In Menton the Swedish pairing of Catarina Midskog/Magnus Magnusson brought home the silver medals to Sweden. A couple of weeks later the pair was again runners-up, now in the Swedish Mixed Championships. Just what you can expect of an experienced pair. But, what drew attention was that Cecilia Rimstedt, who beat them for the Championship is only 14 years old. She had qualified from her district into the 52 pair strong field. Of course no one expected any miracles from her, especially when she partnered an average player.

But Cecilia wanted otherwise. She mostly struggled in the top five. After the first day’s 64 boards she sniffed at the medals from her sixth place. With only 16 boards left to play (of 102) Cecilia was in fifth place. The circumstances made her declarer on 10 of these 16 boards – and she solved them extraordinarily well. So well that they scored 74% and won the Championship!

Perhaps she was born with this ‘bridge-gene’, knowing also that her mother and grandmother won a Swedish Championship. That’s something, isn’t it?

Cecilia is the youngest player ever to have won a Championship in Sweden – even if you include all the Junior Championships – and in the world, I assume. Where is there someone younger somewhere else?

The youngest player ever to have won a Swedish Junior Championship is Jessica Larsson, winning the Junior Pairs in 1996 when only 16 years old. In November she’ll represent Sweden in the Venice Cup. Remember the name Cecilia Rimstedt and beware all juniors. I will not be surprised if she in the near future will be one of the names on the line-ups here at the World Teams Championships, defeating you all!