A proposal for 3-level suit opening bids

By using 2-level suit opening bids for all strong hands, the Culbertson system was able to introduce the obstructive use of 3-level opening bids, with the main purpose of making it more difficult for opponents to enter the bidding, while still carrying a good number of tricks in case it should turn out to be the final contract. Disturbing the opponents' bidding is certainly one of the three requisites for a "good" opening bid, and this "pre-emptive" 3-level suit opening bid absolves it; being of little defensive strength, the "disturbance" factor of these opening bids is certainly dominant.

More generally speaking, for each opening bid, it is important that:

• it shows a likely and well-delimited point-count range;
• it shows partner a large number of cards; and,
• it disturbs the opponents' bidding.

Better still if it satisfies two of these conditions, and even better, of course, if it satisfies all three of them.

I propose 3-level suit opening bids with a six- or seven-long suit and a point-count range of 9-13 (even 14 with a 6/4 shape). In fact, it is important that each non-forcing opening bid should be applicable to hands of 9-10 points, the range where probability is highest; in fact, the more likely is the opening bid (provided it shows a precise point-range and a good number of cards), the more frequent will be the ensuing disturbance to the opponents' bidding!

From this point of view, my 3-level suit opening bids compensate the defects of the classical Culbertson "3-level pre-emptive" (still in use today): by not covering a 9-10 point-count, pre-emptive 3-level opening bids are less likely, and at any rate they take on an "exquisitely destructive" nature which may often end up damaging our partner.

With a 3-level suit opening bid, as I have proposed (i.e., with 9-13 points and 6- or 7-card suit), our partner is well placed, with a full range of choices; in fact, he can:

• pass
• raise to game (even defensively, or to interfere with the opponents' bid)
• use a "one-step relay" (but 4§ on 3ª) to ask for singletons or voids if any
• conventionally ask for A's and K's when looking for a slam (my personal preference here goes to the Warren convention).

It is crucial for us that the opening bid should give immediate information to our partner; we want to avoid the behavior of a strong American partnership who (in 1995, during a World final they won), out of 69 opening bids, 22 times opened with 1¨... such a distributionally insignificant bid!

On the contrary, our 3-level suit opening bids send partner a great deal of information; besides that he receives directly, other aspects can be easily deduced, at least at the level of probability (e.g., considering our shape, partner must know that in 40% cases an opponent will also have a 6- or 7-card suit in his/her hands). Furthermore, and this too is very important, these 3-level suit opening bids (together with higher ones, indicating two-colors 5-5 or 6-5, which we shall examine separately), allow us to restrict to exactly five cards (not one more, not one less!) the length of the major which is shown with a 1© or 1ª opening bid (in a natural way, I must add, and in the same 9-14 point-range)!