European Championship 2017 — Montecatini, Italy
First-time partner Adam Wildavsky and I — moreover, we had only gotten together just at game-time,
as our respective partners both had to leave the tournament suddenly — demonstrated our unrehearsed mystical rapport by showing up to play the final session in the same color T-shirt. By this time, some 250 pairs had been whittled down to 50 or so, hence the rather empty-looking room — Oh did I say “room”? Actually due to an organizational snafu, the originally planned Convention Center venue was unavailable, and they scrambled to arrange a surrogate — which proved to be a huge makeshift tent way out in the Tuscan countryside, cozily sandwiched between a dinosaur theme park and a shooting range. Maiden outings are often remarkably successful, and this board is an example. While we sport our What-Me-Worry? grins, Alfredo Versace (left) and Mustafa Cem Tokay (red shirt) — one of the toughest pairs in Europe — commune with their respective inner oracles in hopes of finding a winning lead against Adam’s 6NT, which as it happens had to be a diamond. The good news is Adam made his slam contract for a top board. Alfredo and Mustafa obviously didn’t have too many rounds like this, though, because they finished third overall. We meanwhile contented ourselves with a top-10% finish, not so shabby for a first-time duo in perhaps the toughest pair event in the world.
