Now Yao Bao is playing in the third round of the 2018 Tianjin Youth Bridge Open Championship. In the just-concluded second round, they ranked 19th out of 21 teams. This is a ranking that Yao Bao has never achieved since he participated in the bridge competition.

The last time they played in the "Wentianxia Cup", they were beaten to 11th place (***20 teams). At the end of that round, Yao Bao cried when he came off the court. . This time his ranking was even worse, but he didn't cry, or even meant to cry. Instead, he kept holding the card paper and discussing the 14 decks of cards with his partner, reading them while walking, eating, and returning to the room. Still watching until the third round that just started. Therefore, no matter how we play later, learning not to shed tears on the court is already the biggest gain.

I just sent them into the arena alone. Four children, two in fourth grade and two in sixth grade, had just experienced a disastrous defeat. It was really a disastrous defeat, and they were beaten 20:0. It is really unimaginable and unimaginable to have one's head shaved in such a national championship field. I don't know if they have unspeakable scars in their hearts, but I can tell that morale is low. I said that I never wanted you to be ranked first. As long as you play the game seriously and try your best, it doesn't matter if you are ranked last. There is no shame in being inferior to others.

Speaking of this competition, it should be said that it is almost expected that the four of them will not achieve good results. In order to cope with national competitions, if you don't have 1 hours of partner training every week, then it can be said that there is no tacit understanding between your partners. Yao Bao and his partner have only played poker for about 2 hours in the past 2 months. I think the other pair of temporary partners should not have played for more than 2 hours.

How important is the tacit understanding of partners in bridge? As important as it is. If you don’t understand, you definitely won’t be able to call. If you can’t call, you will definitely get no results. The same goes for defense. What’s the point of talking about defense without a tacit understanding? How did the bridge champion come about? It comes from defense.

I think the four members of their team are not bad individually. However, due to the neglect of cooperative training, not only cannot the strength of the partners be seen, but even the individual abilities cannot be fully utilized.

So bridge is a very typical team sport. In a bridge team, individual heroism is of no use. Only when four people are good, have a tacit understanding, and are united can the team be powerful and achieve results.

Of course, it is necessary to admit that there are cases where skills are not as good as others. This is a long story.

First of all, please allow me to set the time back 28 hours.

Yesterday morning, I was typing words carefully at work. The courier called and said that a document was delivered, but there was no one at home. I asked him to help put the snacks at the door while muttering in my mind.

At 12:30 noon, I hurriedly picked up Yao Bao from school and returned home. When I took the express delivery from the owner of Kuike, I caught a glimpse of the signature on it - Jiang Weijie.

Teacher Jiang is Yao Bao’s first bridge teacher. In September last year, he must have just entered his senior year and worked part-time in the Stars of Tomorrow Club. He met Yao Bao, who had just started learning bridge, and became Yao Bao's first teacher.

Later, when I was chatting with teacher Zhang Ruming, I mentioned Teacher Jiang and he said that Teacher Jiang is a very good bridge teacher. It was this excellent bridge teacher who led Yao Bao into the door of bridge. This is Yao Bao's luck.

Teacher Jiang taught the Sunday afternoon class for the Stars of Tomorrow. When Yao Bao entered, the class had been open for a year. The first time I took him to class, I caught up with Teacher Jiang to give everyone a test. I don’t know what he thought, but he actually handed out a paper to Yao Bao. Yao Bao answered the question without any difficulty and actually scored 75 points. If the level of answering questions is not too high, then he is really talented.

At that time, I didn’t know whether Yao Bao had any talent. Sending him to play cards was purely to find him a trap that wasn't too bad. It’s summer vacation, and the streets are full of dazzling COSPLAY, which is both impressive and thought-provoking: for children, the world is full of traps, and they either fall into this pit or that pit. Instead of not knowing which pit he will fall into in the future, it is better to push him into a pit that is not too bad first.

Bridge was the pit I chose for him. It was rare that he himself had no doubts about it and plunged into it headlong. At first I was worried that he wouldn't be able to learn, but I still attended the class with him in a decent manner. I remembered in my notes that he was serious, and I planned to discuss with him after class. As a result, within a month, he had left me far behind. Facts have proved that Yao Bao is indeed more talented than me at bridge.

I have always believed that talent means that you can achieve better results than others by spending the same amount of time. However, according to this standard, I think Yao Bao is definitely not talented. He spends much more time on bridge than on badminton + piano + percussion combined. I said that he only perfected the "three ways" when it came to learning bridge: immediately (in the car), on the pillow and on the toilet - he kept a bridge book in front of him all day long. That serious look made me still question whether he understood what the book said. Anyone who has read a bridge book knows how brain-burning it is.

After the "Begonia Cup" in Shanghai ended this spring, Teacher Jiang said that he would graduate soon and go to work, and could no longer teach cards in the club.

This made me very worried, fearing that Yao Bao's bridge career, which he had just started, would cause trouble. But Teacher Jiang comforted me and said: The master brings me in, and cultivation depends on the individual. If Xiao Yao is of this caliber, he will naturally meet a teacher who is more suitable for him.

Sometimes things in the world really depend on God’s will. Around this time, Xiao Lai’s mother, Yao Bao’s first partner (who we had been with for a few months), sent a link on my WeChat, saying that Four Seasons Education was recruiting young poker players to play in a competition. Because I didn't understand the situation, I didn't take it seriously. Unexpectedly, this link was seen by Yao Bao, who later used my mobile phone to play with it. He just played it for fun and filled out the registration form casually. I didn't know about his registration until Four Seasons called him to come for an interview.

In that case, let’s give it a try. Unexpectedly, this sight brought Yao Bao to the Four Seasons Bridge training team, and he met a bridge teacher that he would never see in a lifetime.

I don’t know why Teacher Xu Minqi likes Yao Bao. Yao Bao is not the best card player in the training team, nor is he the most diligent, nor does he have any unique potential. He is even very careless in class and keeps making little moves. I would be annoyed by him even watching from the outside. die. For Teacher Xu, who has seen countless smart children, his qualifications are too ordinary.

But Teacher Xu just favored Yao Bao. Every time someone else made a mistake, points would be deducted. Yao Bao could always be forgiven for making a mistake. As a result, at the end of the summer, Yao Bao's accumulated points were actually ranked higher than those of the training camp. The front of the team.

I know that this score carries Teacher Xu’s preference, and I also know that there is something in it that even Teacher Xu is not aware of. This moisture is the problem pointed out sharply by teacher Peng Yachun of Shanlinglingshan Club - it is not systematic.

Everyone says that bridge is difficult. To me, it is difficult because it constitutes a huge system, including a large logically related system of bidding, bankership and defense. I have always felt that learning bridge among primary school students is a bit ridiculous, because I feel that this logical system is beyond the understanding of most children. This view of mine has indeed been verified by reality.

In every class at Four Seasons, Teacher Xu will talk about one or several knowledge points, and then focus on this knowledge point to explain the relevant things as deeply and thoroughly as possible.

The better the bridge teacher, the more extensions he will make when teaching knowledge points, and the easier it will be for students to integrate the large system of bridge. Therefore, when experienced teachers teach students, you will feel particularly open-minded. In just a few words, it seems like an endless horizon can be opened to you. The person who has reached the pinnacle in this aspect is Teacher Zheng Weiguo. By chance, Yao Bao had attended several of Mr. Zheng’s classes, and I listened to them. Of course I am talking nonsense, Teacher Zheng is the coach of the national team.

However, for children, their logical thinking ability is not so malleable. Sometimes the system is too large and the logic is too complex, which they cannot accept, and the expected results are not that good.

Because obviously the system is big, you need to put together the puzzle. You have to pay attention to collect all the puzzle pieces, and then put them together according to the correct logical relationship. But Yao Bao's collection of puzzles is a bit like a blind bear breaking corns. He does not bring a basket, but uses two chicken coops, and can only harvest two ears. What I mean is that he doesn’t know how to accumulate. For example, he can take notes, write down all the knowledge points, and then memorize them repeatedly, so that they can form a system. If he doesn't know how to take notes, then for him, Teacher Xu's lecture may be in vain.

So in the bridge classes at Four Seasons, it is very obvious that the older the students, the better they master the bridge system and the faster they progress. For primary school students in grades 2 and 3, their results are really not that ideal. Because it sounds difficult to listen, it is normal to slip out of the account.

So I say that Yao Bao now plays bridge entirely based on his sense of the game and his talent. It's okay to just play casually at the initial stage, but the higher you go, the more effort you need to put into building your bridge system.

For Yao Bao now, it is obvious that he still does not have the ability to build this system. The reason for not having it is largely due to lack of awareness.

The lack of consciousness is not entirely because he is too young. For example, his partner, Gao Siqi, a classmate of the same age, has the consciousness to build this system. Then why does Xiao Gao have it? Because Xiaogao has good study habits. Good study habits, in a sense, are the construction and integration of a learning system.

Maybe everyone has understood it by now. I personally think that no matter what results Yao Bao achieves in today's game, the stage of playing bridge based on talent is over. If he wants to continue learning in the future, The key to bridge is to study hard (school book knowledge), master better learning methods and habits, and then use these methods and habits to work hard to build your own bridge system.

At the same time, it is particularly important to learn English well. Whether it is Teacher Zhang, Teacher Xu or Teacher Zheng, they all repeatedly emphasize the importance of English for bridge. Although I can't understand it, I don't know how serious it is. I think this effort must be made.

Actually, I don’t know if it was a coincidence or something, but the envelope sent by Teacher Jiang contained a book, but it was not a bridge book, but an English novel The Chronicles of Narnia—The Magician's Nephew , this should be the gift that Teacher Jiang promised to give Yao Bao to participate in the "Wen Tianxia Cup" bridge competition and enter the top ten.

This book is in my hands now. In the book, Teacher Jiang wrote a long message to Yao Bao, including this paragraph:

"First, I want to inspire you. Failure is not a terrible thing, but if you do not move forward after failure, or It's a big problem to just lie down and stop playing. ...The second reason is, I told you before, and I'll tell you again, the "win or lose" in bridge is not at the table itself, be humble and polite, and know how to act. Others’ thinking is the interpretation of this “gentleman’s sport”.”

Since Teacher Jiang is Yao Bao’s first teacher, please Yao Bao always remember Teacher Jiang’s words: “Failure is nothing. The scary thing is that what bridge really brings to you is beyond winning and losing.”

At the end of the article, I would like to thank the rising star teacher Zhang Ruming for his love for Yao Bao. He overcame all obstacles to develop the youth bridge career and achieved the current first-class competitive level of Shanghai youth bridge. I would also like to thank all the teachers, classmates and parents I met on Yao Bao’s journey of playing bridge. Thank you for your support and companionship.

Happy National Day!