Adventures in Bridge
Leaders in Bridge Entertainment and Education
www.advinbridge.com
(2) Bidding Basics: Which Suit To Open
Updated: October 2011 ©AiB Robert S. Todd
Level: Novice
[email protected]Basics
Opening the bidding is the start of our conversation with partner (and often the opponents.) It
is very important that we start that conversation in the right way – make the right choice in
opening the bidding. If we start off with the wrong opening bid we often have trouble properly
describing our hand as the auction progresses. This document contains a basic overview of
what to open when your choice of opening bid is not clear.
Majors
When we have a 5-card Major, we usually open it. The first question we’ll consider is what to
do when we have both Majors.
5♠-5♥ (or longer with equal length: 5-5, 6-6)
We open 1♠ and rebid ♥.
5c♠-6c♥
This is a more complicated hand. If we have only a minimum opening bid, we treat it like we
are 5-5 in the Majors. If we have extra values (enough to Reverse), then we open and bid more
naturally – start with 1♥ and bid ♠ twice after that.
Ex. 1♥-1NT-2♠-2NT-3♠-
Minors
When we do not have a 5c Major and do not have a hand that can open some number of NT,
we must go to our backup plan – open a minor. If we have both minors we have a choice of
which suit to open. Our planned rebid and the rest of our hand will help us determine which
suit to open.
[email protected] PO Box 14915 ♠ Tallahassee, FL 32317 850 570 6459
Adventures in Bridge, Inc.
www.advinbridge.com
5♦-5♣ (or longer with equal length: 5-5, 6-6)
Open 1♦ and rebid ♣.
4♦-4♣
Open 1♦ and rebid Notrump if balanced or something else if unbalanced.
3♦-3♣
Open 1♣ and rebid Notrump (we must be balanced.)
5♦-4♣
Open 1♦ and rebid ♣, like you are 5-5 in the minors.
4♦-5♣ (Difficult Hand)
With this hand, we generally open 1♦ and rebid 2♣, showing an unbalanced hand.
Note: We will treat some 2-2-4-5 hands as balanced and open 1♦ planning to rebid 1NT – or we
open 1♣ planning to rebid 2♣ or 1NT.
Nothing to Open (4-4-3-2)
We generally promise 5-cards when we open 1M, 4-cards when we open 1♦, and 3-cards when
we open 1♣. There is one hand, with distribution 4-4-3-2 that gives us nothing to open. With
this hand we open 1♦ - our longest minor. This is the only hand in which we open 1♦ with only
a 3-card ♦ suit.
Problem Hands (Advanced Topic)
When we have a 4-5 shape and an unbalanced minimum hand, we can open 1♦ if our suits are ♦
and ♠. But if we have 4-card ♥ suit and a 5-card minor, we may be faced with a very difficult
bidding problem.
Example Shapes
1-4-5-3
1-4-3-5
(2) Bidding Basics: Which Suit to Open 2
Adventures in Bridge, Inc.
www.advinbridge.com
With a minimum hand, we would open our 5-card minor (let’s say ♦ in this case), but if partner
responds 1♠ we will not have a good rebid. We can rebid 2♦, 2♣, 1NT, or reverse into 2♥ - but
all of them are “bad bids.” The question is which one is the least bad bid. Rebidding 1N or
reversing into 2♥ are the worst two bids. 1NT shows a balanced hand (which you don’t have)
and 2♥ shows lots of extra values (which you don’t have.) Rebidding 2♦ shows a 6-card ♦ suit
and rebidding 2♣ shows a 4-card ♣ suit. All of these bids are lies.
So what to rebid? As a general rule in bridge, it is better to lie in a minor than a major or NT, so
rebidding 2♦ or 2♣ are the best rebids! Our general rule is not to lie to partner about our hand
type. By rebidding 2♦ or 2♣, we might lie a little bit about our length in the suit, but at least we
haven’t lied about our hand type: partner knows we have an unbalanced hand.
(2) Bidding Basics: Which Suit to Open 3
