Holding games

If your opponent is succeeding with his racing game plan, then you need to give up on yours and start looking for a hit to catch up. This is the essence of the holding game. You are intentionally hanging back to maximize your contact, and you are trying to build out your homeboard to trap a checker for when you do manage to hit one.

Below is the prototypical holding game:

Gary has escaped both of his backcheckers, and is leading the race by 23 pips. As we discussed last article, a lead this large in the race makes Gary an 80% favorite in the game.

But all hope is not lost — you have managed to snag an advanced anchor on the 20 point, Gary’s 5-pt, and you almost have a 5-prime. Having an anchor so far up ahead gives you a few advantages. First, you have a line of sight on every checker entering Gary’s homeboard. Gary needs to roll pretty well not to leave any shots until the end of the game — only doubles, 5s, 7s, or numbers larger than 8 will play well for him. (You still, of course, need to hit any shots he leaves you, but there are enough sequences where that happens to make it worth playing out.) Secondly you still have a decent racing chance. Rolling 66 just once will even the race out, so you just need a little bit of rolling luck and you’ll do alright. And being so advanced, those backcheckers can easily take off if that number ever arrives!

Finally, because white has completely left your homeboard, you have the time and space to build out a beautiful contiguous prime. There is very little danger to leaving blots anywhere, so you can use your rolls to maximum efficiency to prepare for any checkers you may hit.

Next lesson: Priming games