Poker Actually

Ex-cruise-iatingly bad poker

2010-08-08T15:14:00.002+01:00

I’m writing this blog entry from The Independence of The Seas , on a cruise in the Med. On the whole, I am a big fan of cruise vacations. It’s genuinely true that there is something for everyone on these big ships. This is our third cruise, and our second on this particular vessel. We have already booked for next year.

I’d describe Royal Caribbean as an upper mid-market brand. It’s a high quality offering, but it’s not at all formal or stuffy. Fantastic for kids (especially the older ones). We do not see our 14 and 15 year-olds except at dinner. It’s obviously a very safe environment, and they love the freedom. There is a 1am curfew, which they simply ignore.

The ship has a casino. A pretty big one, and quite busy. Like most American casinos it is rather over-populated with slot machines (this ship is now based entirely in Europe, so the slots are scarcely used).

It also has a whole range of blackjack and (double zero) roulette tables and other daft casino games, like 3-card poker. No craps though, interestingly. The table takes up too much room, possibly. It is a ship, after all. Space is at a premium (theoretically, anyway).

Thankfully (I thought) it does also offer some real poker.

They actually have 2 (count’em – two !) hold’em tables, although both are 7-seater converted blackjack tables. Obviously the considerable expense (many hundreds of dollars) of a real 9/10 seater couldn’t be accommodated after they spent $800Million on the ship itself. This is a shame, although last year I played some enjoyable poker on the same cruise (interpretation: I won).

However, it wasn’t the physical limitations which really irritated me this year.

The fact is, these guys really know how NOT to run a cardroom. Many of you reading this will play at The International which is of course a superb example of how to do things right.

Of course, you may have gripes about the tourney schedule, or the structures, or the buy-in ranges or you may not like the cash race, or the carpet or the temperamental air-con etc. But even if you are a big fan of the club, you probably don’t appreciate just how important the basics are – especially competent, efficient dealers and knowledgeable, consistent management.

When the basics are wrong, it makes for a bad game. The other thing is that the game was full of really bad players. Now, I generally don’t agree with those who say they hate playing bad players.

Of course I understand that it can be difficult to know where you stand against players who don’t know what their bets are supposed to mean, and I have some sympathy for the extra bad beats that come around because the fish do not realise when they are supposed to fold.

However, I usually say that I love to play against terrible players, for the obvious reasons. I’ve organised plenty of very enjoyable corporate tournaments at The Gutshot and The International, where the fields were pretty weak. I even have some decent success against those fields. I also certainly don’t mind playing cash against players who are even worse than me.

However, the cruise players were bad in especially annoying ways (which I shall come on to).

It’s actually quite surprising to me that the players could be so bad. The ship has 4,000 passengers. Altogether, perhaps 20 people or so came along to the poker games. Just 1 in 200.

So, you would imagine these were the ones who actually already play and know the game quite well. It would seem like they must have actively sought out the game (like I did). I don’t think live cash poker is the kind of thing people just “have a go” at.

Actually, the standard in all kinds of games on ship seems quite low. For example, I went along to some darts sessions hosted by Keith Deller (remember him ? Nice guy actually). Highest score with 9 darts – that sort of thing.

tbh, I didn’t trouble the scorers much. I haven’t played for many, many years (although the 1989 Oxford-Cambridge varsity match is still a very clear memory to me. Well, the actual memories are a bit fuzzy as they tend to be after 12 pints, but my memory of not remembering is quite clear).

Still, you would have thought with the number of tattooed arms on the ship, the treble-20 would be wearing out. However, the quality of the arrows was not impressive ! Maybe being at sea causes problems. No such excuses for the poker players.

Last year, the onboard poker game included a couple of genuine UK regulars and some others who had some decent gamble in them, and it proved a fun game.

This year, the players seemed to know the rules and mostly claimed to play a lot online, but they were just mind-numbingly bad.

Let me try to give you some idea just how bad.

The casino was running a 7-handed shootout satellite to win an EPT cruise. $50 entry, with $25 rebuys. The structure was alarmingly shallow. 1,000 chips with blinds 25/50 to start. 10 minute levels, blind doubling at each level. 30 minute rebuy period.

I can tell you for a fact that I was the best player by a mile. I know this because I had 5 rebuys in 30 minutes, which was 5 more than the rest of the table put together. You have to try to get some chips, I feel. I went on to finish (very annoyingly) 2nd in my heat (i.e first of the losers).

The lady who won my table made this play of champions:

After a 3-way all in at the 3-handed stage, she had scooped and I was left with just 1,200 chips at the 1,000/2,000 level. She had 20,800. I won the first heads-up hand [ all in perforce on the BB], so I had 2,400 on the button for the next deal.

Obviously I moved in blind (before the cards were dealt, so there was no iota of doubt that I was blind). She therefore had to put in 400 into a pot of 4,400 against a blind hand. She had me out-chipped by 10-1.

She folded! I don’t think she is necessarily going to be outclassed at the final table, mind you.

Still, she was a tournament player. Perhaps the cash players would be better. Well just barely, I suppose.

The terrible players were part of the problem with the cash game. The slow pace of the game was probably the most difficult thing to cope with.

But, in the meantime, the rake was a nightmare. Now you generally do not find me engaged in a Jack Glass-style rant about the niceties of reduced rake or missed blinds or the like.

I generally do not worry about the rake in any game. I’m usually just happy to play.

Still, 10% is a pretty steep rate in a 7-handed $1-2 game. It was at least capped (at $10). That is where the good news ended. They raked heads-up pots; they raked split pots; they raked pre-flop pots; they started the rake at $5 pots.

The final straw was when I raised the button and the blinds folded. They raked this pot as well.

There was a players’ revolt at this point. Apparently this was a new rule, and I don’t know what was more shocking – the fact they wanted to take a rake in this scenario, or the fact that they couldn’t immediately see it was wrong.

Eventually they relented on this ruling, although we had to put each new dealer straight on it. However, they still raked in the case of limp-raise-all fold.

Pretty tough to beat this rake, and somehow it felt even worse because at the end of each pot they would laboriously stack the pot into $10 piles and then count off the 10%. If you’re going to rob us blind, at least make sure we can’t see you doing it !

I still fancied I could beat the players and come out ahead. But to be honest I never found a good way to counter the extraordinarily passive play. The players would simply limp virtually all the time.

I obviously tried raising a lot. They would often call these raises, which sometimes made for decent post-flop pots, but it was impossible to bet them out of these pots. I suppose the best strategy would be tight-aggressive but the pace of play was glacial, so there simply wasn’t time to wait for good hands.

You would be amazed at the numbers of ways that inexpert dealer and bad players can slow the game down.

Obviously, start with slow shuffling and lots of forgotten blinds. Then, individually make change to everyone who has posted an oversized chip. Also pre-emptively make change for people who want to be able to have the right chips to call the $2 (i.e. everyone).

Since there isn’t a lot of folding, each street can take a while especially as players do not realise when it’s their turn. Naturally if there is an all-in it will take ages to get a count. Allow the $0.50 cent chips to play, of course, to complicate matters. Do various amounts of pointless stacking of the pot. At showdown, no one turns their cards over, and then it takes some time to decide who’s won.

I am exaggerating, certainly, and some of the dealers were accurate and would earn a shift or two at The International (if there were a London-wide pandemic flu, say). Some of the poor players were in fact just a bit weak-passive (almost experts, in context).

The fact is, it is just not fun playing in a game against all bad players where the rake makes it a basically just a zero-soon game.

I’ve already mentioned some of the outlandish rake rulings. To be fair to the casino, I think they ran a fairly efficient operation but just didn’t really understand poker and what makes for a good game.

They were earning a pretty good income despite all the problems (although you would think they would see it made sense to speed up the game). I think there could be a bit of a virtuous circle if they ran a better game with a slightly less extreme rake structure.

The final straw for me came when a player pocketed two-thirds of his stack after we combined two tables. That’s bad etiquette even if it weren’t against the rules. The floor didn’t prevent him from doing this, and for some reason I just couldn’t bear to continue in the game after this happened.

The best thing about this game, I suppose, is that it really makes me appreciate what I’m missing at the club. I can’t wait to get in a properly run game where I’m going to lose because the other players are just much better than me. DC-Wednesdays at The International sounds like a dream come true (£100 FO followed by a spot of 6-max multi-game madness).

Paradise City

2010-06-26T19:59:00.000+01:00

Blog coming .... after I get some sleep.

How do they know ??

2010-06-06T20:40:00.003+01:00

I created my Twitter account and within a couple of hours or so I picked up four "followers".

Each of these was basically a semi-spam account. Real businesses (as far as I know) all related to poker - with something to sell. This happens a little bit on facebook. In my case, for example, a cardroom or casino may invite me to be their friend. I usually decline such meta-advertising.

On LinkedIn, headhunters invite you to connect so they can get in touch with you and so that they can see into your network of colleagues.

Fair enough, I suppose, and I nearly always decline those invites as well.

On Twitter, I doubt one can block a follower - it's a "recipient led network".

There's no real harm in it either.

What what intrigues me is how - when my account was just tens of minutes old and I have made no posts at all - they knew I was a poker player ?

They'd be kind of scary at the table I guess - excellent reads.

To Tweet or Not To Tweet ?

2010-06-04T12:26:00.000+01:00

I am hardly a technophobe, but I don't find myself leaping at the new technologies or the new internet trends. I was a pretty slow adopter of eBay, for example, and highly skeptical of their business idea. Likewise, I did not see the big deal about yet another search engine (google).

It took a while before I decided to give facebook a try, and the same for LinkedIn.

I have quite consciously avoided taking on any more of these networking services - they just eat up time, I think.

This specifically applied to Twitter. I really struggled to see the point of it. 140 characters - why ?

However, I am on the point of caving in.

With a trip to Vegas just around the corner, it seems like it would be the ideal way of keeping friends (those also in Vegas, those about to come, those staying at home or already back) informed of my progress at the tournaments and indeed to share the news of others among the "community" (I do find that UK poker players in Vegas constitute a real community).

I may soon be learning Twitterese.

My Main Event 2009, as seen in Wordle ...

2010-05-26T21:12:00.002+01:00

A-Z guide to winning a beginners tournament

2010-04-29T22:59:00.001+01:00

Avoid Bluffing.
Cheap Draws.
Exploit (Fully) Good Hands.
Introduce Judgement/Knowledge/Learning
Manipulate Novice Opponents.
Position !
Quickly Recognise Situations To Unlock Value

Winner [X] (You !)

ZOMG .....

__________

It didn't work, however.

Double Trouble

2010-04-26T22:54:00.000+01:00

I turned up at The International last Tuesday night with one objective – to play SCRABBLE (and win). We’ve had some great matches at the club, in fact, with several tough poker players showing they are multi-talented.

I have a good record but lack of practice was a factor, and the field looked dangerous. Fair play to Sam Acheampong who was one of the first to put his name down (not his actual name – that doesn’t go in Scrabble) despite being a little outmatched.

Thing is, you never know with Sam. Maybe he could bink this thing as well (nb: BINK does go). I was a little wary when I drew him in the first round.

Sam, in fact, nearly didn’t play despite coming to the club specifically for the tournament.

Actually, when I arrived, I found him playing the £25 Deep’n’Steep. Apparently when he got through the door, he had forgotten why he’d come and clicked “auto-register”. Still, he assured me he’d probably still be available for the 7:30 Scrabble ;)

I resolved that there was no way I would attempt to play both, especially since I was planning to take down the Scrabble. However, I spotted Neil (definitely one of the favourites) at Table B.

This was enough of an excuse – and I was in. My seat was directly to the left of Sam !

There is a report on the Scrabble itself in the International Forum.

This blog is going to be about my attempt to do the Poker-Scrabble double on the same night.

I only had time to play half an orbit before I went off to organize the draw and then play my first round. This was enough time, though, for Sam to divest himself of his tournament duties (6-2 offsuit, how did he miss ??).

My table was broken whilst I got on with my match, and when I came back to play one hand 30mins later, I had to fold to a big 3-bet behind me from a solid player.

The table asks me what Acronym I’m playing today – I can’t think of one, so I say “SCRABBLE”.
One orbit later I came back and found my stack diminishing – down to 6k at 150/300. Playing only about 2 hands an hour, you don’t get too much choice in hand selection so this time I decide to over-limp in EP with 4-3o. The same player 3-bets again. I think “FIP” and call the extra 1,000. The dealer points out it’s actually another 400 on top of that. OK, I call.

Flop: 7-4-3. Check, ship, call. Kings no good sir !

30mins later I get to come back for another hand. I am on the Big Blind and with 7,800 at 800/1600 I figure it’s going in, but I find a fold to an UTG raise. I fold my SB as well.

Now I have only 5,400 and now I face a MP shove from an equally short-stacked player. I find A-5 and it has to be a call. The Big Blind thinks for a bit and decides he has to call.

J-4 for the initial raiser, A-5 here and 3-3 in the blinds.

That's not too bad ....

Flop 4-6-2.
Turn J.
River: 3 !

The BB takes a moment to realise I have scooped with a straight. Having trebled up, I get up to continue my Scrabble semi-final, but there are only 90 seconds til the break so I play one more – pocket Aces !

I end up all in pre vs 87s – I have to sweat an open ender on the turn but finish the level on 36k !

I see with amazement that there are only 19 players left – I’m thinking I may actually be final-tabling both comps.

Unfortunately, the “steep” part kicked in and having raise-folded one hand, I pushed with ATs (I only had 28k at 1,500/3,000 blinds), called by AQ. Queen high flop wasn’t great although the dealer gave it a go with a King on the turn. Somewhat surprisingly no Jack came and I fell in 15th.

Neil, meanwhile, did go on to make the final table and chop the comp. He would have had an excellent shot at the double but unfortunately he ran into Ade in the Semis and lost despite scoring not far short of 400 himself.

So, I have learnt the meaning of another word:

SCRABBLE, I now realise, stands for: Sometimes Call Recklessly And Bink (Be Lucky) – Easy !

Poker as SPORT

2010-04-20T10:00:00.003+01:00

When I walked into the club last Wednesday, a number of people came up to me to ask we whether I would be playing "No, No, No" again.

I was able to answer "No" (just the once). Tonight was "SPORT".

Almost universally, the other players immediately offered a possible meaning for today's acronym (at least for the "S" - some of them petered out after that).

Kirit came up with the quickest and most complete alternative version: "Shove, Push, Overbet, Re-shove and Tilt"

I decided to keep the real meanings to myself for the time being (mainly because I didn't want to stifle the creative guessing ... )

S for Spew ? S for Solid ? S for Stud ? S for Stacks ?

I can now reveal that this is what I had in mind:

S for Situations / Situational. I do believe that optimum poker is about identifying, understanding and exploiting the situations that arise. A situation can be as simple as "I have 8BB on the button; it's folded to me; I have two cards; I'm all-in !".

Most are a little more complex, and there can be dozens of factors to consider. However, by paying attention to the key variables - stacks, position, betting patterns and so on - we can make more good decisions.

In today's case, I intended "S" to focus me on actively seeking out good situations that didn't rely excessively on hitting good cards.

P for Position. Many of my acronyms will contain "P" since position is so crucial. I like to think it has the special property that no matter how much importance you have given to it, it's always a little bit more important than that.

Position is of course vital in creating and maximising many Situations.

O for Opponents. Playing at The International, one is generally facing a strong field. I do believe that the standard of play is high. I have certainly found that a standard £100 MTT here attracts a tougher field than a GUKPT ot a WSOP event.

The other thing is that I will know a lot of the players. In any case, I was conscious that I wanted to actively bring my knowledge and history with players into my thinking.

Studying the Opponents and their Position is of course useful in identifying good Situations.

R for Reads. When I first started playing, I believed it was a waste of time looking for reads. I thought betting patterns and other objective information were much more important.

Part of the reason I did not pay much attention to reads was that I knew I was too inexperienced to process all the basic info, let alone get into the ephemera.

Now, however, I come to realise that once you and your opponents reach a certain level then the relative importance of live reads grows considerably. I am a long way from being able to do this competently, but it's important to practice.

My plan was to explicitly look for and make reads and then compare my reads with the reality. I resolved to try to make reads in hands that I was not involved with as well, to gain extra practice "for free".

Naturally, Reads combined with information on the Opponents and the power of Position can put us in a good Situation

T for Timing. The "Timing" here refers to a number of tournament concepts - thinking about the stage of the event, deciding when to change gears, evaluating good opportunities to make a squeeze or a steal etc. It's also a reference to taking my time in making important decisions.

Well-judged Timing, strong Reads on the Opponent and good Position can make for a great Situation.

Just after the break, I thought I found a good Situation: I had Position on my my Opponent, Robin Dhinsa. I felt I had a good Read that his raise was weak (he himself was in hijack seat where he would be raising a lot) and that he could fold a lot of hands to a shove.

Timing looked good - I had 20 Big blinds and for Robin to call would be over 1/3 of his stack.

I re-raised all-in with 7h4h.

Robin dwelled. It seemed I had made the right move.

However, Robin obviously believes fishing is a sport as well and made the call with KhQh (only kidding Robin).

Unbelievably, I missed. Next time, I am playing "WHOOPS".

No, No, No !

2010-04-16T16:45:00.000+01:00

I do like to come into a tournament armed with a good acronym.

Recent examples include:

"TV poker" = play Tight, and Value bet - I used that one for the HORSE tournament at the LPM festival.

"TOP" (or "POT") = Tight Or Positional; this was supposed to be for cash games to remind me to think about hand selection relative to my position in the deal. Admittedly, I didn't really use that one. I just said "POT" a lot.

In my most recent outing to the £100 Wednesday Freezeout at The International, I came with "No, No, No" which stood for:

1. No Show: I tend to have a bit of an addiction to showing my hand (i.e. generally showing bluffs - I get many opportunities to do this; occasionally to show my hero folds). I think it is pretty clear that a good rule is never to show and so the first "No" was to remind me of this, and I stuck with it almost 100%

2. No Hurry: Many times in the past (often in big tournaments) I have regretted not taking a little longer to make a really big decision. I tend to act very quickly.

Online I will often finish an MTT without having used a single second of my timebank. Live, I have only been "clocked" twice ever - each time it was an all-in call in a bracelet event. So, I am not exactly pushing the boundaries of an acceptable pace of play.

I should take a little time when the big hands play out, and I did also consciously slow down my routine decisions a little so that I could start to get into a habit of thinking a bit more about my actions.

3. No Fear: a reminder to myself that if the conditions seem right then I must be prepared to put my tournament life in jeopardy - whether it be the important thin value bets, the all-in calls, the strong reads, the short-stack shove with air or the trademark H-bomb check-raise bluff.

As a rule, I am not exactly nitty but I do sometimes hesitate when it comes to being actually all-in, and even I do need to remind myself that it's important to be committed to the moves we have decided upon.

I think, as well, that it's important to try to project no doubts that our opponents may pick up on.

With this mantra in mind, I set out once again on my mission to finally win something at the club. I resolved to play a genuinely solid game and - to many people's surprise - I actually did tighten up a lot on the day.

Admittedly, first hand I opened UTG with 8s7s . I was paid off 3 streets of value as the board came K-7-2-7-5 . My opponent was a bit upset at himself.

I played relatively few hands (for me, at least) and I also found the fold button in many spots where I wouldn't normally. I raise-folded 77 - TT about half a dozen times at least to strong action. Normally I think "they must have AK - let's race !"

I had a lucky break when I raised AcKh from UTG+1, with a MP caller and Terry "Final Table" Simpson calling in the BB.

I decided to check the JcTc9d flop - checked around.

On the turn, good news/bad news: the Qc.

Terry led out just 500 into a pot of nearly 2,000. I was not quite sure what to make of it. I felt I had to raise for value and made it 2,300. MP folded and Terry insta-shoved about 6k more. I have to call, I think. He showed 6c2c . Luckily a club hit the river and I was sitting on a nice stack.

I was pleased at my play in one other pot that I remember. Having raised early with 7h4h and received a call from a loose player in the blinds, I checked the 5c3c2h flop and called when the BB bet the Ac turn.

The river was an offsuit King and I found raise on the river - called by Ace-Ten.

In this hand, I was pretty sure he did not have a flush but in the past I have generally worried that if I raise I may get bluff-shoved and have to make a hero fold.

In this case, I had decided I was calling a shove, but as it was I probably got full value anyway.

Talking of river shoves, there was a funny hand against Chen when I had KhTh.

On the flop (Q9x), I pick up a gutshot and a backdoor flush draw and call Chen's lead bet.

On the turn (Jack), I make the nut straight but somehow I don't realise, and I check behind even though there is now a flush draw on board.

The river pairs the nine and puts a flush there. I am thinking to myself that I may hero-call Chen with King-high if he bets (say) 3/4 of the pot.

However, he over-bet shoves more than twice the pot! I ponder whether I can hero-call now and then after a little while I check my cards as I go to fold, and see I have the straight!

Now, against Chen, I snap call and am good against his A-9.

I began to feel that I had a good chance at my first win but at the 2-table stage, it all unravels after we move up to the TV table.

Phil King opens in UTG+1. I have him well covered and raise with AK. Now the BB wants to shove,

Phil folds (TT apparently), and I have to call 13k into 22k leaving myself with 7k if I lose (about 9bb at that stage).

I can hardly fold (or can I ? If I fold, I have 25bb).

The BB has QQ and holds.

Soon after I shove KsQs and am called by A-8o in MP (a bit surprising !).

The first two cards out are Ts, 9s so I have 18 outs 3 times.....

3d ... No,
7d ... No,
4h ... No !

Need a new mantra for next time ...

A - Z of Poker (abridged)

2010-04-13T22:10:00.002+01:00

Avoid being cold-decked; even fold good hands (if justified).

Karma? Luck? Meaningless ... nothing outweighs profits / quality results.

Simple truth: unite volume with experience & you'll zoom !

Post Mortem

2010-04-11T17:17:00.002+01:00

It's rather incredible that 3 months have elapsed since I last posted. I doubt I have any readers left ! Previous analysis has shown me that hits are closely correlated with posts.

It's not entirely due to a lack of blogworthy activity, although it is true that being back at work has slowed me down in terms of playing and then in terms of finding time to write about it.

Several times, in fact, I have made notes at the table with the intention of committing my thoughts to the blogosphere, but then time has passed by and the events no longer seem sufficiently topical.

This post will have to serve as a placeholder for posts that will follow shortly.

WBCOOP

2010-01-16T22:33:00.001Z

I have registered to play in the PokerStars World Blogger Championship of Online Poker! The WBCOOP is a free online Poker tournament open to all Bloggers, so register on WBCOOP to play.

Registration code: 644544

£300 Freezeout Nov09

2009-11-30T11:27:00.002Z

I was looking forward to the £300 freezeout at the end of November. This event is, I suppose, the Blue Riband offering on the poker schedule at The International.

I rarely play live poker at the weekend. I’ve only played the £100 a couple of times ever, and I have literally never taken part in the £300 (either here or at The Gutshot).

The event would be my last chance to register a tournament win in London for 2009. It didn’t seem terribly likely, but one has to be optimistic !

I started out on a positive note, registering a win in the scrabble beforehand. Perhaps I could overcome similarly tough opposition in the main event ?

Generally speaking, I start out in a deep-stacked tournament by setting fire to part of my stack. I have never adjusted well to the long structures, and I just cannot seem to make the necessary changes to my game. I vowed to try to correct for this today.

As expected, the 63 runners were a Who’s Who of Gutshot/International players. Faces everywhere.

My table was no exception. For example .... on my left, Stuart Prior (serial final tablist in the £100) and Mikey Tse. On my right, Prof Achillea, Martin Spearing and Phil Haddon.

For the first couple of orbits I was very careful about getting involved until I did try a little (and rather obvious) bluff last to act on the river on a Q-8-5-6-6, showing 3 diamonds. Phil Haddon found a call with Q5. Perhaps this was factor in the hand that played out shortly thereafter?

Still at 25/50, we see a 7-way limped pot with Andy having started off the limping. I have KhTh.
The flop give me some hope: J-9-6 with one heart. Andy bet 125 and finds 3 callers including me.

The turn is gin for me: Qh bringing me the nuts with the King-high flush draw. Andy bets 175. I have a range of options, but I must raise for value I think. I make it 625 and am pleased to find Phil Haddon and then Andy calling. There is now about 2,700 in the pot.

The river is a blank. Andy checks. I have the immortal nuts – can I get paid ? Clearly Phil and Andy have hands of some value. Again, there must be a variety of options here. I consider checking over to Phil but I opt to make a small lead bet. I revise down my initial thought of bet size and put in just 1,200. Perhaps it will look weak ?

Good news. Phil puts out a raise (also small) to 3,000. Clearly he is not trying to bluff me here. My first thought is that we may be chopping, but I do find it unlikely that Phil wouldn’t have raised with KT and no hearts on the turn. Surely he would not raise now with a set or 2 pair?

It seems definitely possible that he has T8, even though with this hand he might also flat call the river. Perhaps he doesn’t feel 1,200 is enough reward for his hand and believes I will call with a hand like 2 pair myself?

Andy folds (2 pair he says). It does seem unlikely that Phil will now call if I re-raise the river. I do my best to appear discomfited, and take a look at the stack situation. On the one hand I may need to almost min-raise to get him to call, when he must now believe he is losing. I could make it as little as 4,800 theoretically. I started the hand with about 11k so an all-in raise would be to about 10,000 – about a pot sized raise in fact.

It is well known that I like the river raise or check-raise bluff. The 3-bet-all-in-river-bluff is the most grown up bet in this family of high octane plays. I must get some credit for a possible audacious bluff ?

If I do shove, I am of course expecting either a sigh-fold or a snap call for the chop. I am really not expecting Phil to call almost all-in with less than KT. There again, if he’s calling at all maybe he has to call the shove and maybe it is easier to call the shove?

On the whole I do think I under-bet my monsters, so I go for it.

When he doesn’t snap, I’m praying for him to find the hero inside! He mutters some version of the “this is sick” psalm and I think he uttered the classic “I think you’ve got it but I can’t fold” and with that, he makes the call with T8 and is shown the bad news.

Up to 22k and presumably the chiplead ! Phil still had a couple of thousand left. I think this was a factor in his decision. That is still 40 big blinds in this comp, and in fact Phil doubled up with a T8 straight a short while later. I remember thinking that it was still quite likely he would outlast me !

I made another nice step forward towards the end of the same level. Having made it 150 from late position, I get a call from Mike Tse and one other. Mike leads for 200 from the blinds when the flop comes Ts9h3s. I have As6s and I opt for the raise to 800, which Mike flats.

I ask him “do you have a flush draw?” No answer as per usual. The turn is the Js. The nuts for me. Mike checks. How much to bet ? I decide again on a smallish bet and decide on 1,400. I pick up 2x reds (500 each) and 4x 100 chips. I say “fourteen” and throw in the2 reds and 4 greys.

Now, the greys are 1,000 each so I have actually put in 5,000 chips! There is some confusion and some amusement at the table. Some kind of moody from me ? Some kind of Freudian slip ?

Someone suggested that I may have been made to put in fourteen thousand but I think the decision was pretty commonsense and I colour down the bet. Mike calls.

I’m not too sure what to put him on, honestly. A smaller flush ? KT with the King of spades ? KQ with one or more spades ?

My ideal river is a spade I guess. The Jack of hearts comes down. Hmm. I am not too delighted about this but, really, can he have a house ? Can he have a set on the flop and bet/call like that ?

Unlikely surely. How about TJ, J9 ? Not impossible but would he check the river ? Obviously I don’t want to get check-raise bluffed but once again I am aware that I need to get enough value for my big hand and that my image can help me get paid.

I choose an amount that I hope will dissuade Mikey from a bluff raise. I go for 4,000 into about a 4,900 pot. Mikey obviously had a hand as he found a call after a modest dwell, and I was good.

On about 26,500 chips I was feeling in great shape, obviously. I was very aware of my history of blowing up big stacks and I even took a couple of fairly long breaks from the table to enforce some discipline.

I thought I might really be running good when I picked up Kings on the button. Unfortunately, my standard raise took down the blinds and one limper.

Likewise, just a couple of hands later I find Aces and raise in early-mid position. Robin on my immediate left seemed to have been playing quite solid values and he appeared to think very carefully before make a near minimum raise from 600 to 1,200.

I thought I may be in luck. Ordinarily I might think his raise indicated Aces. This seemed unlikely here ! We seemed too deep for me to just flat but my 2,500 re-raise unfortunately scared him away. He later told me he only had QJ, so I suppose this wasn’t that tight of a fold !

Andy Achillea had been moved from our table and after a period playing 8 and 7 handed, we received a couple of new players. Briony Stone was moved into Andy’s seat on my right.

In her first hand she was the SB to my BB. I thought I may be getting a walk, until Briony bumps the bet to 700 (100/200). I have the rather appealing-looking JhTh. I think (why ?) that Briony may not have a monster so I decide a raise to clarify the situation is in order.

I don’t want to commit myself so I am about to make a smallish raise but something makes me say “2,000 more”.

This is met with an insta-ship for a further 5,200. I guess I found out. I go to fold when something else says to me “getting 2:1 ...” and I’m taking into account that Briony may well realise that my initial raise can be very light. Can’t she re-shove with 8s and 9s and AK, AQ ?

I hear myself say “call”. Briony has Aces, obviously. Is this the beginning of the downward spiral ?

Still, it wasn’t an easy hold for the Aces – two hearts on the flop and a Jack on the river gave me 14 outs on the river. None came, though, and the very next hand I bluffed 2,000 into the river only to find Briony insta-calling with 99 on the Queen high board. The river did complete a straight, but unfortunately it was the 5-7 straight rather than the 5-6 that I held. Still, it was promising to realise I could have value bet a made straight and been paid.

I still was running OK. The main problem was getting paid rather than getting a hand. I was hitting sets for fun, and straights as well although the next straight I made came with a flush on board – Martin Spearing made the flush on the turn exactly when I made the nut straight. I called his check-raise and when the river paired, I was able to see the bad-news-showdown without facing another bet. Could I have barrelled the river and represented ? Maybe.

I continue to preserve my chips relatively well, in my opinion, whilst at the same time playing pretty aggressively. It is important to play within one’s own style, I think.

However, with about 40 players left we’re in the last hand of level 6 (200/400/50), when this happens ...

JoeJoe “Goldenboy” Whittaker opens for 1,025 in early-mid. Martin Spearing is super-short on the button and is now all-in for 1,050. I am the big blind with 9s4s facing 650 to call into a pot of 1,050x2+200+400+9x50=3,150, so I am receiving nearly 5-1 on the call.

I cannot resist the call. OK ...

Flop – good news, bad news. J-9-4 all diamonds. I flop bottom two pair. This is probably winning right now. Of course, our Golden Boy may have flopped anything up to and including the nuts.

I opt to check to see what happens first. I have about 21k at this point and JoeJoe has me covered by several thousand.

He bets 2,025. Into a dry side pot this obviously announces that he has some values. The logic for my next action is one of those part-baked ideas. I wanted to “explain” to JoeJoe that I have flopped a big hand and that he should fold. I decide that a min raise will achieve this, even though realistically he cannot fold !

I duly make it 4,050 and now the rest falls into place. “How much do you have” etc. And then “alright, I’m all in”.

At this point I am essentially certain that he has one pair and one diamond. I should also explain that pre-flop I verbalised the fact that I was making a pure odds call. This means my opponent knows that his one pair/one diamond hand is either the best hand or the best draw. He has excellent information on the scenario.

The only hand he really fears from me is something like 8d3d and even then he knows he is almost certain to have a high diamond draw. There is essentially zero chance I have a made flush higher than a Queen.

OK ... If I fold I leave 40bb, about to become 25bb or so. Not a disaster. However, if I win I will have > 42k chips – up there with the leaders. I am very sure I am ahead now but I am also pretty sure I am about a 50/50 shot.

I think that to do well in these tournies I probably need to alter my style to incorporate a much higher value on my tournament life. In the moment, I made a deliberate decision that I wanted to play to win. Now I suspect a majority may argue that “playing to win” means fold here.

However, not wishing to give Ostrich more ammo to call me The Laydown King, I go for the call.

JoeJoe, as advertised, has QdJh. Martin in fact has a gutshot and a diamond draw with KcTd. The turn brings a Queen – making Martin the current nuts.

I need one of the remaining 4s or 9s. No joy and I am left to rue my pre-flop call. I don’t think I can ever get away on the flop although others maybe can ?

About the only comfort I can take is that my two chip donatees (JoeJoe and Briony) both final tabled as chipleader and eventual winner respectively !

2010 targets ... win a tournament at The International.

Final Board

2009-11-29T21:24:00.004Z

Bingo!

2009-11-29T21:05:00.003Z

During a recent late night PLO game, Miriam threw down the scrabble challenge gauntlet. Perhaps it wasn’t exactly a “challenge”, per se, but wanted to play and was confident she would win.

Based on what we know, this seemed plausible. But, never one to let near-certain defeat put me off, I accepted the challenge. We agreed to play before the £300 at the end of November.

I don’t know whether Miriam really expected the game to go ahead, but after I announced it on the forum it really had to be done!

Knowing that Miriam is a very good player, I was surprised to learn that she had in her possession neither a scrabble set, nor a scrabble dictionary!

I don’t have a board either as I have been playing on facebook with other forum members over the past few months but I haven’t played a “live” game for over 30 years. In any case, first order of the day on Saturday was a stop at “Toys-R-Us” to pick up a brand new scrabble kit. The game was removed from its shrink-wrap live at The International – so no issues over it being a complete set!

Expecting a heavy defeat, I negotiated Miriam down from £1 a point to 50p/point and off we went.

I ran good.

First, I picked “E” vs. Miriam’s “O” to win the right to play first (presumably that is an advantage) and whaddya know. Straight away I can play all 7 letters (playing all 7 letters is known as a “Bingo” in scrabble and is one of the keys to high scoring). It is obviously rare to be able to start the game this way, but unbelievably I found “ALCOVES” and I’m off to an absolute flyer – 82 points to open. That’s like picking up Aces vs. Kings in the first hand!

Miriam started with a modest 10, but then as I struggled to follow my strong start, Miriam fought back impressively using small multi-word combos to great effect. I had played “DIRT” when I should have played “WRIT” at move 2 and this enabled Miriam to play a really elegant SAY/DIRTY/NA for 33 points using only 3 letters.

A couple of moves later, she found the chance to play a Q on a double letter score AND pick up the double word – effectively netting 40 points for a single tile. “QUIET” was the word, but the reaction was anything but. Miriam had pulled back to within 3 points.

She was unlucky to find me with a “U” in hand so I could play “QUAD” to the triple word score in the bottom left, effectively neutralising her quad-Q to a great extent.

Now I had picked up 2 S’s and a blank is my hand – that’s a bit like freerolling to the nuts two ways. I had “FISSION” in my hand but couldn’t see how to play it for another Bingo. Miriam called the clock on me and I settled for playing just the “F” and holding the other letters.

Miriam took the chance to play two letters again for an AH/HA/DA combo – 23 points for two letters – very nice. She wasn’t sure about DA and I didn’t think she was bluffing, so I made the first of three important challenges that proved critical in the game.

DA was good (a Burmese knife) so I miss my turn and Miriam gets the chance to play on the open Triple Word at the top of the board. She breaks the 200 point barrier and gains the lead for the first time.

Meanwhile I decide to hold on to the chance of a bingo and play “IO” and “GO” for just 7 points.

Miriam makes an error here, I believe. She challenges and when IO turns out to be a valid term for a type of moth, I get a free go and can now play my S-S-blank combo for a Bingo (SUIToRS) and gain the momentum back.

Miriam couldn't quite believe that one, but at least she has learned a word to use in anger another time.

Game on! The “sack” was hitting me in the face, really, but Miriam countered with a fantastic 50 points for playing X on a triple letter, scoring twice in one move (XI, EX) – 48 points for 1 letter !

She unbelievably had the lead back despite me playing 2 Bingos and snagging a tripled-Q.

I say the tiles were good to me but at one point here I held the rather unfavourable AAEEEEB. I never like to exchange or pass. I prefer to play out of trouble – dropping in EE in the middle of some other words. Miriam was dubious about “IDES” but let it go (it is valid in fact).

After EX/XI I played CAB/BIO (although risky/doubtful) but Miriam elected not to risk the challenge again (BIO was fine in fact).

She was able to tag “CAB” to play LUNGS and SCAB which may have left the board a bit open and when I managed to dump my Z fairly safely, Miriam failed to close off the top-left triple when she chose to play RINK to keep the scoring lead in the game.

I was able to use the triple (and make it safe) with LIVED.

All the tiles were now out and I held EJLOPT to Miriam’s MNNORTU. Playing “MORN/EM/DO” Miriam moved into a single point lead (actually on checking the scores later Miriam was in fact 2 points behind at this stage. “Live” we saw her as 1 ahead – either way it was extremely close).

Miriam announced she could go out at the next turn. I hold a P and crucially an 8-point J in my hand. If she really can go out then I am crushed if I do not play my J. Not only will I not score with it, but it will effectively count against me 8 points twice.

The letter J is not always easy to play, and I am not sure what score I need to defend either.

I opt to play “JO” which I knew was good and at the same time I make “OI” and “JA”. I score the J twice (instead of losing it twice) but I am not certain about “JA”.

I have to make up my mind quickly and decide to go for it.

JA/JO/OI puts me 19 ahead. I have 6 points left in my hand. If Miriam knows this (theoretically she should but in practice she will be guessing) then she will need to score 8 to win. Scoring 8 puts her 11 behind and the 6 in my hand is deduced from my score AND added to hers. This will leave her the winner by one point!

In a world of perfect information, Miriam would know all this and play “TURN” on the double word score, for exactly 8 and a win by a single point.

I give a bit of speech about now being sure of “JA” and Miriam decides to challenge. If she is right, she is a lock for the game but when “JA” is good (it means Yes, basically) I get another go and dump my P.

That settles it for a win by 17 (Miriam actually plays “RUNT” for 6 points on the end which doesn’t matter now).

In quite a twist, I rechecked the scores in detail later (and with the benefit of time) and it turns out that Miriam was in fact 22 points behind so if she doesn’t challenge and plays “TURN” then her 1 pt win would swing to a 2 point loss on recount. How to rule on this one ? She had incorrect information and could have played differently if she knew. Would the result stand? Tricky one!

I only ever play on the internet so wrong scores do not happen. Miriam made no errors at all in calling her scores. I scored wrong 3 times (only by 1 or 2 points) but as we see it can make all the difference!

It’s fair to say that Miriam played the better game but it takes two to tango, and all agreed it was an exciting match. Most said it was more exciting than watching KILLYGLEN fail to trouble the scorers at the Haydock Park which was on simultaneously.

I had wanted to watch the race but the board held my attention, and apparently I didn’t miss much (except for the $100 I had on the stupid nag ...).

International Scrabble Tournament anyone ?

Lost My Car Playing PLO

2009-11-12T21:49:00.004Z

Not literally, you understand, but it was the kind of game where you could imagine anything happening.

I made a trip down to The International to play in the $100k bounty tournament, and it turned out to be a great fun night of poker.

First phase was a quick spin in the £1-1 NLH game. I say “spin”, but there is another word that goes after “spin” that is not “up”.

I didn’t have long before the bounty tournament itself, so I was playing “speed poker”. It worked OK some of the time, but a few of the players realised they could call me pretty light.

One player called my shove on the river (double-paired board) with Queen high. Admittedly I did announce “Queen high is good”. Maybe that was too much of a clue. People should tell me if they’re going to take my speech play at face value, so I can adjust.

After a reload (or two...) I should have known better, perhaps, than to 4-bet all in against Sam “Light Call” Grafton. Four-high no good vs his monster Ace-Ten.

On to phase two. The club had laid on an incredible $100k bounty tournament in the guise of a £25 freezeout. One of the bounty pros, Andy Achillea, was at my table and he seemed to be playing 0% of hands. I made up for this by playing 100%.

Things might have worked out. Raising in early position with 4-2o and receiving 4 callers, I was allowed to see a free turn after the T-3-6 flop and was pleased to hit a five. The small blind led into me. Perhaps I should just call but, with 2 diamonds out there in a 5way pot, I opted for a raise and took down a moderate pot.

I tried to put the modern “light call” into practice after hitting bottom pair of deuces against one opponent who kept betting. When I called the river and tabled J-2, he nodded “Good call”. He flipped over his hand – 54o – which was all very well, except that he had rivered a low straight that he apparently had not noticed !

A thin value raise with KQ vs AQ on a queen high board saw me slip to about 3,000 chips (starting chips 6,500) but it seemed I had my second chance when I picked up my first genuine hand.

Andy raised (for the first time in the comp) from early position and was called on his left. I simply shoved from the small blind with pocket Queens.

After Andy passed, the other player dwelled but cannot be faulted for believing he was likely ahead with TT. I was good till the river, when a third Ten was enough to knock me out.

I was disappointed, but this did not stop me getting on the PLO list. The game was quickly up and running and a whole host of familiar faces were involved, including the fearless Warya.

Early on, I could not get a start in the game and dropped several buy-ins before deciding to fight fire with fire and pull up £2,000 – by no means the largest stack at the table.

Immediately things take a turn for the better. Picking up Aces with Ace-high clubs, I get involved in a 3-way pot. Unusually it is only £10 to call pre-flop (I limp the £10), but I still manage to get £2,000 in on the turn when I make the nuts. Warya had Kings with King-high clubs, and the other player had a set, missing.

AAQQ next hand stands up in a £1k pot and then I flop the world a couple of times and get paid off by second best hands.

I put together a great run and am soon on over £10k. Warya, naturally pulls up to cover me and there are otehr deep stacks as well.

It is often said that Omaha is a game of making the nuts. Well, this one wasn’t ! Vast pots were won with one pair, and two pair.

I became comfortable with lighter and lighter calls: £300 on the river in a multiway pot with a pair of queens, jack kicker, for example. Or £1,000 with 9s and 4s (two pairs made on turn and river). I was particularly pleased with a winning call with Aces up when I was check-raised to £1,300 on the river with a pair on board.

Having said that, I probably did not value bet/raise sufficiently light for the way the game was.

For example, in one pot I started with Aces and check-called the flop. I check-called the turn, having only improved to a gutshot wheel draw and a draw to an Ace-flush bluff.

On the river I hit my wheel draw and check-called £500 with £800 left, winning against a flopped set. This was a clear error. I was worried that my lowest-possible straight could easily be losing, but in this game it was a clear check-raise or bet-shove.

I really enjoyed the game and I did feel that I made a lot of good decisions throughout the night. However, it is generally the mistakes that stay in the mind.

I remember one pot against a smart aggressive player where I allowed him to bluff me with essentially air after I check-called the flop for £300 and then led for £600 on the turn, to face an £1,800 all-in.

The board showed a possible made straight (which I did not believe he had), and 2 spades (I had none). I was playing an overpair of Kings at this point, with a gutshot, but I was miles ahead of his bottom pair, no draw. I should have gone with my first instinct.

Most memorable of all was a big pot with Warya and Trevor, which might have been truly enormous if I play it differently.

I straddle £5, called by Trevor and the small blind. Warya raises in the BB to £25 total. I call with T-9-7-4r, and now Trevor raises the pot (having limped) to £105 total, leaving less than £200 behind.

SB folds. Warya calls £80 and now I have to call £80, not to crack Trevor;s obvious Aces, but to play the £10k behind that both Warya and I have left.

Flop 9c-8c-3h.

I flop top pair/open-ender with no part of the club draw. I will be happy to put it all in against Trevor here, but the flop is checked around.

Turn: 6d. I make the nuts but my hand cannot improve. Warya checks again and I bet £225 for value. Trevor agonises. He seems to recognise he is losing but eventually he puts in his last £185.
Now, Warya check-raises to £1,080 ....

If I raise now, I can make it £3,500ish and I could face another £7,000 re-raise all-in. Do I want to put in £10k potentially being freerolled ? I’m not sure what to do, and in the end I go for the call as a default option, obviously hoping for a brick on the river.

I don’t think I had really comprehended how few bricks there are on the river ! My hand could be vulnerable to any club (for a flush), any 7, T, J or Q (for a higher straight), or any 3, 6, 8 or 9 (board-pairing cards, of which there may be as many as 11 still in the deck).

The river pairs the 9. Immediately, Warya announces “full pot” which is £2,665.

Now I lost my nerve. It was one of those classic poker moments where you “know” your opponent is bluffing but you still don’t call. In the end, I think it was simply the sheer size of the bet that overwhelmed my better judgement and I found a fold.

Warya showed T-J-5-5 (no club draw) for nines up (effectively playing a pair of fives) and raked the considerable side pot. When I say “showed”, I mean “slammed down and fist-pumped!”.

”Noooooooooo.....”.

Trevor, meanwhile, has had an absolute coup. On the turn he is drawing dead with A-A-7-5. His backhand came in but I had him crushed, and now out of nowhere he picks up the main pot of well over £800 !

A brilliant example of missed opportunity, and a major case of self-tilting.

The game continued for hours and my stack fluctuated between £5k and £9k most of the time, with the whole stack potentially in jeopardy at all times. It was a scary game, but great fun. It was played in a really good spirit by all involved and I felt I was definitely learning something about the nature of “big bet poker”.

It went on so long that my transport plans were thrown into a tailspin. I had driven into London, ostensibly so that I could get home after the last train. When the game extended to breakfast time, that reasoning became moot. It went on so long that I had to move my car to the nearby Hoxton Church car park.

When we eventually finished playing at about 3pm (by mutual exhaustion), I was too tired to risk a long motorway drive so I left my car overnight (sending word to the car park via the ever-helpful Jimi).

I had to make a trip into London the following day to collect it (some 48 hours after I first parked it outside the club). As I was there, I popped in and there was an Omaha game just starting off ....

Bounty Hunter

2009-11-03T13:43:00.003Z

Tonight I shall make another attempt at winning my first tournament at The International Club. I only had to wait one event to score a win at the old Gutshot Club, but at this venue I have final tabled seven times without taking the last, vital step.

It was (and is) one of my poker targets to score a win this year and - in reality - I have less than a handful of attempts left (not counting thumbs or little fingers, either).

I plan to play the £300 at the end of the month, and tonight’s tournament, but that’s probably about it.

We’re going away early for Christmas so I will miss GOSCARs night, and I have never dared to leave the family behind to play the boxing day event !

Sometimes, such pressure has translated into me playing my A-game. With my A-game and a few H-bombs, I always stand a chance.

On the other hand, tonight is a £25 freezeout with a fast structure so although that sort of structure suits me, it is of course a bit of a luckament.

The added sparkle tonight is the bounty element being thrown in by Gutshot.com. $100 each for knocking out any of the 4 named Gutshot pros is a nice freebie, but they’ve also decided to throw in some serious cash in case anyone manages a multiple knockout.

$1,000 for getting two of the blighters. $10k for a hattrick and $100k for the holy grail of a grand slam of knockouts !

Like finding the holy grail, it is widely assumed that this feat is impossible. To be sure, it is so unlikely that it might as well be impossible, but it makes for a great headline !

I was wondering how impossible it is. Difficult to model realistically, but here’s my first and only attempt at it:

So ....... someone has to win the tournament and I will take it as a given that this person will have knocked out four or more players on the way.

This is not certain to be the case of course; theoretically the winner may knock out only the runner-up, but I have to start somewhere. I will further simplify by assuming they knock out exactly four players.

So, assuming a nice amount of randomness and independence and all that good stuff (definitely not true; there are some clear dependencies, but bear with me) then what is the chance that those four are in fact exactly the fantastic four?

This is a bit like playing the tournament with four bounties but only revealing the names upon the opening of a sealed envelope after the event.

Seems to me that this will be of the right order of magnitude.

There will be at least 100 runners tonight, so I will take 100 as a nice round number.

How many combinations of 4 from 100 are there ?

It’s 100!/(4!x96!) I believe, which is about four million to 1 against. It’s got that “million to one shot” about it, so I think it’s a very suitable answer.

The chances of me winning the tournament are definitely better than a million-to-one, so that’s something to feel good about.

Something else that is better than a million-to-1 is the chance of me picking out the winner of the WSOP main event in a sweepstake that is running on the Gutshot forum.

I don’t know who my "pick" is yet, but I think it’s a fair bet that most people reading this would love to see James Akenhead take the big one down. Good luck James !

If best wishes were Aces, then I think he’s due a sick run of cards.

I have a clear hierarchy of favourites (in the sense of who I’d like to see win, not who I think is most likely to win). If it isn’t to be James then I’ll be supporting Steve Begleiter, as we worked together for many years at Bear, Stearns.

I don’t feel any link to any of the other players, so failing these two, I am on the Phil Ivey bandwagon. I support the view that Ivey for WSOP champion is good for poker.

However it finishes, it promises to be a fascinating final table. A whole bunch of people from the club are in Vegas to see it, I know. If James is out first hand, I'm sure they will find something to do !

On Poker and Golf

2009-10-20T15:53:00.002+01:00

Many poker-playing readers of this blog will also be at least occasional golfers. Poker and golf have a lot in common.

For a start, they are both sports.

I know that there is debate about whether one of these is actually more of a “game” or a “pastime” than a genuine sport. Nevertheless, I believe that – despite their reputation for drinking, smoking, gambling and a general lack of physical fitness – golfers are still genuine sportsmen.

In any event, there are a great many commonalities in the experience of playing these two great games.

In both, the player benefits tremendously from experience and practice. For that reason they are also both sports that one can play credibly at an advanced age with the years of practice mitigating the loss of vigour.

Poker and golf offer a huge amount of material available to the player to further his/her game.
In both cases, the average player totally fails to take full advantage of the resources available and should undoubtedly study more and play less.

In poker there was already a wealth of books magazines and software tools available, and now there are online coaching videos and even one-to-one coaching. Unlike golf coaching, this can be achieved in the warm and dry over an internet link.

I wouldn’t argue that in poker one can gain much advantage by purchasing superior equipment – a difference from the golf parallel. Of course, some believe their latest iPod, ridiculously expensive noise-cancelling headphones and designer sunglasses are vital poker aids, so maybe I am wrong about this.

Both games constantly serve up disappointment but they also offer enough glimpses of glory to keep the player coming back for constant punishment.

In golf, we struggle round with a mix of pulled drives, thinned wedges, missed putts short, long, left and right and then suddenly on the 14th fairway we unexpectedly connect with a 5-wood from the semi-rough, catch a kind bounce and a favourable run and incredibly our ball finishes 6 feet from the hole for a miracle birdie chance.

It sometimes doesn’t even matter if we now miss the putt. Our faith in the game is restored and will carry us for weeks to come.

Likewise in poker we endure a constant diet of bad beats and poor finishes and most likely a steady drain on our bankroll until suddenly one night we make a final table or pull off some miraculous squeeze or river bluff check-raise or make a supreme winning call with King-high and suddenly we’re Phil Ivey all over again.

I think we ultimately remember the highs more than the lows, although I have never lost a WSOP bracelet heads up when my opponent 4-bet shoved with T4o and flopped a full house !
Poker is probably unique in the extent to which our own perception of our ability is correlated to results on such a short timescale, and it must offer one of the highest love-hate factors of any activity.

There are differences of course. Both can be played and enjoyed by beginners, but only poker offers the ultimate level playing field and – yes – that first-timer no-hoper may beat the entire field on the day. It does happen. I’ve seen it happen. I’ve even been that no-hoper.

And, for now anyway, poker (unlike golf) has not been granted Olympic status.

Quadruple crown anyone ? WSOP-WPT-EPT-Gold Medal .... it is absolutely no less ridiculous than tennis at the Olympics in my opinion !

What is the ultimate in either sport for the keen amateur ? Is a WSOP bracelet the equivalent of a hole in one ?

Well, whatever the doubts about the quality of my poker game I know for a fact that I am a better poker player than a golfer and yet I have actually achieved a hole in one. That took me only slightly more than 25 years to achieve but I’d be happy to wait the full 21 more years if I can have the bracelet .... just one time ....

Mixed Results

2009-10-08T13:09:00.002+01:00

Blog for the EPT 8-game is best read on the gutshot blog section as it's a bit long for this layout:

http://www.gutshot.com/bforum/blog.php?b=667

Mixed Fortunes ?

2009-10-05T15:17:00.003+01:00

Tomorrow I plan to play in what might well be the last live tournament of the year for me.

It's the EPT London festival at the moment. The EPT (European Poker Tour) has been a roaring success since it was conceived just a few years ago.

I'm not playing the actual EPT main event itself (which, this year, turned out to be the biggest ever tournament staged in the UK). The event was way too expensive at £5,250. I did have a half-hearted attempt at qualification, but without troubling the scorers.

Like all these large events, there is a whole raft of side events - eg: a £1,000 NLH today - but in fact the event I picked out weeks ago is the European 8-Game Championships (£500).

"8 game" is a bit like HORSE in that it is a mixed game - several different poker disciplines played in rotation. The 8 games are (I think !)... the HORSE games (Limit Hold'em, Limit Omaha Hi/Lo 8-or-better, Limit Razz, Limit Seven Card Stud and Limit Seven Card Stud Hi-Lo 8-or-better) PLUS No Limit Hold'em, Pot Limit Omaha and Deuce-to-Seven Triple Draw (played as a limit game, I believe).

It's mad really !

There was a £2k version of the same tournament last week - Joe Hachem (2005 WSOP Main Event winner) won it. I imagine it was a field solely comprised of high-stakes pros to be honest.

I am not quite sure who will play the £500. On the one hand there are people like me who like the mixed games but are not wiling to shell out £2k. On the other hand, some of the big names probably cannot be bothered to play for the £500 stakes. And we are drawing to the end of the massive season of festivals in London, so quite a few pros that are not still in the EPT will have started to head home.

There were 60 runners for the £2k event. I suppose on balance I would expect a similar number for the £500, but who knows !

I've continued to play a few HORSE tournies on pokerstars - I cashed in one last night (24th, the lowest paying place in fact: made a bad call in Razz) - so I feel I just about know those games.

Obviously I know NLH and PLO although I cannot quite get my head around how they gel with the limit rounds. This leaves "triple draw". I have never played this, so I am reading up on it in Super-System 2. Daniel Negreanu wrote the chapter, so hopefully it is intelligible.

Overall strategy wise, I am thinking I may go for super-tight. Despite the presence of NLH and PLO in the rotation, the event is primarily a limit event and I know it is right to play very tight in limit tournaments.

Presumably the structure is OK (it's a 2day event), so I reckon I need to really go out of my way to play extremely tight (but aggressively when I have a hand).

I think the 2nd best choice might be very loose (and hope to get lucky), but I'm going to try very hard to bite the bullet and become the H-rock. Tight players can get lucky as well, after all !

And Finally

2009-10-01T10:26:00.002+01:00

I played in the £1,000 NLH event at the WSOPE (E for Europe) recently, which I felt was worth a punt, but I never intended to tackle the main event (£10,000 entry) which has just moved to the final table stage at Day 4.

Ironically, it will of course finish (today) more than a month earlier than the final of the WSOP Main Event itself from the Vegas series due to the TV-inspired 3month+ break in that tournament.

There are clear differences in the two events; the most striking of course is the difference in the field size although at ~400, the European Main Event was not remotely small for such an enormous buy-in [the WSOP main event had about 6,500 entrants this year].

The other difference, I would say, was the quality of the starting field. It was absolutely packed with high profile players and it seems like the whole of the global elite of poker is spending the entire autumn in and around London, with so many key events being staged. The EPT festival is already underway in fact whilst the WSOPE has not yet finished.

The intense starting field has led to an insanely talented final table.

http://www.gutshot.com/bforum/showthread.php?t=33588

I previously mentioned that I have two "interests" at the November final table. It promises to be a fascinating encounter with Phil Ivey in the mix, but I will of course mainly be following both James Akenhead (Gutshot heritage, and "I know him" factor) and of course Steve Begleiter (Bear Stearns veteran).

The incredible thing is that James Akenhead has made the final table of the WSOPE Main Event as well. What is more, another player (Antoine Souat) has also made both final tables.

It's an amazing feat on both their parts. To top it, one of them could go on to win both titles I suppose which would very probably be an achievement never to be repeated. In fact, if either James or Antoine were to take this title then it's safe to assume that it will be a gift to Harrah's and ESPN in time for the November coverage.

James' stock - already very bullish with his 2nd place in WSOP Event#2 last year, November 9 this year and Full Tilt pro deal - must be absolutely through the roof here.

The eX-post

2009-10-01T10:24:00.002+01:00

I suspect a lot of regular readers of the poker actually blog were surprised to find The ex-Files post here which had next to nothing to do with poker (the word "poker" was used in it, but that is about it).

It has been moved to the Tales from number 54 blog in case you were wondering.

http://hvsmith2.blogspot.com/2009/10/ex-files.html

Good Read

2009-09-30T08:37:00.001+01:00

Am I a good player ? It’s a question I often ask myself.

Occasionally the question is put to me although, thinking about the conversations that poker players have, they rarely ask about the other person as such. Mostly each player talks about themselves, whether consciously or otherwise !

Back to the question.

It’s not easy to answer. One way to tackle the question, of course, is to look at whether I am winning. Even this is not trivial as, sadly, my records are pretty poor.

I do have excellent records for my Las Vegas trips and in fact my 2009 visit was so profitable that it puts me clearly in the black for the aggregate of those visits over the years. Previously I have had mixed results in Vegas due to my failure to cash in large tournaments.

In 2009, I successfully addressed the tournament problem and I was also profitable in cash (and sponsorship !)

Equally clear is that I am a loser at online poker. I know this because I am much more familiar with deposit methods than withdrawal procedures.

This is the overall result, but it’s actually a game of two halves. I have definitely been a loser in cash, but I have almost certainly been a solid winner at online MTTs.

In live (non-Vegas) games, the lack of good data prevents me from making a definitive statement. Of course, if a poker player is “not sure” whether s/he is up or down then it is in fact a safe bet that s/he is losing.

I have the same problem in live UK play as I previously had in Vegas: lots of high-priced tournaments with no significant cashes. In smaller buy-in tournaments I am slightly ahead. In cash, somewhat down.

In terms of objective evidence the available data is, in fact, fairly encouraging. The latest data for me at OPR (officialpokerrankings.com) say that I above the 99th percentile for tournament players on pokerstars and also confirms I am profitable with a strong ROI%.

Sharkscope covers tournaments on Gutshot.com (Cake network), and I am classified as a “shark” with strong statistics again.

There are other sites that track tournament data and I am in good shape on all of them.
I don’t look at the products that offer cash-tracking but I know they would confirm I am a fish. The problem is patience. In many non-poker situations I am actually a very patient person, but I simply have not found a way to convert this attitude into cash play.

This goes for both online and live play, but the problem is severe in internet play. Live, there are other factors that can mitigate my natural tendencies, but online a lack of patience is rarely less than fatal to the bankroll.

Outside of the objective data, I do feel subjectively that I am a better player than ever. There is no doubt in my mind that I have learned a lot about the game since I started about 4 years ago. To be sure, I could have (and probably should have) learned even more by being more disciplined in the actual study of the game.

My approach has been mainly of the “Learn by Doing” school which I favour in most endeavours.

It is of course difficult to quantify any improvements in my game (although, on the publicly tracked stats the improvement is visible: OPR 48% in 2007, 56% in 2008, 99%+ in 2009). It has not been translated into clear gains in my bankroll but this is at least partly explained by the fact that I migrate upwards in stakes at least as fast as any improvement in my game.

I like to think that if I had to make a living from poker, I would have enough skill to do that. Of course the problem is that to do this would involve playing a rather dull game.

I would need to play much lower stakes, and really focus on issues like good game selection and correct bankroll management. All of these necessary steps would, with certainty, lead to a more boring game. This would be a problem.

A number of people over the years have suggested that the best approach for me would actually be to go UP in stakes to a level where the money involved would be more meaningful for me. I think there actually is some merit in this advice although I have generally been reluctant to do so since it’s far from obvious that being a small loser at low stakes means I will win at high stakes !

If it’s difficult to be sure how good I am, and difficult to prove or measure, I have nonetheless had glimpses of what it must be like. For the most part when I am playing, I think I am slightly above average (say a 70% percentile player) but I have sometimes been in situations where I am clearly the best player.

I am thinking of an invitational £50 rebuy I played last year, of the cruise poker I played this summer and of certain MTT tables on gutshot.com. For short periods, I have understood what it feels like to KNOW that you are better than most (or even all) of the other players and to experience the wonder of reading the opponents as if, in fact, their cards were face up and they had informed you of their exact intentions in the hand.

I suppose it must be like this for the top pros all the time !

WSOPE £1000 NLH

2009-09-20T16:27:00.003+01:00

After initially putting this event on my calendar, then thinking I would give it a miss (various reasons including a fairly unanimous view among players that it is bad "value" as a tournament), I flip-flopped back to the "yes" camp.

Diary-wise, it fitted in somewhat nicely with the birthday celebrations at The International the night before. Karen & I stayed at a hotel on Friday night and I was booked in for Saturday night as well.

The Friday night was good fun at the club. In the random tag teams event, I was paired with JJ. The tag structure had the effect of tightening up my play (even though I hardly had to worry about JJ being unused to the loose approach). JJ presumably did not react in the same way as his early position push with A7 was snapped off by Andy Achillea's AQ.

I took a fairly early retreat from the cash games (lively: some highlights included me calling India's all-in check raise on a Jack high flop with my J-9o. I had 4-bet the pot pre-flop. My top pair was good. I imagine India had a hand like 88. Lowlights: check-raising all-in on Axx flop with 63o and failing to get A-8 to fold).

The Empire was busy, no question. The poor structure had obviously not been enough to counteract the positive halo effect of a WSOP bracelet on offer. About 300 (capacity, basically) had played on day 1A with the same number again there for 1B.

Plenty of faces on show. I did not recognise anyone at my own table, although they all struck me as pretty experienced players. At the next two tables, I spotted Chris Ferguson, sitting next to John Juanda and Barney Boatman (who lasted about 20 minutes). There were some other faces that looked vaguely familiar.

Although 3,000 chips was plainly far too few, the blinds did start at a helpful 25/25 (maybe they changed this under protest from the players because the posted schedule certainly said 25/50) and the 1 hour clock was respectable.

After winning and losing a few very small pots, I found myself in a difficult place after getting too committed with top pair and the nut flush draw, losing out to a full house (did not see that coming at all).

Tournaments are often about "what if" so in this case, I can wonder "what if" I had not limped with Aces in level 1. Actually not that much would have changed, probably. As it turned out I lost a small pot when 4 diamonds came (I had none) and I paid off a small bet on the river.

Having lost some chips, I thought my way back may have come in the shape of pocket Kings.

Two callers pre flop, and then they both called on the Ace high flop. The pot was now checked to the river where I lost to A3. So, what if I bet bigger pre-flop? Or bigger on the flop, or if I fire the turn or river as well ? My feeling was that I did not have enough chips to shake off the flopped Ace.

In any case, the result was that I had no real room to move until in the 3rd level my stack had reduced to 15BB. Obviously now I was waiting for a good re-shove opportunity. It came soon. The button, who had just won a big pot, opened to 300 at 50/100 and with AQ on the big blind and 1,550 chips it was an automatic all-in.

The player seemed hesitant about calling despite his decent 9k stack. This seemed a good sign. "Ace-Ten" someone volunteered, having apparently played with the raiser earlier. "Yes please" I thought, but it was pocket Tens.

Still, I was happy to take a race. Unfortunately a Ten on the flop cut short my hopes. They were briefly rekindled by a King on the turn, but there was no miracle Jack on the river.

So, a rather brief stint - a little less than 3 hours - although about 100 players had already exited in this short period. The rapid elimination of players did mean that those who did survive the first few levels quickly went deep into the tournament. In fact, they had to stop play early on day1a to prevent the money bubble bursting on day 1 !

Next time ..... although I am not sure I will play any more live tournaments this year.

PSOP £1,000 Main Event

2009-09-16T13:00:00.000+01:00

My attempts to satellite into the main event were ultimately rather expensive and unsuccessful. I made a fairly deep run in the £50 rebuy satellite (not right near the bubble, but I was getting there). Then, when I open-pushed from the small blind with A7, the BB called for half his stack with QTs. I thought that was a little bit surprising, but he hit the Queen and that’s that.

So, onto the main event itself. I arrived slightly late (some traffic issues), and I had already been moved. A good thing too, as my first table draw looked absolutely fearsome.

12,000 chips and a 75 minute clock. Play was scheduled for 3 days. I knew that patience had to be the watchword. I was playing extremely cautiously, but soon a real gift presented itself.

A player on my immediate right open-raised in EP to 225 (blinds 25/50). I find the rockets. I decided on a raise to 725, called my Martin Spearing on my left. Folded back to the original raiser, who now makes it 2,325. I have a choice to make.

Normally, I do not mess around and would put in the next raise. But here I felt that this would really be turning my hand over, and that the player would get away from some very strong hands. Of course, he ought to have a very strong hand anyway but on the whole it seemed like flatting here could be the best line.

We see a flop heads-up: 7-high rainbow. On this flop I think I must be 100% safe as he surely cannot hit a set there. He leads for 2,300 and I opt for a small raise to 5,500. Villain now helpfully shoves. Of course I snap call, to be shown pocket 9s (??)

Up to 24,000 or so in the first level. I know my mission now is not to blow these gifted chips and I actually spend some time away from the table. Partly this was an effort to force myself not to splash around, and partly I was simply trying to get my internet connection working. The wireless connection in the club is a source of repeated frustration for me. This time I even brought a broadband dongle as an alternate connection, to no avail.

Sad to say, after a couple of hours of being very parsimonious with my chips, I could not help myself from getting involved. There wasn’t any single incident, but my stack gradually dwindled as a combination of some light calls (eg: I called with 2nd pair on a board that looked like it contained a lot of missed draws; villain showed up with Kings full !!) and some moves that did not work out.

In both cases, I am not sure whether they were hopeless plays or whether they were only slightly off in timing/opponent etc. There was one particular pot I recall where I have re-raised pre-flop from the SB with no hand and led out on a raggy flop. I get almost limit re-raised and I let it go. I am wondering in hindsight whether I could have put in another bluff raise at this point (still leaving chips behind). Or it may have been that he really had the goods.

The net result was that I found myself rather short-stacked. In fact at the 100/200/25 level I had only 4,500 chips left at one point.

Now, rather too late, I came to my senses and realised that with the structure (both the gradual escalation of blinds, and the 75minute clock) I could be very patient about choosing my spots.

So, rocked up, I hung in the tournament for many more hours. I rarely put my chips in and I was only looked up once (I got a bit lucky to survive). I raised from the cut-off with AJs, hoping that Richard Gryko on my left (also short stacked, but covering me) would shove and I could call.

He did raise, but ominously he made a smaller raise to about half my chips. I didn’t like that too much but I thought “FIP” and pushed the rest in. He snap-called with pocket Jacks, but an Ace on the flop saw me double up and Richard down to <> 100k chips on day2.

I continued to survive, and the field thinned out. Obviously my short stack was becoming ever shorter relative to the average. I was not worried about this. Nor was I worried about the prospect of perhaps surviving to come back with a bowl of rice on Day2. Since I was already committed to being around at the club for a few days, there were no issues of “double up or go home”.

Still, I would need a series of double ups eventually. I continued to be very tight in calling (in fact I don’t remember calling at all). My blinds were very much up for grabs.

Eventually, we reached the last level of the day 300/600/50 and I had around 6,500 chips – probably the shortest stack of the field. I was surprised that about 2/3 of the runners had already exited.

I pushed several times in this level, but always as the first into the pot and always with some kind of hand. Normally I will push with literally any two cards but then we are not normally playing a 75minute clock !

Of course during this period I passed some hands that would have trebled me up, as it turns out. C’est la vie.

Finally my stack fell below 10bb and now I had a stroke of luck. UTG with 4,900 I picked up 63s.

It was obvious to everyone that I was playing very tight so with the prospect of the blinds about to come through, I felt that I should have enough image equity to get this one through. I pushed (my very first push without a respectable hand) and found a pretty quick caller in Richard Mackay just a two seats along.

That was the bad news. The good news is that no one else called and I had to hope I was looking at live cards. Indeed I was – AQ suited for Richard. Unfortunately, the same suit as me.

A three came just in time, on the river. I now had over 10k – as much as I had for literally 6 or 7 hours.

One more double up would see me in reasonable shape.

I passed my blinds, and now made a possible error and definitely a critical hand. Action folded to me on the button with A2. My stack is about 16BB.

Normally I would be insta-shoving with Ace-high on the button with this short(ish) stack. Here, I hesitated. My stack is somewhat above the real shove-or-die zone and of course the structure is not remotely a crapshoot.

But, then, the two players behind me are very tight and Ace-high is likely the best hand. I can pick up 1,300 chips. I shove and receive an immediate call in the BB – Richard Mackay again.

He has woken up with pocket Kings. Now is the time to find that Ace ! It doesn’t come, and I am basically out although not before there is nearly a final twist.

I have 875 chips change (1 big blind and a few antes). We know what CAN happen. Next hand, 87 is enough to throw the chips in. Ade Bayo has already limped and two others come along.

The flop is T43 . Ade bets, to leave us heads up. He turns over Aces ! However, I hit runner J-9 for a straight ! With over 3,000 chips now, can I keep the dream alive ?

Shortly afterwards I am in the Big Blind with A9 facing a raise from India on the button. I put the rest in, and am ahead of KQ. In fact I hit Top Pair, Top kicker on the 9 high board. However, a Queen on the turn finally does shut the door 15 minutes before the close of play.

I know it’s irrational, but I would have really liked to make day 2. You do have to be “in it to win it” and although I broke my day 2 duck at the WSOP this year, I am still waiting for a day2 in any UK event.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing and in hindsight I see that I probably could have cruised into day 2 if I had taken better care of my 25k stack in level 1. There weren’t any massive coolers or outdraws to blame. Instead, it was a failure to recognise the dynamics of such a long tournament. I made the same mistake in the WSOP ME.

My hope is that I have learned something from these mistakes. I do notice that of the tournament objectives I have set myself, I am gradually achieving some of them and getting every closer to others. I can’t wait for the next festival to try out my new patient style !

PSOP £200 HORSE

2009-09-15T14:04:00.002+01:00

I was pleased to see the HORSE event on the festival calendar once more. In fact I hope it will be a fixture for all future festivals. I would encourage everyone to have a go at it. I quite literally only learned the rules of the other games a few days before I competed in the first HORSE event, and it’s not hard to learn them.

Of course, it may be hard to learn to play them well but the great thing about a tournament is that you can’t come to too much harm whilst you’re still making big mistakes !

The other thing about HORSE that I imagine puts people off initially is that they are LIMIT games. It’s true that the first few rounds are quite slow going but, in reality, this is often the case in a deep stack NLH event, unless there is an AA vs KK trainwreck.

Once the blinds and antes kick up a bit, the pots can quickly escalate and the stacks can swing around quite violently.

Actually, I like the fact that in a limit tournament (ironically) you can more easily make a dramatic recovery from a short stack. Of course you have to find a hand that you want to commit with but, when you do, then you often will get paid off in full by multiple opponents so a multi-up is always just around the corner.

Online the other day I was down to 1.5 big bets and was last of the remaining 29 runners. A few hands later I was the chip leader and I felt a bit aggrieved in the end not to win the thing !

The HORSE event at the PSOP was the last competition of the 2-week extravaganza and, de facto, my last shot at a trophy. A field of only 29 runners meant that there were less bodies to get past although, not surprisingly, there were some specialists in attendance including several faces who only really come the The International when the HORSE is on.

In the end my campaign fizzled out in 13th spot. It was a rollercoaster; very early on I chipped up nicely, then lost ¾ of my stack in a series of situations where I was deep in hands and then had to give up. Frustatingly, I would have got there in some of those.

However, my 3k stack was soon up to 16k again as I did hit some hands. This was a decent stack but, again, not enough to sustain more than one or two serious hits.

I was crippled in a Razz hand where on 6th street I had a made 8 and I could tell my opponent had paired one of his low cards in the hole. Unfortunately he felt compelled to chase, and hit a 6 low on 7th street. I called his last bet at the end; I still do not have the stomach for folding to 1 bet into a 12 bet pot on the end even though I know the chances are that he is not bluffing.

I decided to get all my chips in on 3rd street in the next hand. You are never that far behind at this stage in Razz. JoeJoe was slightly ahead to begin with but had no low at all on 6th. Of course he got there on the last card and I was out. He went on to win, which is some consolation to me I guess !

I think I perhaps need to alter my strategy for a medium stack in these tournaments when I have a good hand. Perhaps play more passively until later in the deal to protect my stack ? I need to have a think about it before the next event.

The next relevant event, in fact, may be along quite soon as I am planning to play the £500 8-game at the EPT (October 6th). I am not sure what kind of player will participate in this. There is a £2,000 8-game for the big boys. Will the same players get involved for just £500 ? If not, who will ?

I suppose that a majority of the field will be mixed game experts. I will be dramatically outgunned for experience and technical knowledge in that case and I guess that it’s harder for luck to play a decisive role than in NLH (although 8-game does include NLH and PLO; maybe I need to explode the H-bombs in those rounds ?).

Still, as the EPT itself out of reach buy-in wise, I am happy with my choice of event and you never know what may happen. I know I will enjoy the event no matter what happens.

Taking the 5th

2009-09-15T10:46:00.002+01:00

It was Sunday and I fancied a go at the Sunday Million. I felt in reasonable tournament form.

However, the regular pokerstars schedule was affected by the WCOOP – a series of big online events over a 3week period. I didn’t take part in any of them, but I know they are/were a very important part of the calendar for the serious online players and for the pros who mix the online and live circuits. In fact the WCOOP has been an important challenge to some of the live festivals.

In any case, the regular $215 tournament had been replaced by a $1,050 2day marathon. I certainly wasn’t going to invest either the money or the time in tackling this one !

Back to reality. I entered the $150+12 $100k guarantee on gutshot.com – those MTTs are nice in that they have a few hundred runners (about 700 this time) and last a sensible few hours. The standard of play is also not spectacular. I also clicked on the Sunday 1/4-Million (the usual 28,000 runners and a chance at a huge payoff for the $11 entry) and a couple of other low stakes MTTs.

Earlier in the day I had final-tabled a HORSE event. In fact I was a bit disappointed not to win it as I came from 29/29 to a big lead with 10 players left. Still, my record in HORSE tournies is pretty good – cashed in over 50% of my starts and with an ROI of 800% (lol).

As the tournaments went on, I exited the $3R when my Aces did not hold up against J8 (standard ....) and then in the Gutshot $100k I self-destructed with 2pair on a very “wet” board where I probably should have escaped.

Meanwhile in the ¼-Million I cruised into the money places but making the top 10% (Aces no good again vs JJ aipf) was only good for about $10 in profit. These tournies pay so many places, but nearly all the worthwhile cash is at the very top end.

However, I was still in the $11 rebuy. I had made the freezeout stages with a modest $41 invested and was comfortable thanks to a nice triple up in the last hand of the rebuy period.

I don’t play enough MTTs on a regular enough basis to really know the individual structures but it was apparent this one was a real slow-burn. 12minute levels (that’s pretty long in online time) and a very gradual clock meant I was playing a 60-100bb stack all this time.

As the tournament grinded on, I had to stop playing my $1/2 PLO game and really concentrate. It was getting late and I was only just into the money places. Furthermore I wasn’t going to be very happy to finish in the lower money rungs ($55 to 495th place). However, at the sharp end it was $15k to first.

I was playing very tight by my standards, although there were still some H-bombs. In fact I hit the front after one such moment.

Raising with Q8 from early position, I faced a min raise from a large stack in the Big blind. It was an actual minimum raise – not even a raise to double my bet. Most peculiar. In any case, I could not fold. I flopped top pair but elected to play quite cautiously in position and when I rivered 2 pair I did not raise, but my opponent with Aces was still not happy !

He was clearly a bit tilted and that contributed to the very next hand where I raised UTG with pocket nines and called his shove from the Small blind. I figured his range was much wider because he was upset, and I also had in mind that this was a good time to take a race against a big Ace so I could go to bed if I lost !

Instead, it was even better as I was up against pocket 6s. There was a stream of abuse in the chatbox !

So, chipleader with 75 left. I don’t have a record of going really deep in pokerstars huge-field MTTs so I wasn’t too confident and at the same time I wanted to make the most of the opportunity.

I continued to pick up some good cards, race well and generally run pretty good. By the time we hit the last two tables, I was still amongst the top runners.

I made the final table – the first time I have ever done so – and eventually came in 5th for about $4,600. Overall I have to be happy with this. It’s among my top cashes in $$$ terms, and to make the top 5 from 3,500 runners is objectively a strong result.

As in any tournament, one is left with the feeling that one could have done better ! Lots of what-ifs, but I’ll take it.

I’m thinking of viewing it as a satellite, in effect, to the WSOPE £1,000 next weekend.

PSOP £300 PLO Double Chance

2009-09-14T16:20:00.002+01:00

After my good run to 4th in the £200 NLH, albeit no trophy, I was excited about the prospects for the £300 PLO.

I arrived just after the start, at the exact same moment as Nik Persaud and James Akenhead also walked through the door fashionably late.

It turned out to be quite a small field – just 29 players – but every one of them was a familiar face.

My table included James, as well as Scottish Rob and Miriam, and many other well known players from the club.

The structure was 5,000 chips at 25/50 to start, with an optional 5,000 extra chips any time in the first 3 levels. After a previous experience with this structure, I opted NOT to take the extra chips early on (this was the standard choice).

Emboldened by the prospect of a second life, I started out with check-calling the flop, air check-raising the turn and then bluffing the river vs Miriam who always suspects I am doing this but often opts not to pay me off just in case.

Actually in this case I did river a pair, so maybe it was a value bet ;)

Second hand, in the big blind. There are 5 limpers to me. I must raise, surely, and what do I find ? Double-suited Aces ! I pot it to 350, to find Scottish Rob now making it 850. Akenhead calls this, and I see no reason not to bang it up to 3,350. In a few moments we are all-in 3 ways.

Obviously I am winning, but they both have pretty Ace-cracking hands and I have to dodge most of the deck on the river. However, one pair takes the lot and I have over 15k after two hands.

Someone utters the dangerous words “even Howard can’t blow this chip stack”. The fact is, I hardly knew what to do with this many chips and it caused some odd plays.

Notably, when I picked up double-suited Aces again and bumped it from the small blind, I actually led the flop and folded to a pot bet from Miriam even though I had flopped the nut flush draw to go with my overpair. A short stack called Miriam so we saw that she had top pair with a weak kicker, plus a flush draw (dead to my hand) and a gutshot. At showdown, a pair of Queens, Ten kicker was good.

So, as it turns out, I might have moved on to 30,000 chips here if I re-pot and she goes with her hand. My thought at the time was that I didn’t want to play a 30,000 pot with a player who covered me. In hindsight I think I would play the pot smaller but not give up so early in the hand.

After that, I made some expensive hero calls (eg calling Dan Do’s shove with top pair, 9 kicker).

After I dwelled and called, he said “good call” but in fact I was outkicked. He assumed I had made a tough call with the bare overpair of Aces. Several hero calls later, I needed my rebuy chip but I did calm my play down and tried to ensure I would remain in the hunt.

By this time, a £50 rebuy sat to the Main Event was underway and Miriam and I were multi-tabling.

Back on the Omaha, I receive a lucky break when I 4-bet shoved with KKQx and JymJam appears to dwell up over the call a little bit. So, when he doesn’t instacall I figure I cannot be facing Aces.

However, I am ! I guess he was just taking a moment to think about the tournament situation.
I am in jeopardy but I flop more outs, and turn a straight. An unnecessary King also comes on the river. I am now in decent shape and make the final table again. Only 4 places to pay with this small field, though.

What a final table ! £50 rebuy PLO champ George the Cake is there. Nik P, Barry, Jym Jam, Mike Selzer. It doesn’t look great for me ...

However, I score a major H-bomb vs George. I make a raise on the button in a limped pot with the mighty J-8-6-3 and get two callers. The flop is J-J-3 !! George check-raises me all-in – he has the other Jack with overcards. Those don’t come, so I more than double up to a very useful 40k or so.

I’m having another spell over at the rebuy sat when I hear that a deal is in the advanced stages of discussion. I am not a huge fan of deals but, by the time I come back over to the table, six of the remaining seven players have agreed an even money chop.

I really want the trophy, however, so I only agree on the basis that we are playing on properly for position. Clearly some are more interested than others in the trophy and the play can never be 100% “normal” once the money is chopped. Indeed, a couple of players get their chips in quickly and very light.

We’re down to 4 players when I find a hand I am happy to get it all in with – double suited Kings. We play a big pot 3-way all-in with George playing Queens and JymJam a nice rundown. My Kings hold to take me into a heads-up for the trophy with Miriam.

Who would have predicted this !

We are very even in chips and we are both clear that we are playing to win. It would be a first trophy for either of us.

I felt a had a good chance, but in the end the battle was short. In one hand, we both flopped big draws and I had to give up a big pot on the turn after Miriam had clearly hit her straight. In the very next hand, my Aces were outflopped and I went broke vs 2 pair.

So ... disappointed to have fallen short of the trophy once again, but pretty happy with a 100% cashing record at the festival so far !

PSOP £200 NLH Freezeout

2009-09-10T23:26:00.001+01:00

My route into the event was typical H-Bomb stuff, but, once I sat down for the real thing, I tried to focus on playing properly. I really wanted to record my first outright win at The International.

I believe I achieved my aim of playing a really solid game. I stayed below the radar early doors, although I was also on the lookout for opportunities to make some stylish plays.

I was particularly looking to make some winning hero calls. Early contender for that was my river call with a Pair of Sixes, Queen kicker in a six-way pot where the final board has three cards six-high plus a high pair on board. Yes, this means my hand was Q6, but they were soooooted.

This, to be fair, was not an especially difficult call. However, it was a decent-sized pot since there were the 6 limpers pre-flop and 5 of those called my small stab on the turn. Clearly most of them were flushing, and the button decided to have a 1/3 pot bluff at it when all checked the river.

Since I was playing so few hands (by my standards) I had time to look around at the festival. There was the new TV table with commentary station for the webcasts – what a brilliant idea !

What else is new ? Well the air-con is really cold, which is a novelty. I don’t mind that, personally.

The tourney chips are also new. I like the design, but I am not really sold on the weight and feel. They’re also so clean that they slide around and don’t stack up properly. Hopefully that will cause me some problems !

Still not much happening for me. I go through that phase where the hands I fold would have hit the flop like a guided missile. I get a small float the turn/bluff the river and bluff through against Ray Caabay and it keeps me going on about 12,000 chips at the end of level 3 (slightly above average with about a dozen players having made early exits).

Now I get a run of good cards. I am dealt AA twice and KK twice but frustratingly I don’t make too many chips with them. Having said that, I do win all those hands (all without showdown) so one mustn’t grumble too much.

I don’t seem to be able to hang onto my stack though. And, unlike some other events, it is not really due to splashing around. I have to fold KQs and AJs to strong pre-flop action and then when I get pushed off a mid pair by a squeeze from Ray, I turn out to have been ahead of his T3 (!) and also of India’s AQ (who did call).

Although I’m not making much forward progress, I am alive in the comp and I improve on my hero‑call record with a river call with K-high on an Ace-high board showing three cards to a flush and straight. Winning vs Thom’s Queen high. Again, though, not a genuine tough call based on the action.

I receive a few murmurs of “good call” from around the table although one’s never sure if these are ironic ! Thom, meanwhile, remarks wryly “I’ve got you where I want you if you’re calling with that”.

We’re down to the last 3 tables and my stack has been in the range 9k-14k for the entire comp.

By now, of course, that is only about half the average. Still, it is enough, and I am pleased that I have stayed patient. The fancy plays that I have done have all been for sensible amounts of chips so there haven’t really been any H-bombs yet.

Now, finally, I get some proper momentum. I double up with QQ > 99 and again with JJ > TT and then a dream scenario plays out vs. India. At 1,000/2,000 I make a raise with KcQc from late position to 5,100 and receive a call from India in the blinds. Even in position I’m a bit afraid of her, but the flop comes down AcJc6c!

I wonder how to proceed .... when she opens the flop for 7,500. I do my best to look concerned and flat call. Check/Check on the turn (a blank).

What to do on the river ? Again, my decision is made for me. India bets 12,000 (half my stack) so I shove hoping she has a piece of it. She insta-folds (J3 apparently). She said she couldn’t let me have the pot pre-flop on her blind!

Now I’m motoring, although I immediately take a 20k hit right back when a short stack (5bb) opens and I push with AQ from the big blind. He dwells forever (long into the break) before making the call with 77.

I lose that pot, but momentum returns soon after and before long we are setting out the final table.

At this point, Mike Middlemiss also rolls the clock back to the 2k/4k level which means there will be a fair amount of play at the final table. My 99k is a solid 25BB.

In fact, I soon have twice this many just by stealing and re-stealing and as a few players get knocked out, I start to feel I can take it down.

With 4 left, we take a short break and I am in a slender chip lead (280k vs 230k, 130k and 70k).

However, it is a tough field at this point. Two former festival champions in the form of Al Hughes and India Storrar, plus Chris Huxtable who is obviously more than capable of taking this down.

My aggressive play at the final table got me into this spot, and it was equally aggressive play that was maybe my undoing.

At 5k/10k, Chris opened UTG for 26k which was somewhat standard. He started the hand with 130k or so and I know that he is folding very strong hands to a shove. So I think J9s is plenty and put him to the test.

He passes the test rather easily as he snaps with KK. Oops. Of course, I still have a reasonable stack once I lose this hand (I do flop some outs to give Chris a sweat, though).

In the end it wasn’t to be and in fact I went from chipleader to finish 4th, whilst India came from 4th to take it down !

Still, 4th place was my largest tournament cash at The International and my first placing in a festival event. It was also a European Ranking tournament so I am presumably now ranked as the Nth best player in Europe where N, of course, is an almost arbitrarily large number !

Festival of Fun

2009-09-04T13:08:00.001+01:00

The 2-week PSOP Festival is on at The International right now.

I was only planning to play the £1,000 main event, but the buzz emanating from the club and the forum convinced me to think again.

Then, the club started live-streaming from the newly created TV stage.

Change of plans ! Let’s forget about a selection of WSOPE, GUKPT and EPT events for the balance of this year, and go for a festival binge at The International instead.

So, I make it down for the £10 rebuy satellite to the £200 NLH freezeout (Event 7) and my intention is to play every event from then on (except for the £100/50 on Thursday which I can’t make).

Things start well.

In the £10R sat, you can rebuy immediately but I decided to be all-in first hand instead, and double rebuy if I lost. Two all-ins before it got to me. I duly called all-in blind.

Pocket 3s and pocket 6s have pushed before me.

My 84o doesn’t look too promising, but three clubs on the flop and another on the turn leaves the others hoping for the board to run out a straight flush.

After this first-hand treble up, I was couldn’t lose.

Even when I lost, I won the side pots.

It all led to me being the chip leader at the end of the rebuy period. I still added on as I don’t believe there is such a thing as too many chips, particularly in a super-turbo (as this was about to become).

I decided my strategy would be to exploit my chip lead by opening a lot of pots. I perhaps took this a little far when I raised to 650 with Q-6o from early position. Kirit in the big blind pushed for only about 1,400 total so I was just saying how it was unfortunate but I really had to call, when he accidentally flipped up his hand: Q-6o !

I am not sure whether he thought I had called, thought I had folded or thought he was calling all-in.

Whatever the case, I call now. If it wasn’t incredible enough that I raised with Q-6o, that he then pushed with Q-6o given I am likely to call, and that I now call with Q-6o, I now proceeded to win the hand with a 6-high flush !

Meanwhile, another player says he passed Q-6o as well in this coup.

That’s how good I was running.

Alas, once again, I failed to turn a winning satellite position into a seat. I need to learn to play even tighter. Mind you, I am not sure everyone else was playing tight enough either. With 12 left, I open-pushed with A-3o from the small blind and was called by 5-5 (he covered me by a tiny amount).

That’s not an automatic call, surely ?

Anyway, no good, but there was 10 minutes left and one seat left in the £20 turnover.

I give it a spin and 8-6o is good for trips on a 4-straight paired board, and we’re in !

Part 2 to follow.

Poker on TV

2009-09-03T12:05:00.000+01:00

The ESPN coverage for the Main Event has been running for a few weeks now. They are airing weekly shows in the run-up to the November final.

I still do not really like the 3-month hiatus, but I am beginning to understand why ESPN/Harrah’s think it is a good commercial idea.

The Day 1C coverage was supposed to be released on September 1st. This would be when I would find out if my Full Tilt hat was going to bring me a pay-day.

I was genuinely in two minds. I was told I needed only to feature in just one deal on the final edit to get paid.

On the one hand, I played at that table for about 6 hours and made some crazy “good for TV” plays. On the other hand, Daniel Negreanu had such a lame main event that I could easily imagine the whole session hitting the cutting room floor.

I really didn’t know, but in reality the actual playing on the TV table was the main thing. I have no real interest in being shown on TV. Of course a few $k of free money is always welcome.

Then, about a week before the due date, I heard on the internet that the table had been shown and was on pokertube (sort of a youtube for poker videos).

Apparently, I make only a brief appearance, getting out of the way pre-flop.

To be honest, I thought this might fail even the low hurdle that was set for my appearance money but actually I just heard from Full Tilt that they are paying me out. Indeed, the money is in my account. Of course, getting money out of online poker sites into the real world is not always the easiest thing (see previous blogs !)

I doubt I will ever be on TV playing poker again – at least, not for a long time.

The next best thing, then, is to be webcast in real time playing poker at The International.

If you liked Big Brother, you will love this ! Live streaming video from the newly built “TV table” at the club. For the past few days, it has been broadcasting 24/7. Even when there are no players, the mics pick up the sounds of the club. Strangely fascinating.

Unlike the ESPN shows, the feed is not edited at all (which may not be a good thing !)

I guess I was on there for a few hours on Wednesday as I managed a 4th place in the £200 Festival event (still searching for that first win ... sigh...). Fame at last. Since EPSN does not broadcast in the UK, this webcast is probably seen by more people than my prime time US television appearance !

Pokertube link (my moment of fame at ~ 3:17. Yes, that's it !)

Webcast from The International

Square Deal

2009-08-24T11:40:00.000+01:00

It had been a little while since I came back from holiday, and I hadn’t played any poker at all since the games on the cruise ship. I even had a relatively light playing period before going away.

Mentally, I was setting up for a few bursts of really concentrated poker for the rest of the year, with less casual play in between.

I had a good look at the calendar of upcoming events for the remainder of 2009.

It is action-packed to say the least !

I am only focussed on UK events, but there are multiple GUKPTs, an EPT, the WSOP Europe, and several festivals in reachable locations including the 2-week Paradise Series of Poker at The International. Each of the major events also has a full array of side events.

Then, online, there is the WCOOP. The list goes on and on, not to mention a possible forum game in October, the 1-year anniversary bash at The International and perhaps I will host another event myself.

I look at my options.

I am not going to play the GUKPT grand final or the EPT without winning a satellite (or being sponsored, lol !). And the fact is it isn’t easy to satellite in (no double shootouts on Full Tilt, boo...).

So, I put those to one side as well as the GUKPTs that are not in London (where is Thanet, anyway ? I Wikipedia it and find out it is not even a place – it’s more of a geographical concept).
I played the WSOPE £1,500 last year so I do fancy the £1,000 event this year. The other “must play” is the £1,000 at the PSOP. At the EPT, I pencil in the £500 Mixed game event.

Deeve from the forum says he’s playing a £50 satellite at The Empire to the £1,000 WSOPE. For that reason, I decide to give it a try as well.

I drive in because I want to be able to get home the same night. I have worked, lived or played poker in London for over 20 years so I do know my way around a bit but when I drive in town I realise that I don’t necessarily know the best routes, or the proper location of things.

I do have a sat-nav but I almost always leave it at home, along with the A-Z. I must be able to find Leicester Square.

I have my own favourite routes through London. I guess they are really based on my history. I take certain roads, or navigate via certain landmarks based mainly on where I used to work, where I went to a football match, where I went to a party one time, that place where I drove the wrong way up a one-way street and got stopped by the police.

Actually, that has happened twice. Once after I met my mum in Covent Garden for dinner with my then-girlfriend (now wife), and again the first time I tried to find The International on East Road.

Fortunately, both times I got away with a quizzical look, a “drive safely” and a let-off.

So, Leicester Square.

“West End” sounds a good direction to aim for. As I get further into central London, I feel it wouldn’t hurt for there to be an actual sign for the place !

I am surrounded by locations where I had an interview once, or met someone for lunch, or that place where my beaten-up Fiat decided to pack up in rush hour. I know that in London, places are usually surprisingly close to each other, or else the exact opposite.

Finally, when I think I may have to weaken and look under the seat or in the boot to see if I actually do have an A-Z, I recognise the Trocadero (where I last met my old friend Jack from Jordan whom I haven’t now seen for 11 years) and I’m sorted. I was wondering where on Earth I could park, but “Leicester Square Car Park” seems to be the answer.

So, in I go. Deeve is there as well as a couple of other people I recognise. I am “persuaded” to sit down in a £1-2 NLH game for 10 minutes before the off and manage to lose a full buy-in in ridiculous fashion (his call was ridiculous, not my bluff, obv.)

The field for the satellite is soft ! Let me give you an example. Mid-position limps. I limp the hijack with pocket 5s. Button makes a min-raise. We both call.

The flop comes T-T-2. I intend to check-raise here but first the other active player bets 100 into 900.

I decide to just call and the button folds (?!). Turn a 5. Now my opponent bets 500 with 650 behind.

Really, I should push now but I decide for some reason I can get the rest on any river. The river is an Ace, which completes a flush as well. The fella checks so now I have to put him in (terrible river for me really) and he calls with QQ.

So, with this kind of field, it was a bit disappointing that at the end of the rebuy period I had almost the minimum possible number of chips ! I went bust bluffing into the nuts on the last hand so after a rebuy and add-on I needed a solid start to the freezeout.

A few hands in, after picking up a few blinds, I push with AQ. All insta-fold to the big blind who tanks. I’m liking that and when he eventually calls I am hoping that I dominate him, until he shows me AK-suited !

Hey ho. I look around and since my bluff-calling friend has left, I decide to take advantage of my early exit by relocating to The International for the rest of the evening.

Naturally I start out by bluffing off a couple of buy ins (by now, you would think I could rely on previous evidence to do my advertising ?) before I am able to turn it into a hole-escaping win.

I rarely play at the weekends, but it seems like the cash games at the club are worth making a trip for!

2009-08-18T20:42:00.002+01:00

After my first losing session at the $1/2 NLH game on board, I enjoyed a solid recovery in the subsequent games.

Not all the players were bad. Some of them were clearly quite experienced, in fact. Norman Gold was one of those. I don’t know him, but he apparently plays regularly at The Vic. A couple of other players knew him from there, so they likewise must be assumed to know their way around the game.

Still, I didn’t need to win any money off that section of the table. There was plenty to be had from the other groups: (a) the short-stacked timid players, (b) the predictable players and especially (c) the roulette players.

The roulette guys more or less knew how to play poker (mechanically speaking), but on roulette they were experts. For example, they knew when Red was hot and when Red was favoured one of them had a good plan: bet on every red number. His equivalent strategy in poker was to play every hand for any raise pre-flop.

By the end of the 2nd week, I had amassed a useful 4-figure profit from my starting $200buy-in without ever being down overall. I paid off the room bill (just the extras: sadly not enough to pay for the cruise: if it had been a $5/10 game then maybe ....) and set aside some profit. I left myself just $160 in my wallet “in case” I wanted to have one just go on the last night.

I came into the game at about 11:30pm with a quick spin-up in mind. I pulled up just $60 – the average stack was about $250.

After winning one small pot, I had $71 when I picked up Aces on the button. Alan made it $17 to go from early position. He was a regular all week and had picked up on my very loose play, no doubt. I felt very sure that I could get it all in now, and indeed he fairly quickly called my shove with pocket 5s. First double up accomplished.

I made another good step forward with 43s – flopping two pair vs Alan again, who virtually doubled me up as I bet it all the way to the river vs his top pair.

Finally, with an early start and long drive ahead of us in the morning, I reluctantly announced I would play around to my button.

My button hand duly arrived. Scottish Colin elected to limp and re-evaluate after my assumed raise. I looked down at KTo and decided to just call the straddle and await developments. To my surprise, no one raised.

5-way to the flop: Q-J-3. OK, I have an open-ender but I really do not want to get too busy on the last hand of the night. Someone bets $15, which I called, and now Colin check-raises to $50. I decide I can continue here.

Turn – an offsuit 9. Colin moves in with his pocket Aces and is drawing dead when I call with the nuts !

I decide, for once, to end on a high and I call it a night having turned $60 into nearly $500 in about an hour.

Out of Port, Stars on Board

2009-08-16T18:29:00.000+01:00

In the later part of the cruise, the poker took on a pattern. All the regulars now knew there would be a game in the late evening, and more people had heard about the game.

In principle, there was a game whenever the casino was open. This was from about 30mins after we left port, or all-day (say noon – 2am) if we were at sea.

In practice, the game seemed to start around midnight.

However, as the days went by, the start time definitely drifted earlier to the point where I was showing up after dinner and finding a full game already in progress.

The busier games brought in new players. Especially the “casino fish” who would stroll over to the poker table after a good run at the roulette. These players were not timid about putting their chips in.

They were the typical “bad players” that tend to provoke mixed reactions. On the one hand, they were clearly terrible (and drunk) so they were huge value, but on the other hand they were noisy and slowed the game down, and of course they were very dangerous (especially to those with shallow bankrolls).

Personally, I find it baffling when a solid player says something on the lines of “I hate playing against real fish”. I just about understand why they say this, but it completely wrong-headed in my view.

Yes, these players can and will get very lucky. Yes, they can bust you multiple times whilst their luck holds. But if you can keep reloading and don’t run out of time, then those chips are coming right back (with interest).

Perhaps my natural style also has made be comfortable with a very volatile game, so I am willing to fight fire with fire and put all my chips in.

The first night that the roulette crew came by saw my first losing session.

When I sat down, Jonny from Cheshire had already taken chunks out of the rest of the table. The two hands I watched before sitting down saw him river a flush with 73s in one hand, and in another he cold-called a raise and a re-raise pre-flop with J8o. The flop came QT9r. He cleaned up again.

It was clear he had no preflop standards, but actually he did get paid the max on both hands which made me think that possibly he might know what he was doing.

He was prepared to make big raises pre-flop with almost any two cards. Once I realised that he had such a wide range, I decided to let him know I was in the game. I limped for $2 along with a couple of others. Jonny made it $15 from the blinds. Two of the limpers called this as well (these were the tight-weak players), so now I moved in for $150 with A6o.

I figured I will knock out the other players for sure and I am ahead of Jonny’s range even if he calls.

He calls.

The board runs out K-8-2-T-3.

I announce “Ace high”. Jonny verbalises Ace-high as well. I am only beating 2 hands, but lo and behold he shows up with exactly A5o. Sweet.

Still, the session does not go well. Jonny and a couple of his friends who join us, are hitting for fun.

I lose four $200 buy-ins before I get a nice double-up with J9 – I flop trips and turn quads, and manage to get it all in by the river.

So, I have a useful $451 stack to attack Jonny (who has nearly $2k) when I pick up my next hand.

Aces. There is a $4 straddle by Scottish Colin (a decent and aggressive player). Jonny is on the big blind. Steve (one of Cheshire Jonny’s mates) limps in. He is incredibly passive pre-flop, even with monsters.

I limp, hoping Jonny or Colin will raise, but unfortunately we see a limped 5-way flop.

QT8 is the flop. Jonny checks and Steve leads out for $50. Esa from Finland moves all in for $200 or so.

Well. I have to assume a set is unlikely with no pre-flop raises. I think that top pair will bet aggressively here AND that I can get paid off by AQ/KQ and draws, so I move in for my $451.

Jonny calls. Steve folds pocket Tens, he says.

Esa has AQ. Jonny shows J9 for the flopped nuts ! A King on the turn gives me broadway outs, but the river is a blank for me (actually it paired the board).

Aarrgghh !To be honest, I think if I raise pre-flop with the Aces, I still lose my stack.

I have one more buy-in and make $350 back before the night is over. Jonny finished on $2,500 or so.

It was a fun game, despite the losses. The banter was good (albeit a but drunken). Jonny had a habit of calling everyone “cock”. This seemed to be light-hearted and basically friendly term coming from him, but it still felt a bit odd. Since he & I tangled so often, most of the cock-calling was aimed at me.

I bought a round of drinks, and hoped Jonny & Co would return the next day so I could have a crack at repatriating my chips !

Strike Two

2009-08-13T23:32:00.000+01:00

Having discovered that “Lightning Poker” was real Texas Hold’em played on an electronic table, I heard that cash games would also be spread. The game was to be $1/2 NLH. Good news indeed after the horror of $5/10 Limit on last year’s cruise.

However, the players didn’t really like the machine and whenever I popped in at the casino in the next few days, it lay silent and empty. I started to doubt I would get my cash game.

Then I bumped into the poker manager (well, the floorman who seemed to deal with poker) and asked about the Sit-n-Go scheduled for the next sea day. “Might not go ahead” he told me. The machine was broken and needed specialist repair. But possibly they would revert to playing with a real dealer.

Next day, not only was the dealer-dealt tournament a “go” but the players were playing cash before the tourney. Apparently these games had been going on for days but since they were running on a blackjack table in the corner of the room, I had not noticed !

Bad beat ? Maybe, although it did mean that my wife was not a poker widow until the latter part of the cruise.

As soon as I sat in this game, I experienced a bit of epiphany. I was genuinely better than most of the other players!

I was running OK, which helped, but the fact was that it seemed I couldn’t lose.

I knew some of the players from the SnGs. None of the payers seemed to be really strong, but there were definitely two groups. The more experienced players played OK, but rather predictably and without sufficient aggression in my opinion.

The others were of a type that I rarely come across at The International. Those were the weak-tight players. They were totally incapable of any moves, it seemed, and completely oblivious to tournament strategy (especially short stacked).

For example, one of these players playing an 8BB stack raised the button for more than half his chips with KQs then genuinely agonised over the call when the BB put him all in for about 3BB more.

This player actually went on to chop the tournament with one equally clueless individual and one of the experienced players. This tells you how soft it was. Mind you, I finished 11th of 12 in this SnG so maybe I shouldn’t comment !

Both types were playing in the cash games along with the occasional passer-by. Those poker newbies mainly played an extreme weak-passive game that was absolutely guaranteed to be a losing proposition.

I am not a strong cash player. Although I do think I am above average in the universe of all cash players, I am not far enough ahead to overcome the rake and poor discipline and come out a consistent winner.

In this game, however, I felt like a pro !

I was still playing my very loose style but instead of just leaking chips, I found I was able to play a lot of flops and generally get paid later in the hands. I found that I could read the players easily.

I did not make the very most of this good situation, but I was making FAR fewer errors than the other players and as we know, poker is a game of the fewest mistakes. Never have I made so many easy and winning calls with Ace-high.

I turned $200 into $650 and then in the 2nd session, $650 into $1,300. Unfortunately the casino threw us out at 2:30am. I would have loved to play all night ! Mind you, the “last few hands” did provoke some crazy plays so I was able to take advantage.

For example, Alan was one of the experienced but predictable players. He was pretty tight pre-flop, but very easy to play on the flop. If he missed, he check-folded or folded to c-bets essentially 100% of the time. Meanwhile if he hit, he would put a lot of money in with a modest made hand like TPGK.

In my opinion he played too passively and somewhat weakly, but his tight hand selection was still enough to make him a generally winning player in this game.

Occasionally, however, he would go mad with a hand. He would put in huge bets preflop with semi-premium hands but not AA/KK. Very exploitable.

And here was another example of his occasional mad plays. I over-limped with Kc9c, and Alan raised to $13 from the button. He announced that he was going all in on the flop no matter what (for about $200 more).

I believed him, so it made it an easy pre-flop call to fit-or-fold. He dispelled any doubt that he would go through with the flop push, by putting it in blind.

When the flop came King high I gladly called the push. Unfortunately he hit running 2pair with his AJ-suited, but I was happy with the decision.

The only problem with the game was that it started late (not till about midnight) and finished early (by about 2:30am). I would have liked to play this game 24/7 !

Lightning Strikes Once

2009-08-09T22:49:00.002+01:00

Last year I wrote about my painful cruise-ship introduction to limit poker. I played on the “only game in town” principle until I could no longer bear it and resorted to playing blackjack (a game that I barely understand – as several gutshotters can attest to).

Based on last year’s disappointment, my expectations for meaningful poker on this year’s cruise were close to zero. I didn’t even look into it before we set off for Southampton.

My wife (knowing that I would want to play if possible) did check it out, and her web search revealed that “Lightning Poker” would be played aboard ship.

This news barely raised my hopes as my experience is that “poker” games with names that differ from standard nomenclature always turn out to be, in fact, various forms of house games.

They are as close to “proper poker” as video poker, or poker slots. Best case, I thought, Lightning Poker could be an abbreviated form of the game: maybe betting pre-flop followed by dealing all three streets at once (say). I tried to imagine what game I would come up with if I was told it was to be sensibly called “Lightning Poker”.

Still, once at sea, I was pleased to see a Texas Hold’em Sit-n-Go announced and I turned up for that with reasonable expectation that it would actually be poker.

And so it was, and the mystery was solved. “Lightning Poker” turned out to be one of those electronic tables for live-play with no dealer. I have never played such a game before but apparently they were using it for these SnGs and also for a $1/2 No Limit cash game.

Good news!

After a considerable software glitch caused a delayed start, the machine finally powered up and I was quite impressed with the nice solid feel of it all. A big screen in the centre of the felt displayed all the action and the software for betting etc was easy and sensible. The only minor gripe I had was the lack of a slider for bets but I’d easily give it a 9/10 for the interface.

On to the game – it was a 9-man $50 SnG playing 2 places 70/30 after the hefty $10 rake. 3,000 chips starting at 25/50 on a 12-minute clock. With this live/electronic hybrid game it was fairly turbo clock but nothing to complain about really.

What of the other players ? Well the fact is you don’t get novices turning up to these things – you might think that out of 3,600 passengers you would find plenty of poker players but in fact they did not fill the 9 seats and we went off 8-handed.

All the participants were clearly somewhat regular players to seek out the game but after a while it became clear they pretty much all played that very passive game that you often see among less experienced players. I am never completely sure how to counter this but I really like to play aggressively so I decided to really focus on position. I was very tight in early position but on the button I was raising pretty aggressively with any playable holding and then post-flop was able to benefit from the passive and rather predictable play.

This worked out rather well when I re-raised a min-raise from middle position with 86o. The original raiser called the re-raise and the other cold-callers let go. The flop was Q75 rainbow.

The pre-flop “aggressor” bet 250 into 2,250. I called and the turn brought the helpful 4. I raised the next 250 bet (I didn’t dare raise to more than 750). The Queen on the river was helpful as I was not remotely afraid of a house and I was able to get all my money in against his QJ.

By now I was clear that none of the other players was a big threat but of course the 12minute levels go fairly quickly without the rapid play you see online (I am not sure if there was a time limit on players’ actions, but it wasn’t uncommon for a player to not realise it was their go).

The game was very friendly and no one was taking it too seriously (I wasn’t either, except that I was determined to win, especially against this field !). One player who needed to make a trip to the toilet actually asked another eliminated player to take over his cards on the bubble!

Definitely not allowed, but it didn’t seem worth pointing it out. I just put the substitute all-in every hand, confident he couldn’t call under the circumstances.The bubble broke and I found myself in-the-money with a 5-3 chip disadvantage. I immediately squashed talk of a chop (although some of you may say that an even chop in that spot is a +EV proposition). It didn’t last long. First hand, I raised and called his shove with AT. He had a small pair and I hit, to take the lead.

In the next pot, he limped and I checked with the mighty 4-3o. Flop T32 with two clubs. He dwelled a bit then shoved. I called feeling my pair was probably ahead now. So it was, but with 7c5c his play was pretty automatic.

However, a 3 on the turn reduced his outs, and a few moments later my record for electronic tournaments became P1, W1. Hurrah !

HORSE Riding

2009-07-27T14:11:00.002+01:00

I haven't played any live poker since I returned from Las Vegas. In general, my plan is to play a bit less of random sessions of poker but to plan ahead for some of the larger live events for the rest of the year and make a concerted effort to play in those (and in some cases, satellite in due to the high buy-ins of - for example - EPT London).

Online, I have dabbled a bit. Again my plan is probably to play less, but with more focus (eg on qualifying to high value events, or to making a good run in the Sunday majors).

I decided not to play the big-ticket Sunday tournaments but I did register for a clutch of the large-field low-entry events on pokerstars - getting nowhere, basically.

At the same time (I always like to have at least 3 or 4 events going) I fired up the $3,000 Guarantee $33 HORSE tournament on pokerstars.

I have a bit of a soft spot for HORSE ever since playing in one of the first ever such events to be held at The International. I hope to be able to play another live event. In the meantime, there are a few such events online (obviously far fewer than NLH events, but still enough).

I first played such tournaments when I was practising for the event at the International - I managed to bust after only a few minutes (an achievement at limit poker) and to come dead last the first two times I played.

I have since realised that you really cannot splash around in this format in the early stages.

In last night's comp, I registered late (pokerstars are now allowing registration up to 1hr late - I approve of that very much. In fact Cake/Gutshot used to have that feature until recently they curtailed the late signups periods somewhat).

This late entry really does not matter one jot as in the first few levels of a limit tournament, no one goes out. I think the average chips had advanced from 3,000 to 3,029 - meaning just 3 out of the 300ish field had gone bust.

Recently, I actually have a decent record in these HORSE games.

I advanced pretty steadily - to 5,000 chips in Level 8 then 11,000 in Level 10. I remained solidly above average all this time.

Then, I took some big hits. Ironically, in limit, the pots can easily get big relative to the stacks - especially in the stud rounds. You can also find yourself having to give up a hand having invested a lot whereas in NLH you would have been all in at an earlier stage and either gone bust, or doubled up. In Limit (especially stud games), you can often end up in a situation where you know they're not bluffing, and you simply MUST fold.

After some hands that did not work out (especially in Razz - it's always Razz !) I found my stack dwindling to 4,000 (now well behind average) and then finally after losing pot to a short stack I had just 406 chips left playing Limit Hold'em with blinds of 250 and 500 !

From there, however, things looked up. I folded a couple of hands before picking up pocket Aces and earning a triple-up. Soon after I tripled up again with QJ facing AK and A9. I then went on a absolute heater during the next Omaha Hi-Lo round, picking up superb starting hands and scooping multiple large pots.

20 hands after being down to 400 chips, I had 40,000 !

I continued to play the fairly straightforward style that I play in HORSE: tight pre-flop hand selection, followed by just betting my made hands hard for value.

Eventually, with about 15 left, I hit the chip lead and it looked like I would make my first ever pokerstars final table. Despite falling away a bit, I duly made the final in 6th/8 position.

Blinds and antes were very big now so it was a lot about picking up hands, although pre-flop aggression was also worthwhile - picking up the dead money (especially in ante games) was very valuable indeed.

It all had a happy ending. I had a good Omaha-8 round again, then finally Razz was NOT my un-doing, as I made a 7-low to take out both the other players for my first pokerstars MTT win.

Very happy with the win. Like my last MTT win (live at the Rio) it came from a position of an extreme short stack at one stage (in this case, about as short as you can be). I will have little trouble believing in "chip and a chair" in the future.

I hope I can follow it up with a first MTT win at The International tonight !

November Nine

2009-07-20T15:02:00.003+01:00

Well, Steve Begleiter made it through to the final table ($1.2Million guaranteed - and all to play for !)

He's still third in chips and Betfair have him at 13/2 to take down the title (roughly in correspondence with his chipcount).

James Akenhead obviously is still the one I would like to see take the title for the Brits and with his Gutshot pedigree. He is the short-stack on 6.8Million chips (average = 22MM approx) but one double up would put him in 4th or 5th spot and then anything is possible.

Obviously he will need some good luck, especially at the start, but it could happen.

He's 18-1 or so on Betfair which rates him at a 50% premium to his pure chipcount. Most of the other runners are trading at less than their chip equity with Phil Ivey being the clear exception: he is at a 150% premium !

I have not actually seen any good analysis of how chip stack should translate into % chance of winning. Most articles I have seen start with the assumption that the two are equivalent. We know this is true at the limits but somehow I would naturally tend to think that the curve may be a bit "flatter". i.e. 10% of chips is more than a 10% chance of winning and 80% of chips is less than an 80% lock.

The odds do remind me of the difficulties I had running a book on the BSPT events. These prices always generated a lot of discussion (and a lot of trading) and one key focus was always the "skew" which in this case had to do with how much more likely the skillful/experienced players were to win.

The outcome routinely suggested that the advantage enjoyed by the better players was rather modest. Even allowing for the fact that luck obviously plays a big part in a fast structure, we were still constantly surprised at the levelling effect of the cards on the night.

Ivey at 2.5x his Chip% - this seems probably too much. I don't think many would take issue with him being the best player left in, and the structure still leaves plenty of play. But, is he 2.5x as good as the field ? Doubtful.

Having said that, if he doubles up then he will be 3rd or 4th in chips and with 60bb he may be hard to stop.

I have never been a big fan of this July-November hiatus but this year I certainly will be paying attention come November !

Bear Poker - btw !

2009-07-15T23:50:00.003+01:00

At the same time as 80 of us were having a poker-centric reunion, Bear alumnus Steve Begleiter was riding high in the main event of the world series.

Steve was at Bear for 24 years and I certainly knew him (although he likely did not know me). I recognised his name in pokernews coverage in the past few days but I did not know until today that it was actually him rather than a namesake.

At the time of writing, he is 3rd in chips with 18 left. $500k is guaranteed and he must have a decent shot of making the final table ($1million guaranteed) and, who knows, the title and $8.5 Million for first place. What an incredible run for an amateur player. Nearly 6,500 players started.

Good luck Steve, although I would still ideally like to see James Akenhead (formerly a regular player at the Gutshot) come through and take the bracelet. James was runner up in a NLH bracelet event last year, exiting in cruel fashion in the last hand (all in pre flop with AK facing T4. Flop: T-T-4).

Bear Poker Reunion

2009-07-15T23:41:00.002+01:00

Monday 13th July was BSPT10 - the 10th Bear Poker event, and the 2nd in the reunion series (BRPT2).

Numbers were somewhat lower than anticipated, but we still had nearly 80 players including a large number of first-time players. I managed to track down a lot of faces from the past 15 years. Not all of them were able to come, but it was great to see some of them from way back !

I really wanted to win this time. In the early days of BSPT, people expected me to win and indeed I did have an incredible winning run at the beginning. Now, I have not won (or even been on the final table) since 2006 !

This time, I bubbled again (3rd time I have bubbled the final table) although I did come back from 3BB to be in 3rd place with 2 tables left. I did have some luck on my way back up so I can't complain too much at my exit. I pushed from the SB with KT facing one limper (who was limping a lot).

The SB (playing tight pre flop) then called so I knew I was in trouble, and the limper over-called. I was facing AJ and A8 so I wasn't in terrible shape. If I win this pot, I fancy my chances from 3rd or 4th in chips at the final table.

Ah well, next time ....

There are photos: http://www.johnchukwuma.com/poker20090713/ and I have the report in pdf form. Most people who are interested in the report will already have received it but send me an email if you want to see it.

Live by the Bomb, Die by the Bomb: Main Event Report

2009-07-06T22:19:00.003+01:00

$10,000 World Championship of No Limit Hold’em

Split Loyalties

Sunday 5th July. One week since I arrived in Las Vegas for the longest trip I have ever made here. I originally planned to come just for a week in the middle of the WSOP. However, when I won a seat in the main event via a quadruple shootout on Full Tilt, I rescheduled. My itinerary also included a start in Event #54 as well, where I was delighted to achieve my first ever Day2 and a first ever WSOP (or any major) cash.

Following that up with a crazy run to 3rd in the Venetian nightly and then an outright win in the Rio $340 nightly, I was in confident form and had earned two new nicknames for the week : “Run Good” and “Golden”.

I was finally adjusting somewhat to the Las Vegas timezone but even so I was running a little late as I made my way down Convention Way towards the Amazon room. Normally I would wear a Team Gutshot shirt in any large tournament just to show where my loyalties are, but today I am incognito – the H-Bomb decked out in Full Tilt colours.

I thought about wearing both, but the terms of the Full Tilt package do (naturally) require you just to wear their logos if one is to qualify for various bonuses (eg: $10 Million for winning the Main Event).

It seemed very unlikely indeed that this would come to matter, but I know from 20 years in the markets that it is a bad idea to sell deep out-of-the-money options for free. So on display it was all Full Tilt, although I had a Gutshot cap on hand for emergencies and of course a supply of Gutshot-styled H-Bomb cards.

Run Good Continues

The night before, I had made a note of the location of my table (Orange 92) so I could find it quickly on the day. It doesn’t matter, as such, if you are late but it’s the Main Event and I wanted to play and enjoy every minute.

However, Table 92 seemed to be impossible to find. The tables are laid out in a basically orderly fashion but in place of where #92 should have been was #58.

The reason became apparent, however.

“Are you on Table Orange 92 sir?”

“ Follow me, you’ve been moved to the feature table”.

OMG. I’ve seen the ESPN TV table before on many visits to The Rio, and I have occasionally stopped for a few moments to peer in. But, safe to say, I had never imagined I would be taking part.

It was a bit surreal but, yes, a few minutes later I was being fitted with a mic and being shown where to place my cards to show to the hole-cam and so on.

Does this mean we’re really going to be on TV ? Apparently, yes !

In due course the other players arrived and settled in. The reason for our selection was soon apparent in the person of Daniel Negreanu. I asked Daniel if he’d ever visited the Gutshot (apparently not) and as he did not seem to know who I was, I handed him an H-bomb card.

Wearing Different Hats

The other remarkable thing that happened before the start was that Rich from Full Tilt Events came up to me and explained hats to me. This was just fairytale stuff.

Apparently, so long as I appear in one hand on televised coverage then Full Tilt will pay me $10k if I wear their hat. I am already wearing their shirt, of course, although they actually put an extra-big-for-TV badge on top of the one that is embroidered, and they have to tape over the logo on the back of the shirt in order to comply with the logo rules.

Back to hats. To get the $10k, I have to appear in the TV coverage (not too much I can do to influence that) and I have to wear the baseball cap backwards (that offers superior coverage apparently). It’s $7k if I wear it regular way and since I am wearing the Full Tilt shirt I can have $5k without a hat at all.

Now, you are going to tell me that for an extra $3k you’d wear anything. Well, I am 41 years old and I do not wear baseball caps backwards. I give it some thought and I conclude that since the whole thing is a freeroll then it is better for me to feel comfortable and be able to play my way than to “sell out” for the extra $3k.

Completing the table are two other Full Tilt logo’d players, one Party Poker, one SNAI (Italian poker/gaming company), Jeff Bryan (pokerstars), and two un-logo’d players (although one – Jeffrey Alan – acquired Ultimate Bet colours during a break before this was ruled out of order according to the rules that prevent sponsor-churning).

I was in the big blind for the first hand. It is uncanny hearing the whole action on commentary. There must have been three hundred people in the seating area around the table, of which 299 were supporting Daniel.

Daniel , 4 seats to my left, raised the first hand to 200 (blinds 50/100). As we would discover, he in fact raised EVERY hand pre-flop by the minimum. I had pretty much decided that there was no way he was taking my big blind on the first hand and as it happened I looked down at AT-offsuit so that was an easy decision to make up the raise. Any worse, and I might have reraised immediately.

As it was, I check-raised his continuation on the 9-8-2ss flop and took down the first pot. I usually like to get the check-raise bluff in early whilst there are still enough chips for me to put in a 3rd bluff reraise and still get away if necessary.

I did not receive a round of applause for successfully bluffing with the best hand ...

Good for TV

After a while it became apparent that Daniel was easily the most active player. He literally min-raised every hand that was folded to him, from any position, prompting me to ask “You do know it’s No-limit before the flop ?”.

The three players on his immediate right were very tight so often he was first to raise. When I acted before him, I often raised and in that case he called 100% of the time.

I was certainly the 2nd most active player. I suppose in hindsight, I found the TV-table made me want to play even more H-bomb au-naturel . The signature element of the H-bomb style is the bluff-raise in position. I played a lot of hands especially the pretty looking suited and/or connected small cards.

Of course I wanted to play the powerhouse, but I was only dealt it once and faced a raise and a re-raise to me. I decided to let it go although when the flop came T43 (all spades) I would have flopped an open-ender. It was probably a good thing I was not in the hand as action was very strong on this board, with the Ace of spades being shown.

In the absence of 5-2o, I had to make my big play with 6-3o.

It has been raised to 300 by a tight player and called by another tight player. In late position I felt it was clear to call. The button called and Daniel Negreanu obviously called from the Big blind.

1,550 in the pot. The flop As8s8c. Daniel led for 700 and the next two players folded. Well, imo a weak bet like this needs to be raised, especially in position. I make it 2,600.

What is supposed to happen now is that I pick up the pot. However, the button called and Daniel, indeed, folded.

Hmm. Presumably I am supposed to give up now ? You will probably say that the over-caller is representing a big hand. I’m not one for really giving up.

The turn brought the 9c and I bet 6,000 at the pot. The button seems to dwell up a bit before calling. He’s hiding very effectively under his cap.

The river is the 3c. I guess I could really give up now (although I have improved to a pair of 3s now ! ) but the natural H-bomb tookover and I fire a last 8,000 bullet.

There is much riffling and stacking of chips. Am I going to get this through finally ? That would be sweet ! No. The button comes out with a raise of 14,000 more.

Oh .... So not only did he have a good part of that flop, he actually had a monster. Now I have to Hollywood it a bit and eventually let my hand go. I am congratulated on my tough fold.

I think to myself “if that doesn’t get me on TV, nothing will”. I spoke to the player later when our table broke up. I usually do not ask players at the time what they had (what is the point?) but I think that if you ask at a point when it no longer matters then there is a decent chance you get the truth.

He told me he actually had the quad 8s. We may indeed get to see it on TV. A 3-barrel into quads with 6-high – signature H-bombing right there.

Outlasting Kid Poker

I’m down to 14k or so. I lose some more chips when I raise DN out of the small blind. He calls. I check-fold the 987 flop and he shows me Kings.

Daniel in fact is playing a style where his preflop action reveals NOTHING about his hand. He reasons, with merit no doubt, that he can outplay everyone on later streets.

However, he’s not getting quite the results he wants. He pays off overpairs a couple of times (although he also made a correct laydown with Aces on a double-paired board). His stack is even more volatile than mine.

I am not too concerned about losing half my chips (obviously I would have preferred not to) because I still have 75BB even as we come into the second level but I took a second hit in the following hand.

I raised to 600 with K8o. I didn’t mean to raise, but reflex took over. Two callers from pretty quiet players – Maurizio from Rome and Nicholas (the Quad-8s) on my immediate left.

Flop 974-all hearts. Checked-around. The 6c on the turn gave me an open ended straight draw. I bet 1,600 and both players called.

The river, 5d, made me the straight. I am losing to T8 for a better straight and to a flopped flush but overall I think there has to be a decent chance I have the best hand.

I contemplate the check-call; perhaps a missed flush will take a stab ? I decided to value-bet instead and put out 2,400. Maurizio min-raises me to 5,000 and Nicholas folds after some time (he folded 8d7d he says).

Hmm. I don’t like it but I am getting 5.5:1 on the call. I am sure some of you will say that makes it an easy fold. However, I think there must be SOME chance he has a set of 5s, say (especially with the 5h). I hope I might be splitting even. I call and get shown KhQh for the flopped flush.

Down to 7k. I will need some help to recover from here !

The only player struggling more than me is Negreanu ! He’s not quite as aggressive (in a raising sense) as I expected and he seems prepared to get quite deep in a hand calling down. I guess when those hands work out, he adds quickly to his stack but in actual play he ended up getting quite short.

As reported on pokernews, he lost his last 8k in a pot with pocket 3s on the button. He called a cut-off raise and a SB re-raise, then called all-in when the SB fired the TT7 flop. He had a considerable dwell before calling. He apologised to the table.

“Take as long as you like” I said, “This is my best chance to make day2”.

He eventually called the clock on himself . I think he thought the SB had him beaten, but in the end decided to go for hope over belief and find the SB with AK. The player had Queens, which held.

With Daniel out, the TV cameras were soon given a rest. At the end of Level 2, therefore, our table broke and I had 7,250 chips to take to my new table.

Out of the Frying Pan ....

I arrive at table Orange 73 in the midst of a huge pot where none other than 2005 Champion Joe Hachem finally put in a 4th raise all-in on the turn which read AA3Q. His opponent made a gut-wrenching fold.

What have I got myself into here ?!

Joe Hachem 3 seats to my left, Brazilian pokerstars team pro Maria Mayrinck on my right.
It’s another friendly table, which is great. I ask Joe if he remembers visiting us in Clerkenwell, which he says he does. He places my H-bomb card just behind his chip stack, so you may get a glimpse of that on TV as well.

Actually, the very first hand I actually play I get dealt the Hachem Hand (7-3o) in the big blind.

I almost play it just for karma value. There are several limpers until finally Maria Mayrinck does put in a sold raise from the SB to take me off the hand.

This is such a shame as the board eventually read 6-4-3-7-7 and the action was checked on the flop. Hachem called a bet on the turn then bet when checked to on the river.

Maria called after some thought with AK-high, which was good. At this point I would have had 7s full of 3s ! This hand was actually the basis of the “slow roll” comments that were reported on pokernews and it was a running joke for the next few hours.

Back in the H-Zone

I was pretty short now especially after giving up two small pots to re-raises. I entered my comfort zone: shove time. My first shove with AQ was met with all folds.

When I finally picked up a hand – pocket Kings – I was so short that I opted for the limp. No action at all behind. Joe Hachem made up the SB and I picked up a small pot on the flop.

Joe, like Daniel, was opening nearly every pot. He typically opened for 800 at 150/300. In one such pot, my Main Event life was finally at risk for the first time. Joe made it 800, the player to his left called. Folded to me in the SB with AJo. I figure to be ahead of Joe, and his LHO has not shown strength. I push for 5k or so. Joe folds and the other player calls pretty quickly.

Joe said “he has Kings” but in fact I was shown AJ-suited.

This is déjà-vu. Last year I went out shoving AQ and being called by AQ-suited.

This year, the flop brought us BOTH a backdoor flush. Last year the backdoor completed for my opponent, but this year I survived to chop although our dealer seemed unable to split the pot correctly. I nearly ended up losing chips in this coup until we finally got the floor over to make it right.

Was this the start of a run-good ? Could be, because Joe says he folded pocket deuces.

Apparently not, as I made a new chip-low. In the BB with 43o in an unraised pot vs the button I bet the turn with bottom 2pair. My opponent called with middle pair and when the river counterfeited me, I check-called a small bet to be on only 4,025.

Any Two Cards

I fold a couple of hands and eye my diminished stack as if to will it to grow. Joe asks me “What are you waiting for ?”

I perk up. “Good question” , I answer. “ Any two cards, I guess. I heard any two cards can win.”

It’s folded to me so it seems the right thing to throw it all in: “4,000 all-in”.

All fold, and I show the 4 of spades. “Four thousand for a four. I was hoping for a quadruple up”.

Next up, a glimpse of light. In the Big blind with AJ again. The cut-off raises and I shove. She announces “it’s a bad call if I am dominated” and makes the call. I fear AQ, but am shown QJ-spades. It all comes safe. In fact by the river she needs only a red Queen as I pick up a backdoor club draw.

Up to over 8k. I miss one good opportunity to shove with pocket 7s and I also decide not to commit my chips with KJ on a J98 all club board. A huge amount of chips go in on the turn in that hand so although we don’t see a hand, I suppose KJ was losing there.

I make it to the dinner break on 7,500 chips. This is 25BB so it is not all over.

I want to stick around partly just for the Joe Hachem show. It could happen.

Ace-King No Good

The crucial hand comes about 1hr into level 4. I find AK in early position and make a raise to 700. Joe Hachem re-raises to 2,100. He hasn’t RE-raised a lot (whereas his open-raise range is enormous) so he must have some hand. However, with 25BB and only crushed by AA and KK, I think my move is automatic here. I 4-bet shove for a total of 7,800.

Joe has a little think. He had been a bit late back after dinner because Jonny M and Louise had accosted him and told him to go easy on the H-bomb.

Joe still hadn’t called after a minute or so. This was good news. “I know you hate a slow-roll Joe, so I feel good about the hand now”.

“I feel I owe you a double up”, he says.

I reply: “It’s win-win for me. In fact, it’s win-win-win. If you fold I win, or I can hold and win, or I get knocked out by Joe Hachem”.

He calls.

For the second time this WSOP I am all-in with AK vs pocket 9s. “That’s a slow roll !” cries Maria Maryicnk. Joe says he thought the small raise-shove could mean he was crushed. In the end he probably reasoned that with 5-2 a bit part of my range and AJ seemingly my favourite hand on the evidence to date, that he has to call.

In fact, getting 2-1 I don’t imagine he is ever folding pocket 9s to my stack.

I hit a King on the turn, but not before a 9 on the flop leaves me drawing dead.

A shake of the hand later, and an H-bomb card to the circling reporters, and it’s the end of the road for me.

Looking back on the event today, I did not play a style appropriate to the huge stacks. But, unlike most other times when I have come out of a deep-stack feeling that I blew it, I was actually pretty comfortable with my approach today. It was very high risk, and it did not work out, but it was my natural game.

If it had worked, it would have been an amazing story. In fact, it was one amazing story.

If I look back at me “TREAD carefully” plan I see that I scored very well on E and A. I did not feel nervous at the TV table. It was tremendous fun playing with Negreanu and Hachem. I managed to spread the H-bomb legend a little wider (Hachem to Maryinck: ”You haven’t heard of the H-bomb?”; Maryinck to Hachem: “I’m from Brazil. We don’t have even have electricity. I came to the WSOP on my donkey”).

Not so well on T, R and D. Obviously bluffing 6 high into quads for half your stack isn’t ideal. I was, in hindsight, a little too quick to get involved. But even now I cannot bring myself to regret any of it. You can’t run good forever, but it is better to have H-bombed and lost than never to have H-bombed at all.

Next year ....

Oh, What a Bloggable Day

2009-07-06T05:27:00.002+01:00

Just finished for the day in the Main Event Day 1C and you just cannot believe the amount of bloggability that was squeezed into one day.

You couldn't make it up.

I will write it up as soon as I can but just a few teasers in the meantime:

... TV

... Negreanu

... Hachem

Coming soon ....

Plan for today: TREAD carefully

2009-07-05T18:59:00.002+01:00

In about an hour I will be sitting down in the Amazon Room to play day 1C of the $10,000 World Championship of No Limit Hold'em. Event #57 of the 2009 World Series of Poker.

I'm running good, as we know, so my confidence is up. Plan for today ? TREAD carefully:

T: Think. What has served me well so far is to constantly be appraising the tournament situation and what the current status of the stacks (mine and theirs) and the blinds and payout structure mean in terms of the approach we will take when we look at our cards. By constantly thinking, I hope to avoid getting into situations that will lead to a lot of regret.

R: Read. It is so, so important to read the table. This is one thing I have learnt over time. I am not an expert at reading individual players in individual hands but it is possible and vital to categorise the players as soon as possible and then to refine that evaluation as the game goes on. The corollary is that we need to be careful after moving tables, and when new players arrive.

E: Enjoy the event. It is a game, remember !

A: Aggression. I do think I have played a stronger game this year. Of course I have been very lucky (especially in terms of not getting UNlucky), but I have also played my game and played to my strengths. One of these is aggression. I must not put this away just because it's the main event.

D: Don't go broke. Well, as my win at the Rio shows, as long as you are still in, you are in with a chance. We have to be prepared to go out on any hand but let's try not to go broke with 1pair 200bb deep and so on. If we are going broke, let's do it raising rather than calling.

With 30,000 chips this year, and playing only 4 x 2hr levels (for some reason) the chances are I should be able to make day2 but I need to play with a view to playing several days.

Wish me luck and good luck to all other Gutshotters in action.

Chip 'n' a chair

2009-07-04T22:16:00.001+01:00

Never truer, especially when you're running super hot.

In the $340 Nightly at The Rio, I had a very volatile stack in early running before going through a card drought as we approached the money bubble. I was unable to make any moves (no cards, no situations) with 2 large stacks behind me.

It came to the point where I determined my only viable strategy was literally to fold to the money (sound familiar) and then it came to the absolute bubble (19 left, 18 pay). I am in the big blind with 2k of my 8k in the blind (1k/2k/300 ante).

One of the big stacks raised to 6k from UTG and I look down at AK. Well, I have to go for it, and more than treble up that hand vs AT. Meanwhile a player busts at the other table so we are all in the money.

I have 50% of average chips with that bit of good timing and double up with QQ>AK. Up to average.

A combination of good cards, holding when ahead, winning races and picking up a LOT of blinds and antes eventually led to me winning the thing for $10k (no chop).

My biggest concern now is I am using up my run-good allowance for years to come and especially for the Main Event.

This year I have entered 4 MTTs and cashed in 3 (including a 3rd and a 1st). In a previous 5 trips to Vegas I did not cash once, even for minimum cash.

Meanwhile, much better players here (Ed, Andy) are getting the other end of variance. Go figure.

I shall enjoy it whilst it lasts. And hopefully things will turn around for Ed and Andy and they will get the last laugh on the poker Gods in the big one.

Cash is King

2009-07-02T23:44:00.000+01:00

Having just cashed in the WSOP Event 54, I was more delighted to tick off a poker goal than I was disappointed in exiting when I might have hoped to go further.

I was pretty tired having played for 13 hours in the event the previous day, and then having hard almost no sleep overnight.

But I felt an urge to play real H-bomb poker and a $120 MTT at The Venetian seemed just the thing. The tourney had 7,500 chips at 25/50 starting blinds. But with 20minute clocks and an aggressive structure with anted from level 4, it soon switches from deep to steep.

I started out pretty wild with the super-deep chips at level 1, lots of moves at pots to see who’s who.

The first key pot arose at level 3 (100/200) when Swiss Miss in early position made it 600. I decided that 65s was plenty to call to bluff from the big blind. The flop 6-2-2 was no help to the raiser, and gave me a little something. I check-called 600 on the flop. This indicated to me that she probably wasn’t super strong.

The turn was an offsuit 9. My plan was to check-raise a weak continuation. She made a bigger bet than I expected (1,300) and I selected a 3,300 check-raise hoping this would be strong enough to take it down. However, this elicited a reluctant call. Only one move left now. She clearly has an overpair to the board so I have 2 outs.

The river is a 5, which changes nothing. I move in for about 4,500. I just cover her and it seems like this is the decisive factor as she folds Jacks.

I have a stack now, and this starts an amazing rush: next up I call a raise 3way in the SB with JJ and on the Ten high flop I get all the chips from the button who started with AT.

AQ on a Q44 flop is good for another pot. Not all the pots go my way, however, as I am a spectator post flop which comes 9-3-3. Eventually, all the chips go in on the flush-card river.

One player had 99 for top house. The other player had 33 for flopped quads !

However, I am back in action very soon. I have been opening a lot of pots now that antes are in play but I decide to limp J9cc under-the-gun hoping to get a free flop with a little speech play.

Now a player who seems to specialise in min-bets raises to 2,100 which offers me 7/3 odds to call.

Flop is J9x. I check and the villain makes it very easy for me by shoving for 8k. I snap-call and he’s drawing thin with QQ. Next, my A5 takes out a short-stack 99 with a straight. Even the times I fold I would have hit. After raising with 66, I face a shove from a moderate stack which I am calling but before I can, the quad-3 player moves in and he has me approximately covered. I fold and we see AQ from the first shover vs AA for the over-shove. Door-card is a 6 ....

However, this is a short pause. I pick up KK in the small blind and face a raise. I re-raise and the raiser shoves. Call. Aces for the initial raiser ! Cooler.

Yes indeed ... Flop KKJ !

Next hand I am on the button. The cut-off pushes with AJs, I over-push with QQ. I am knocking players out so fast that we have to keep waiting for new fodder and the floor stations a supervisor at our table to direct incoming traffic. I have 50,000 chips at 300/60/50.

I fold KT in a pot vs AQ and 64. Board 9QJA7. See, I should play EVERY pot !

I make a raise now with A7-suited and my left hand opponent, short stacked, calls. Another player also calls but I do not notice.

The flop come KT9 and I decide to put the short stack to a decision and shove. He folds and I go to muck, but the other player calls with KJ and has a decent chunk (15k). Damn ! This is what happens when you don’t pay attention.

However, when you are running hot, help is always at hand. Running clubs see me flush out our unlucky villain. I am up to almost 70k chips before I barrel off 20k in two pots and I now realise that I need to calm down and concentrate on winning this thing.

About 70 of the 290 starters remain. With about 48k I still have a decent stack but the steepness of the structure really kicks in here and the field typically has 10-15bb with the leaders on 20-25 max, sometimes less. I play very aggressively, always as the initial raiser (i.e. shover).

We make the money but it is an extremely flat payout structure in the first 10places. It’s virtually money back for the first cash and even 8th place is only $500. Meanwhile, 1st place is > $8k.

As we reach the final table bubble, I have 253k with blinds of 10k/20k/antes of 4,000. I am above average in chips with this 12BB stack.

Here’s an interesting hand as we play the bubble. We are playing 5 handed and 6 handed and a player is all in at the other table. At our table, the shortest stack has 51k total and has 20k of it in play as the BB. The chipleader at our table on 320k makes it 45k from under the gun.

I think a shove here should buy the pot. I figure that the UTG player has to credit me with a hand especially as the BB has to call. My only hesitation is that the UTG player is apparently a real hero-caller. My plan works out even better as a player goes out on the other table mid-play. The BB now folds leaving himself just a couple of blinds – he realy wants to be on the FT (he already told us that before the hand).

The chipleader now starts to dwell. TBH I can’t see how he can even think of calling. Eventually he folds an Ace. This means I go to the final table with 316k which is roughly the same as the 2 other big stacks.

I get off to a bad start when I lose the first pot and on 170k after paying some blinds, I am getting quite short-stacked already as we are playing 30k/15k/5k. But I pick up KK on the button. UTG raises to 90k. I wonder whether to flat call given how short I am but I decide not to be greedy and push for my 170k to just take it headsup. The BB folds with some pain and then unbelievably the initial raiser also folds for less than a minimum raise !

This starts a rush, anyway. I take out the button who raise with AT into my KK Again then I take out a player with AT > A9 and another with AQ>A9.

With 5 left I have half the chips but still I only have 20BB as we are up to 40k/20k/5k.

When we come to 3-handed we have been playing for 8 hours and are very equal-stacked. We briefly discuss a deal but really none of us is interested. I am not too keen as I always want to play to win. The other experienced player has the same attitude as me and the third player is delighted to have some this far and is also willing to see what happens.

What we do agree is to flatten out the extremely steep payout structure so that the money is 7,150/5,100/4,000 instead of 8,500/5,000/2,750.

As it turns out, I go out 3rd. I made it into the chip lead with one of the stacks somewhat short. The short stack pushed and I called with K8. She was in trouble with K4 but 2 fours on board put all three stacks pretty equal.

I lost another clip and so was actually in a close 3rd place when I shoved from the BB with QT facing a standard raise from the SB. He called with K3 off and a King on the flop pretty much ended it.

So, a slightly disappointing 3rd place but overall to cash twice in Vegas in one day when I had not cashed in 4 previous trips was a pretty amazing run. To Janey and Peter: it was nice playing with you.

Event #54 Report - Part 4 (of 4)

2009-07-02T22:26:00.000+01:00

After the pivotal H-bomb moment with the 9s8s, I have 50,000 chips half way through level 9. We are playing 10 levels on day 1 and average chips are less than 30,000. I have 60 big blinds. It is absolutely obvious that I should make day2 and probably the money.

I’m feeling pretty good, and make a river call with Ace-high (winning) to move to 55,000 which turns out to be my high point. I am reluctant to get involved at this late stage on day1. Perhaps in future events I will feel that I can take advantage of this reluctance in others, but for today I am happy to be the one playing lock-down poker now that I have got a stack.

Level 10. 500/1000/100. 48,300 chips. 461 players left.

I move to Table 43 where there are some large stacks and some better players (it seems to me). One is pokerstars team pro Raymond Rahme. There are also 3 or 4 local Vegas pros. I resolve to be very cautious. I do play pocket 8s and take down a small pot on an Ace-high flop, and I win a small pot with 54o blind on blind vs a very tight player.

But, to be clear, I am basically counting down the minutes and hoping no kind of cooler situation develops. With 10 minutes left, they draw for the number of hands left and it’s four more. “I’m only playing Aces” I announce and I pretty much mean it.

The poker gods toy with me, dealing me respectable hands: first QcJc (I open-fold), then KhJd (I open fold), then 5c5s (open fold) and then on the very last hand of the night AcKc. I am under the gun. I really, seriously, consider open-folding but opt to limp in case I can see a flop.

The button who has 90k chips make a raise to 3,600 and I fold. He shows me AdQh. Yes it’s a weak play on my part, but I really did not want to have to blog how I got to the very last hand of the day and no further.

So this is a completely new experience for me. I have never made day2 of a multiday event of any kind. This includes a half-dozen or so WSOP Event, a GUKPT, WSOPE and several GSOP etc main events.

We bag up our chips (something new for me). I write my name as Howard “H-bomb” Smith hoping they will report it as such on pokernews, but they go for the more straightforward “Howard Smith, Bedford, United Kingdom”.

I discover that on 49,300 I have about 50% more than average and am lying in 76th place out of 376 left. I am only a triple up away from the chip lead in fact. What will day 2 bring ?

Level 11 (day2). 600/1,200/100. 48,300 chips. 376 players left.

We restart at 2pm the next day. My new table (there has been a full redraw) is quite logo-heavy but these are all qualifier logos so there is still a shortage of known players. The one exception is James Keys (Blackbelt pro and “internet whizzkid”) in seat 1. I am in seat4 and am 3rd in chips at my table behind James in 2nd and another player on 89k.

I realise I have to play carefully to make the money and avoid the heartache of missing out now (when I am in a good position). My cards make it pretty easy to stay out of trouble and I play no hands for the first half an hour as the number of players drifts down to 350 and below.

Then, I witness a massive pot between James Keys and the player who was on a respectable 30k chips at the beginning of the hand. Action folds to Tom Jones in the small blind, who just calls. James raises 2,000. Jones now limp-raises 4,000 more and James instantly moves all in and is quickly called.

For James: 7c6c
For Jones: AdJd

Flop: Td7d5h – James is ahead but needs to avoid any Ace, Jack, diamond or running cards. The turn and river miss the other player and James moves on to about 140k.

The very next hand, James is in the small blind and I pick up red Tens in under-the-gun+1. This is the first real hand I have had, and I think I should raise. I make it 2,800 which is standard at the table.

From here, the hand is a story of mistakes and tricky decisions.

Folds to James who is stacking his monster pot from the previous hand still. He re-raises me to 9,600.

Now, at the time, I did not notice that James had stopped stacking in order to play this hand with a re-raise. We discussed it afterwards and he pointed it out to me.

In the heat of the moment I thought “aggressive internet player”, “I have a big hand”, “I have position”, “I am getting >2:1”.

What I should have thought was “good player is raising an apparently tight EP raiser out of the blinds”. My tens are probably way behind or slightly ahead. I will have position but I already see the stacks are going to be awkward. At the time I also miscalculated the odds and thought I was getting better odds than I was. Also, I now realise, the chip-stacking was a tell.

In post-match analysis I am clear that I should fold now.

“Ten-high please” I think. Unfortunately it is not to be although the 8-high flop is possibly not so bad. 8-6-5 rainbow. James carefully bets 11,000. My problem is that I cannot tell if this is a continuation with a missed AK, or a continuation with a pair that beats me. Of course 3 other pairs now beat me so I am only beating 9s now and even that hand has a gutshot.

I think for a bit. My first instinct is to raise all-in. However, I think about what James will think, and what he will do. If he has QQ+ then he will call. I appear not to have KK or AA. He might think that I flatted AA but he will stay “pay off”. I think he will also call with QQ. Possibly he may fold JJ but he has so many chips that I am doubtful. He will probably fold 99 and presumably he now folds AK, AQ that I am already beating. The advantage of moving in if I am winning is that it stops him bluffing me off on the following streets.

I decided to call in the hope that (a) I am winning, and (b) that he will let me see a showdown although I must say that I fear he will see that this is what I want and keep the pressure on.

In the end, I decide that if I cannot see the showdown I will still have enough chips to survive and make the call, swelling the pot to 42,900 and leaving me with 25,800 behind.

The turn is the Ace of hearts (it’s a full rainbow board I recall). James asks for a count. He doesn’t actually look like he is pleased to see an Ace, but neither am I really ! It means that I am now beating nothing. The only good thing is that perhaps it will slow him down and let me see showdown.

James gets the dealer to count out my stack and I am quite sure he did not really need this done to know how many I had. Presumably he wants to get a read on me. I suspect that he can pin my range pretty closely. Would I really call the flop with Ace-King/Ace-Queen ?

I actually am acting pretty confident on this turn, and the reason is that I know that if he bets again I will fold. I am not going to have to dwell or think. I don’t think he has an Ace but I know that if he bets I cannot push and get him to fold a big pair. I suppose I could call and probably get a free showdown on the river but then I would be short. I am not prepared to do that.

More interesting will be if he checks. If we were in the money and he checks, I think I will move in. I wonder to myself if I am prepared to do that here but I know the answer.

In the end, James carefully selects 12,800. I pass quickly. He tells me later that he had Queens and I 80%+ believe him.

I am disappointed about this hand. Calling the pre-flop raise was a mistake and it puts my WSOP-cash in danger.

What I had not realised, but what I would know in future, is how quickly the required 80 players get knocked out. I was expecting a painful bubble process (my mega-sat experience from last year is on my mind, but that is such a different scenario) but instead the numbers are falling steadily. We are down to 325 or so when this hand plays out.

I don’t completely shut-down from here but my focus is now single-mindedly on making the bubble. I was happy with a couple of decisions I made.

Here is one more key hand where I might have conspired to fail at the last hurdle. It is a couple of orbits after the 10s. We are playing 800/1600/200 so there is 4,400 in the pot before betting.

Folded to mega-stack James Keys in the cut-off. Behind him the button is uber-tight (played one hand in 80mins), the SB is short on 11k and I am on 25k having lost that pot to James but shoved from the button with AK and AQ once each (I am not so tight that I will not shove AK from late position but I probably would not call with AK).

James bets 4,000. I put him on a wide range in this position. The button folds as expected but the SB shrugs and throws in his 11k stack.

I am in the Big Blind with pocket 9s. Now, I am thinking I am in OK shape vs the SBs range with all the money in the pot. I am definitely ahead of James’ range. If I push then I can hopefully get rid of him and play a pot with 30k in it against the SB heads-up and still be on 14k if I lose.

It seems the right move. Again, if we are in the money I think I must shove here. I look at James – hard to tell where he’s at. If I make this play and win I am back on 44k and in good shape.

I look up at the clock. There are 306 players left.

I pick up the chips from on top of my cards and straighten up my stack.

I prepare to move in. It’s a great spot.

I fold.

James snap calls with Kings. Bullet dodged.

The clock counts down... 303, 302, 299, 298. The TDs go through a slightly comical procedure to count heads to make sure we are indeed at the very bubble. Hand for Hand. I have 16,500 now but it is absolutely apparent that I am 100% to make the money by folding.

Would I folds Aces now ? My right-hand opponent (who survived a shove vs James that was quite similar to mine except he had JJ to James’s 99 instead of 99 vs KK) says he is folding Aces now, and seems to mean it.

Hand for Hand lasts, in fact, just one hand. We have done it !

As expected, after this, the fallers are thick and fast. Our table breaks immediately and at my next table I am waiting for a spot to shove.

Level 13. 1000/2000/300. Chips 15,800. Players left 296 or less.

At my new table, the player on my left has 140k and to his left there is a stack of 90k or so. I am going to have trouble shoving into these guys with no hand.

I fold everything for a period (the scenarios are just no good) until I get pocket deuces in the small blind and it is folded to me. I see the end is nigh. I order a Corona from the waitress and push my last 13,100 into the pot. It’s 10,800 for the Big Stack/Big Blind to call.

He calls with JT. The boards runs all low and suddenly I have 28,900. Maybe, just maybe ?

My Corona arrives just in time for the next hand. A player in UTG+2 (who had just raised with KQ and folded to a shove) makes it 5,000 to go again.

It is folded to me on the button. I look down at AcKh. Reflex takes over and I put it all in. The EP raiser has 40k total and makes the call with black 9s.

Now, if I can win this race I will suddenly have 64k and be back above average ! However, it isn’t to be although QT on the flop and turn give me ten outs on the river.

Obviously it is right to shove with AK here but I regret insta-shoving. By doing this, I announce to the raiser that I have AK and so he can call knowing he is ahead. If I dwell and push then he may think I have an overpair some of the time and perhaps he can fold. Most likely it is the same result whatever I do, but if there even a small edge to dwell-pushing then I should have done so.

244th place, $2,923

Of course I am disappointed about what might have been, but actually this is one case where overall I am actually slightly more delighted at making one of my key objectives than I am upset at not having gone even further.

Event #54 Report - Part 3 (Boom!)

2009-07-02T06:59:00.003+01:00

As we come towards the end of Level 6, here is another interesting hand. Under the gun makes it 700 to play (150/300/25) still. I decide to see a flop (hopefully) with QT-suited. We do see a flop heads-up.

In fact, the UTG player thought everyone had folded and went to muck his cards. I make sure to tell him to take them back. Some of the other players seemed to think I could force him to muck and claim the pot. I do not know if this would have been a correct ruling, but in any case I have zero interest in doing that. It is just wrong, imo, $4 Million prizepool or not.

So, we see a flop AQ2r. He checks and I think my Queen is probably good – I bet 1,300, which is called. The turn is another Queen ! It puts 2 clubs on board but I suppose it is unlikely he has a flush draw (which is a shame). It is very unlikely I am not ahead now. He checks and I bet 3,300 which in hidsight was too much when, really, I have the nuts and he may have 2 outs. He folds. Missed opportunity to get more out of him ?

Level 7. 200/400/25. 19,825 chips. 921 players left

I am moved to “Blue 50” and announce my presence by shoving from the button with 98o. The short-stacked SB calls me with ATo and wins. The BB was even shorter, hence my shove. I also lose a little when a 2BB stack pushes into my BB. I call without looking obviously and am not in great shape with J6.

Level 8. 300/600/75. 15,300 chips. 760 players left.

My stack is only as high now as six hours ago and therefore I am starting to have a stack that allows few moves. I also fall below average chips for the first time since I hit the set of 5s vs Mike Eise.

I fall to 13,375 at the low but a couple of shoves and re-shoves with AQ, AK advance me to 24,900 at the end of this break, when we colour up the 25-chips. I am the player who buys up the chips and I stay for the whole colour up. Now that I have a fair amount of tournament experience, I do like to be the one doing this – partly just doing my bit, partly so I can be 100% they don’t mess it up. Last year in the Mega-sat I nearly lost 5k chips during a colour up.

Level 9. 400/800/100. 22,900 chips. 583 players left.

Strangely, when I get back from the break, my 24,900 stack has become 22,900. This is confusing. I have to assume I miscounted before the break.

Key hand #2. Here comes the H-bomb .. this is it. Here is the swing hand of the whole tournament, effectively.

A good player opens for 2,100 in UTG+1. He is opening quite a few pots; not a ridiculous amount, but he will be opening a wider range than just super-premium, because he should. The next player thinks and calls. He presumably has some hand. It is folded to me on the button and here is a big decision.

The call is almost exactly 10% of my stack which is the outer limit of what I call with a speculative holding. On the other hand, I am getting 3:1 and probably close the action here as the blinds are very tight. I will have position. I have 9s8s – a pretty hand with which to possibly win a huge pot.

I call. Pot is 3x2,100+9x100+400+800=8,400.

The flop falls Js6s5c. The preflop raiser leads out for 4,000, just less than half the pot. I guess he will continue on a lot of flops. The other caller dwells. I imagine he maybe had something like pocket 7s. Whilst he is dwelling I get a chance to consider what I will do.

I guess my options will be:

Fold – I have 9high
Call – I have a gutshot straight draw, a 9high flush draw and two live cards.
Raise – the pot will contain 16,200 after my call and I will have 16,900 left so my all-in raise would be a pot sized raise. So, if I raise it has to be all-in really.

I am never flat calling here. And, let’s face it, I did not come here to call with 98-suited and fold on this flop. I only have to decide how long to appear to dwell once the other player folds.

I manage to wait about 5 seconds before announcing the all-in. The other player immediately calls. I must admit I thought he might shows a set of Jacks.

In fact, he has Queens. I am near to 50/50. I am 100% comfortable with the move. He will lay down some hands that are beating me (pocket 9s. Ace-Queen etc) and when he calls I have at least 42%.

Turn ... Jc. River .. BOOOOOOOOOOOOM Ks. I am on 50k !! Now I can seriously think of making day 2 and the money. I am ecstatic. The fella with Queens is not happy. He has me well covered (and went on to cash easily), but he has been well and truly H-bombed.

Event #54 Report - Part 2:

2009-07-02T05:44:00.003+01:00

In part 1 we saw how I leapt to over 10,000 chips in early play. I had to give up on the turn to “moustache” with top pair, top kicker on a Jack high board, but out of position to a raise on the flop and a bet on the turn, I think I am beaten. Next ... I have exactly 9,000 as we start Level 2.

Level 2 50/100. 9,000 chips. 2,500 players estimated.

Now, lest you think that the real H-bomb has been lost in translation, and should you be allowing yourself to think that I only play Aces, Queens and sets, consider this play at 50/100:

Nike makes it 225 from early position. Now, I don’t think that near-minimum raises are the way to play level 2. I have the button and the perfect re-raising hand: 8c3s. I make it 800. Degenerate Gambler, as he is wont to do, calls from the blinds. Nike sees the game is up and passes.

The flop is pretty good for black 83o: 9d5d4d. DG checks and I fire out 1,100 to take it down.

I think we can agree this is so standard that even Louise would play it like this ?

I pick up Aces for the second time and face the same 225 from Nike. This time, however, I am in the Small Blind. Nike has about the same chips as me: 11k or so. I have no interest in letting him see a cheap flop. If he has a big hand, let’s get it in now or play a 3 or 4 bet pot. I make it 1,225 and he passes.

Level 3 75/150. 11,000 chips. 2,100 players estimated.

Interesting hand: California bets 350 from under-the-gun. He has started to raise more hands preflop but is not making strong action post-flop. I have pocket Tens in early middle position and decide to flat call with so many players behind. California is not that deep: he has about 3,000. Obviously I can “afford” to double him up if need be but I am necessarily keen to jam in so many chips immediately.

The flop is 964 rainbow. Now, I guess for the most part I am now way ahead or way behind ? If he started with Jacks or better I am still losing and drawing to 2 outs. I am also now losing to 9s. Obviously if he has AK, AQ then he’s way behind now.

A lot of people will say I should just bet this flop but I am thinking that if I am ahead then he has only 6 outs and that if he check-raises me then I probably cannot get away even though I know I am losing. I check behind.

Turn is another 6 and presumably helps no one. He bets 500 into 850. I call for the same reasons as the flop.

The river is another 6 and he bets another 500 with perhaps 1,800 behind.

Now, I just call and he shows 44 ! So, as it turns out, I rivered him to counterfeit his flopped set/turned house. If I had bet the flop then we get it in and I runner-runner him. I probably should raise the river on the basis that JJ – AA bet harder on flop and turn. I am not worried about him having a 6 obviously. On the actual hand he may find a pass if I raise as he now is losing to 55+ and any 6 or 9. But, he may have sighed and paid me off at least a min raise ?

Level 4 100/200. 15,000 chips. 1,800 players estimated.

I find pocket 7s when it is folded to me in the cut-off. Degenerate gambler is quite short now, and I limp hoping to snap his shove from the SB. However, another LatAm player who has come into Adam’s seat makes it just 500 (?). LatAm2 has just taken out Mike Eise with slow-played Kings.

DG passes but moustache makes a contemplated call. I assume this puts him a small pair or two high cards or other kinds of pretty starting combos. OK, plan A did not work but I do not give either of the active players a big hand so I make it 1,800 to go. LatAm passes and now moustache apparently has a decision. “Call, you may hit your set” I say. He calls.

Flop: 765 all red. Gin. Unfortunately he doesn’t look like he hit it. Still, I don’t want to give him a free card and more to the point, if a free card could hurt me then he may be prepared to pay to see a card. I bet 2,000 (in hindsight I think I might try less). He passes quickly so I guess he had black JT or something like that. Why couldn’t he have hit a set of 6s !

Oh well. Our table finally breaks. As I take my new seat I try to remember all those times I went broke after a table move and hope I can avoid doing this again.

Andy and “I Pity The Fool, Sucka” join me on the rail and get to see me misplay AQ: I pick up this hand on the small blind and face two early/mid limpers. Well, people shouldn’t limp and I want to raise them off their hands. I don’t want to play a flop o.o.p with this hand so I decide on a big raise to 1,200 which gets rid of the first player easily but the second player (who covers me by about 3/2) calls fairly quickly.

Flop is 345hh. I have overcards, a gutshot and a backdoor queen-flush. Not great. I could check and see what happens but checking is not my thing. I fire 2,000 and face a small raise to 4,600.
Hmm. Andy reckons this bet asks “do you really have Aces” and thinks a reraise may take it down here. I agree that the pot may be for sale and my gut says the guy is using position to steal the pot BUT he could have flopped big and I do not want to go broke with AQ in the small blind.

In hindsight, a smaller pre-flop raise was probably the move but I decide to fight another battle having thrown away 3,100 chips.

Level 5. 100/200/25 13,000 chips. 1,650 players left

Not much to report

Level 6. 150/300/25 15,000 chips. 1,100 players left

Under-the gun I make it 700 with AT. UTG+1 insta-calls. The Small blind calls. Flop is KJx rainbow. I can maybe fire at this but opt to check my gutshot ace-high. Checked to the Qc turn.

Nuts ! I bet 1,600 called by the UTG+1 and the SB folds with some apparent reluctance.

No club please ... the river is another King. OK .... so a set housed up. Quite obviously he did not have a set on the turn. It is possible that he has KQ or KJ and I may be going home here. I hope he has a hand he can call with... I bet 4,000. He calls .. with AT ! Oh well. Would I fold if he jams the river he asks. We will never know, but I think not.

The SB says he folded T9 for the low straight but actually speaking to him later when he cashed in 243rd I think that was a lie.

Ed Roger walks by. I say “walks” but actually he steamed by – just knocked out by a 3-outer with the money going in on the turn. Sick. I feel lucky to be the last gutshotter still standing especially since the ones who have hit the rail are all better players than me by a distance.

Event #54 Report - part 1

2009-07-02T05:37:00.005+01:00

I am writing up this blog from my notes and I see it is going to be a LONG report, and possibly very boring. Well, you don't have to read it.

You may also find it is better to read it on the Gutshot forum blog where I will post the same content but there the page is wider and I can use card icons to make it easier to read.

http://www.gutshot.com/bforum/blog.php?u=13218

Anyway, here goes. You may already know the ending of course.

________________________________________________

WSOP 2009 Event #54, $1,500 No Limit Hold’em. 3 Day Event, 29th June 2009

I come into this event with a 0/6 record in WSOP bracelet events that I have played in the last 4 years. I have been somewhat deep before – late in the first day – but never threatened to make the money. I am sure that I am better player than when I first played in 2005 and exited in level 1 after flopping the second nuts, but am I good enough or lucky enough to break my duck ?

Things start well when I actually get into the event unlike dozens (maybe hundreds) who attempt to buy in after the event sells out at 10pm on the day before. I assume there would have been over 3,000 runners if the event were not capped at 2,818 runners. 2,800 was the official cap and I can only assume the last 18 were at the TD’s last-minute discretion.

I start the event in confident mood. It is hard to put your finger on exactly what experience of a WSOP event buys you over a player with the same skill, but playing his first event. But there is something there, for sure, and one factor is that it’s not quite a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity so we have the willingness to put our tournament on the line. Against that, I am still trying to get a result so I am obviously not wanting to donk out.

I do feel confident, though, and confidence is important. Let’s go !

I play tight, obviously, in the very early running. I make a conscious effort to try to profile the table. I still remember Richard Gryko’s advice on the topic on the forum. I cannot begin to approach his skill at immediately getting a take on the players but who do we have:

Seat1: Adam – recognises my Gutshot logo and asks about the club. I tell him to check out the Spirit of Gutshot at The International. He’s obviously not a very experienced live player or else he would know that the Clerkenwell club had to close, even if he never played there. But he looks fairly comfortable so I rate him as a somewhat solid opponent. Unfortunately I am often only able to classify people as “somewhat solid”. I guess it is better than nothing.

Seat2: is wearing sunglasses-with-headphones combo and wearing a “degenerate gambler” shirt. As play goes on I see that he doesn’t play position that well.

Seat3: American with grey hair and moustache. Call it stereotyping, but I find these players to play predictable holdings and to be rather passive. Their play on late streets is very readable.

Seat4: Mike Eise, winner of this year’s Event #28. He is not a professional (lack of logos, and just his table demeanour). His play does not seem fearsome, but I credit him with being a good player. In my opinion, notwithstanding the luck element, you do not win a 3,000-runner event over 3 days without being a decent player. I did not immediately recognise him, but the bracelet on his wrist was a giveaway and I asked him at the break which event it was (that is a polite way of asking “who the heck are you?”. I looked up his name later).

Seat 5: Showed up late, Latin American with a “Toronto” cap. Looked hungover. Not a threat.

Seat6: “Nike” and sunglasses. Seemed tight-aggressive and a smart bettor. Decent player. Play him in position only.

Seat7: "California". Lots of mixed logos on the hat and shirt but definitely "customer bought". Talked about his WSOP and WPT events of the past. Clearly a regular attendee of these kinds on events but no talk of great success. Seemed as time went on to play somewhat weakly (in the sense of not applying maximum pressure).

Seats 8 & 9. Very obviously tight.

Seat 10: Lunatic, wearing team gutshot logos, foreign accent, has his own “H-Bomb cards”. Doesn’t look like he will last long.

First Level 25/50. 4,500 starting chips. 2,818 runners

We started with 4,500 chips so the fact is we are deep-stacked in Level One. I fold for a whole orbit, then raise Nike (who limped UTG) with 8h7d. I flop a pair on the Q74ss board, but decide to check one street. I call 300 when the Qs falls but give up when he fires the river as well.

I am back to 3,825 when the first key hand occurs. I limp with 5h5c and then, when Mike Eise raises to 200 out of the small blind, I call with set odds and position.

The flop comes 865, all red. OK. Bottom set. Am I prepared to go broke on this hand ? Yes is the answer. Mike Eise leads for a slightly more than the pot: 600 is the bet.

I have 3,625 left at this point and the pot is currently 1,100 before my action. I can’t be too worried about the flush or straight draw, as such, but I think the key is that I may represent a draw myself and I don't want scare cards to kill the action. I am only thinking about how best to get all the money in.

I opt for the raise to 1,600 leaving 2,025 behind. Mike Eise sets me in and I SNAP, obviously.

He has black Queens and misses his two outs. Boom #1. With nearly 8,000 chips after 30 minutes I am clearly making a good start.

A short while later, I am in the big blind when short-stacked Mike Eise limps from middle position. The tight small blind reluctantly puts in an extra 25. I look down at two black Aces. “With 250”. Mike shrugs and puts in his whole stack of 850, SB folds and I show him the bad news.

He needs help with pocket 8s and help comes in the shape of a flopped 8. Well, as far as having Aces cracked goes, I’ll take a loss of 850 chips. Mike ends up surviving a few more hours although he will eventually fall in level 4.

Still in Level 1, it is folded to me with Queens on the button. I make it 200 and now soon-to-be-international player Adam makes it 650. I have him about 2-1 covered. I make my plan. He may have Aces or Kings, of course, but I decide I will pay him off on a low flop as I cannot be eliminated. I call planning to probably fold to overcards.

The flop brings T96cc. Adam leads for 1,000. He has just over 2,000 left. I set him in. When he doesn’t instant-call I know where we’re at. But, with a resigned look he makes the call with Jacks. Ace and Queen complete the board and we lose our first player.

I have over 10,000 after 45 minutes. Now this is what I’m talking about !

Comfortably Numb

2009-07-02T03:09:00.001+01:00

Got a modicum of sleep this morning after returning from the Venetian in the late early hours. Enough sleep to stop me from wanting to sleep again before I play a little this evening, but still not enough to leave me anything other than pretty knackered by normal standards.

Bit too tired to actually go very far so took the option of getting myself organized here. Spent a good long time tidying up the room and was pleased to find I haven't lost my passport or my plane tickets or any one of a number of things that I had kind of lost track of.

I also was able to account for my money to the last $$ and this was a great delight - partly because I have quite a bit more than I started with, and also because I do take quite a bit of satisfaction in knowing that I have managed to track my bankroll with 100% accuracy so far. In fact, everything was accounted for down to the last banana.

I mention the banana because (a) it seemed amusing and (b) it gives me pleasant memories of the day2 table I was at in the Event #54.

One of the other players (Jansen) had a banana in playand every time he moved in (he was quite short, so it was all in or fold each time for him), his action was to place the banana on top (he had his stacks arranged in a more or less linear fashion with a slight banana-shape curve) and announce all in.

Because of the banana, it was not deemed necessary for him to move any stacks to confirm the all in - the floor ruled on this.

Anyway, I found that all my money and possessions, brought and bought, were all present and correct and this has put me in a very good mood.

I have eaten the banana now, however.

No more tidying up to do here so I shall get to work on the WSOP and Venetian blogs.

Coming soon to this blog

2009-07-01T23:41:00.002+01:00

- report from the event 54

- report from the Venetian comp

H-Bombing at The Venetian 2009 Edition

2009-07-01T21:02:00.003+01:00

Last year's episode of "H-bombing at the Venetian" was big on fun, shots and the seven-deuce game, but ultimately rather short on the actual winning the H-bomb way.

After the disappointment of the exit from the $1,500 at the WSOP (admittedly, disappointment of the still-making-my-first-ever-WSOP-cash-which-will-be-on-the-record-forever-and-taking-home-$3k kind of disappointment) I still hadn't had any sleep for about 60 hours but didn't think I could sleep. A conundrum.

Louise said that a few gutshotters were going downtown for drinks and dice which seemed a good option, but something drew me to the conclusion that the best wind-down from an intense poker tournament would be .... a poker tournament. The $120 nightly at the Venetian to be exact. (That "something" begins with "s" and ends with "ickness" I suppose).

After 16hours of folding AQ to a single raise and that kind of thing, I felt that I would be able to unleash my style without fear in this comp. 7,500 chips but a 20minute clock with antes from level 4 -- a true deep & steep. Or deep and vertical really. Ideal, tbh.

Well .... blog to follow as soon as I can muster the energy.

I must say I was blown away by the Venetian itself and remember I already thought the Venetian was the best poker room in Vegas. As to the comp itself, a few people in the game asked me what "H bomb" meant.

It's always hard to put into exact words, of course, but this was a demonstration of H-bombing. I'm going to have to dig deep in the thesaurus to try to articulate just the enormity of the H-firestorm that went down at certain phases of this comp.

If I had played (and ran ... I think running like nuclear fusion is a key element of H-bombing) like that in the WSOP then they probably would have red-flagged the event, awarded me the bracelet and played on for second :)

Vegas D is for ...

2009-07-01T01:32:00.000+01:00

i) Disappointment and ii) Delight.

Report on Event 54 to follow.

Crimes against the Powerhouse

2009-06-30T20:11:00.002+01:00

After registering for the $1,500 (just in time it turns out: I was in at about 8:45pm on the day before and forgot to ask how many runners, but was told it maxed out before 10pm that evening), I had to play a little cash.

I bumped into Alex E who showed me around the action: sick tables at the $50k HORSE (Hansen, Huck Seed, Seidel next to each other with Antonius and Chau Giang also on the table); mega-busy STT sat action (and Alex's patented tip of going backwards through the queue); 5-5 PLO that Alex reckons was a "good game"; but I opt to play safe with $2/5 NLH.

The cash at the Rio is generally reckoned to be soft and I will be disappointed if I am a net loser at the end of the trip.Today's table seemed to be playing quite passively as usual (except for the opening raises to 25 or 30 the action pre tends to be passive). The players were not button-straddling either which imo means they are not totally on their game.

I decided to sit down with a full $500 and advanced this pretty quickly to $800 by just barrelling really.

Standard stuff: 83o on the button, raise and call a min-raise from a tight/weak player in the BB after one other caller in between. Flop 8-4-4 with two hearts. BB bets 60 into 120 or so (obviously looking to be raised off his hand). The other fella calls and both of them are seen off by a pop to $200.

I had drifted back a bit when I get my first powerhouse 5h2c and make it $20 from the cut-off, called by the button and the BB. Flop Kc6h2d . I bet $40, called twice. The turn is 5d. BB checks again, and I bet $100 for value (possibly a bit small in hindsight). The Button calls (again) and now the BB check-raises to $200.

Huh ?I am not sure what to make of this. If the intention was to confuse, he succeeded. No hand makes sense for this action. I was a bit worried on the flop that they are trapping with a set (only because I have seen both players slow play a set).

If either player has a set (666 being the most likely) then I would have expected a raise from the button and if the bb has a set then surely he must c/r all in at this stage.

Although a set doesn't really make sense I don't want to put all my money in dead so I elect to just call and await developments. The button calls as well !

So $600 has gone in on this turn. Presumably at least one of them has a diamond draw so I think I can easily get away from a diamond river. The river is 8h and the BB immediately shoves for $450. He has me covered, but the button has more behind.

Hmm ... I have the lowest hand that isn't one pair.

I cannot think what hand makes sense for the BB. I am not worried about a straight, but I am beating a bluff only, really. Except I am beating AK but how can he have AK ?

He's betting into two players for 100bb and we have shown interest in the pot on all streets. He is sort of shaking which I assume means he is bluffing or has a monster (set of 6s would be a monster here and this is what I put him on really despite the illogical bets).

I decide not to be a hero but when the button folds Kd9d face up, the blind shows AsKh.

OMG ! I folded the powerhouse 2pair getting 3-1 on the river. I cannot believe what I have done and instead of having $1,600 I am back to $375.

Looking back. I think I should go for the textbook interpretation of min-riase=bluff and knowing there are draws out there, push all in on the check-raise. May even get two callers and scoop a monster. Button has played his hand like what it is really and you can see what he was up to with position and plenty of chips behind. I let the BB off big style though with my disguised hand.

Please, please, do not let me commit such a crime again. I can only put it down to first-day nerves.

After this, obviously I titled off my money - in the last pot of the night I was down to $150 and saw a 6way flop with Q9dd. Flop J96hh.

Check/check/ I shove for $135. button calls me with 9c5c(!). 5 on the river and I call it a night.

Need to try to get some sleep before the $1,500 tomorrow.

ABC of Vegas

2009-06-30T18:13:00.004+01:00

A is for arrivals. I do find that Vegas is a pleasant place to land into the US. The immigration and customs there are friendlier than anywhere else, in my experience. You actually get the impression they are there to help speed you to the tables as soon as possible.

The flight itself went well - we caught up some time that was lost to a late departure slot - and approached the city just 15mins behind schedule. It was a good landing but I wish they wouldn't do that thing where they bank the plane in a series of sharp turns - they feel like 270degree turns at 45degrees to the perpendicular. To me it always seems like we're about to drop out of the sky at any moment.

At least we got a good view of the strip - the hotels look like toytown from this perspective. When you drive past them, however, they appear larger than life. And of course if you try to walk all the way through one, you have to cross 3 timezones.

Once on the ground, the immigration queue is a pretty happy place. Apart from 3 guys from Circus Casino, Stoke (pink polo shirts and pink tinsel cowboy hats), the only other obvious poker player I spot is Steve Davis in a very understated black and white Team Ladbrokes top.

Steve (unlike Shane Warne and Boris Becker) doesn't have a big sporting clash with the WSOP, I guess. As we know, he's got a pretty decent record in Vegas.

B is for Baggage. The first of the Vegas attractions is of course the comedy baggage carousel, which stops and emits loud buzzing sounds at 30second intervals, and is split into 2 separate belts for no apparent reason. My two (!) suitcases appear one from each belt (a bit of a mystery) and in a bit of a clue to the outside weather they are noticeably hot to the touch.

After that, I had to declare my cash at customs (a first for me: the well-documented hassle of turning internet $$ into cash in Vegas at the moment has forced me to go for the option of just bringing a load of actual folding stuff). If any of you ever need to do this (> $10k is reportable) I can tell you it's very easy so I wouldn't be concerned about it.

Apparently you have to declare on the way back as well but the customs guy gave me the impression that they didn't have a lot of need for those forms ...

C is for Cabs/Check-in. There's never a problem getting a taxi from the airport. As usual, however, the route taken by the driver appeared to bear little relationship to the actual distance or direction from A to B. Nonetheless, we got there $30 later and a short while later I was checked into the Masquerade Tower at The Rio.

I have stayed at the Rio before and played there a lot but even so I have never been to the other wing of the hotel, having always been in the Ipanema Tower (it's only 100meters away mind you!) and I got lost 2 or 3 times before finding my way to the elevators.

I did resist the urge to play before I even unpacked, but after wasting as much time as I reasonably could getting settled in, I was drawn to the Amazon room to register for the $1,500 and of course to play a little cash, of which more next post ...

Say Hello, Wave Goodbye

2009-06-29T18:37:00.003+01:00

So, we've been from A to Z. Now it's time to go from A to B. Or from LGW to LAS to be precise. It's an early start as Sunday engineering works mean a special (i.e. slow) train timetable. The train really trundles down to St Pancras, and then the Gatwick Express is so pedestrian that it's practically stationary on the journey from Victoria.

Despite that, it only arrives 5 mins behind schedule, so if it actually went at full speed it would be almost like a teleport I guess. The fact that it terminates practically in the check-in hall makes it a good choice compared to the prospect of M1-M25-M23 with roadworks all the way. The very empty carriages made for a pretty painless trip so far. Maybe the trains & tube were so empty because everyone is already here - the place is packed !

I am glad I managed to retain my Virgin Flying Club Gold Card for one more year so although I haven't managed to secure an Upper Class ticket, I get to check-in as if I have and skip straight to celeb-spotting in the Virgin lounge. Very short on logos and branded shirts this year. There is word of Frank Lampard, but I don't recognise anyone.

Looking around for clues, I see a few laptops (possible evidence of a last-minute poker fix?) and then one or two fellas who seem a bit too young and a bit too fashionable to plausibly be flying upper class except on ill-gotten sponsorship deals. At the gate, a chatter of "satellites" and "multiple Day 1s" floats around the queue so I know there is poker lurking below the surface.

Further poker clues turn up when I take my seat in Premium Economy and say hello to my neighbour, who turns out to be Naomi Hissey (Customer Development Manager for poker at Ladbrokes). She's obviously loving the poker role and flies in-character in oversize sunglasses.

I give her one of my new-for-Vegas09 H-bomb cards. "Are you sponsored for the series then?" Sadly not. We swap a few names. "Ladbrokes? You must know Louise then ... and Jake ...". Ladbrokes have done something similar to what Gutshot did last year: supersat packages instead of direct main event seats to get more people out there.

The Virgin fleet on the Las Vegas route is not known for using their most modern aircraft and I notice that the leg-rest on my seat is apparently broken. I'm in a good mood, so I'm not too fussed, but they send an engineer over anyway and after he confirms the prognosis I am happy to accept a friendly apology. I am pleasantly surprised, therefore, when they offer to comp me some flying club miles as a Gold Card member (they have a list, you see, and it's quite nice that they come up to you and acknowledge you personally).

I thought no more of it, and I was genuinely shocked when shortly before take-off they asked for a quiet word ... would I "mind" if they gave me a complimentary upgrade to Upper Class ? YBA ... :)

I'm running good already !

A - Z of Poker: Day 26

2009-06-28T11:00:00.003+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day 26: Z is for ...

Z is for zzzzz: Sometimes, poker can be boring. Tight is right, they say, and even I have to concede that there is a lot of truth in that. But tight can be pretty boring and sleep-inducing at times. Actually I can recall several players at the Gutshot/International who have been known to fall asleep at the table. These were tight players, accustomed to lots of time passing with no action, so they possibly weren't playing all that differently to how they might have done if they were awake.

Some other players have a knack for appearing to be off with the fairies only to wake up when holding Aces.

Of course, sleeping through a cash game is one thing. Sleeping during a tournament probably is a clear-cut bad idea but it's not unknown for a player to oversleep and turn up late !

I'm usually a world-class sleeper. I can sleep pretty much anywhere and anywhen, although I don't think I have ever nodded off playing poker. My particular playing style (playing every hand ...) keeps me involved and awake. I must also admit that I will sometimes find a bad beat or a big win stays with me and then I can be awake for hours thinking about it.

I'm hoping that in Vegas my results will lead to sweet dreams not recurring nightmares.

Z is for Zoom: Well, nearly there. About to zoom off from Gatwick to Vegas. It seemed a long way off when I first booked the trip but now I'm less than 24 hours from being back involved in the WSOP !

Hope you enjoyed the A - Z. Thanks to Mat and Jonny for their suggestions and reminders !

A - Z of Poker: Day 25

2009-06-27T23:00:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day 25: Y is for ...

Y is for YBA. An acronym that is forever associated with gutshot. "You'll Be Alright" is another of those wonderful phrases with an infinite spectrum of meaning. I don't know if it really was coined by gutshotters (anyone care to suggest a clear provenance ?) but its use in conversation is a clear giveaway of associations with gutshot.

A quick "google" on the abbreviation reveals that the most accepted use seems to be "Young British Artist" although "You'll Be Alright" does make it into the 6 "accepted" definitions along with the airport code for Banff, Youth Basketball Association, Youth Bowling Association and Youth Buddhist Association (of Hawaii). Hmm....

I am not clear what the criteria are for "acceptance" on acronymfinder.com are, but I do know that YBA is absolutely accepted among gutshot aficionados and, indeed, it is more or less mandatory to get one or more instances into any serious conversation.

Y is for YOYO. As we have discussed previously, nicknames cannot be changed once granted and ideally no two players should share a nickname in common. So, I am stuck with H-bomb and in any case YOYO has been taken by the unique Mike Khan and indeed by UK professional Julian Thew, whom I met in Vegas last year actually.

But, were it not for these reasons, then I would have a claim on the name I think. In both cash and tournaments my stack is prone to wild gyrations. Occasionally this is due to the natural flow of the cards and luck but usually it is a symptom of finding multiple excuses to get into pots and not wanting to give up on them.

I am not sure if there is any effective cure for my YOYO tendencies. There is a potential solution to the fact that "YOYO" is taken. Someone recently suggested to be that I could take "Zebedee" instead. This has not been claimed as far as I know. It could also give me something to write about on Day 26 ....

A - Z of Poker: Day 24

2009-06-26T22:00:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day 24: X is for ...

X is for x. As in "I put him on A-x", or "raise to get rid of players limping with A-x or K-x".

x is the generic "unknown" of course and oftentimes we are involved in a "battle of the x's". How big is your kicker ? x marks the spot and the more spots the better, of course, where our side card is concerned.

I often find that in post-mortem, x gets an upgrade. If we held A7 and were out-x'd by AK or AQ then our 7 may suddenly become and 8 or a 9, perhaps a ten so that our play sounds a little better in the glare of public discussion. Where's the harm in a little license ?

For tournament success, we probably need to have a little of the x-factor going for us. Win a few of those AK vs Ax races (in both directions) and all will be well. If not, we soon have an "X" next to our name.

X is for XX. As someone who likes to play random cards at the slightest excuse, I especially enjoy those situations where it is actually correct to play any holding. Best of all are the tournament scenarios where it becomes optimal to open-shove with ATC (any two cards). Those positions are often fairly clear-cut. The main consideration is the stack sizes, the lateness of our position in the betting round and, vitally, the action being folded to us.

Braver still are the re-raises with any two cards. These are the real high-octane plays. It's hard to spot these opportunities and harder still to pull the trigger with 92o. But the thrill of success is hard to beat. If you're caught out, then seeing your 9 high beat Aces is of course something of a guilty pleasure all of it's own.

Half Writ

2009-06-26T21:28:00.002+01:00

I got half way there ...

The A - Z of poker got as far as "M" with just the one serious hiccup in the publishing process.

Then N for Next didn't quite make it, and then it was "O" for Oh, I missed another day. P for Procrastination set in ....

The time to Vegas seems to have sneaked by pretty quickly. So much so that to catch up now I need to get to X marks the spot all in one go.

I am going to give it a try.

Again (in this blog) I am going to re-date the entries once I actually compose them so that it all appears, in the mirror of history, to have been a smooth daily prose progression.

A - Z of Poker: Day 23

2009-06-25T21:00:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day 23: W is for ...

W is for WSOP: When we say "WSOP" I suppose a lot of us mean the "main event" itself but of course S is for Series and you cannot accuse the current WSOP for failing to offer sufficient quantity of events. By the time we come to the big one, it will be event #57. Quite a variety of events will have preceded it. Some are styled "World Championship" events although since all of the other events also offer a "bracelet" I think this particular distinction is lost on almost everybody.

This year will be my second attempt at the $10,000 World Championship of No Limit Hold'em. I muse to myself sometimes on the extent to which my chances of winning the title exceed zero. I think they really are not quite zero whereas there is presumably no other sport where I could enter the world championships with any chance at all of coming out the champion. Of course in nearly every other event, my chances would be zeroed out instantly because I wouldn't even be able to enter.

Such is the unique nature of poker's world championship. Anyone can enter, an enormous number of the entrants might win it. We can play next to a world champion and we play on equal terms, speak the same language of poker and we really can beat them. It's fantastic.

W is for Why ? Especially as in "Why, oh why?". I dedicated a series of blogs to the "W.O.W." factor already and I feel confident I will have many more occasions to utter these words. Most of them can be covered under the biggest "W.O.W." of them all. "Why, oh why didn't I THINK before I .... called, pushed, folded, played in this game, stayed in this game, left this game, took a shot, drank those shots, or any one of 100 other poker sins".

I guess W can also be for Why Not ? A useful and versatile answer ! Could I win the WSOP this year ? Yes, why not .... ?

A - Z of Poker: Day 22

2009-06-24T20:00:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day 22: V is for ...

V is for Vegas. What else could it be ? I love Las Vegas. Obviously there is a lot to Vegas that I never take advantage of, but I simply do not tire of the 24hour feast of poker there. This trip will be about my 6th, I think, and I am not close to even thinking of "too much poker".

Barry, I understand, has been something like 20 times and I know there are many players who will go for several weeks every year. I think it's like chips (the potato kind). Something so intrinsically fantastic that there is no such thing as a surfeit of it.

This will be my longest trip so far (11 nights, or two weeks as my wife likes to describe it). Potentially (pretty please ...) it could be longer if I make it to day-3 of the main event. I suppose when I arrive it will seem like a long trip ahead of me but I know with 100% certainty that it will seem too soon to leave 11 days later.

I think it's quite possible that I know more people in Vegas (at this time of year) than in any other City in the world. I can guarantee to bump into dozens of people I know from The Gutshot, The International and of course there are many dozens more people whom I know from the UK poker scene who don't necessarily know me. So, I feel at home there and there is never a lack of a topic to strike up a conversation. "See, I had AQ in the cut-off ...."

V is for Virgin. I understand that British Airways are soon to start up a Las Vegas route (if they don't go bankrupt first, I suppose). This would certainly be a welcome move. I am a fan of Virgin Atlantic (and I have the Gold Card to prove it), but even I get frustrated at the liberties they appear to take on the Las Vegas route. The strong impression conveyed is that they are a monopoly and they know it ! So, expect work out planes and zero chance of booking a reward flight with the billion flying club miles that I have racked up over the years.

Still, I associate Virgin with the trip to Vegas and it's hard to carry too much of a bad feeling about that. Typically, I do not travel "in logo". I can't quite put my finger on why but I notice that to a large extent the others leave the branded apparel in the suitcase as well. Which makes "spot the poker player" one degree harder unless (like last year) they are unmistakable (Gus Hansen) or insist of telling everyone who will listen that they just took down EPT Monte Carlo (Glen Chorny).

A - Z of Poker: Day 21

2009-06-23T18:00:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day 21: U is for ...

U is for UIGEA. An ugly acronym, which represents an especially heavy-handed piece of US legislation. UIGEA stands for Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 and refers to Title VIII of the SAFE Port Act 2006 that was tacked on at the end and thereby sneaked into law in the most ridiculous fashion. (ps: I just learned that SAFE is itself an acronym for "Security and Accountability For Every". That clever recursive acronym may be the best bit of the whole bill).

As we all know, this act caused tremendous ructions: the exit from the US of Party Poker, for example, and the subsequent collapse in its stockmarket value. Unjustified arrests of directors of legitimate gaming companies, and so on.

I personally find the whole concept of the bill to be ludicrous. The inconsistency of US rules just defies belief. I can't even summon up the energy to look into it properly to understand what the rules really say. I am 100% confident that, if I did, I would find it to be badly conceived and poorly executed.

I find it easier to just ignore it, which is of course what the great majority of "US" poker sites did. Pokerstars and Full Tilt, in particular, seem to have carried on regardless.

Mind you, I can imagine that the bill must genuinely inconvenience the average American poker player. I recently discovered what a pain it is to move money from Full Tilt into usable US$ form to make my buy in at the WSOP. I think this difficulty resulted partly from UIGEA in that Full Tilt could not buy me in directly.

The rest of the problems arose from the general stickiness of transactions involving moving money around when the institutions involved don't have any great incentive to help you. I lost more playing cash on Full Tilt whilst I figured out how to get the money out than it would have cost me simply to proceed immediately with the least elegant and most expensive transfer method. Doh!

Still, my issues presumably were nothing compared to those experienced by US players and I genuinely feel for them. Smart move by the US Government to force millions of law-abiding citizens to use offshore, inconvenient, expensive, possibly illegal and sometimes risky methods to move their own money ... not.

U is for Unlucky. Say no more really. "unlucky" or "ul" is what I always say when knocking out an opponent in a tournament. I say the same thing whether it's a complete cooler (his KK vs my AA), a bad beat (his AA vs my QJ), his bad play, my bad play, whatever it is. I consciously try never to say "sorry" even if the scenario is such that my play merits an apology !

I am not sorry, obviously, and I feel quite strongly about not wanting to rub it in.

A - Z of Poker: Day 20

2009-06-22T10:12:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day 20: T is for ...

T is for Tilt. An obvious choice for today. We are all susceptible to it, I suppose. Do we recognise it in others ? I think we do, and we should be looking to take advantage of it. Do we recognise it in ourselves ? I think people may have differing views on this.

Some will argue that it should be rather clear to us when we are tilting and then equally obvious that we should take defensive measures (which should really be some version of stopping play !). I believe others will take the view that the point where we cross from rational to tilt-driven is more insidious.

In either case, most of us will find a reason to carry on whilst on tilt. A good one is "they know I am on tilt so I will be able to get paid off more easily when I have a monster". Hmm ...

What about self-announced tilt ? Should we pay any attention ? Player-dependent I suppose. If I announce "I'm on tilt" you can generally take this at face value and know that I am going to be getting involved with bold and aggressive moves, sometimes bordering on desperation. This will not help you very much, however, as that is how I play anyway.

If Gandi announces tilt then you might, at best, include single-suited Aces and the 2nd nuts into his range.

The other facet to tilt is inducing tilt in others. This is an area in which I am world class. I don't need to engage in any particular tactics. Just playing my normal game and refraining to justify my play is enough to tilt certain people (naming no names, Miriam).

Lastly there is hindsight tilt. This is a very special type of tilt that manifests itself away from the table. It comes about in flashbacks and bad dreams when we rage and tilt at our own inexplicable play that resulted in yet another untimely (it's always untimely) tournament exit.

T is for Timing. Once we have put into action a solid game, have made proper adjustments to our opponents and the game state, and made every effort to plan our actions, a tournament result will often hinge on that certain something - "timing". I suppose it may be another synonym for "luck".

How else to explain that after waiting patiently for the right spot, just when we pick up KK and the action is call, raise, call, call, call and we are in the small blind. We push with the ideal stack size ..... and this time, the big blind has Aces !!

A - Z of Poker: Day 19

2009-06-21T10:10:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day 19: S is for ...

S is for Sunglasses. In the common perception, sunglasses must be one of the first things that are associated with the game. And, if I think about recent WSOP champions, then the immediate mental image of Joe Hachem, Chris Moneymaker and (especially) Greg Raymer has them wearing their trademark sunglasses.

I have never worn them myself during the game. I'm afraid I wouldn't be able to see the cards properly ! I also have chosen not to wear headphones or use an iPod. I rarely wear a hat at the table. In all these cases I suppose I am concerned I would lose more in terms of being able to follow the action than I would gain by appearing inscrutable. (Admittedly the hat shouldn't be too much of an issue!).

I have been wondering lately about changing my approach. It does, genuinely, seem to be the case that most successful players do use the full armoury. A case of "if you can't beat'em, join'em ?"

S is for Speech Play. This is an area of the game that I feel I am way behind in. I disapprove of certain tactics in poker which verge on rule-breaking but there are some devices that are definitely part of the game. I think physical "acting" such as feinting to move all-in or making a dummy "fold" action are completely acceptable and it's up to the opponent to defend against these. I don't use these very much, either.

Speech play is a 100% valid weapon I believe (obviously abusive language, and so on, is not).

Jamie Gold (2006 Main Event champion) is generally reckoned to have made enormous use of it. Admittedly his tactics were said to be at the very edge of the rules, so I do find that my admiration for his skillful application is significantly tempered by the thought that he was angle-shooting. That, and the fact he seems to be very annoying to play with ! Overall, in fact, I am neutral on him as I haven't met him and haven't played with him and I don't like to form a judgement based purely on the media. It's safe to say that the media isn't fair and balanced.

I think in the big tournaments I may revert to the default position of being silent in hands I am involved with. I think this is probably the safest option as I know I am weak at speech play. The counterargument is that trying to do this is likely to be pretty tricky (you may think I am a pretty quiet chap, but still 12 hours a day is a long time to be mute !) and that what could happen is that I end up giving a lot away on the few occasions I break the pledge.

The alternative - constant babble - may be worth a try. Maybe the English accent will confuse them, to my advantage !

A - Z of Poker: Day 18

2009-06-20T07:00:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 16 Letters

Day 18: R is for ...

R is for Razz. This was the first R that came into my mind even though for a long time I had literally no idea what Razz was (never having played it or watched it). Barry helpfully told me to "just play it the same as low-ball" which was of no use at all when I hadn't played that game either.

Eventually I was forced to learn the game when I decided to participate in the first HORSE tournament staged at The International. Actually, that format was filled with games I didn't know. Arguably I didn't even really know "H for Hold'em", since it was limit hold'em. The other games were even more exotic. I thought I might know "O" for Omaha but it turned out to be limit Omaha Hi-Lo Split which is not at all similar to PLO (high only).

Razz is 7-card stud (2 card down & 1 card up initially, followed by 3 more up cards and then a final down card. A total of 4 up, 3 down and no community cards) played for the low only.

The winning hand is the LOWEST 5-card hand you can make. Straights and flushes are not counted and Aces are low, so the nuts is A-2-3-4-5.

What is not apparent from these straightforward rules is what a mad, gambling game it can be.

There are 5 rounds of betting (after the initial 3 cards, then on each subsequent card) and the limits double on the 3rd round. So the fact is, even at limit, the pots get very big very quickly.

The other thing is that you get an extremely clear view of the relative merits of your own hand vs your opponents hand as it develops on each street. Lastly, unlike Hold'em where the best starting hand (AA) can often win unimproved, the best starting Razz hand [A-2-3] can be destroyed by bad cards to the point where you effectively have no hand at all whilst your opponents unpromising junk develops into a winner.

Ironically for a limit game, I find it presents quite a few opportunities for bluffing especially as you often have a very good idea what hole cards your opponents must have started with.

I used to find the whole idea of a game played for high-low split rather unappealing, let alone low-only, but now I will be actively on the look out for some Razz action on my trip to Vegas this year.

R is for Rules of Thumb. I find these very useful ! A classic example would be the "less than 10BB" rule or the "10% rule". As I understand them, the first rule tells me to push all in rather than raise if I have < id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">stack in a tournament. The second tells me that when playing a deep stack I can call a push from a short stack with any two cards if it represents less than 10% of my chips. Then there is the 20-1 rule which aims to help us decide whether to call with a small pair hoping to hit a set.

The usefulness of these rules is obvious. They substitute for tricky calculation in real time at the table and, if they are well-founded, then they can mean that we make lots of good decisions.

Their failing is that of course they fail to take account of all the game conditions. The fact is in a tournament poker situation, there are an incredible number of relevant variables including the whole payout structure, all of the chip stacks and their relative positions, player images, betting patterns, game dynamics and so on. Rules, de facto, cannot cope with this rich dataset.

A more subtle issue is that reliance on rules can tend to take us away from a proper analysis of the situation. Failing to practice the analysis stores up future problem.

Perhaps I need a new rule: Use No Rules.

A - Z of Poker: Day 17

2009-06-19T19:00:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day 17: Q is for ...

Q is for Quitting. I think one of the commonest things my sons ask me during or after a cash session is "why didn't you quit while you were ahead". It's kind of futile to attempt an explanation / justification along the lines of "table conditions, meta-considerations, game-flow" and so on. An answer of the "I didn't want to" variety probably stands more of a chance.

To be sure, their reasoning isn't particularly sound (basically, if I am ahead by any amount and no matter how short the elapsed time, they think I should be cashing out).

However, many are the times I look back on a session and lament not cashing out earlier. Quitting whilst I am ahead is something I am all but incapable of. It goes against all my instincts. To do so would mean leaving a game that might actually be a good game and is pretty certainly an enjoyable game (winning = enjoyable). I also consider hit'n'run to be a capital offence.

Based on evidence of my sessions, an independent analyst might conclude that I must equate hit'n'run with ever leaving the game in profit. That is to say, I have a strong tendency to play until I'm bust. I need to quit doing that !

Q is for Qualifier. As you know, I qualified to play in the main event of the WSOP this year. It's the second year that I've managed this and in fact it's really only the 2nd year that I tried to. I don't really take this to mean that I am all that good at qualification but I might feel next year (and subsequent years) that I have to do it again and I have visions of spending $1000s trying.

I'm wondering whether to actually play more qualifiers when I actually get to Vegas. It sounds a strange idea at first, but I have been told there is a lot of value in the single-table SnG qualifiers at the Rio. Perhaps the knowledge that I am already "in" will allow me to play without too much fear, which may be a good thing. But it would feel strange to lose money playing qualifiers after already making it. Each $ lost this way might feel worse than a $ spent trying to qualify in the first place.

A - Z of Poker: Day 16

2009-06-18T14:40:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day 16: P is for ...

P is for PLO. We finally got there! In poker, P is for Pot and Pot is for Omaha. I suppose if you said "pot" out of the poker context, then it might be assumed that you were speaking of the smoking kind of pot. And it often strikes me that smoking and PLO have something in common.

At first it's something that you have heard about but it's something other people do. You can't really see why anyone would want to do it, and you don't imagine that you would get involved with it.

Then one day, for whatever reason, you give it a quick try. You hate it, obviously. It leaves a bad taste in your mouth / wallet. Your initial suspicions were correct.

But, you are persuaded to give it another try and the pain is a little less the second time. Before long, you can't get enough of it and take every opportunity to get your hit. The thought of giving it up is ridiculous.

I actually did manage to give up smoking 12 years, 7 months and 29 days ago. Maybe that is where PLO differs because I am not sure I could ever give up that up.

P is for Position. Position, Position, Position as estate agents might say. I have a feeling that the importance of position follows one of those special rules where it is always slightly more important than you think, even after you have already realised it was more important that you previously thought.

It also follows that poker golden rule that whatever lesson you learn (notwithstanding that you paid for the lesson in cold, hard losses), the lesson has to be learned over and over again.

Repeat after me: Position is everything, only more so.

A - Z of Poker: Day 15

2009-06-17T10:03:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day 15: O is for ...

O is for Omaha. Well, it could be, but without P for Pot, Omaha is really not worthy of discussion so we shall postpone that topic for 1 more letter and instead look at O for Odds. I think even the least mathematical players concede there is merit in being able to quantify the value in particular situations. Some are more tractable than others, of course.

There are some genuinely complex scenarios but what surprises me greatly is how much disagreement one gets (at the table) between experienced players concerning positions as simple as a pre-flop matchup between two hands. You would think that a player would either (a) know the odds, and know they know or (b) not know, but know they don't know. Instead, I often see a wide range of "views" being given and firmly held even though there is quite simply one correct answer.

I am at a loss to explain it.

People often assume that I must know all the odds to the nth degree of accuracy. In fact I know only the most common and useful situations, and to a "give or take" degree of precision. I think this is plenty. I think it's foolish to ignore the usefulness of the basic odds, but it's an area with plenty of scope for spurious accuracy. This is my excuse, anyway, for not having studied it harder.

Actually, on my list of "things to do eventually" is to work out these odds myself, manually. I am half serious about this, as I suspect doing the work would make it much more likely I would remember and it would also give me a lot better understanding of what drives the odds in the first place. I think everyone would agree that understanding is more important than remembering in this case.

O is for "One Time". As in "One time, dealer!" or "Brick it one time" or "Ace one time" or "No Ace one time !" and so on. The power of hope and the belief in suggestion in poker. Hope keeps us going a lot of the time, I guess. Hopes are easily and quickly dashed but are equally quickly resurrected.

Of course the truest "One time" hope is for the "Big One". We hope that this time, this One Time we can be number One.

I'm hoping for a result in Vegas this "One Time" but, if not, then hopefully "Next Time".

A - Z of Poker: Day 14

2009-06-16T21:36:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day 14: N is for ...

N is for "nh". One of those ubiquitous shorthand comments that is liberally sprinkled into the chat boxes of online poker, "gg", "omg" and "wtf" being among the other bestsellers. Like some of those obscure words in long-lost languages, "nh" manages to pack a lot of nuanced meaning into 2 letters.

It can mean anything from "I can't believe I paid off 3 streets of value when you obviously flopped the nuts" to "I can't believe you called for a gutshot to the low end on a flushing paired and straightening board".

Personally, I rarely go beyond "nh", "ul" and (in tournaments) "gg" in the chat window. I do certainly go on tilt and am not beyond a silent rant at the injustice of it all (it's silent to them whether or not I actually scream it out loud) but I never vent my anguish in the chat. As we all know, however, the same cannot be said for all our opponents. The stream of abuse that can sometimes follow a perceived bad beat is incredible, and often hilarious.

I never join in the "discussion", not even to rebut suggestions that I am a "donk" (or worse). Actually, my style of play often triggers the odd comment. I don't respond. One reason it that I could never hope to equal that timeless riposte by Barry the Bully in one of his earliest videos. You must remember it: "Retard with your money".

N is for Never (as in Never Again). Never must be one of the most ill-used words in the whole English language. Never again will we ... play whilst drinking / drunk ... play on tilt .... play above our bankroll ... play above our limits ... play Omaha of any kind at any limits or in any venue. Never again will we rock up for 5 hours in an MTT then push with Q7o on the bubble. The list goes on.

I agree with that oldest of epithets: Never say Never.

Follow That Blog !

2009-06-16T12:43:00.003+01:00

If you look on the sidebar and scroll down a bit you will find an icon which you can click to say you are following my blog.

It will make me feel better if a few of you do that, so I so do not feel I am talking to a brick wall ! I think I have a pretty good idea who regularly reads the blog, in fact, but it would be interesting to really see.

I reserve the right to take the icon down again if an unsatisfingly small number of you actually do so....

By the way, you may notice I have registered myself as a follower. This is not just because I wanted to get the numbers up (from 1 to 2) but I really do read my own blog avidly. I find it quite interesting to look back and see waht I was thinking and doing at last year's WSOP for example !

They say it is a good idea to learn from your mistakes so I am putting some serious study into the catalogue of errors that are recorded on this blog !

A - Z of Poker: Day 13

2009-06-15T13:27:00.005+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day 13: M is for ...

M is for M: I was introduced to "M", like many of us, by Dan Harrington in his excellent "Harrington on Hold'em" series of tournament books. The M itself is apparently for Magriel, an individual whom I have never heard of before or since. For such an important concept, I actually think Harrington develops it relatively little in the book.

Mind you, not as little as "Harrington's Q" which he defines, names after himself, and then never refers to again !

M in this context is the number of rounds of blinds and antes that our stack permits us to survive for. It needs rather a lot of modifications and qualifiers to truly inform our best play, but it's a very useful shortcut for a basic determination of our tournament situation. And, of course, any poker concept that can be summarised in an acronym finds favour with me. One-letter acronyms ftw !

M is for Merging Ranges: This is an example of the kind of concept that you hear the modern players discussing. I have no idea what it means ! Actually, that is not true. I have some idea what it means, like I have some idea about ICM.

I suppose I really ought to put the extra effort in to study some of the poker theory and mathematics of poker. I am not someone who believes that the maths & theory is all important. I think common sense and experience can take you a long way. But it surely must add a dimension to one's game. Is this more important than adding in some psychology or table talking skills ? Probably not, but it is possibly easier to learn (for someone like me, anyway).

I certainly think that betting theories that focus on the stack sizes are very powerful and that's really something I would like to improve in my game. I think a combination of study plus experience is required in that area: study the maths and the typical situations, practice using that in real-game situations, then come back and review the hands with the benefit of hindsight and the luxury of time to analyse. Ideally discuss the hands with other players as well.

M obviously also stands for Must try harder ...

One Day At A Time

2009-06-15T09:46:00.002+01:00

I have received some complaints that my A-Z of poker is not being published on a satisfactory daily basis. My apologies to readers.

It's a good thing that I'm not a paid journalist, with this sort of record at missing publication deadlines.

Although, in fact, it may be the lack of an true externally-imposed deadline that is causing the problem because I am in fact pretty good with real deadlines (a legacy of many essay-crisis-all-nighters from University days).

I should say, in deference to those who studied proper essay-producing degrees, that when I say "essay crisis" it is in the metaphorical sense. I had the good fortune to study a degree where precious little actual written output was required.

However, when such hard-copy evidence of effort was required, and after not neglecting to put in the required hours at the bar/pinball/darts match etc., I would always get it done somehow.

So, I cannot properly account for my failure to produce the daily blog. I will catch up shortly. Since I don't have a time machine, the blogs will appear in a cluster and not in true daily sequence.

The reader can, if he so wishes, delay reading the entries so as to simulate the effect of daily output.

Now, blogger allows me to date the entries as if I posted them on the daily schedule and I will probably take advantage of that facility. So, for many readers it will appear as if the blogs follow the proper sequence and they will be left to wonder what on Earth I am on about in this post.

A - Z of Poker: Day 12

2009-06-14T12:53:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day12: L is for ...

L is for Live. Live is the kind of poker I prefer, I have concluded. Yes, it's slower, more expensive, less comfortable and theoretically less profitable. However, I don't really play for profit (I'm not playing deliberately for loss either, despite any evidence to the contrary). So, really, the appeal of internet poker is mainly that it's there for all those times that I cannot get to a live game.

I especially like playing live where I know the place, the people, their names and they know me. So I have always enjoyed playing at the Gutshot (before it closed) and at The International now.

I also love playing live in Vegas, obviously. Clearly that is a different live experience to playing in a small (by Vegas standards that is !) club in London but it's one of the Wonders of the World and the fact is that I do know a lot of people even in Vegas (like me they are visiting from London) - especially at this time of year. Those friendly faces enhance the Vegas experience for me.

"Live" is also what my cards tend to be at showdown. Since I often play the most ridiculous hands at the slightest excuse, I am often caught out with 9-2o vs A-K and similar match-ups. The best that can be said about that is that my cards are "live". The definition can also be extended, when the need arises, to 9-2o facing AA.

"Live one" is not a label one wants to attract of course. But no one would argue that any game with me in it is likely to be Live-ly !

L is for Legal. Is poker legal? Is internet poker legal ? I simplify the question considerably, of course, especially as the most important qualifier to the question is L for Location. My view is that the answer in most cases is that it hasn't been definitively shown NOT to be legal.

In the event that the decision is that it is NOT legal, then my view is that the decision is ridiculous ! The situation in the US is of course ridiculously ridiculous.

I think that, on the face of it, poker and/or internet poker may be illegal in quite a few places in the US (but not in others ... the very definition of ridiculous imo). The idea that one of the most popular and perfectly defensible pastimes can be illegal in the country with more poker players than anywhere else in the world just beggars belief. It's even less reasonable than that other brilliant idea ... Prohibition.

Reportedly, President Obama is pro-poker (following quite a tradition amongst US presidents)and may sort the mess out, but I would imagine he's busy and wouldn't want to be holding my breath.

A - Z of Poker: Day 11

2009-06-13T12:23:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day11: K is for ...

K is for Karma. I believe it ! I suspect 'Karma' has a very technical meaning, strictly speaking, but of course I am thinking of "it was meant to be" and "I just felt lucky".

My travel plans for June and July have certainly been karma-affected. My qualification for the WSOP main event - by means of a quadruple-shootout win - had all the hallmarks of the magic "K for Karma".

Ideally, this karma should extend into the event itself and produce the necessary one-outers and bricks required to see me into the money. I do genuinely think that having a positive attitude and feeling good about one's chances helps in the actual tournament. This has nothing to do with superstition, and everyone to do with the fact that poker as a mind game relies on confidence, and on projecting doubt into the mind of the opponent.

I am equally certain that when I hit a miracle river after a terrible call and say "it was karma, I felt lucky!" my opponent will not appreciate that it was all meant to be.

K is for Kelly Criterion. This principle states that wherever and whenever there is demand for a poker club, and such poker club is not definitely illegal, then that poker club shall be opened !

It is also apparently the name of a mathematical principle that aims to put some method behind every gambler's hunch that they have a "system for beating the house". It's a pretty pukka (and relatively simple) piece of theory that gives the optimal size of bets according to certain conditions and is also used in financial applications.

The most interesting application of it that I have personally come across was in the "The Vic roulette team" story. I say "story" as if to suggest it is fiction, but it's a known fact. Or, if not, then it should be true. Actually, it was widely reported, eg here.

Essentially, a group of smart poker players took advantage of a seriously -EV promotion that the Victoria Casino offered on roulette (40-1 odds on the "day of the month" number). The team of players pooled together a large bankroll to exploit the edge freely offered by the house to the players and the Kelly Criterion was used to decide on the correct betting strategy to maximise the win whilst minimising the risk of getting unlucky and going bust.

I have played (poker) with a couple of people from the team that ran up many tens of thousands of profit from this wheeze and it's nearly as much fun listening to the tale as having been in the team itself (actually, probably more fun but less profitable !).

A - Z of Poker: Day 10

2009-06-12T11:50:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day10: J is for ...

J is for Jacks. Pocket Jacks is one of those hands that is routinely referred to as "the hardest hand to play in Hold'em" or used in such phrases as "I hate Jacks; I always lose with them".

There is some merit to the claim that Jacks present a difficult problem. I suppose the main issue is that they will usually be the best hand pre-flop, but will generate strong action only when behind (or racing at best). In that sense, they are similar to AQ and indeed pocket Queens: another hand that I find can lead to very bad spots.

The fact is, though, that people will extend "I hate XX" up to Queens, Ace-King, pockets Kings and even to Aces. "I hate Aces" is one of the most bizarre things that poker players utter. It's a curious syndrome which is the result of the truism that poker leads constantly to disappointment !

J is for January (and July). If it's January, it's time to reset that spreadsheet with those precise columns of P&L, hours played, rake, ROI%, $VPIP and so on. Good intentions abound. Actually, I do know of some players who really have kept meticulous records (in some cases, from the very beginning of their poker playing career). Those players tend to be winners, although the losing player with accurate records is in some ways more impressive (he/she has a peculiarly realistic and objective viewpoint on the game).

More often, though, if it's February then the spreadsheet has probably been neglected beyond reasonable hope of repair !

Now, if it's July (as it soon will be) then it's time for a 2nd chance (it's a game of two halves?) and of course it's the WSOP. If ever there was a chance to repair the damage in one go, this is it !

A - Z of Poker: Day 9

2009-06-11T11:28:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day9: I is for ...

I is for International. Another obvious choice for the A-Z. After the disappointment of seeing the Gutshot close, it has been nice to see so many familiar faces at The International club nearby. It's not got quite the same ring as "Gutshot", but still. You do meet the most fascinating people there and I've enjoyed/endured some pretty sick sessions of poker there. Some of those, in turn, have been chronicled on my blog.

I'm still waiting for my first tournament win here. As things stand, with my imminent trip to Vegas, I suppose I am hoping that my first "International" success (in the geographical sense) comes before my first "The International" victory.

I is for ITM. There were a few acronymical choices here. ICM was another very obvious candidate although then I would have had to write about what I don't know about the Independent Chip Model rather than what I do (either that, or go for an exceptionally short entry).

ITM (In The Money) is where we all want to be of course. I am still waiting for my first ITM finish in any WSOP, GUKPT, EPT etc event and I certainly hope I can tick that off in the next few weeks. On the whole, I don't place great emphasis on ITM finishes in tournaments. I prefer to shoot for the win - a great excuse for wild plays near the bubble. Discussion of correct play near the money does seem to generate quite a polarised debate.

Some players (eg Derek Kelly of Gutshot fame) are adamant that the first duty of a tournament player is to cash and that only then can the business of climbing the payscale take precedence. Others (especially the internet hotshots/youngsters/JoeJoe-lookalikes) are equally clear that cashing, per se, is not an objective. The two schools of thought might recommend the same play in a particular situation but the latter will give little or no weight to "tournament life" as an independent priority.

I have never agreed with Derek about the over-riding need to cash in any particular event but insofar as I have failed so far to make a money finish in any major event, I will be wimping out big time if the occasion arises in Vegas in 2 weeks' time !

A - Z of Poker: Day 8

2009-06-10T23:22:00.002+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day8: H is for ...

H is for H-Bomb. Poker nicknames are for life. I can't ever change my name now and (like any good poker moniker) it was not invented by the owner.

I believe it was "Ron Burgundy" of the Gutshot forum who coined the phrase during a lively forum league game last year. I had just scooped a huge pile of chips in my trademark style of building a massive pot whilst in need of some help from the deck, and then hitting.

The phrase "H-bomb" immediately resonated with the other players in the game, and the name stuck.

The H-bomb style is built on aggression and luck. The luck sometimes appears to flow in unlimited quantities. The aggression rarely slackens. The collective memory of my opponents (and myself) tends to selectively remember those occasions when the aggression and luck have combined to suitably thermonuclear effect.

The H-bomb effect is often instantaneous. I will sometimes sit in a stagnant £1-2 PLO game, where the £500 stacks are moving at glacial speed, and have the whole table all-in pre-flop within 5 hands. Usually sooner.

At the WSOP this year I am hoping to explode a few bombs without causing too much collateral damage.

H is for Hendon Mob. Ask poker players what "Hendon Mob" means to them and I am guessing that whilst many could name one or more of the four mobsters, nearly all of them would mention the massive database hosted on their site. Results from every significant poker tournament are tracked there. Hundreds of tournaments per month, thousands of players. A cash in a WSOP, EPT, GUKPT would obviously be there along with all the successes from festivals (large and small) from all over the world.

Type in the name of any famous player and their achievements will be listed. However, it is not just the world champions and household names. Many of my poker friends merit inclusion. Sometimes it can be just a £300 place in a £50 end of festival freezeout.

Not a big deal really ? But: they are there and I am not !

This is one reason why if I get near the money in Vegas this year, I am folding till past the bubble. I am folding until I am in that database !

A - Z of Poker: Day 7

2009-06-09T22:58:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day7: G is for ...

G is for Gutshot. Where to start? Well, that is where it all started for me. I came to the old Gutshot club in November 2004 as the guest at a corporate event. I hadn't played before (except for a dabble online at Ladbrokes.com). It was a £50 rebuy and - although I could certainly afford the stakes - I didn't want to be throwing money away.

So it was that I eked out my dwindling stack so I just made it to the end of the rebuy where I could get the extra value add-on without having needed any rebuys. I think I had less than one blind left at that stage. Do you recognise this thriftiness in my current rebuy approach ? No ?

Well, after the break I went on a mini heater and after reaching the final table with the chip-lead I eventually went on to finish 2nd (A3 losing to J6 - I still remember the hand).

The rest, as they say, is history and I hosted many a corporate event myself at the Gutshot before it finally shut its doors for the last time.

G is for Gamble. I am firmly in the school that argues poker is a game of skill. I don't deny the role that lady luck plays, but her part is played on the stage of skillful foundations. As such, I will tend to resist the assertion that poker is gambling at all.

The good player, I would argue, can wrestle control away from the luck fairy and his enterprise is more akin to investment than speculation.

On the whole, I think not nearly enough research has been done in an attempt to support the skill hypothesis. I have generally been underwhelmed by the evidence and arguments marshaled in defence of poker as a skill game whenever it has come to legal proceedings.

Of course, even if you accept this line of reasoning, you should realise that I apply it to "other players". Myself, I like a gamble !

A - Z of Poker: Day 6

2009-06-08T20:22:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day6: F is for ...

F is for Fold. My fold button is generally broken, both live & online. That goes for both cash and tournaments. I take, rather literally, the view that you can't win by folding. I love the action too much (as most of my opponents quickly realise, whether they like it or not).

However, occasionally, I embrace the F-word. I have done so most notably at the WSOP events last year. It takes a huge effort of will for me to do this, but I was rewarded with some fairly deep runs. I was, briefly, able to appreciate the power of the fold !

Mind you, the hands that haunt in the long run are the bad folds, much more than the ill-advised calls. In fact the worst kind are those where I folded and forever feel that I had been robbed (having not seen my opponent's hand).

Folding QQ on the river vs Thomas Fougeron in the Main Event last year, for example. In many ways a routine hand, but I felt I allowed myself to get outplayed and I am still thinking about the fold a year later !

I do accept (in theory) that we're supposed to make the decision and move on. I think I feel those difficult folds more keenly because it is so counter to my normal approach.

Of course the other folds that annoy me are the ones that my opponents don't make when I bluff all streets and push all-in on the river !

F is for Forum. There's only one real forum in poker of course (and I don't mean 2+2). I didn't take to the forum at first (I'm too old!). It took me a while to get used to the way conversations are conducted on the interweb. Personally, I still stick very much to the offline and old-school maxim "if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all".

But I must have found plenty of nice things to say, as I now am the 4th most prolific poster of all time on the Gutshot forum and am now catching "omen666". So perhaps it was quantity not quality which earned me the 2008 GOSCAR for "Forum Poster of The Year"!

A - Z of Poker: Day 5

2009-06-07T10:31:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day5: E if for ...

E is for +EV (positive Expected Value). One of those many buzz-words and acronyms beloved of poker math-geeks. Also a shorthand among poker aficionados for a favourable happening in any part of life.

We're supposed to play "+EV poker": making the right choices in terms of game selection, positional play, hand ranges, pot odds and so on. Opinions seems to vary on whether we should pursue an EV edge at all costs, but it's hard to argue that +EV is a bad model for success.

For me, though, poker is +EV by nature. I love playing, and writing about it, reading about it, just being around it. I am a wholehearted subscriber to the notion that "the next best thing to playing poker and winning, is playing poker and losing".

The fact is, of course, that this attitude is almost certainly -EV in terms of the actual business of winning. However, from the glass-half-full perspective, poker is win-win for me.

E if for Early Night. This is a bad thing in poker terms. On a Sunday night I will generally play at least one of the large field MTTs. Tonight I played the $250k guarantee (30,000 runners) and the benchmark "Sunday Millions" on pokerstars, and I also played the $50k and $100k guarantees on gutshot.com.

The "Million" routinely runs till breakfast-time on Monday. The others are not quite as intense, but should see the winners playing until the early hours.

So, being able to switch off the PC at 11:30pm meant this was definitely a "-EV" evening. An opportunity to catch up on sleep was scant compensation!

A - Z of Poker: Day 4

2009-06-06T09:22:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day4: D is for ....

D is for Discipline. An obvious choice. If you had to pick out a few essential qualities for successful poker then you might be able to argue that mathematical ability is necessary (but you will find plenty of counterexamples among "natural" players), or that player-reading is vital (but, in truth, a solid and winning game is possible without this especially online where its importance is limited).

The ability to bluff ? The heart to gamble ? Being born lucky ?

All of these are useful but one quality that is simply indispensable (and without which all the other qualities can founder) is discipline.

This is a problem, since many otherwise brilliant players clearly lack it in sufficient quantities. The evidence for that is the descent-to-busto regularly endured by obviously winning players. Quite a lot of them seem to think "D is for Dice".

Discipline means many things in practice: bankroll management, game selection, tilt control, session management and so on.

Unfortunately, discipline is hard to learn, hard to practice, and lapses in discipline tend to be rewarded with swift and severe punishment from the poker gods.

Discipline is going to be the "D" in my plan to play "ABCD poker" in Vegas this year. "Apply Basic Commonsense and Discipline". For me, this will mean things like: NOT accepting the unlimited free alcohol on offer at the cash tables, NOT playing for 28 hours without a break, considering sleep as an option from time to time, and so on.

D is for Disappointment. It's incredible that this game can seem to exert such a strong pull on us, and such desire to get back in the game, when all it really seems to offer most of the time is constant and repeated disappointment !

This is especially true in tournaments. Short of winning the whole thing, the result is generally:

disappointment at an early exit or else:
disappointment at not making the most of a good start or else:
disappointment at falling away in the mid stages or else:
disappointment at losing out on the bubble or else:
disappointment at only just making it past the bubble or else:
disappointment at not making the final table or else:
disappointment at only just making the final table or else:
disappointment at not making the final 3 where all the big money is or else:
disappointment at getting to the final 3 but not finishing the job

Cash games also don't fail to disappoint. Either we played a long time but didn't win much, or we are disappointed that we left too early, or left too late. We didn't cash in when we had a big stack, or didn't carry on when we had a big stack to play with. Or we didn't play well, or we DID play well but weren't rewarded. Or the other players were too good, or too bad. And so it goes on.

In any case, we will be disappointed if we don't get a chance to put it all right next time, and soon.

A - Z of Poker: Day 3

2009-06-05T19:02:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day3: C is for ...

C is for Confidence. Poker is undoubtedly a mind-game. Some of the mental skills are obviously mathematical in nature - counts the outs, calculate the pot odds etc. Some are more qualitative: the discipline required for controlling tilt or good game selection, for example.

Poker, especially tournament poker, throws a lot at us in terms of mental challenge - constant frustration basically ! It can be very difficult to play well when we are running bad and seemingly being 1-outered for fun.

Conversely, when we're on a heater, we believe we can do anything.

I believe that a confident attitude is a positive factor for success. I would characterise it as "necessary but not sufficient". I think that without confidence in our game, we will surely lose. We won't be capable of making the moves that are required, and our observant opponents will pick up on our weakness and exploit it.

Naturally one needs to guard against over-confidence but a healthy dose of self-belief is first order of business.

C is for Concentration. The fact is, there is a lot going on in a poker game. The cards are the least of our worries. We are supposed to be constantly monitoring the state of the game which especially includes how our opponents are playing, all the chips stacks at the table, the current tournament situation including the remaining players, average chips and prize structure.

So many times, in hindsight, we will find that we didn't need to get involved in a particular situation or that we couldn't pass, or that THEY couldn't pass or whatever it may be.

Concentrate !!

A - Z of Poker: Day 2

2009-06-04T15:24:00.000+01:00

From London to Vegas in 26 Letters

Day 2: B is for ...

B is for Bankroll Management (BRM). Apparently bankroll management is one of the most important skills of a professional/successful/winning player.Is it more important than running good ? Ha, I doubt it !

I don't play with money I can't afford to lose (fortunately, and I am in the fortunate position to be able to do this).

This is not to say that the money doesn't matter to me. Au contraire. I manage to be very upset when I lose the money I have nominated as my bankroll. This, and managing to have a bankroll in the first place is as far as I am claim to practice BRM !

The fact is that proper BRM is that other B-word .... BORING and most people will agree that when I am playing the game is anything other than boring !

B is for Bad Beat. Ah yes ... a universal constant of poker.

I like to think that I score very high on the etiquette index in poker. You will find that I never slow-roll; I never criticise another player or a dealer; I do not scream and shout; I do not call the clock on people; I do not angle-shoot or seek to bend the rules in any way. For me this is just the right way to behave.

I have to accept in poker that I am giving up some edge because of this, but for me this behaviour is so hard-wired that it is not up for negotiation.

There is one area, though, where I consistently fall short of my own high standards. I cannot help relating bad-beat stories. I try to stop myself but I can't !

I often don't cast them as bad-beats per se; I usually will explain in my story that the event was just one of those things, or my bad play or something other than a pure beat.

However, that just means they are thinly-veiled beats and maybe that's even worse !

I would make a resolution to myself to stop telling bad-beat stories but I'm trying to give up making resolutions that are impossible to keep to !

1 out of 3 Ain't Bad

2009-06-04T10:08:00.003+01:00

Three of my poker objectives (in realistic-but-non-trivial category) have been:

- win an MTT at The International
- cash in a WSOP, GUKPT, EPT, etc event **
- win the $20k rebuy comp on gutshot.com (Cake)

** or at least make Day2

In each case, I have been close several times.

In live MTTs at The International I have been runner up, and had other deep runs including 3 final tables in successive weeks.

In the case of the large-field live events, I couldn't say I have been right on the bubble, but I have been late on day1 several times.

In the case of the $20k ($30 rebuy NLH) on Cake, that is on every day at 8pm and I have played it many times. It is a really soft field and I regularly cash in it with a bunch of final tables already. Best place previously =2nd.

Well, last night I finally won the $20k. $4,240 for first place.

I didn't start too well - I hardly won any chips in the rebuy period (had 3,128 when I could have had 3,000 just by buying in and adding on at the break). After adding on I still had a usable stack (5,628 at the 75/150 level) but I frittered away 1/3rd of these before making a slow climb.

I doubled up with AA vs AK at the 125/250/25 level to stand on 17k and with another nice situation (KK vs AK at the 300/600/50) I advanced to 40k. Just playing very solid, tbh.

KK again - vs 52 at the 800/1600/150 level: I raise to 3,599 from the cut-off and the BB calls. The flop is T-5-T. He checks to me and I bet 6,899 into 9,198. He instantly shoves for a total of 35k. Easy call. Up to 80k now and cruising.

I start to open up a bit and am also winning vs short stacks: eg AJ vs JT.

I also pick up some nice pots in position: the SB raises me and I call with K4s on the Big Blind. Flop AK5 (two hearts). He bets, I call. He bets the pot on the turn (a 4); I call. We both check the river which is a Jack. He shows T-5. I should perhaps raise the turn but I don't want to play all-in here and I pick up a 78k pot as it is.

On 140k now and among the top few places.

I am now sat on the immediate right of "patrice1", an unbelievably aggressive player who is in every pot and winning most of them. He is incredibly loose in raising, and calling, and seems impossible to kill. I am not in the best spot position-wise.

I lose a chunk with A3 vs AT. In this pot, I feel my Ace is good and call a shove when the flush hits the river (I am confident the player does not have a flush, which he didn't. He had hit two-pair, however, and I wish I had shoved first on the river to give him the decision). Back to 80k.

I 4-bet all-in vs "patrice1" who calls with Q9 (!!) vs my pair. I hold. Back to 160k. I shove again with AK against him but he finds a fold (he must have had utter filth !)

I picked up another nice pot from the BB vs the same nutter: He makes it 12,600 from UTG (1,500/3,000/300) and I call with Kh9h. This is a call for value here!

Flop: 8-J-J (pretty good flop). Check-check. Tun is a 9. I check-call 14,400. I think I am winning but I want to keep the pot somewhat small out of position to a madman. River: Ace. Not delighted with this card as he can easily have had a random Ace to start.

I feel I have a solid bluff-catcher vs this player and when I check he bets 28,800 - about half his stack. I could check-raise for value I suppose but I call and he shows Q3 (suited).

I evenually knock this player out when I push from the SB with Q7. He only has 8bb and I feel he will call with any hand. My hand is 50% vs random cards and with all the dead money (blinds, antes) it is worth it when I have him outchipped 8-1. He calls with A2 and I make a Queen and a straight !

Now I am in a decent chip-lead with 6left. I keep the pressure up with a lot of small raises and continuation bets and a selection of 3-bets, 4-bets and re-raises based on the situations (and occasionally on good cards !)

I show few hands and am getting quite a few walks in the Big blind. It feels like they don't want to take me on. On the other hand, the 2nd-in-chips player (goliath31) unaccountably seems to pay me off with 2nd best hands in position when I bet 3 streets for value. His passive play cost him huge amounts of chips: he can raise me off these hands easily. Folding would be his 2nd-best play. Calling down is the worst of all options.

At 3-handed, I have more chips than the other two combined and I still have a 4/3 advantage when we start the heads-up.

goliath continued to play pretty passively and I felt it was a matter of time before I would overcome him. However, we were playing deep-stacked now with 850,000 chips in play at the 3,000/6,000/600 level. I did not want to get all-in too quickly when I felt I had an advantage just grinding away.

I had secured a > 3-1 lead when I 4-bet with 99 and faced a call all in from AQ. By the turn, he had a flush draw and a gutshot to go with his 2 overcards, so it wasn't too surprising that he found a winner on the river.

Back to square one ! A long heads-up dragged on.

I actually lost the lead for a short time after getting pretty deep in a hand with 5-2 and flopping a pair and an open-ender. I gave up to a shove on the turn where I had raised his lead bet; I put him on a strong draw but wasn't prepared to call with a pair of deuces !

I had to survive an all-in with AK vs JT. He had limp-shoved my initial raise from the BB (slightly odd play that one) and with my lead restored, I once again built up to a 3.5:1 advantage before getting him to call all-in with Q9 vs 77.

50/50 for the win (or else, back to square one again !) and this time my pair held.

Job done, finally !

I'm hopeful I can tick off the other two this year as well. Starting tonight at the club for the £50 freezeout again.

A – Z of Poker: London to Vegas in 26 Letters

2009-06-03T22:10:00.002+01:00

It’s 26 days till I will sit down to play in this year’s WSOP (Event #54) so there is just time to get in a series of blogs containing the wisdom (or lack of it) that I have amassed about this game that we love, hate, or love to hate.

Day 1: A is for ...

A is for Alcohol. It is often said that Alcohol and Poker don’t mix. This is false. I am able to mix the two very easily, and for long periods. I have tested their miscibility to destruction. Bankroll destruction, that is. The things I will do for the scientific method...

A particularly thorough experiment took place at The Venetian last July. The peer-reviewed results are here.

What is true is that Alcohol and Winning Poker are hard to combine. Maybe that’s what they meant?

A is for All-In. Yes indeed. Sooner or later (in tournaments anyway) it comes to this. I certainly prefer to be the one shoving, and not the one making the all-in call. As a general rule, I think it's somewhat accepted that it's better to get your chips in first although I possibly take that nugget of advice to extremes.

Before a big tournament, I will actually practice my all-ins. I'm not joking !

I mentally (and occasionally out loud !) imagine the scenario has arrived and I am saying:

"All in" or
"I'm all in" or
"I'm ALL in" or
"I put you all in" or
"OK, I'll go all in" or
" " (silently pushes chips over the line) or
" " (silently waves hands indicating the shove)

What possible purpose can this serve ? None, really. I guess I can make a tenuous argument that visualisation is a useful approach in tournament poker. Really it's just evidence of my degenerate love of poker !

Suicide Kings

2009-06-03T10:19:00.003+01:00

Down at the International Club on 28th May.

News of my Main Event qualification had reached a lot of players there, so I received plenty of congratulations. That was certainly a big win, but I am still in search of a first MTT win at the club, and I really want to be able to tick off that achievement.

I'm not saying that I'd rather win here than cash in the WSOP, but it's a big hole in my poker CV.

I had a good feeling that this was my night. A positive attitude in the game really helps, and my early form in the tournament backed up my good vibes.

First hand, I tried out the check-raise bluff on the flop and got this through. For once I had started in an upwards direction !

Soon after, I raised with 99 and saw a flop 4-way. One player check-called me on the T-4-4 flop. We checked the six on the turn. The river brought a 9. George-the-Cake called a decent size bet on the river and I added a chunk to my stack.

Now a real stroke of fortune. Steve Z raised the 100/200 blinds to 500 from UTG. Next to speak, I raise to 1,400 with AK. A mid-position player now makes it 3,700 with a bit less than that behind. Steve Z gets out of the way and I decide that (a) I have chips left if I lose (b) the player looks to me like he can raise there without AA or KK and (c) it's my night.

I set him in, and of course he insta-calls with Kings. Steve Z apparently folded AK as well so there are only 2 Aces left. No Ace comes, but the board runs out a completely sick 8-9-T-J-Q so that I river broadway and march into the chip lead.

It doesn't all go my way: I call down a hand with JJ facing AA, and then choose the wrong time to bluff Doug Henshaw. However, I get all those chips (and more) back when I limp and call a raise with KQo. Wilson has also called on the button.

The flop is KT8 all diamonds. I have TP2K and the Queen high flush draw. I check to the raiser who thinks, then pushes for 1.5x the pot.

I give it some thought, but can't really pass (especially as I have him covered). He's winning with KT -- I am a bit shocked at his pre-flop raise tbh. As it was my night, the flush came straight away. Wilson meanwhile had failed to raise preflop with QQ (and missed a chance to knock us both out there and then).

I now move tables and immediately get into a hand with Gary the dealer. As I get dealt in, I am first to act from EP with Jacks. I give a bit of chat to Gary on the BB - in principle I am trying to sell my hand as weaker than it is when I make a raise to 1,700 (300/600).

Gary reciprocates and implies he is raising with air as he makes it 5,700. Gary in fact has pocket 9s. I insta-shove and now Gary tries to get a read off me. I don't know whether he does or not, but he presumably decides insta-shove=AK and makes the call.

A Jack is the first card out and although he picks up a gutshot on the turn, my Jacks hold and I have > 50k.

Soon after, Sam Grafton pushes for 7,200 from his button into my big blind. I am about to pass 33 (I am not a fan of calling with the very small pairs) when Sam says something that makes me change my mind. Not a read, as such, because pockets 3s are hardly crushing any hand.

However, Sam shows pocket 2s! Further confirmation that tonight's the night.

Another table move, and I take out another player. Doug Henshaw pushes with KQ and I snap with Aces. Poor Doug had lost the previous hand with the exact same matchup (vs another player).

I now had > 80k chips, the chip lead and about 3x the average chips with only 2 tables left. I could see victory awaiting me.

So, it was a shock to me that 15minutes later and in about 14th place I suddenly went to the rail in one hand.

I had 78k at the start of the hand and was covered by one player. We're playing 7 handed when I open for 6,000 (blinds 1,000/2,000) from 2 off the button (AQo).

Wilson (who has me slightly outchipped) makes a flamboyant raise to 25,000 from the button.

For some reason, at the time, I felt he was making a bit of a move. In hindsight, why would he do that against a raise from the other big stack ?.

In the heat of the moment, I pretty much insta-shoved. His call came pretty quickly with pocket Kings.

The flop came King-high which sealed matter. I was in a bit of a daze. From "out-in-front" to simply "out" in one rash move.

In discussions afterwards, there was consensus that I should simply and easily fold the AQ to the raise. Once key difference in view, though, was the reasons why I should fold.

In my hindsight analysis, I gave quite a lot of weight to the notion that I do not want to lock horns with the chip leader - the one player who can knock me out. Most of the other players felt that ranges and ICM considerations dictated the fold but were not concerned about "tournament life" as such.

Whatever the right reasons, I am gutted that I blew my chance to cruise onto the final table and perhaps secure that 1st win.

STP on FTP

2009-05-24T15:48:00.008+01:00

STP in the world of finance means "Straight Through Processing", a holy grail that is often sought and rarely achieved. The same acronym has no standard usage in poker as far as I am aware, but I am going to invoke it for "Straight Through Poker" ..... read on to find out what I mean.

FTP means "File Transfer Protocol" I suppose, in common internet usage but in poker it stands for "Full Tilt Poker", the second big beast in the online world behind Pokerstars.

I have had a Full Tilt account for a while but hardly ever use it, so I did not expect to see it figure in the most significant event of my poker year.

I was chatting with a friend (from poker and finance) who had just won a seat to the Main Event of the World Series through a qualifier on Full Tilt.

I was already musing on whether to make a serious qualification attempt. I knew that I definitely would not go unless I qualified cheaply, and I had played a few freerolls. But I thought a plan was needed if I was to stand a chance.

Jonny recommended the $216 Double Shootout that had been a route to success for him.

In that format, 81 players play on 9 tables of 9. Each table plays to a single winner, then those players play a final table to take the main prize.

I thought I would give it a try but I didn't have $216 available in my account, so I registered for an $8 tournament of the same format. The winner of this (actually the top 2) would get a ticket to play the $216 game.

I didn't have any great expectations, but it was just one of those days when things go right !

Before long, I had won my first table in the $8 event. The tournament wasn't full so I only had to finish in the top 2 of 6 to win a $216 ticket. I duly managed that. Part one accomplished. It wasn't particularly tough but, then, there wasn't much on the line - only $8 invested.

Now for the real deal. What happened at our table was that one player quickly hoovered up a substantial portion of all the chips. With 3 of us left, I was in 3rd place with 2,900 chips;2nd had 5,700 and the leader had nearly 10,000. Now a couple of crucial hands.

On the BB (50/100) with 9h7h I face a min-raise from the button. I call. The flop is A-7-7. Bingo. I check and he bets 600 into 450. I flat call. The turn is a horrible Ace. Now my hand, which was massive on the flop, has turned into a bluff-catcher.

I decide to await developments, and check. He checks behind. The river is always going to be pretty irrelevant unless it is a 7 or an Ace; in the event it is a 6. I can see no benefit to betting here, so I check and it's always in my mind that I may be faced with a big call.

I am never going to be raising whatever bet he makes and as it is, he puts me all in, which is a bet of 1.5x the pot but only 1/4 of his chips.

This is it. His hand is pretty much the nuts or nothing, and for whatever reason I decide to call his bluff, literally. He shows Q8o and I double up.

A few hands later I am in the SB with JTo vs the same player. I call and then call his min raise from the BB. The flop is 7-8-9 with two clubs, making me the nuts. I lead out for 600, he raises to 1,900. I riase all in and he calls with K-6. He has a draw to the low end of the straight (that draw is dead to my hand), and a backdoor club draw. From his perspective he may think his overcard King is relevant.

As things stand, he is in very bad shape (<5% to win). The Qc on the turn improves him to a 1 in 5 chance, but the river is safe. I cover him by just 30 chips, so we're heads up. Heads-up lasts 25 hands, of which I lose just 3 hands. The end comes when I raise on the button with pocket deuces. He instantly shoves for 25 big blinds so I am sure he is on Ace-X.

I have a 3-1 lead so if I lose we will still be even in chips and I am confident I can grind him back down again. So, knowing I am winning now, I call. He shows A-5 and when the flop comes T-3-2, my set is miles ahead although he does have a gutshot 4 for a straight. My set holds and we are on the final table.

My first table was over so quickly that of the 54 starters, 29 are still in action ! I have to wait a fair while before the final table can begin.

It dawns on me that so far I have effectively turned $8 into $2,000 - a 250x return. It's a bit moot as I cannot cash out, but I now have a 1 in 6 chance of taking down a $12k package !

We all start with 18,000 chips and blinds of 120/240 so it is pretty deep-stacked poker. No need for shove-or-fold any time soon.

Things start rather well. I fold a couple of junk hands, and then pick up QQ on the small blind. I face a raise to 600 from the cut-off and I straightforwardly raise to 2,150. He calls.

Flop: Queen-Ace-Queen!! OMG. Quads. Of course I check, and he checks.

The turn is a King, putting 2 hearts on board. I venture a small bet of 2,400. He calls.

The river is an offsuit 9. I consider my options. I could make the all-in overbet and hope he has a hand and thinks I am making a desperation shove. I could check and hope he bluffs at it. On the whole, I think I have been failing to make enough value bets so I think I need to make a bet. I opt for 2,400 again hoping he might see it as weakness and play back.

He flat calls. Of course I win (with the nuts!) but I possibly missed out as he held JT for the turned straight. He wisely opted to just call down. He is losing to so many hands -- AA KK QQ AK AQ KQ -- that could have reraised preflop. It can never be right for him to raise the river, but he will probably call a bigger bet.

Still, a great start and for a long time it is plain sailing. I scarcely lose a hand. TT - I reraise and flop top set. QQ - I raise and take it down preflop. I do give up a pot with AK, but otherwise I march on. The deck is hitting me in the face and the others seem reluctant to take me on.

I take out the first player when I raise with AQs UTG. The BB shoves and I instacall, to face A7. The turn brings him an open-ended straight draw but tonight I seem to have a protective shield from outdraws.

1 down.

After winning a big pot with Aces -- I reraise preflop and bet the flop and move in on the turn -- I have half the chips in play.

Shortly after that, the shortest stack moves in with pocket 2s and I call for less than 10% of my stack with pocket 5s. Two down.

3rd man down when I flop top pair and a flush draw with QdTd on a QJ7 board. I check to the short stack who moves in. There is a call before me and now I shove. The other caller folds a higher flush draw, whilst short-stack shows QT but no flush draw. I am freerolling and hit on the turn.

Now 3-handed and I have 77k out of the 108k chips in play. It should be a formality.

However, I nearly blow myself up when I pick up QQ (again) on the button. I believe the short stack on the SB will push, so I limp intending to isolate after a shove and a call. However, the SB folds and we see a flop.

It is 5-4-2 with 2 clubs. The big blind leads out and I raise. Now, the BB re-raises and I should probably abandon ship. Of course it is true that my hand is greatly under-represented but I must see that I am probably losing.

However, with my massive chip lead I see the possibility to effectively end the tournament here and I raise all in. He insta-calls with 6-3 for the nuts.

I am drawing dead, basically.

I lose the lead for the first time, and the short stack also stages a recovery so that he moves into contention as well.

However, it is to be my night. I win a crucial race with AKs vs QQ to eliminate the shortest stack and take a 60-40 lead into the heads up.

HU lasted 20 hands, of which I lost only 3 despite having really no cards at all to speak of. The other player was pretty solid but was far too timid at this stage. Presumably he didn't pick up much in the way of hands himself but he allowed me to dictate events.

I had advanced my chip lead to a 2-1 advantage when the following hand developed. The blinds are 800/1,600. I have red deuces on the button and raise to 3,300 (my standard opening). He calls. He rarely re-raised pre flop.

The flop was 8-5-3 all diamonds. He bets 3,200; I call. The turn is a black Ace. He bets 8,000 into 13,000 leaving him with 22k behind.

I see a real opportunity to put pressure on here. I do not put him on a really strong hand, but I doubt I am winning with a pair of 2s. I doubt he has an Ace but I feel he is inclined to fear the worst, and will not want to call off his tournament life. I move all in.

If he does call, he is likely to be winning (although he might call with KXdd) but either my flush draw or my gutshot should be live and another deuce would also be a winning card.

He folds and with a 4-1 lead now I really do not think I can be caught.

He does not win a single hand from here on, and in the end he shoves with QT and I snap call with A7. An Ace on the flop nearly kills it although he did pick up some chances with a Queen on the turn.

However, my golden form saw me through.

All told: 302 hands, 5h27min elapsed time, 3h20min of actual play from $8 to $12k. One shot. Straight through to the main event !

If you really want to see the gory details, I have uploaded the hand histories onto the gutshot replayer here and here.

Vegas ahoy !

The Bear is Dead, Long Live the Bear !

2009-04-28T13:35:00.002+01:00

April 27th, 2009

BSPT9 - exactly 3 years since the first one (26 runners), and one year since the "last ever" Bear poker event.

When the idea of this reunion / anniversary tournament first occurred to me after a chance conversation, I really wasn't sure how much interest there would be. Former colleagues and participants in the previous 8 events were now scattered all over the City.

Quite a few were now posted overseas and most of those were unable to come (but Valer Zetocha showed up from Madrid to defend his title).

However, interest was very strong and a record field of 104 battled for the title.

A full report is to long for this blog. If you want to see it, send me an email and I will send it on to you. There will be photos as well - John Chukwuma took over 1,000 shots apparently.

Last year's BSPT8 was supposed to be the "last ever". You wouldn't want to bet against another re-running, not least because I need to keep hosting them until I win again !