United States Bridge Federation

The United States Bridge Federation (USBF) is the national federation for contract bridge in the United States and a non-profit organization formed by the American Contract Bridge League (ACBL) and the American Bridge Association (ABA) in 2001[1] to hold the United States Bridge Championships and to select, train, and support Open, Women, Senior and Junior teams to represent the United States in international competition.

The USBF receives support for its teams from the ACBL International Fund and Junior Fund, its membership dues, contributions and entry fees for the USBCs.

Organization

2018 officers.

The President and the Vice President are elected for 2-year terms.

Olympic recognition

Originally, the USBF was also created to support the World Bridge Federation (WBF) efforts to obtain Olympic recognition for bridge. Following August 2002 recommendations by the Olympic Programme Commission, bridge and chess were recognized as "mind sports" by the International Olympic Committee but they were not found eligible for the main Olympic program.[2]

On April 19, 2005, three years after that negative Commission report and three years before the 2008 Summer Olympic Games in Beijing whose program was its focus, four mind sports including bridge and chess established the International Mind Sports Association with primary purpose to organize quadrennial World Mind Sports Games approximately alongside the Olympics.[3] The inaugural, 2008 World Mind Sports Games were held in Beijing during October, two months after the Summer Olympics and using the same facilities. The second, 2012 WMSG were held in Lille, France, entirely unassociated with the London Summer Olympics—smaller than in 2008, with a much smaller bridge program including no individuals, pairs, or youth events.

See also
  • List of bridge federations

References
  1. Manley, Brent; Horton, Mark; Greenberg-Yarbro, Tracey; Rigal, Barry, eds. (2011). The Official Encyclopedia of Bridge (7th ed.). Horn Lake, MS: American Contract Bridge League. p. 17. ISBN 978-0-939460-99-1.
  2. Olympic Programme Commission (August 2002). "Review of the Olympic programme and the recommendations on the programme of the games of the XXIX Olympiad, Beijing 2008" (PDF). IOC (olympic.org). Retrieved 2014-11-05.
      Sections 2.5, "Mind Sports" and 3.3.2, Sports ineligible through the position of "mind sports" in relation to the Olympic Programme (pp. 8 and 15).
  3. "History". IMSA – International Mind Sports Association (imsaworld.com). Retrieved 2014-11-05.
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