The second week of the 2026 World Bridge Series featured the Open Teams for the Rosenblum Cup, the Women's Teams for the McConnell Cup, the Jacek Pszczola Swiss Teams, open to teams eliminated from the Rosenblum after the Swiss stage and new teams, and into which players on teams eliminated in the Rosenblum rounds of 64, 32, 16, and 8 and the McConnell KO stages could drop, and the Week 2 BAM, into which teams could drop from the Rosenblum Semifinal and after any stage of the Pszczola. There were also Open and Women's Pairs. 38 USBF players (by my possibly erroneous count) earned medals in these events:

ROSENBLUM:

GOLD went to FLEISHER, USBF players Marty Fleisher and Chip Martel and NPC Jan Martel, with Thomas Bessis and Cedric Lorenzini from France and Sjoert Brink and Sebastian (Bas) Drijver from the Netherlands.

SILVER went to ROSENTHAL, USBF players Andrew Rosenthal, Aaron Silverstein, and Chris Willenken, with by Christian Bakke and Boye Brogeland from Norway and Martin Schaltz from Denmark.

BRONZE: In this tournament there was no third-fourth playoff, the bronze medal was awarded to the 2 teams that lost in the Semifinals:
DEEP FINESSE, USBF players Bill Bailey, Josh Donn, Dan Korbel, and Roger Lee, and NPC Arti Bhargava, with Alon Birman and Dror Padon from Israel, and ZIMMERMANN, the only team in the medals which had no USBF players.

Christian Bakke, Boye Brogeland, Martin Schaltz, Andrew Rosenthal, Chris Willenken, Aaron Silverstein, Cedric Lorenzini, Thomas Bessis, Jan Martel, Sjoert Brink, Marty Fleisher, Chip Martel, Bas Drijver, Dan Korbel, Dror Padon, Arti Bhargava, Bill Bailey, Alon Birman, Josh Donn, Roger Lee. Photo by Marek Jarkulisz.

Rosenblum Winners with all of their faces reasonably visible, Photo by Andrea Bierstein:

MCCONNELL:

GOLD went to BAKER, USBF players Lynn Baker, Olivia Shireson, Cecilia Dwyer Rimstedt, and Sandra Rimstedt, joined by with Katarzyna Dufrat and Justyna Zmuda from Poland. Photo and other medalists in earlier article below.

PSCZCOLA:

GOLD went to the all-USBF SILVER SURFERS: players Mark Bartusek, Chris Compton, Kevin Bathurst, John Hurd, Vince Demuy, John Kranyak, and NPC Donna Compton.

SILVER went to a team from Poland.

BRONZE went to another all USBF team: SIMSON: players Doug Simson, Eric Rodwell, David Grainger, Joel Wooldridge, Finn Kolesnik, and Eddie Wold, and NPC Bob Morris.

Kevin Bathurst, John Kranyak, Mark Bartusek, Donna Compton, Chris Compton, Vince Demuy, John Hurd, Joel Wooldridge, Finn Kolesnik, Doug Simson, Eric Rodwell, and David Grainger. Photo by Marek Jarkulisz.

Second Week BAM:

Gold went to DEEP FINESSE: USBF players Bill Bailey, Josh Donn, Dan Korbel, and Roger Lee, and NPC Arti Bhargava with Alon Birman and Dror Padon from Israel;

SILVER went to a team from Belgium;

BRONZE went to a mostly Chinese team with one USBF player: Ming Sheng.

Alon Birman, Dan Korbel, Roger Lee, Arti Barghava, Bill Bailey, Josh Donn, Dror Padon, Photo by Marek Jarkulisz.

USBF Players also starred in the Open Pairs, which was won by a Polish pair, Piotr Lutostanski and Krzysztof Buras: Steve Weinstein and David Bakhshi from England won Silver and Adam Kaplan & Radu Nistor Bronze. 

Pictures coming as soon as I can find good ones. If you have one, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. it to me.

The Baker team (USBF members Lynn Baker-Olivia Schireson, Cecilia Dwyer Rimstedt-Sandra Rimstedt, and Polish players Justyna Zmuda-Katarzyna Dufrat) won the McConnell Cup over Jiangsu Runtai, a Chinese/Canadian team. Tied for 3rd-4th were 2 transnational teams, each of which had one US player: the Castoldi team with Lynne Castoldi and the Huang team with Nina Huang. Congratulations to all of you!

Sandra Rimstedt, Cecilis Dwyer Rimstedt, Lynn Baker, Olivia Schireson, Justyna Zmuda, and Katarzyna Dufra. photo by Francesca Canali