Americans like to have different words to us. A strip is a steak which we call sirloin. In the nineteenth century, striploin was a cut of meat in the US and now a New York Strip is famous. Another interesting expression is The Strip, for a series of casinos in Las Vegas, the other side of the city to downtown. This seems to get its name from Sunset Strip, a stretch of the Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood.
In bridge, the strip (or strip squeeze in full) is a declarer technique which is usually a two-loser situation in which the opponent is stripped down to all working cards and then thrown in to be endplayed.
Nobody made 12 tricks on this hand, from the weekly game last night, and it is not clear to do so. We began 1S-(2H)-Double-(4H)-4S and everyone passed, although I think that the EW save in 5H should be tried and would force NS to go on to 5S.
I just ran the ten of clubs at some point and had to lose two clubs. The line to make 12 tricks is pretty. Say East leads a top heart. You win in dummy and finesse the spade and draw trumps. Now you need to run all the trumps but one so that East has to come down to KJx of clubs and two red cards. Now you need to extract his exit cards so you cash the top two diamonds throwing a club from North, and ruff a heart if necessary. Now for the coup de grâce. You lead a club from North. East has to win with the jack but is then endplayed. You need to read the ending and know how many clubs East has, and playing the last trump too soon is fatal.
The phrase coup de grâce not unexpectedly comes from French, around 1690, and originally meant a merciful stroke finishing off a fatally wounded person, but in most games and sports it now just means the winning move or play.
