friendly 0-49er game with short pre-game lecture on Mondays at 11:15AM – register: SignUp
- Monthly Swiss Team club games: upcoming Mondays October 12, November 9, December 14 at 11:30AM. Swiss Team games SignUp
- Silicon Valley Youth Bridge (SiVY): Casual Friday evenings: SiVY website
Attached is a 1-pager current list of planned events – more will be added through the year.
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Enhanced Unit 503 Mentor Program
The new Mentor Program has launched with a blast! Our wonderful volunteer Mentors can help Unit 503 members improve their skills and enjoy bridge more. There are four new mentoring experiences that meet different needs of aspiring players:
- Four-Over-One (4/1) Mentoring Table
- Two-Months Mentoring
- One-Time Play in the Open
- One-Time Play in the 499/749
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Don’t miss the upcoming 4/1 sessions – only a limited number of seats available – APPLY NOW!:
- Friday, October 9, 10:45 AM
- Wednesday, October 28, 6:45 PM
- Thursday, October 29, 11:15 AM
Apply as an individual or with a partner and up your game! Questions? Contact our Mentor Program Coordinators Sandy Lee Chen and Bill Chow, mentorprogram503@gmail.com.
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Want to improve your bridge game by playing in a relaxed atmosphere and partnering with an experienced player? Sign up to play in Palo Alto Bridge’s Pro-Am Pairs Game on Thursday, October 15!
11:00AM Meet partner and discuss bidding preferences
11:30AM Game starts
You do not need a partner to sign up – we’ll do the matching of partnerships.
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Shout out to experienced players – we need you! Please register if you are willing to partner and help our aspiring players!
Pros and Ams, please register online in advance: Pro-Am game
Questions: contact Denise Pitsch dpitsch@gmail.com
Partnerships: contact H. Paul Davis, pauldav@gmail.com, or text 408 582 4954.
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For more silver points, a fabulous time, and tournament experience, come to Palo Alto Bridge’s 4-day Sectional from Thursday October 22 to Sunday October 25. Oct Sectional
Call your partners, teammates and friends and come play! If you need a partner(s) or teammates, use our reservations system: Online Partnership/Teams Desk
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Separate Silver Rush (under 750mps) and Open/Midflight (<3000) sections.
Special 0-99er game 1-session with 18 boards on Thursday and Saturday mornings.
If you can spare a little time to volunteer/help, please contact Tournament Chair Marc Cervellinomarc.cervellino@hotmail.com
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Halloween Spooktacular on Friday, October 30 is our annual popular fun event where we encourage players to wear a costume! There will be prizes for the best costumes!
Loads of Halloween themed snacks. The Bridge Center is decorated in frightening fashion!
The game starts at 10:45AM. SignUp
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Newer Players: Come and join many other newcomer players at our new relaxed and friendly Newcomer EZ 0-49 games on Mondays. This game is a great way to improve your bridge and gain duplicate bridge experience in a welcoming environment! We can help you find a partner. Please encourage your friends or family who could be interested in duplicate and need a little cajoling into the Bridge Center.
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There will be a short pre-game lecture at 11:00AM by Chris Chung and the duplicate game with 12-14 boards starts at 11:15AM to about 1:15PM. Helpers will be available to answer limited questions during the bidding. SignUp
For Limited section games, our games are on Tuesdays at 10:45AM, Wednesday evenings at 6:45PM, Thursdays at 11:30AM and Fridays at 10:45AM. SignUp
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Palo Alto Bridge offers monthly Swiss team games for you to gain team game experience in a relaxed atmosphere. Next team club game is on Monday, October 12 at 11:30AM, where the boards are already shuffled and dealt with hand records. This is a great opportunity to practice for the upcoming sectionals this fall. If you need a partner, or help to be matched with another pair, let us know. Swiss Team games SignUp
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At last month’s game on September 14 – congrats to the winning team: Ken Rosenfeld – Joel Koransky – Denise Pitsch – Fung Bao. Honorable mention of the top strat C team: Mary Steele – Mary Peterson – Kevin O’Leary – Bob Reed.
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World Champion Debbie Rosenberg gave an excellent and engaging lecture on “Double Trouble” on September 24 at Palo Alto Bridge Center. Thank-you, Debbie! This was part of our Free Lecture Series, which is funded by Peninsula Bridge Education Foundation PBEF.
Debbie’s lecture slides and additional notes on this topic can be found on our website: Lecture Series
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Many of us have benefited from Debbie Rosenberg’s post-mortemsessions.
Her next one will be for the Tuesday club game on October 20.
Sign up to play for the club game: SignUp
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Where can you play with the ‘best of the best’?
“The best bridge event!” on October 3 only at Palo Alto Bridge Center! As expressed by one of the 134 attendees who turned up for this special event to celebrate the 2026 US Mixed Team Bridge Championship winners, won by a team of five local players – Michael, Debbie, and Kevin Rosenberg, Amber Lin, Xin Ge, as well as Disa Eythorsdottir.
Team Ge gave a fabulous presentation of the tournament – sharing informative bridge learnings, giving attendees insight into expert level bridge events, and allowing the local bridge community to better get to know the team members, and doing so with a lot of humor!
We also thank Will Watson for deftly directing the multi-section 33-tables pairs game.
Huge thank-you to all our volunteers who made this event more special: Marc Cervellino, Stephanie Youngquist, Debbie Carey, Sandy Nakata, Sandy Lee Chen, Kelly Heuschkel, Dianne Giancarlo, Debra Willrett, Kyoko Ogawa, Sólveig Kjartansdóttir, Ivana Madrigal, David Merenbach, Liz Koh.
Check out our Facebook page for more photos!
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Sad news to share:
Janice Anderson passed away in August. From Mary Steele: “She was a brilliant bridge player who lived to be 104 years old. She played every Saturday at the Vi for over 20 years. Great storyteller and wonderful sense of humor.”
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Rick “Fluckey” Flucke passed away on September 5th after a long battle with prostate cancer. From his friend Jana Cushman: “Rick played bridge for more than 50 years. Rick had a quick wit, a great sense of humor, a competitive spirit, and an irrepressible zest for life. He loved the game and the people he played with, and his stories, humor, and lively personality made the time around the bridge table as memorable as the game itself.”
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We need you! Our events and activities are put together by our volunteers, and we want your help.
Any little of your time would be appreciated!
We need volunteers for marketing and publicity (photo-takers, storytellers, email blaster) and help organize a bridge tournament. Please let me (lizkoh4bridge@gmail.com) know.
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Accessorize your outfit at your next club game, tournament or bridge event. You can purchase your own customized name badgewith our colorful Palo Alto Bridge logo – order yours online for $14: PA Name Badge Order
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Congrats to the following Palo Alto Unit 503 members who achieved a new ACBL Rank in September:
Junior Masters: Ashish Agarwal, Gabriela Gayer, Suresh Jutur, Saroop Mathur, Jenish Shah, Fan Wang, Zhijun Yan, EJ Zhu.
Club Masters: Susan Moriconi, Vivek Paul.
Sectional Masters: Yu-Shih Chen, K Rao.
NABC Masters: Joe Hirsh, Raghu Murthy.
Life Masters: Kathy Ormseth, Manoj Thawani.
Ruby Life Master: Tomasz Pawlowski.
Sapphire Life Master: H Paul Davis.
A very warm welcome to our new Palo Alto Unit 503 members:
Cynthia Bitner, Kathy Bries, Park Chamberlain, Jesse Chao, Shelley Coleman, Marc Cooper, Veena Damle, Frank Fox, Rebecca Fox, Gabriela Gayer, Beth Gordon, Jonathon Gould, Joann Zimmerman, EJ Zhu.
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P.S. Feel free to forward this to others who play at Palo Alto Bridge but who are not members of Unit 503.
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