Leveling Up

John Kranyak is a professional bridge player and world champion originally from Cleveland, Ohio, currently living in Tucson, Arizona. He is married to fellow bridge player, Dr. Allison Kranyak. Together they have a baby girl Lyla. In his spare time John enjoys golf, pickleball, running and hiking.
John won his first national event in 2005 playing with his mom, Laurie. He was on the winning team in the 2001, 2005, and 2006 world youth team championships. His team won the 2024 world transnational teams and the 2021 Soloway.

Maya attended her first NABC in 2022, and the next year took 2nd place in GNT Cs, won the 20-50 Mini-McKenney, and started teaching beginners with a novel strategy aimed at youngish working professionals. Since then, she's made Day 2 of a bunch of NABC+ events, captained a team to the Bronze Medal of the inaugural Bridge Brawl, and is just off a first place finish in GNT Bs at the Minneapolis NABC.

Rajath Shourie was introduced to bridge as a child by his family, but didn't really play until he had retired from his career in distressed debt investing. He took up the game during Covid, learning online, and went to his first in-person duplicate at the Austin NABC in late 2021.
Since then he has had a number of successful finishes, including wins in the world transnational teams in Argentina, the Soloway Knockout in San Francisco, and most recently the US Team Trials.
He lives in Pacific Palisades, California, with his wife Moira, and their two sets of twin boys.

The year is 1990. A teenage Danny Miles is introduced to bridge by his grandmother, Frances — proving once again that grandmothers are the game’s most effective recruiters.
The hobby stuck. Danny went on to win four Canadian Open Championships and one Mixed title, along with representing Canada internationally.
In addition to playing, he has dabbled in bridge administration — serving on his local unit board and helping organize the 2024 Toronto NABC — confirming he’s now fully immersed on all sides of the game.
For a stretch, career and family limited his tournament schedule, but with semi-retirement and two daughters (9 and 7) getting older, a return to more frequent appearances seems likely. Perhaps, following the Wolperts and De Wijs’s, with kids in tow?
He also mentors Canadian juniors, some as young as 12 — doing his part to ensure the next generation has someone to blame when they fall in love with the game.

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