Club Director Courses and Exams
Currently the centrepiece of Director Development is the Club Directors’ Course.
This is a one day course in preparation for taking the exam for accreditation as a Level D Club Director. Bridge Victoria will provide the course at no cost to participants or clubs for any club that can guarantee ten participants from their club or neighbouring clubs. Timing of the course will be dependent on the availability of a Director to conduct the course and the recency with which courses have been run in the location. To request a course email Bridge Victoria at [email protected].
Bridge Victoria is preparing to replace the written exam with an online exam. In the meantime copies of the exam paper can be obtained by emailing Bridge Victoria at the same address.
The director accreditation framework identifies modules of content that need to be mastered as part of the accreditation process. Currently the modules required for Club Championship Directors are provided in the Club Directors Course. Bridge Victoria is developing courseware for the other modules, though in practice instruction on these happens most frequently “on the job”.
Director Development Modules
The Director development modules cover six topic areas: Laws for Players, Laws, Movements, Scoring & Technology,Tournament Organisation and Masterpointing. Almost all have two levels. You can jump to the modules using the links in the box.
As Bridge Victoria develops resources, including online or video resources, to cover these modules, links will be added to this page.
Laws
Players primarily only need to know the Laws well enough to identify when an infraction has occurred so they know when to call the Director. However, in several cases both the infracting player and the non-infracting players have decisions to make under the Laws. This module primarily focuses on these circumstances.
When calling the Director it is important to call loudly and clearly but not urgently or angrily. Also when you call the Director raise your hand and leave it raised until the Director is at your table. Pete Hollands has an excellent video on calling the Director.
Laws for Players
- The effective use of Penalty cards
- Minor, & Major PCs, Lead Penalties
- Insufficient bids
- When to accept
- Replacement calls that are more ‘precise’
- When is a card played?
- Revokes
- Establishment, correction, automatic trick transfers
- Withdrawn Calls
- Correction of wrong explanations (obligations and timing)
- Dummy’s rights and duties
- Unauthorised Information
- What is authorised and unauthorised?
- The player’s responsibilities
Some of these common rulings are dealt with in the EBUs excellent How Can I Help You video series.
Laws 1
- Common laws, which a Director should be able to do without opening the law book: Lead out of turn, Revoke, Insufficient bid
- Law definitions
- Played cards (declarer, defenders, dummy)
- Unintended calls
- Calls out of rotation
- Duties of the director
- Penalty cards
- Missing cards and incorrect number of cards
- Play of wrong board
- Dummy’s rights and obligations
Laws 2
- Claims and concessions
- Mis-bids and mis-explanations
- Un-authorised information
- Alerting and system regulations
- Written bidding and bidding box regulations
- Appeals
- Partnership agreements and Psychic actions
- Inadmissable calls
- The Director’s discretionary powers
- Assigned and artificial adjusted scores (including split and weighted)
- Defective tricks
- Rulings on disputed facts
- Procedural and disciplinary penalties
Movements
Being able to choose and manage movements is one of the things that makes players think Directors are akin to wizards and equally one of the things that deter players wanting to learn to direct.
Managing movements is made a lot easier with table top devices like Bridgemates and scoring programs. Directors still need to make the choice of movement and should understand how they work.
Movements 1
Mitchell movements:
Odd tables
Even tables with skip (including Revenge rounds)
Even tables, bye-stand and share
Insertion of late pairs/table (rover options)
Howell Movements
Full Howells
Three quarter (reduced) Howells
Insertion of late pairs/table (rover options)
Movements 2
Mitchell movements
1.5-table appendix Mitchell
Arrow switched Mitchells
Web-Mitchells
Howell movements
Interwoven and double Howells
Combining Mitchells & Howells
Teams (one session)
American Whist movement
New England Share and Bye-stand movement
Mirror Mitchell
Multi-session Events
Swiss Movements (Pairs and Teams)
Round Robin Movements (Pairs and Teams)
The use of triangles in Swiss and Round-Robin (Teams)
Laws and Movements 3
Principles of movement balance and pair comparison
The cycling of player fields and sub-fields across multi-session events
Barometer movements (Howell and Mitchell)
Individuals (Rainbow, Stanza, Shoemate, Howell)
Web Mitchell
The use of hesitation and pivot tables
Knockout events with and without repêchage
Kibizing with BBO/RealBridge
Scoring and Technology
Scoring consists of two elements, the score awarded for the actual hand and how that score is converted into ether Match Points (MPs) or International Match Points (IMPs). For multi-session events it will usually include a final conversion to Victory Points (VPs). Scoring technology has simplified the scoring task, but the Director needs to understand
Scoring and Technology 1
Scoring
Setting up the scoring program for a session
Identification and correction of scoring errors
The principles of matchpointing
The awarding of averages and the scoring of fouled boards
Butler (IMP) scoring for Pairs
IMP scored teams
The choice of VP scale
Factoring of boards and sessions
Bridgemates
Correction of input errors during session by the director and the
players
Bridgemate settings and options
Changing movements during the session (after round 1)
The updating of firmware
Scoring and Technology 2
Scoring
Leader’s Butler
Cross-IMPing
The creation of user defined movements – i.e. movement building
Electronic display of results – web and locally
The Neuberg formula and its application to adjustments and fouled
boards
Bridgemates
Data loss from the Bridgemates/BM server/Scoring program
The use of the ‘re-send’, ‘recovery’ and ‘synchronisation’ options
Advanced Bridgemate settings e.g. Results display, player names,
movement instructions, hand records etc.
The running of multiple events within the same BWS
Bridgemate log files and their relationship to the BWS database
Tournament Organisation and Preparation
The Director needs to work with the Tournament Organiser to develop the event structure and movements. Once chosen the Director must ensure that everything is prepared for the commencement of play.
Tournament Organisation and Preparation 1
Event structure and choice of appropriate movements
Standby pairs
Open vs closed entry events
Substitutes
Seeding and ranking of pairs/teams
Preparation of boards and replicates
Guide cards and other player instructions
Timing and rate of play (including Slow Play)
Graded and flighted events
Session duration vs number of tables and boards
Single stage events vs Multi-stage events (ie Qualifying and Final)
Tournament Organisation and Preparation 2
Assistant Directors, Caddies and other assistants
Carry forwards
Layout of the playing area
Walk-in vs Pre-entry events
Control and Circulation of boards
Liaising with the Tournament Organiser
Reports & Appeals
Masterpointing
Masterpointing is the way players keep score between each other and their way to assess their own performance over time. Scoring software usually manages the masterpointing, but it depends on choices made by the Director. The Director also needs to be able to explain Masterpointing to players. Of course, the most important resource is the ABF Masterpoint Scheme Manual.
Masterpointing – Introduction
Grades of masterpoints, including tours
Session masterpoints vs outright masterpoints
Session
75% rule
Minimum number of boards
Supervised play
Half table considerations – Mitchell and Howell
Match awards for 5 boards or more
Teams vs Pairs
Substitutes
Outright
Table average calculation, including 125% rule
Teams vs Pairs
Pairs Finals/Consolation factors
Master factors (graded events)
Submission of mastertpoints with documentation to the State MP Secretary
Authorisation numbers
Inactive and unregistered players
Masterpointing – Advanced
The Congress Acceleration factor
The Director to table ratio requirement
The 48 board minimum for outright awards
Calculation of the number of sessions from boards played
Other types of non-club Red Points (Interclub, Regional, Congress, Super Congress, State)
State events (Red and Gold)
Table number limitations and their effect on Final/Consolation size
The factoring of masterpoints
The manual preparation and editing of electronic MP files
The 40% rule in respect to team membership
The 75% Restriction factor (age, gender)
Requirements for submission to the State Masterpoint Secretary