BerniceC: You have 81 finished games. 24 top 5 finishes (29%). 7 4th place, 7 5th place and 10 3rd place. You dont have any 2nd place or wins yet. The good news is that you have gotten better recently... 23 of your 24 top 5 place finishes have come in your last 44 games, 52%. Thats much better :)

I was going to do mine and pedros to give you some perspective, but since I am on slow webtv, it took me over an hour to sort out yours! Maybe someone with a faster modem can help us out?

Some thoughts..... I dont really believe that it is such a big deal to get into the top 5, if winning is not your main goal. For example, i could bet 50 in the first round and then 100 and 200 and 400 and 800 and 1600 and 3200 and 6400 all blind without even looking at the pond results and I gaurantee i would still be in the game and get a minimum of 7th place with still over 7000 points left to bid.... but I would NEVER have any chance to win one of these games!

My opinion, if you want 3rd 4th and 5th place finishes, keep playing the way you do, but if you want 2nd and wins, then you must change your strategy. Good luck!