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Matamata hosted their annual Junior Tournament on May 5th.

It was a good turnout of 14 tables and the spoils went across the hill to Tauranga with Mike and Angela Newton who had a great morning and even better afternoon session.

Matamata Junior winners

In second place were Megan Jolly and Janice Wilton from Hamilton who are starting to think Matamata is their happy place after winning the Novice Tournament here only a couple of months ago.

Matamata Junior 2nd

Third place was shared across two pairings ... Chris Judd and Sharon Opai from Taupo tied with Mt Maunganui's Phil and Gill West.

Third equal

Top Matamata pair were Father and daughter Joe Keys and Raewyn Richards while Te Aroha had success with June Zhu and Moira Lagulagu coming top in the morning session with a great 60% session!

top MAtamata: Joe Keys and Raewyn Richards

Session winner: from left June Zhu, Moira Lagaluga and sponsor Joanne Morgan

Some action shots from the morning session.

Matamata Junior Tournament

Matamata Junior Tournament

Matamata Junior Tournament

Matamata Junior Tournament

Matamata Junior Tournament

Matamata Junior Tournament

Matamata Junior Tournament

Make sure you get your entries in for the upcoming Matamata Junior Tournament which is part of the Waikato Bays Junior League

Details are:

Entry fee: $20 pp (lunch NOT included)

Morning Tea from 9.30am with playing starting from 10am sharp.

Two sessions, 3B event.

Entry on the NZ Bridge website: http://www.nzbridge.co.nz/events,listing,2651,matamata-junior-pairs-sat....

Or you can email the bridge club directly: matamatabridge@gmail.com

Pre-payment welcomed via the direct debit on 03-0363-0323853-00

Look forward to seeing a good crowd in Matamata on the 5th of May.

Lessons for beginners start at Morrinsville Bridge Club this coming Tuesday March 20 at the Morrinsville Bowling Club. Tutor is Nick Whitten who has taken these lessons now for several years. The Club also runs lessons for more experienced players that want to 'up their game' on the fourth Thursday of each month with Nick taking the novice/junior players and Jim Crawford the more advanced.

Matamata hosted the successful Waikato Bays Novice Tournament - for many the first opportunity to play a two session tournament under relaxed direction. A total of 6 tables were in play and the winners were Janice Wilton and Megan Jolly from Hamilton albeit with a Matamata link (Janice is the neice of Lynette Morgan and Zelda Clements) who had a good morning capped by a great afternoon session. With the win today they also secured free entry into the Congress Novice event to be held at the New Zealand Congress in Hamilton in October.

Novice Tournament: Winners Janice and Megan from Hamilton

A new partnership proved fruitful for Tineke Yates (Te Aroha) and Ross McIntyre (Matamata) who finished up second and got better as the day progressed.

Novice Tournament: 2nd place Tineke and Ross

And Matamata had further success with Diann Voyce and Lynn Ryan took out third place.

Novice Tournament: Third place Diann and Lynn

The seeded teams event starts next week in Matamata and runs for three Thursday nights (March 15, 22nd and 29th).

Enter as a pair and you will put with another pair to make up a team. Each pair is seeded so the strongest pair (based on rating points) will be teamed with the lowest ranked pair; 2nd ranked pair with 2nd lowest pair etc. Thus the competition should be relatively evenly matched!

The format will depend on how many teams are entered; but we still need more pairs to enter. Each pair needs to commit to playing for three weeks but a substitute can be arranged if you aren't able to make all three. If you are keen to play but can't find a partner ring Anne Beetham partner steward on 07 888 9966 or email matamatabridge@gmail.com

Lessons start at Te Aroha on 7th March at 7pm, Morrinsville on 20th March at 7pm and Matamata on 10th April at 7pm.

Please tap your friends, family and colleagues on the shoulder to encourage them to come along.

For more information contact Anna (Te Aroha) on tearohabridge@gmail.com or 0275 183 133

Shirley Power (Morrinsville) on morrbridge@gmail.com or ph 07 8897386

or Kathy (Matamata) on matamatabridge@gmail.com 021 346 808.

We are sad to inform that the Bridge Club lost two members recently.

Our immediate past President and friend Jan Wills passed away last night (Monday night) after what seemed like a relatively short but brave fight against Motor Neurone Disease.

We offer our sympathies to Barrie and children Jo, Roger and Lynley and all of Jan's grandchildren.

Jan Wills

Further service details will be posted as they become available.

Noeleen Begovich was also farewelled last week at a service after passing suddenly earlier in February. Sympathies are also extended to her family.

The Te Aroha bridge club contingent had a solid win at the Gold Coast Congress...unfortunately not for their bridge (although they are lying in the top 10 in their teams comp with another day to play).

Te aroha gold coast team: The Winning team in action

They won the Australiana dress up comp ...ironically the top three spots were won by nz teams!?

The win for the Yule team at Christchurch over the weekend gave Ken Yule the masterpoints required to achieve Gold Grand Master status.

Kenneth Yule

This is the highest rank available to any New Zealand player and Ken joins a select group of just 25 others to hold this rank in New Zealand.

To achieve Gold GM rank - Ken was required to rack up 4000 masterpoints (A & B points) of which a minimum of 2500 had to be A points. Ironically it wasn't the A points holding Ken back as he has got nearly 2900 of these following the weekend success.

While the new ranking won't become official until after the next quarter rolls around when NZ Bridge send out new ranking certificates, we all join together in congratulating Ken on achieving this awesome milestone.

Congratulations Kathy and Ken Yule who along with Grant Jarvis and Jan Alabaster, were the winners of the two day South Island Teams held over the weekend in Christchurch. A 20A event, this attracted all the big names of bridge from across New Zealand.

The Yule team had just one loss from their 8 matches and held the top spot (or close to it) for most of the weekend. They ended up with a very comfortable win by 12 Victory Points (or VPS) with 120 VPs total (or a good old fashioned walloping as one commentator called it!)

Meanwhile all those unable to travel to South Island made do with a day out at Cambridge to contest the first of the Waikato Area Pairs. A great field of 21 tables turned up with the top pair being Jenna and Christine Gibbons of Waikato/Te Puke.

We also had some good local successes with Sonia Crawford and Lesley Quilty winning the morning session and coming fourth overall. Anna and Jacob Kalma came 9th and Tim Rigter and Rochelle van Heuven had a great afternoon session to take 14th spot.