Dream Partner — The Setting Trick
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The Setting Trick
This week’s episode of the Setting Trick podcast features Kevin Rosenberg, a professional bridge player, and a full-time software engineer. Kevin comes from a family of professional bridge players, with Debbie and Michael Rosenberg as his mother and father. He earned second place in the Reisinger at the Fall 2022 Phoenix NABC. He is a multi-time winner of the Youth World Open Championships (2022 Salsomagiorre, 2019 Opatija, 2017 Lyon). In this episode, we discussed getting stars from BBO, teaching bridge for beginners, Kevin’s thoughts on having parents who are world-class bridge players, impressive partnerships that Kevin came across, and more.

Resources:

Connect with Kevin:

bridgewinners.com/article/view/in-the-well-kevin-rosenberg

John McAllister

0:07

Hi, my name is John McAllister. And I'm here with Kevin Rosenberg, who has been my partner for two North American Bridge Championships. He's been my teammate for another NABC. I have said previously on this podcast, if I had unlimited funds, that I would pursue hiring Kevin as my professional full-time partner, but he is not a full time pro. He has a J-O-B.

Kevin is the son of Michael and Debbie Rosenberg, who are arguably making them top two bridge families. We'll get to that later. And he just won the Goren Trophy for the most masterpoints at the Fall NABC – winning the Soloway Knockout Teams and coming in second in the Reisinger Board-a-Match Teams. Kevin Rosenberg: 404 masterpoints. How's that for an intro?

Kevin Rosenberg

1:11

Pretty good. Pretty good. Yeah, I like the last part.

John McAllister

1:16

The 404 masterpoints?

Kevin Rosenberg:

Yeah, the Goren. Yeah, that was good.

1:24

John McAllister:

Yeah, what's up, man, it's good to see you.

Kevin Rosenberg:

It's been a little while.

John McAllister

1:28

For those who know Kevin, he kind of grew up in the bridge world. I just want to point out that we started out this interview by having Kevin clean up his room.

Kevin Rosenberg

1:38

That's true, my background. Even though maybe some of you won't see it. My background left something to be desired the beginning.

John McAllister

1:47

Which is funny too, because I had asked your mom for, I asked your girlfriend, Amber Lin and your mother, Debbie, for potential questions. And they both gave me great stuff. And it was amusing to me, given that I was just communicating with your mom, that I had you clean up your room, basically, to start this interview.

Kevin Rosenberg:

2:07

She’ll be happy, might be the first time in a while.

John McAllister

2:12

So, my first question, Kevin, is you got a little upgrade on your Bridge Base Kevsters handle recently. It used to say Kevsters and I think it said like eight plus. And now there's a pretty little star next to your name. So, you want to tell me about that.

Kevin Rosenberg

2:34

That was a funny story. So, I think I'd been, not made fun of, but sort of a discussion for a lot of years that I had no BBO star, because I hadn’t won a national event. And I had won several Junior events. But I missed some kind of cutoff I think where BBO decided to stop counting Junior events as “star worthy.” Even though some of my friends I think, did have a star for also winning Junior events because they hit the cutoff. So that went on for a while. And then yeah, as you mentioned in the intro, the fall nationals happened and where I got to win the Soloway, which is very lucky and nice. And then I emailed BBO, I still didn't really care much about the star. But I emailed BBO support like, hey, I won this event. And they emailed back being like, I'm sorry, at this time, you're not eligible for a star. And they sent this list of events back and the Soloway wasn't on it. Because I guess the list is old and the Soloway didn't exist. So, I guess they didn't know the Soloway is … I email back saying like, the Soloway is an equivalent event to the Spingold or Vanderbilt. And they like still didn't give it and then and then I gave up for like three weeks. And then eventually, I emailed back one more time. Because you know, Amber really wanted me to get the star. So, I emailed back one more time being like, you can find it that I won the national event at this ACBL page or something. And they're like, Okay, you're right. And then I got the star.

John McAllister

4:08

Well, part of the reason that I asked is because I mean, did you happen to notice if the Mitchell Board-a-Match was possible [on the list]?

4:22

Kevin Rosenberg:

Any NABC+ event is a star.

John McAllister

4:24

So, the deal is for listeners, in order to get a star on BBO you don't just get it by virtue of winning a national event, you actually have to ask them and part of the reason (BBO) bridge base online. Part of the reason that you have to do that is because now you're on this list of people that have stars and there's more – I've seen Uday Ivatury, the former CEO of BBO – explain that it increases your profile and it can add you know, unwanted [attention] and maybe you can speak to that have you noticed that people have been, have you gotten more sort of outreach? Since you got the star?

Kevin Rosenberg

5:05

Not yet, but I actually haven't been on BBO that much. I do I know sometimes people, like get more team match requests, because they have a star, and they have to put in their profile like no team match or something. My dad says he puts on his profile. And if somebody still asks him, he says, no, and it's in my profile that you shouldn't ask me, and only if they don't apologize will he enemy them on BBO. But if they apologize, then he says, Okay, that's fine.

John McAllister

5:36

How does enemy work?

Kevin Rosenberg

5:38

Or unfollow or ignore or whatever. I don't know what it's called on BBO. I don't remember what it's called.

John McAllister

5:43

Because they have this thing where you can black – their color turns to black. I’ve done that for one person. I think you also if you're playing a speedball can you play against them?

Kevin Rosenberg

5:57

I think you can play against them, but you just, whatever they type will not appear in your chat. And by the way, so in the star thing, they did try to make me feel better, even when they were rejecting me. Like they were like, we’re sure you are as good or better as many of our stars on BBO. But being a star isn't just about skill.

John McAllister

6:20

So, part of the reason that I'm bringing this up as a question is because like the day after we won the Mitchell – so I won my first national event at the Phoenix NABC, same as Kevin. And it's also in part thanks to Kevin because Kevin's team knocked us out of the Soloway in the last round of qualifying. So, we got to play the event that started the next day and happened to win it. And the reason is like the day after we won, I was like walking to the playing area. And I thought, oh my god, I can get a star on BBO now.

Kevin Rosenberg:

And did you?

John McAllister:

No, I haven't reached out to them yet. Part because there's some pride here. And I don't necessarily want to reach out to BBO and ask. And so you – I figured that you would have gotten a star long ago, but you didn't care. And so you were still on BBO without a star. And Pepsi. Jacek Kalita was also no that's not Jacek Kalita. Sorry, Jacek Pszczola –Pepsi. So you and Tom Paske doesn't have a star. And so I was like, you know, maybe it's just cooler not to have a star. But I've been wrestling with it. I've been wrestling with having to reach out. And I haven't done it yet. So now that you've broken …

Kevin Rosenberg

7:42

No, I think I reached out. I mean, pretty soon after the tournament the first time. But anyway.

John McAllister

7:50

How did you know about this? So, had you reached out to them before about this junior thing? Or? Because in 2017 you won the …

2

Kevin Rosenberg

7:58

I don’t remember. I think somebody told me I wasn't eligible. I don't think I'd reached out anyway.

John McAllister

8:04

Okay. All right. All right. So, I have I have something that I want to share with you. I live in Charlottesville, Virginia. I went to the UVA basketball game men's basketball game on Wednesday night. And Steph Curry was at the game. That was really cool. He was there because Ty Jerome, who's the UVA was on the UVA national championship team, plays for the Warriors and they were in Washington the night before and so they were down sitting at center court. It was really exciting as a basketball fan. And I know Steph Curry is your favorite player according to your [in the] well conversation on Bridge Winners.

Kevin Rosenberg

8:46

Yeah, I mean, kind of by default as a Warriors fan.

John McAllister

8:51

He's an amazing, he's amazing basketball player. If you had an hour to teach Steph Curry bridge, what would you do?

Kevin Rosenberg

9:05

Probably just ask him a lot of questions about basketball. But I wouldn't be doing a very good job fulfilling the question, which is okay, but now if I was if I was gonna teach bridge. I think … I don't know. It depends how much how many card games he played before but whenever I'm teaching bridge, we might not even get to talking about bidding stuff if I ever wanted to do a good job. I mean, I don't know if you're gonna ask about other times that like I actually taught bridge and this is more of a lead in to that but I definitely believe in teaching card play first with bridge so probably play some game like Whist or something like that. We'd also need two other people I guess. Make sure he's used to the dynamics of four people being around the table, following suit, winning tricks and then you know, eventually being partners with the person across from you, a suit being trump, it just depends how much how many card games of this type somebody's played really for how long it takes for them to get the hang of it. But even if they have no experience, like they don't even know the order of the cards or the suits. I think after an hour, you can at least be playing something like whist fall and all those mechanics.

John McAllister

10:24

I'm aspiring to do this web series where I teach people like Steph bridge through playing Bridge Master deals, like what would it be like for you if you were me and you somehow got Steph to agree to be on the show.

10:41

Kevin Rosenberg:

What do you mean? If not, what would it be like for me? Like what?

John McAllister

10:45

Yeah, like I mean, elation, it was just so exciting to have him in the building. I'm just like I so I got there kind of I got there after the game had started. And they showed on the video board Ty Jerome, and they said, you know, here's a UVA. And they didn't even say anything about Steph. And I saw that I saw Steph next to him. And I'm like, Oh my God.

Kevin Rosenberg

11:09

I mean, obviously that actually happened it would be super cool. I remember when we were playing in nationals in Memphis. I think there were the warriors were like staying at the hotel near us. Or, or even in that hotel? I think talking to a bridge player there. I don't know if I actually got to teach Steph Curry bridge, that’d be super cool. I think there's been a movement like that sort of there's I remember seeing some videos on YouTube with chess. Like there's a lot of very famous personalities like learning and playing chess. And I assume there are similar videos on YouTube of like an experienced chess player basically doing a chess lesson with someone who's very famous on the maybe not Steph Curry famous but. But someone very famous on the internet. So yeah, I think it would be super cool. And I'd be … Yeah, I'd be happy to do it.

John McAllister

12:06

In my research for this interview, Olivia Schireson and I think said that you used to maybe play two-person whist with your dad?

Kevin Rosenberg

12:13

There's a game yeah, it isn’t how I learned bridge, per se. But there is a game called knockout whist, which is sort of just two-person whist, it's very basic game you can teach like, you know, a six- or seven-year-old, I think when you're just starting to teach about cards, basically, each person gets seven cards. And a trick is just somebody leads, and the other person follows … the rules are basically the same, like winner of a trick leads to the next trick, you're just trying to win tricks. And there's a trump suit, I think the first time it's random, and then the person who wins the previous round gets to call the next round, and the amount of cards decreases each round, until somebody like either wins all the tricks, and then they win the game or whoever wins the One Card round. Yeah, basically, you have to win all the tricks to win the game.

John McAllister

12:59

I don't actually know the rules of whist like, I've heard it as a good idea to teach people like sort of as a start to bridge. But I don't actually know the rules and the scoring.

Kevin Rosenberg

13:09

Yeah, I don't know the scoring either. I don't focus on whist too long or anything when I teach bridge, I basically just say the goal is to take tricks. At that point, I usually just play a couple hands. I don't even know if that is whist, although I don't know exactly what whist is, or if there's different variations. But yeah, just that variation where you're playing with partners or trumps. And there's four people and there's no dummy and there's no bidding. That's basically what I considered whist. And that's how I started out teaching.

John McAllister

13:42

Do you find people engage with that when you're teaching beginners like that?

Kevin Rosenberg

13:47

Yeah, I don't like, like, you mean because there's no like scoring or they're just trying to figure out the right cards to play and get a hang of the mechanics, I think. I think people yeah, and I've heard a lot of stuff about people not being engaged at the beginning when they're learning bridge like also like the dummy aspects of having nothing to do when you’re dummy. I, from my experience, I don't think that's a huge problem. Like usually there's a lot coming at them if they're just learning bridge and I don't think that's the major issue with bringing people in. I mean, it does take a while but if they're doing it I think that people are usually pretty engaged in my experience, but the fact that it's such a big learning curve like it takes a long time to not only learn the rules but also to become at all proficient is a big issue.

John McAllister

14:35

Shall we fast forward to winning the Soloway? You guys had a big comeback in the semifinal. And you were down a fair amount of IMPs in the last quarter of the final. When did you start to think about actually winning the event?

Kevin Rosenberg

14:53

I mean, I'd always thought about it, I guess. But I guess somewhere around the quarter like until the quarterfinal, we mostly won the matches, or through the quarterfinal we mostly ended up winning the matches pretty easily. But I mean, obviously, when we got down a lot in the semifinal, it seems unlikely. I definitely think we had teammates – Finn Kolesnik and Ishmael Del Monte – where I, it wasn't teammates you'd ever give up with their, like, huge ability to generate IMPs. And so like, if it was just like two versions of Simon and me, it'd be hard for us to generate 46 IMPs, it's not our style, one of us would have to be playing a little out of our comfort zone. Whereas like, I think Finn and Is, their comfort zone is generating IMPs anyway. So, Simon, and I, I knew we had a chance after our last set, we didn't have as big a card as Finn and Ish, but I knew we had some good results. And we had teammates that could generate a lot of IMPs, which was, which is what happened.

John McAllister

16:04

How did you find out that you want?

Kevin Rosenberg

16:06

I definitely have this thing. Like some people on these matches, right? They want to look at the Vugraph screen right after to see who won. I don't like that. I like to do a real comparison without knowing who won just because I don't know, but you can't do that anymore. So basically, when it's over, I stay, even if I'm dummy, you know, I stay on, I stay until it's over. But when it's over, I just like before anyone can look at the Vugraph screen, I just leave all my stuff at the table and run out. Because like at least I want to find out from my teammates and not from like the opponents’ reaction. So, and then usually I you know, come back in like, you know, later to collect my stuff.

John McAllister

16:46

So, when you say your stuff, does that include your scorecard?

Kevin Rosenberg

16:49

No, not my score, I would take the scorecard where I compare, I usually, like in the Soloway it was usually like various food items that I may or may not have eaten. I remember before the last quarter of the Soloway there was an extremely strange thing where I, I just I'm weird about eating at the table or just during bridge tournaments in general, I have a lot of trouble eating. And then when I'm at the table, sometimes I don't want to feel extremely hungry. So, I think to the semifinal match, I brought three bananas to the first quarter. And then so before the last quarter of the final match, I was kind of hungry. We went I went with Finn to the stand at the hotel like to buy a sandwich or something like one of those food carts. And they were like closing. And we were just trying we tried to buy this sandwich, and she just would not sell us the sandwich. And at some point, Finn was like, I'll give you a huge tip. Just give him the sandwich. We're about to lay the fourth quarter. And then she was gonna do it. And then two other people came and tried to order something else. And she was like, no, no, now none of you get anything. It was so weird. And then Finn like begged her and then she gave us the sandwich for like free. I think. She was just like go it was so weird. And of course I never touched the sandwich but it turned out I didn't need it but …

John McAllister

18:15

Okay, so basically your opponent misguessed the queen of hearts on the last board, which was trump you guys push them to the five level and did he just claim did he claim right after that or …

Kevin Rosenberg

18:34

Yeah, he had a long think, he misguessed the queen of hearts and then I think we took a ruff for one more trick and then the hand was over. It was very fast obviously after that and then that time I mean it's not ideal but, like we're in the playing room and right everyone's somewhat outside and when the Vugraph operator clicked us winning the queen of hearts there was a giant sound after I mean which should not happen and is a problem with the way how close people are allowed to be to the playing area but yeah so we knew the result so I didn't need generally run out or if I was running out was for a different reason.

John McAllister

19:18

Wow. What did you think? Like you put it all together in real time you know like that. Could you hear the Vugraph operator like hit click or?

Kevin Rosenberg

19:31

No when I heard the noise, I realized I mean I don't know I just I don't think that's a point where I was thinking clearly or consciously you know, you just want to get outside and and celebrate I guess. It did feel like somewhat of a of a faded run after like the previous day with the coming back from the 40 the 46 IMPs and then this match was definitely pretty emotional the match against the Street team. Yeah. And they'd also beat my dad in the quarterfinal. I think this tournament and in the Spingold, if I remember correctly. So, I've really I really wanted him to smash for several reasons.

John McAllister

20:16

What was the score of their match versus your dad's team?

Kevin Rosenberg

20:19

It ended up single digits. I think my dad's team was down 40-something that match and they had a big comeback and fell just short, I believe.

John McAllister

20:26

When did you start to kind of figure out that your parents, both of them are world champions, your dad's really is your dad. I don't know if he's in the Hall of Fame?

Kevin Rosenberg

20:38

Yeah, he definitely is. I was at his Hall of Fame dinner. Actually, that was I have some very nice pictures from that day, because that was the one of the times where me and both of my half-sisters were also there at that dinner with their with their respective spouses. So that was very cool dinner. And I think, yeah, it was very good to see. Everyone had pretty almost everybody in the family that I'm not sure. I don't remember if my uncle was there. Or I don't think my grandma was there. But it was still a good reunion joining of sorts. And yeah, it was cool.

John McAllister

21:19

When did you start to realize that your parents weren't just regular bridge players? Or did you have any moment where you're like, you know, I mean, my parents play bridge, but I've taken them each to the bridge club maybe once or twice. Like, when did you kind of have that realization? Or are you still having that realization?

Kevin Rosenberg

21:39

You mean that they're like, exceptionally good bridge players that you mean? I mean, I'm pretty sure I realized this, before I even started really caring about or playing bridge. I mean, from the very beginning of my childhood, I was going to these bridge tournaments and sitting in a childcare with children of other bridge players, because my parents were playing professional bridge. So, I think I always knew that they were exceptionally good bridge players. And that's like, why I was there. And once I started playing, I think people, some people probably gave me, you know, assumed I was better than I was, or gave better treatment just because of my name, which isn't really fair. But yeah.

John McAllister

22:28

Your mom described it in her email to me as childcare program at nationals, gradually became more interested in playing bridge than going to childcare.

Kevin Rosenberg

22:39

Yeah, I think at some point, when I was like, nine, maybe eight, I don't know I started playing in like very limited games at the nationals like zero to 50 or something. I actually my first real partner was my babysitter at childcare, or my junior sitter, I think was the term he was only like three or four years older than me, his name is Jeffery Schwartz. And his parents are also play a lot of bridge I think, maybe that's part of the reason why he was sort of in a childcare chair. Even the junior sitters are also were too young to be like totally unsupervised. I think at least at that time, like if he was like 13 or 14 or something. Yeah, and we would go play bridge and I guess I guess he was in some way maybe playing pro bridge because I think technically, he's getting paid so in some way I guess I was like a client but not or my parents were I guess.

John McAllister

23:44

I wonder if you played were you in the Washington Nationals? I think it was like 2009 summer maybe summer nationals because I played in the zero to 199eer game like a like a two session zero to 199er and I think that I won with my partner.

Kevin Rosenberg

24:01

I'm think I was at the Washington I have a shirt that says Washington some from like pretty middle school it's like our childhood age and I might be from that nationals I don't know.

John McAllister

24:11

I wonder if we could have played in each other.

Kevin Rosenberg

24:14

It's possible. I still to this day can have people you know come up to me say Oh, do you remember when like 20 like 10 or 15 years ago I played with you in this event that this random like swiss at nationals and I like no, usually no. But it's good experience. I definitely I had a lot of pickup partners. I think when I was just starting out like besides playing with Jeffrey I would there were several times when I would just go to a partnership desk and pick up a partner I think at nationals. I'm playing the 299er game or something. And I think …

John McAllister

24:52

People would probably be like Rosenberg? Are you Michael and Debbie's son? They'd get excited about that.

Kevin Rosenberg

24:59

Yeah, well I think it's good. I think people were mostly. Yeah, I think I had a good interaction with people. I don't remember like any of my partners being extremely mean to me. I mean, occasionally you'll have some bad experiences. I don't really remember it now. The only bad experience I remember was that an actual bridge thing where I think it caused me to cry for some reason, when I was like, 10, where I was like in a slam or something, and I had two very long suits in my hand. And I ruffed trick one with the wrong suit. Like it wasn't the trump suit, but I thought it was. And I went down because of that. And I remember that made me very sad at the time. But yeah, I think overall, I, I have been lucky to have people, you know, treat me very well that I meet and, and probably I'm sort of, what's the word like, privileged to have that luck? Especially because my name is Rosenberg? Yeah.

John McAllister

26:01

Do you think you did anything different in Phoenix with respect to your game? You know, you came, you won the Soloway. And then you came second in the Reisinger, which I mean, it's pretty amazing. Pretty amazing. Two events.

Kevin Rosenberg

26:16

Yeah. I mean, I think I did try to handle like food better that tournament than I usually do. I do think there are times in previous tournaments where I've been like feeling just hungry at the table. And I tried to avoid that this tournament. I think it's important. I tried that I tried in previous tournaments, too. So, I don't know if it was different. I tried to focus on like, just always being there and the hand don't make decisions. Like, if you're not sure what to do, you just like keep work trying to work out the hand until you have some hand in mind and play for it like, no, like, silly lapses, kind of, but I think I've tried to that lots of tournaments. So, it's kind of kind of random. Yeah, I think we had very good teammates to that tournament. I think that was probably like close to the best team I'd been on. Like when I was a lot of the nationals I played on years before like I was playing with, you know, juniors there, which are good teams, but like, maybe not quite that good as well. So that might be really …

John McAllister

27:32

It's impressive that Finn Kolesnik who's your teammate in the Soloway and I think he's 18 years old. Like how far he's come in really a short time to the point where he's winning this event and …

Kevin Rosenberg

27:49

Yeah, Finn and his sister Emma both are doing really well, and Emma also had a good tournament because she got to day three of the Resinger on a four-handed team, which was really, really great. But yeah Finn also has had, especially for 18, you know, one of the, like, most prodigious talent like winning young players, I think ever like I think some of the other people that would be in that category are like Bobby Levin and then Zach and Zach Grossack and I there's probably more I should know, but I was trying to think of players I'd heard of winning events when they're very young.

John McAllister

28:29

Zach Grossack, who's been your junior partner at times, and is your dad's current partner for the nationals. He was on the Sorry, Partner podcast. And he talked about something. Do you know this expression that's like, they're not allowed to use in their partnership when like, Zach, I guess it's basically when Zach does something, like that's way too aggressive. You know about this? There's basically like a word that is banned. And I can't I don't know what it is. I shoot. I wish I knew exactly. Your dad's not allowed to say it anymore.

29:14

Kevin Rosenberg

Hmm. I don't know.

John McAllister

29:20

I don't think they have transcripts. I'll have to look it up. It's a phrase that you wouldn't it's an unusual phrase I'll have to look it up. You got any good Zach Grossack stories for me?

Kevin Rosenberg

29:39

Zach Grossack stories. Define good.

John McAllister

29:45

I mean, are you guys are the same age, right?

Kevin Rosenberg

29:48

I think I'm a little older, but we are the same age for like half the year or something. We're probably the same age right now because my birthday is soon or we must be.

John McAllister

29:59

You didn’t play in the junior teams that we did the film on, that was 2012.

Kevin Rosenberg

30:05

Yeah, that was before I was into bridge or that was like, right as I was getting into bridge. I think we moved in 2011. And my first bridge like Junior bridge tournament was in 2014. I probably was like starting to play and like 2012 2013 mostly. Mostly 2013. Probably. And yeah, and then my first bridge tournament was U21 in 2014 in Istanbul.

John McAllister

Were you USA one or two?

Kevin Rosenberg

USA one. I can claim a perfect record at the trials and an opposite perfect record at the World tournaments that the trials qualify for so far.

John McAllister

30:50

Who do you think people speaking of the trial, the junior trials, you played the junior trials against your girlfriend's team? Who do you think people were rooting for in the finals of the junior trials?

Kevin Rosenberg

31:03

I mean, that's pretty clear that they were rooting for Amber’s team. I don't think. Yeah. I think pretty much everybody was rooting for Amber’s team. I don't think I talked to anybody outside of maybe our own team members. People were all so worried that I was rooting for Amber's team.

John McAllister

31:29

Olivia said she'd never seen somebody less excited when they won a match than you when you when you guys won.

Kevin Rosenberg

31:36

Well, yeah. I mean, also their team, like, especially right after we won, their team was pretty upset. And they're like a lot of my closest friends and my girlfriend. So it's hard to be too happy about that.

John McAllister

31:51

So in the junior trials, they have their you're in hotel rooms now. So with just your screenmate, and I noticed that you were in the you were playing against Amber at the same table, but it looked like you were in the in the hotel room with her partner.

Kevin Rosenberg

32:05

Yeah, it wasn't like really. You weren't you weren't alone in a hotel room, because you had a bunch of other like south wests or whatever, like playing the same hotel room with other tables. But yes, you're really, the trials in hotel rooms alone, like the open or mixed trials, but the juniors they just didn't didn't have a space for a hotel room for every two. But yeah, I was I was screenmates with Cynthia, Amber's partner, for both of the sets where I played them. Yeah. Which I assume was on purpose. As that I guess we didn't want the but yeah, yeah, I had played one match against Amber before that about a year ago now almost, which was the GNT qualifier for 2022 in our district, and they beat us. Yeah, we were I was on I was on a pretty good probably the best one of the best GNT teams I've ever been on. I was playing with my dad. And my mom was playing with Max Schireson. And we had Kit Woolsey and Chip Martel. We were six-handed and Amber was four-handed playing with Andrew Hoskins. And Anant Rathi and Andrew Gumperz. And yeah, they beat us in a full day match in the semifinals. And then they went on to win the finals, which is so is really good. Yeah. And then they added me and my dad, and we played in the nationals. And we I think we lost in the quarterfinals. Yeah.

John McAllister

33:35

How much do you play with your dad?

Kevin Rosenberg

33:38

Not a lot. I would say we played some online stuff during COVID. We played this GNT event. And we played one national event besides that together, the LM Paris, where I remember we did pretty badly on day three. That was the event if I remember correctly, that event was like, quote, unquote, a graduation present. Not that it needs to be a present for him to play with me. But I think he had the philosophy that while I was in school, I should focus on bridge and therefore he, No, I shouldn't focus on bridge is the other thing. I should focus on school. So I said he didn't like plenty of bridge events with me during that time, really. And then once I graduated, that was like the idea of the president. But yeah.

John McAllister

34:25

Is this graduating from high school or college.

Kevin Rosenberg

34:28

College. I think in high school I wasn't, I might not have even been like an experienced enough bridge player for him to justify playing like national events with me, or I don't know, maybe he had other commitments. But yeah, and maybe the studying wasn't as important during high school. I don't know.

John McAllister

34:47

Do you have to study the notes that you have with your dad? You said you played a version of those with Simon in the Soloway. Do you have to study those, or do you pretty much know?

Kevin Rosenberg

34:57

Yeah, I've been playing some version of these notes have most of my partners, which is nice. I don't really need to study them too carefully at this point, although I probably should have more. And there are some differences I usually make with each partner and depending on what they want. There was I remember, there was a case with Simon in the finals of the Soloway, where I'd like totally blanked on a system thing that I should have known where I opened a notrump and they over called two clubs to show the majors. And I just forgot what we played over that. And he made a bid. And I'm like, I don't know if this bid means. But then the opponent's bid and eventually, we just passed. So …

John McAllister

35:37

How did you how did you end up playing with Simon in that event?

Kevin Rosenberg

35:42

Well, we'd played the previous year in the same event, it's actually kind of our nationals now like the fall nationals, because that's the only two times I've ever played with Simon is at the fall nationals in 2021 and 2022. I don't remember in 2022, like we'd almost played previous nationals in 2022. We but it didn't work out and then we played that we'd been emailing. I don't remember how it came about originally that I played with him in 2021. Yeah, I'm not sure how that came about, or who brought us together. Maybe I could go check at some point.

John McAllister

36:15

But the fall nationals used to be our event.

Kevin Rosenberg

36:19

It did. Yeah, we played what was the one? We played that one before …

John McAllister

Honolulu and San Francisco.

Kevin Rosenberg

Oh, San Francisco was the same one actually. Right. But, so that was all I played. No, no. Before COVID before COVID Yeah.

John McAllister

36:37

Yeah, that was the last 2019. Honolulu was 2018.

Kevin Rosenberg

36:40

Yeah. Yeah, we had some some sad Reisinger, well, you know, good and but sad in that not anything day three. I remember.

John McAllister

36:50

Yeah, we were leading after the first half of the semifinal, I think.

Kevin Rosenberg

36:56

We were.. I think we were second. But we were leading.

John McAllister

37:00

I thought I thought we were leading, but I could be wrong.

Kevin Rosenberg

37:03

Um, but yeah, that was that was one of the painful ones. I remember because we were like first or second. And we had some string in that second session where we scored like one and a half out of 14 I remember or something.

John McAllister

37:17

Wait what did we score?

Kevin Rosenberg

37:19

Like at some string? Like, I know, the whole thing's out of like, 20 The whole thing's out of like 27 I think the evening session, but there was one like 14 boards stretch where we got like one and a half or something. Which was not fun during the comparison. You just kind of like start going faster and faster like hoping you're gonna get to one that you like want but it doesn't it doesn't happen.

John McAllister

37:46

I've had an eight in the Mitchell Board-a-Match. I think I've had it twice in the Mitchell Board-a-Match and I've also won that event. So, let's go.

37:53

Kevin Rosenberg

That’s good. That’s good. High variance.

John McAllister

37:59

High variance. Have you ever won a youth NABC? Your mother said to ask.

Kevin Rosenberg

38:05

Yeah, no, I have not which is very … yeah, I was playing it for a while. Like when I before I was really interested in bridge like I was still more of a chess like playing chess more as my main game and I was playing at the nationals. I remember that those were the days when I was like I would play against like the extremely like I played against the Adam Kaplan I played against Zach I played against the Jeng brothers. They were all like so scary at the time. It was like they're like gods of bridge. There are some other people like some of the people don't play bridge like Arjun I played against he was one of the people that was on the one of the better teams usually there's Murphy Green. I remember too many people. There was one time then when I was getting more serious. I was playing with Ben in these youth NABCs I think I might have played two with him. There was one where I got second in the pairs with Ben. I think in Atlanta finishing behind Zelenski and Allison formerly Hunt now Kranyak. And then …

John McAllister

This Ben Kristensen.

Kevin Rosenberg

Yeah Ben Kristensen who's actually yeah, he's still my current well, who was took who wasn't my junior partner but now that I was allowed to play juniors again, he is my partner for this most recent tournament. Yeah. And then sometime after we played in Istanbul, like we got like the silver medal in the U21 in Istanbul and I was like, Okay, we're definitely gonna go win the youth NABC now like the power of it, I don't remember I don't think we played the team event. But I was like, we're gonna go win the pair event of the youth NABC like easy, and it's a pretty like short event because it's a qualifying session into a final session. So, it's really just one session that matters. And yeah, in that final session, we scored like a 51 like we were like nowhere. We looked through the hands. We were like yeah, even if we played perfectly this session, we could not have won this event like this. Sometimes that's just how it goes.

John McAllister

40:01

How did you befriend Zach Grossack and Adam Kaplan and those guys?

Kevin Rosenberg

40:06

Um, probably … I was on teams with them like I think at some point I definitely considered them like scary bridge people I didn't know like in the youth NABC. At some point after the first trials I played in Istanbul or like the first Junior tournament I played for U21 Istanbul after that I played U26. And I've been on two teams with Zach Grossack, Adam Kaplan the exact team was slightly different but they were on both of those teams so that's like a several year period and yeah, just hanging out with them at Nationals. Adam Kaplan went out of bridge for a while but it's good to see that he's back in the bridge world now I think he was at this most recent nationals.

John McAllister

41:05

Have the European teams for the juniors already qualified or is that still happening?

Kevin Rosenberg

41:11

I don't know. I'm not sure actually probably.

John McAllister

41:16

Do you know if Thibeau and Guy are they playing for the Netherlands?

Kevin Rosenberg

41:22

I don't know. I think it's likely they are if they're allowed I don't know if they're older than I think they might be older. And I'm already technically too old. So, if they're any older than me they're not going to be allowed to if they are my age than two of those age they are the rules are really like two people that are one year too old are allowed to be on each team. I don't know why. So that's on my team. That's me and me and Zach.

John McAllister

41:51

Have they still not announced when and where?

Kevin Rosenberg

41:54

They have. It's like the first week of August and Veldhoven Netherlands which will be fun. I've never been to the Netherlands actually except the airport. So that'll be another new European country.

John McAllister

42:10

I saw in your well that you said that the Gold Coast Congress is your favorite tournament. And you're headed there, presumably are you going with Amber? Are you gonna …

Kevin Rosenberg

42:19

I'm playing with Amber as partners the whole time. Yeah, we haven't played that much as partners. We just made the key decision last night I think actually to switch to transfers over one club. So that's a big step in our in our relationship.

John McAllister

42:38

Is that what you and Simon were playing?

Kevin Rosenberg

42:39

No, I've never played transfers over one club. But Amber has.

John McAllister

She talked you into it?

Kevin Rosenberg

Yeah. Well, Amber's past played that before. I think she's also playing it with her partner that she's training with a lot now who's Chris Willenken. They've been doing a lot of bidding practice and I'm just basically going to play their system with so she can get the practice. Yeah.

John McAllister

43:00

Got it. What do you like about Gold Coast?

Kevin Rosenberg

43:05

Oh, I just really like Australia. I studied abroad there in college for a semester and I met a lot of really like cool bridge players. I like the city of Sydney. Although that's not you know, where Gold Coast is but I liked a lot of the cities I went to in Australia. I'd say my, like, a lot of the people I know best there are Liam Milne and Susan Humphreys who recently had a baby which is really cool. And I was actually there for their engagements at the Gold Coast before right before COVID like 2020 February or something.

John McAllister

They got engaged?

Kevin Rosenberg

At the Gold Coast in 2020 February, I think yeah, like right before COVID started. So yeah.

John McAllister

43:48

Are they your teammates?

Kevin Rosenberg

43:49

No, I'm actually I'm playing with Finn Kolesnik and Adam Kaplan actually.

John McAllister

Oh, wow.

Kevin Rosenberg

At the Gold Coast. Yeah.

John McAllister

43:58

Wow, that's who knew that all those guys were going over there too.

Kevin Rosenberg

44:03

Yeah, yeah, there's the Gold Coast gets usually historically a decent amount of international like participation, I think and it's a really fun tournament. So I'd encourage you know, anyone who wants to do a cool bridge doorman somewhere abroad to do try the Gold Coast.

John McAllister

44:21

They can meet you there. Who are the – not including the Rosenbergs – who are the three top bridge playing families.

Kevin Rosenberg

44:36

I should probably know I mean, I think the obvious one is like the Blanchard right family or and then the Berkowitz family are two of the most obvious ones, I think, but I probably should not. I don't know if I know if there's a third one I can think of that's like clear …

John McAllister

44:57

Oh my gosh, you're dropping the ball majorly on this.

44:59

Rimstedt is pretty big.

John McAllister

45:04

Okay, rank them, you can rank them for me.

Kevin Rosenberg

45:10

I can rank them alphabetically which would I guess would make us last if we're included in the list? If Rosenberg I mean would be last if we rank them that way.

John McAllister

45:24

What did what did Amber say to get you to … how did the decision get made that you're gonna play her system? The system she's playing with Chris. Did she ask you to do it? Did you have to think about it?

Kevin Rosenberg

45:39

No, no, I was being mostly facetious. It wasn't like a difficult or maybe like it was not a major decision, but it wasn't like it took a lot of protesting out of me or something. I think it's something we'd intended to do for a while. Like for a couple months but we both have other you know, partners and events and I didn't want to do any like major partnership system new learning before like the junior trials and stuff. And but I'm there's always, if you're if you're a competitive bridge player, especially who's getting into new partners, there's always new stuff to learn. And like right now I'm actually starting a new partnership with Brian Platnick. And we're the I have to make sure we're on the same page and do a lot of bidding practice with him. And I have to do practice with Ben for the upcoming juniors so there's always other stuff to do so yeah, we're just gonna do it for before the Gold Coast hopefully.

John McAllister

46:40

Are you playing the Spring Nationals with Brian Platnick?

Kevin Rosenberg

46:43

Yeah, Brian. I'm, I'm you know, planning to be regular partners with Brian starting in the Spring Nationals and we're playing the Spring Nationals in the trials and stuff then probably, hopefully, all the Nationals.

John McAllister

46:56

I know he's good friends with your mom.

Kevin Rosenberg

46:59

Yeah. Yeah. I really liked Brian. He's also my partnership coach with Ben for juniors, which is cool, because we're yeah, we're basically all playing the same system.

John McAllister

47:09

And are you doing a lot of that bidding practice on Cue Bids?

Kevin Rosenberg

47:12

Yeah, I have recently started doing Cue Bids. I did practice with Simon on Cue Bids before the Soloway. We probably did you know, a couple 100 hands there. And recently, I have been doing Cuebids, sort of nightly with Amber, we usually bid like 24 hands.

John McAllister

47:35

Do you look besides that the bidding between the two of you, do you look at what other people how other people have bid the hand?

Kevin Rosenberg

47:43

Sometimes if it's a difficult or interesting hand, we look to see if there's anyone we know. That's why it's important to have a username that you know, identifies you.

John McAllister

47:54

Right. What's your username on there?

Kevin Rosenberg

47:57

Good question. I don't know. But hopefully, yeah, it's something like Kevsters or maybe just my name. Honestly, if I can look it up. I think it's name maybe or? Because Amber's just her name. I think it's just our names.

John McAllister

48:12

How often do you go to your dad or mom to ask them about a bidding situation?

Kevin Rosenberg

48:17

I actually I do email them about like, if Amber and I like are being on Cuebids sometimes saying we have a bidding question. I actually do email sometimes. Yeah, we have. I'm incredibly lucky to have it like just an absolute plethora of bidding resources of just resources for bridge I mean, in general. I because Amber also sometimes if we have a bidding question like just emails Chris, who's another like, just top bidding theorist. It's very lucky.

John McAllister

48:49

That is cool. I have a bidding problem for you. Okay. Stiff ace, stiff king. Ace-king-fifth. King-queen-10-sixth. So you open one club. Nobody's vulnerable. And it goes two hearts on your left. And partner doubles.

Kevin Rosenberg

49:23

Partner doubles. So I have stiff king of hearts, right? So I would think I could either bid three hearts with the plan of bidding four diamonds or I could just jump to four diamonds right away. Both of those seem like viable options to me. I guess I don't mind just bidding three hearts. I think I might get a better picture of partner's hand by bidding three hearts.

John McAllister

49:56

What I didn't know is that I … I can't bid three diamonds because it might I might not be showing my … if they just have like a like a weak hand with longer clubs and diamonds.

Kevin Rosenberg

50:10

Well I don't know how I feel like you're definitely not implying a hand like this strong. I guess I'll I feel like I know that like some people at the one level like if it goes a club a heart double pass two diamonds I've heard of people like not playing that is forcing at all like could just be a minimum. I don't know if it would extend the two level I definitely would be afraid to just bid three diamonds undiscussed which is why I would only consider like cuebidding to set up the game force or just jumping to four diamonds, which seems also pretty clearly forcing like it's a jump reverse. So I think either of those is fine. I basically, I mean, the nature of my hand, is more or less, I'm missing two aces, if I have a fit, I guess if it's a diamond fit, I also need some you know, help in the diamond suit if it’s the club fit I might not if I can ruff my diamonds. So I basically like if partner bids four clubs over three hearts. It's even if you just play four No Trump. Well, I'm a little light. I mean, it would be reasonable to want to bid keycard over that, I think and just sort of hope that you can take care of your diamonds either by ruffing or partner having the queen or something. If your partner has one ace you have a chance a decent chance to make slam, maybe you're not quite worth that.

John McAllister

51:36

What would you play if they just overcalled a heart and it went double? Would you play two diamonds was stronger? Or …

Kevin Rosenberg

51:43

I'm fine. I probably would wouldn't would not play it as forcing if I if I've made an agreement. But yeah, undiscussed I would be it's one of those situations where I'd be very scared to bid it or to pass it if my partner bid. So yeah, I thought I talked to Roger Lee recently. And he has this theory that like in undiscussed partnerships, anything that sounds like it could be non forced, or anything that sounds non forcing is, which is, I think, contrary to the way I've mostly thought about, like bidding, like I would like, just be very scared. And like, generally just assume things are forcing if they sound like they might be because you don't want to pass. But if you have the explicit agreement that like anything that sounds like it's non forcing, is not forcing, if both partners are on the same wavelength, I can see how that could work well.

John McAllister

52:34

So do you have like, do you have your most system with your father then?

Kevin Rosenberg

52:40

Well, I basically have technically the same system notes with most of my partners, like I said, like Platnick pretty similar Ben pretty similar. Copi was pretty similar. I think my dad is very reliable at you know, knowing every line of the system notes. For the most part.

John McAllister

52:58

You have an agreement about this situation with your dad.

Kevin Rosenberg

53:01

No. I don't think we I have an agreement of like whether two diamonds over a club a hard double would, I don't think we've discussed that. Yeah, no, it's so hard. If you're not in a regular partnership with somebody having agreements with them about like, every situation that might come up is very difficult, even if they're a family member.

John McAllister

53:20

Do you have like a meta agreement? Go ahead.

Kevin Rosenberg

53:23

I just gonna say I'm sure I've talked to him about this auction before at some point in our lives and he might have shared an opinion but I don't remember what it is. And even if I did remember what it is it doesn't really constitute a partnership agreement just because he shared an opinion at one point. We have lots of some meta agreements I don't think we have any meta agreement about like this type of two level forcing bid I'd say I have a style in terms of four level bids being forcing like four of a minor rather than just like oh, I was looking for three no and I was going to try to get in four minor that's a place where I have a meta agreement that usually four minor is forcing in these situations if it's bid by an unlimited hand, even if it looks like you might have just been looking for three no as long as you're unlimited.

John McAllister

54:08

So you and Simon didn't have don't have an agreement about this either. Do you?

Kevin Rosenberg

54:12

I don't I don't have an agreement on this auction with like any of my partners but yeah, I mean, maybe I will with Platnick soon.

John McAllister

54:26

Who's the most impressive partnership that you've played against?

Kevin Rosenberg

54:33

I mean, in the most recent tournament, like the Soloway all the matches we played, I think but by pretty decent amount the most impressive one was Bessis/Lorenzini. They were exceptionally good that match I think. I played three sets against them. Even on like the very last hand of the match Bessis made a play which was very small detail, but it was like very deep thinking. I don't even know if it's worth describing. But basically, there's this false card. That people that's a very famous false card with jack-9-fourth of a suit where you can play the nine on the first round of a suit to trick declare into going wrong. And he like carefully like crossed to the other, the dummy to start leading the suit to make it harder for Simon to potentially find this falsecard or something. At trick two like a very, it's very unnatural that he used his only entry to dummy to do it in a very unnatural way. But it was the right idea on the hand. It didn't matter at all on the hand, because Simon didn't have that holding, but it's just like, I didn't, I didn't, I would never have understood why he did it. Like, it was the last hand in the match and only when my dad pointed out later to me, he explained why he did it. Like, cuz it wasn't that actual situation. So I didn't understand why he did it.

John McAllister

55:59

Wow. So your dad saw it on viewgraph that's what happened?

Kevin Rosenberg

56:03

I assume. Yeah.

John McAllister

56:06

When did you beat those guys?

Kevin Rosenberg

56:08

That was the semifinal. Yeah, not only I mean, okay, he probably didn't know that he'd lost or but he'd been having a not very good set in a set where he was up 46 to start and he's on the very last board of the match. He's still found this play I thought is extremely impressive. Like just thinking so carefully about everything. They were they were very slow. It was a very slow table overall, I think. Although Simon's pretty fast. And I I would say like my perception, I think I definitely have a reputation as a Rosenberger being slow, I would say maybe in our in an unbiased way that we get unfairly treated as slow when we're not always. Although, I think we do have a propensity for like long single thinks. But overall, I think about average, I don't know.

John McAllister

57:09

Yeah, I think every match that I kibbitzed in in the junior trials your table was behind [laughter].

Kevin Rosenberg

57:14

Well, in the junior trials, those two sets that I played against Amber and Cynthia, everyone at the table is slow basically, or is average to very slow, I think. Overall. So yeah, and at the other table, everyone is average to fast. In a lot of these sets where we have Zach and Finn and Richard Jeng and Brett so it's a total different extremes. Yeah.

John McAllister

57:43

How do you what's the relationship like with Amber in terms of brain like when she makes an error?

Kevin Rosenberg

57:49

I'm not sure in what sense you're asking but Amber and I have done like literally probably like 1000s of hours of board review overall so I don't think I don't think I'm like not afraid to point out like with like yeah, I'm not afraid to like point out if I think she made a mistake or saying like our goal when we're reviewing boards is just to you know, talk about the facts of what happened and trying to improve so I'm not sure if you're asking about making a mistake in any specific context but yeah.

John McAllister

58:21

Like when you get mad when you're her partner.

Kevin Rosenberg

58:26

I mean I don't think I try not to say anything at the table for sure if I can if I'm if I'm her partner. Yeah. I think mostly on the bridge, we're pretty good as far as I definitely when there's no screens. I can I definitely I'm a bit emotive sometimes I think no, I don't say anything. And it's hard to control and I think I'm working on it to get better at that. Yeah.

John McAllister

59:02

Amber won the event that we came in second and the way that I found out that they won was because like they were celebrating and I'm like they're not celebrating like that because they got but I guess she wasn't even playing the when they won.

Kevin Rosenberg

59:22

What event? Oh, the mixed BAM. In Providence. Yeah, that's a good story because she wasn't like Amber has a pretty busy job. Maybe I shouldn't mention this. Okay. So Amber basically had decided to, like actually take the week off bridge to do to work remotely. And then she got asked to play on the Hill team, but to play half of the boards with Shan and she agreed. Even though yeah, technically she was also like doing the work. So she liked get up, do I think do a little work, then come over to the bridge, play for three hours run home, do work for like the next seven or eight hours. Yeah, we had to call her to interrupt her work to get her to come back to the bridge playing site after the second session because her team won.

John McAllister

For the photo.

Kevin Rosenberg

For the photo, yeah. And then she ran back.

John McAllister

1:00:29

What should I ask you? What haven't I asked you that I should ask you about?

Kevin Rosenberg

1:00:36

I think maybe we could talk about like, Youth Bridge in our area maybe?

John McAllister

No, absolutely. No, that'd be great.

Kevin Rosenberg

I mean, SiVY has done a lot of great things. I wish it was, you know, as active today as it had always been, but …

John McAllister

1:00:57

This is Silicon Valley Youth Bridge. The organization that your mom and another parent started, I think.

Kevin Rosenberg

1:01:06

I mean, that we've had tons of help out my mom was president for at the beginning. And she founded it. And she was president of it for like, I don't know how many years maybe like four or five years. There are so many good things to mention with SiVY that that we've done we've had these parent child games at one time for we were doing them every few months, I think for years and I've got to play in my grandma with with my grandma in those which was a great experience. And there it was really great to see all these like kids playing with their parents. And we weren't like super strict, like, kids could play mostly with someone if they wanted to. But yeah, we had these summer bridge camps for SiVY for I think two summers in 2014 and 2015. Which we got a lot of great volunteer help with. I actually I remember I slept on an air mattress in my bedroom during one of those summers, because we had Anam Tebha fly in to come help run like mentor and run one of these camps. And she was super helpful. That was that was cool. Yeah, overall through SiVY I've been able to like mentor a lot of players who now are like, you know, representing the US through junior bridge, winning lots of they won lots of youth NABCs. I think I think if you add all the youth NABCs up of that people have one that I've mentored I've won one, you know, it like it even if each one only counts like point one per person or something. I won like three, I think. Let's see, I started Yeah, I started. This isn't directly SiVY, but I also started a bridge club in my high school. I remember in Monta Vista High School. I got help with that from my friend, Cheryl Mandala. I think even after I went off to college, because I started the club in my senior year, she kept running the club, which was really cool. I was like taking players that had never played bridge before and from scratch, and that I think I actually taught them enough to help them win this high school championships event we had. And I did not participate in that I because no one else was a very experienced player. So yeah, that was really cool.

John McAllister

1:03:27

What's your greatest satisfaction from all the mentoring all the teaching you done? What do you think gives you the most satisfaction?

Kevin Rosenberg

1:03:34

I think it's gotta be just seeing all these like, young people that I remember just like starting out, some of them directly learned at these SiVY summer camps. And now we can like go to International Bridge tournaments together like the one in Veldhoven I think, yeah, over half of the people going for the US juniors have like some association with SiVY and a lot learned directly. Yeah, I think that's got to be going to these tournaments together. It's that's what the bridge is about. I think like, I think it's nice when you do well. And it's usually, I'd say rare in the bridge world just because there's so many people playing these events, and there's only like one person, one team or pair that wins and I guess you can do well without winning too. But still even that it's rare. It doesn't happen that much for usually and so the point is definitely to hang out with people you like to create a good social environment, I think and that's also how you're going to bring more people who are hopefully some of which are hopefully like pretty young into bridge. You have to have them have other friends that play bridge and to make them feel like going to bridge tournaments is fun, you know, and not just about playing cards for eight, nine hours a day even though it is that too and that hopefully it's fun.

John McAllister

1:04:59

It's great dating someone that plays bridge to you know, like.

Kevin Rosenberg

1:05:03

Yeah, it's definitely a very important connection for her my relationship with Amber, that we can just have this … connection.

John McAllister

1:05:16

Who were your parents rooting for in the junior trials?

Kevin Rosenberg

1:05:30

I don't know. But I would guess Amber.

John McAllister

Were they there, your parents?

Kevin Rosenberg

No. This is the first one actually where they hadn't been there. Because my dad for a while ran the junior training program. And he'd gone to every trials because of that my mom had gone a couple times as a mentor. So yeah, this was the first one where neither of them were there. Now Alex Kolesnik runs the junior training program.

John McAllister

1:05:49

Did your dad ever explicitly say that he was running the junior program because you were in it? Or was that? Did you kind of understand that?

Kevin Rosenberg

1:05:56

I'm still not sure I understand that to be like, the main reason he was doing it. Yeah, maybe it contributed but I don't know. I don't I don't think he ever said the main reason he was doing is because I was in it. Or I think it's possible he still would have been doing the same thing, even if I wasn't in it.

John McAllister

1:06:15

Alright, well, Kevin Rosenberg, it has been an absolute pleasure. I enjoyed communicating with Debbie and Amber beforehand. And also Michael, Sue and Olivia Schireson for some potential questions. It's great to see you winning this this event and having such a great tournament and I can say that I saw it coming. I wish that I… I was sort of part of it because you knocked us out.

Kevin Rosenberg

1:06:43

That's true. That's true. Yeah. Thanks. Thanks so much for talking, John. I really enjoyed it.