Local Realtor Knows All the Tricks

Peg Kaplan may not look like the type to stare down some of the world's most powerful men and come out on top, but she does.

That's the beauty of games like bridge: everybody plays by the same rules, and resumes are checked at the door.

“It's very demanding," said Kaplan, of Minnetonka. "You always are learning new things; you never master it.”

Bridge—more accurately called contract bridge—is played with four players in two teams. It's a trick-taking game, like hearts, but one that requires a lot of communication, strategic thinking and no small amount of brass.

“There are a lot of rules to bridge, but almost all the rules at one time or another are to be broken, so there's a great deal of judgment in it,” said Kaplan, who has been playing nationally for 20 years. She has achieved the rank of Grand Life Master, the highest awarded in North America that few achieve.

“I think there's about 280 Grand Life Masters in North America, out of maybe 170,000 bridge players that belong to the American Contract Bridge League.”

Kaplan comes from a competitive family and as a child played a lot of games, but it wasn't until she post-high school that she learned bridge.

“I learned in college when I got mono and was confined to my apartment,” Kaplan recalled. “I was dating a math professor who taught me honeymoon bridge.” Honeymoon bridge is a version of bridge that is played with just two people.

Kaplan played casually now and then, but some years later when an in-law invited her to a tournament, the game suddenly got more interesting.

Kaplan did well. Really well. Winning her first event and placing in everything, she even beat a team with a world championship bridge player on it. “I was hooked.”

Then she said “I know Bill and Warren from bridge.”

“Bill” and “Warren” are Bill Gates and Warren Buffet, numbers one and two on the Forbes 400 list of the richest people in America.

“I've played against them a lot,” said Kaplan, having even been invited to play on their team in tournament play. “They asked me too close to the tournament, so I turned them down.”

But the next year, Kaplan was able to join them on their team, as well as at dinner. What did a Minnetonka realtor and the two richest men in America talk about over dinner?

“We talked about bridge, because we never played together."

Gates and Buffet have donated one million dollars to fund “Bridge in the Schools,” a program dedicated to promoting and teaching the game in schools around the country. While Kaplan has seen youth around the world excitedly devouring the game, youth involvement in bridge lags behind in the United States. However, Kaplan said that may be turning around.

“At our national tournaments, for three years now, we've had a youth national tournament in the summertime, and it's great," she said. Kids are there from all over the country, including a few who need booster seats to see over the table.

“Some of these little kids, they have card holders because their hands are too little to hold 13 cards.”

Many qualities go into being a nationally-ranked bridge player. Talent for mathematics, logic, spatial reasoning, interpersonal skills and a good memory all come into play.

“There are a lot of factors that go into it, and nobody is the best at all of them.”

Perhaps the best thing that comes out of play are the experiences and opportunities that come from meeting new people with a common interest.

“I was in Omaha last week and I met a really nice guy from New Dheli, and I just got an email last night from him. He said 'Peg, come to India. You'll stay with us. You'll go see the Taj Mahal.'” said Kaplan, laughing. “How else would that happen to me?”