Friday 29 August 2008
Saturday 23 August 2008
On the face of it
Back in the UK now after what seems like a very long holiday in LA. Actually, it really was quite a long holiday by usual standards - 17 nights plus travelling.
No real poker to speak of in that period. I played a bit of limit hold'em as per my previous post and whereas my initial thoughts that Limit Poker is better than nothing, my revised opinion is that No Limit Hold'em >> No Hold'em >> Limit Hold'em.
I am sure that Limit Poker is a very interesting and skilful game in theory but a combination of inexperienced dealers, low stakes, slow play and high rake made it a really painful thing. I did win on the first night (the players were awful, which certainly helped). I lost on the second night and by the third time I played it was pretty clear that I had lost the required patience and in fact I moved over to the Blackjack table where at least I could move "all in" so to speak.
I didn't play online at all whilst I was away. I could have, in principle. Gutshot is open in the States, as is pokerstars of course. However, I didn't even try.
I was relatively out of touch with the gutshot forum as well - which is unusual for me.
Today, though, will be a super-charged shot of poker. I am going into London to the club to play in the £500 main event of this week's"GSOP" (Gutshot Series of Poker). As the name implies, it is modelled on its lesser-known cousin, the WSOP.
What this means in practice is a very good structure - I think it is 20,000 chips with a 90 minute clock and the same blinds structure as the WSOP main event. So the main differences are - 90mins instead of 2hr clock (a small concession to practicality !), 100 players instead of 6,000 (!!) and of course a much higher standard !
I have to expect the field to be stuffed full of high quality players. It is generally recognised that the gutshot events attract a lot of good players, and in these high buy-in events (£500 is high for the venue and of course not exactly low by any meaure) there is a real fish shortage.
Usually in a gutshot tourney I rate myself slightly above average (say 60th percentile). In this field, I think I am solidly in the bottom 1/3rd, probably towards the very bottom. Will have to see what I can do. The hope is that the occasion will bring out my best game !
Being out of the country for nearly 3 weeks means I have some catching up to do on things - I had about 50 emails (I had email access whilst I was away - I just didn't deal with any but obviously urgent things). One was a facebook invitation from someone I know at the club.
I only have a facebook account becuase #1 son (Matt) asked me to try something out on there. I had no intention of joining the facebook world. I strongly suspect I could waste a lot of time on there.
Still, I knew the person and thought it not unreasonable that they add me as a friend, so I duly clicked. Less than 24 hours later, I have over 20 friends and rising fast. I have not really taken any positive action, but already I have a front page burtsing with activity !
So far I must say I am very impressed with the look & feel and the usability of the site. I can easily see why it is so popular.
Unsurprisingly, 90% of my "friends" so far are poker players I know from the club. I have a few requests from people I don't know (friends of friends, literally). So far I am resisiting the temptation to just add all and sundry ! I believe there is an option to befriend all friends of friends automatically (they still have to agree of course). I reckon if I did this, I could have 1,000 friends before the weekend is out !
So back to the poker. As I mentioned, I have not played for a month or so. I am not sure quite how this will affect my game. I hope it does not make m impatient for action because one certainty is that patience will be a minimum requirement for success this weekend. It's a 3-day event, so my first objective is to give myself the best possible chance to make day2 for the first time ever.
I have booked 2 nights in my hotel - I hope the poker gods see this as good karma rather than hubris ! It's mainly just practicality of course.
Wish me luck !
No real poker to speak of in that period. I played a bit of limit hold'em as per my previous post and whereas my initial thoughts that Limit Poker is better than nothing, my revised opinion is that No Limit Hold'em >> No Hold'em >> Limit Hold'em.
I am sure that Limit Poker is a very interesting and skilful game in theory but a combination of inexperienced dealers, low stakes, slow play and high rake made it a really painful thing. I did win on the first night (the players were awful, which certainly helped). I lost on the second night and by the third time I played it was pretty clear that I had lost the required patience and in fact I moved over to the Blackjack table where at least I could move "all in" so to speak.
I didn't play online at all whilst I was away. I could have, in principle. Gutshot is open in the States, as is pokerstars of course. However, I didn't even try.
I was relatively out of touch with the gutshot forum as well - which is unusual for me.
Today, though, will be a super-charged shot of poker. I am going into London to the club to play in the £500 main event of this week's"GSOP" (Gutshot Series of Poker). As the name implies, it is modelled on its lesser-known cousin, the WSOP.
What this means in practice is a very good structure - I think it is 20,000 chips with a 90 minute clock and the same blinds structure as the WSOP main event. So the main differences are - 90mins instead of 2hr clock (a small concession to practicality !), 100 players instead of 6,000 (!!) and of course a much higher standard !
I have to expect the field to be stuffed full of high quality players. It is generally recognised that the gutshot events attract a lot of good players, and in these high buy-in events (£500 is high for the venue and of course not exactly low by any meaure) there is a real fish shortage.
Usually in a gutshot tourney I rate myself slightly above average (say 60th percentile). In this field, I think I am solidly in the bottom 1/3rd, probably towards the very bottom. Will have to see what I can do. The hope is that the occasion will bring out my best game !
Being out of the country for nearly 3 weeks means I have some catching up to do on things - I had about 50 emails (I had email access whilst I was away - I just didn't deal with any but obviously urgent things). One was a facebook invitation from someone I know at the club.
I only have a facebook account becuase #1 son (Matt) asked me to try something out on there. I had no intention of joining the facebook world. I strongly suspect I could waste a lot of time on there.
Still, I knew the person and thought it not unreasonable that they add me as a friend, so I duly clicked. Less than 24 hours later, I have over 20 friends and rising fast. I have not really taken any positive action, but already I have a front page burtsing with activity !
So far I must say I am very impressed with the look & feel and the usability of the site. I can easily see why it is so popular.
Unsurprisingly, 90% of my "friends" so far are poker players I know from the club. I have a few requests from people I don't know (friends of friends, literally). So far I am resisiting the temptation to just add all and sundry ! I believe there is an option to befriend all friends of friends automatically (they still have to agree of course). I reckon if I did this, I could have 1,000 friends before the weekend is out !
So back to the poker. As I mentioned, I have not played for a month or so. I am not sure quite how this will affect my game. I hope it does not make m impatient for action because one certainty is that patience will be a minimum requirement for success this weekend. It's a 3-day event, so my first objective is to give myself the best possible chance to make day2 for the first time ever.
I have booked 2 nights in my hotel - I hope the poker gods see this as good karma rather than hubris ! It's mainly just practicality of course.
Wish me luck !
Wednesday 13 August 2008
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