Jeff Hand

While some high school students found themselves on a football or scholastic or drama team, I found myself in bridge I played on my high school bridge team all three years, playing against other high schools in the county I was president of the bridge club my senior year and we won the county championship In college I won the national championship once and came in third and fourth two other years

When I left college, my ambitions were to play bridge and travel I obtained a minor staff position at the 1972 World bridge championships in Miami While there, one day I asked a Panama player what Panama was like That evening he arranged a money bridge game with me as his bridge partner and the next day he offered me plane ticket to come to Panama and work in the Panama bridge club I went to Panama and played bridge around the world with that Panama lawyer for four years My bridge game greatly improved then During those years I won both the CACBF pair championship and the CACBF team championship

After four years, I returned to college for one semester to complete my bachelor's degree, and at the same time, I worked at the Bridge Centre of Washington About that time I became acquainted with Gail Greenberg, with whom I currently work with in running luxury bridge trips

In 1977 I drove from Washington DC to Panama with Deborah Uber, whom I married in 1980 and fathered a son and a daughter with By 1977 I was no longer earning a living at bridge in Panama and I got into business (mostly wholesaling Sony electron repair parts), while my wife became a teacher for the DODDS school system

I lost my wife suddenly in a car accident in September 1998 and in 1999 I moved to Florida with my children, my son about to start university, my daughter was about to finish junior high school

Back in the USA, over several years I began returning to my old love of bridge and I stopped working with electronic components By 2001 I began distributing business cards as a bridge pro By 2005 I began commuting from Florida to NYC to work as a bridge pro, mostly playing in duplicate games with bridge players who wanted to win

I moved to NYC in 2009, working first in the Honors Bridge Club, and later expanding to the Hartes Club in Westchester About 2010 I began teaching more, filling in time when I didn't have professional bridge dates Between 2010 and now, I continued to increase my time teaching and playing professionally less frequently

I am proud of how I am organizing my lessons and look forward to when I will begin publishing a series of books