The Boring Club (or in Dutch: Saaie klaver) is a

bidding system A bidding system in contract bridge is the set of agreements and understandings assigned to calls and sequences of calls used by a partnership, and includes a full description of the meaning of each treatment and convention. The purpose of bid ...

in the card game

contract bridge Contract bridge, or simply bridge, is a trick-taking card game using a standard 52-card deck. In its basic format, it is played by four players in two competing partnerships, with partners sitting opposite each other around a table. Millions o ...

, designed by

Lucas Smid Lucas or LUCAS may refer to: People * Lucas (surname) * Lucas (given name) Arts and entertainment * Luca Family Singers, also known as "lucas ligner en torsk" * ''Lucas'' (album) (2007), an album by Skeletons and the Kings of All Cities * ''Lu ...

of the

Netherlands ) , anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau") , image_map = , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands , established_title = Before independence , established_date = Spanish Netherl ...

. In this system all

balanced In telecommunications and professional audio, a balanced line or balanced signal pair is a circuit consisting of two conductors of the same type, both of which have equal impedances along their lengths and equal impedances to ground and to other ...

('boring') hands, that in most natural systems would be opened 1NT or would be opened in a suit at one level with the plan to rebid 1NT or 2NT, must be opened with 1. The general idea behind this system is to get the information about the shape of the hand (balanced or unbalanced) across to partner in the first bid. The opening bids in boring club can be summarised as follows: *1: Balanced (12-18 hcp), no five card major *1: 4+, unbalanced (10-21 hcp) *1: 5+ (10-21 hcp) *1: 5+ (10-21 hcp) *1NT: 5+ (10+ hcp) *2: Balanced (19-22 hcp), may contain five card major *2: Multi (including 23+ NT and game forcing hands) *2:

Muiderberg convention Muiderberg is a bidding convention in the card game bridge. It is a two-level preemptive opening based on a two-suiter with precisely a five-card major and a minor suit (four-card or longer). In Muiderberg the 2 opening denotes five hearts and an un ...

*2:

*2NT:

Two suiter In contract bridge, a two suiter is a hand containing cards mostly from two of the four suits. Traditionally a hand is considered a two suiter if it contains at least ten cards in two suits, with the two suits not differing in length by more than ...

in both minors with longer clubs (10-15 hcp)

The 1 opening

A boring club 1 opening shows 12-18 high card points in a

balanced hand A balanced hand or balanced distribution in card games is a hand with an even distribution of suits. In the game of contract bridge, it denotes a hand of thirteen cards which contains no singleton or void and at most one . Three hand patterns are ...

not containing a five card

major Major (commandant in certain jurisdictions) is a military rank of commissioned officer status, with corresponding ranks existing in many military forces throughout the world. When used unhyphenated and in conjunction with no other indicators ...

. This opening bid is non- forcing with transfer responses: 1 - ?? ::Pass: 4+, 0-6 hcp ::1: 4+, 7+ hcp ::1: 4+, 7+ hcp ::1: puppet, forces opener to rebid 1NT ::1NT: balanced, no four card major, 8-10 hcp ::2: 4+, no four card major, 10+ hcp (

Inverted minors Inverted minors refers to a treatment introduced by the Kaplan–Sheinwold (K–S) bidding system for the popular card game bridge. The original structure of Precision, another bidding system, also employed inverted minors over a 1 opening. Howeve ...

) ::2: 5+, no four card major, 10+ hcp

The 1NT opening

In boring club, the unbalanced hands that in a natural system would have been opened 1, get opened with a forcing 1NT opening. The following responses apply: 1NT - ?? ::2: 0-10 hcp, not necessarily -support ::2: no five card major, 10+ hcp ::2: 5+, 10+ hcp ::2: 5+, 10+ hcp ::2NT: -fit, 10+ hcp ::3: -fit, weak (5-9 hcp)

The 1 opening

The 1NT opening

Further reading