It took me a week to get over the WSOPE. 12 long days and nights made me very ill, I'm still coughing my guts up every now and then. Thankfully no more live updates for me for a good while so it wont happen again with a bit of luck.
I played in the Napoleons mini festival the other day, the same one I chopped a few months ago. No such joy this time around, I didn't get dealt any good cards (which is not a good enough excuse) and got frustrated and played badly. I ended up shoving a weak ace into Ash Hussein who very rightly busted me with queens.
I just cant seem to get started with tournaments and SNGs at the moment. Thankfully I have been raping the cash games on Blue Square to make up for it. Not sure why I can only do well in one for the other, but I've decided to commit to cash games because I'm getting sick of the swings I get in SNGs.
Which is why, for the time being only I'm sure, I have turned my back on Pokerstars. For about 6 months I have won more than I thought possible in the six handed SNGs on Stars, I even got myself into the top 5 of a Sharkscope leaderboard for a while. But I'm getting annoyed with the massive swings I take. So I have cashed out my money, traded in my FFPs and gone to ipoker.
With cash games my profit is slower but steady (Except as I write this I've just lost a huge pot with my set against a flush draw). I also think that to get the all round best poker education you have to play cash games, as tournaments can be a bit 'shove and hope for the best'. The game choice on Stars is 2nd to none but there are way too many LAGs and too many educated players, even at the lower stakes. Ipoker looks like a great little fish frenzy.
WSOPE
12 Days in the Big Smoke at the WSOPE has taken its toll. I am now (glad to be) back home and have made myself ill with the non stop standing for 12-16 hours at a time for 12 days. I don't entirely enjoy live updates, however the pokernews team and interface we used were so great that it made it enjoyable enough.
Now, I'm quite naive about London and would have planned my journey so differently knowing what I know now. Obviously my hotel would have been different from the get go. Also, I wasn't aware that the tube actually closed, which would have stopped me getting a hotel 3 miles away from the venue. I would have also made sure my new hotel had a laundrette service - as I ended up buying some cheap clothes from primark because it was easier and cheaper than going to a dry cleaners.
It was a fun enough WSOPE. Tony G is a really top bloke and I was glad to be working for him, gutted he didn't win the PLO Bracelet. Getting to know and work with Snoopy and Pauly MgGrupp was also lots of fun, having only really read them from affar before.
I really wanted John Tabatabai to win the main event, I watched him take apart Gus Hansen before the final table and thought it might have been his year - though maybe Annette winning is better for poker in general.
I'm having a few days off now to recover, but should be doing the Napoleans Mini Festival starting this weekend. I made a final table in the last two so hopefully will be 3 for 3 this time round.
Now, I'm quite naive about London and would have planned my journey so differently knowing what I know now. Obviously my hotel would have been different from the get go. Also, I wasn't aware that the tube actually closed, which would have stopped me getting a hotel 3 miles away from the venue. I would have also made sure my new hotel had a laundrette service - as I ended up buying some cheap clothes from primark because it was easier and cheaper than going to a dry cleaners.
It was a fun enough WSOPE. Tony G is a really top bloke and I was glad to be working for him, gutted he didn't win the PLO Bracelet. Getting to know and work with Snoopy and Pauly MgGrupp was also lots of fun, having only really read them from affar before.
I really wanted John Tabatabai to win the main event, I watched him take apart Gus Hansen before the final table and thought it might have been his year - though maybe Annette winning is better for poker in general.
I'm having a few days off now to recover, but should be doing the Napoleans Mini Festival starting this weekend. I made a final table in the last two so hopefully will be 3 for 3 this time round.
You get what you pay for
For the last time ever I will base a hotel booking on price alone. Of course you wont be seeing me at the Ritz anytime soon but the other day I learnt, as I have done many times before in different situations, that you get what you pay for.
I’m in Central London for the World Series of Poker Europe (Yes, I know, silly name). I’m getting paid by the good folks at Pokenews and rather than making an expenses claim, I simply am getting a bigger fee and have to make my own arrangements. I then hit upon the brainwave that the next 12 days would be a money saving exercise, and thus would leave more money for me to spend on nice things for me.
So my shit ignorant eyes sparkled when I saw a room as cheap as £30 a night slap bang in the middle of London. Packed it, booked it, fucked off as they say.
I arrived just as the Police where grilling the Hotel owner about one of their staff. When they left she gave me the bad news that she made a mistake and booked me into a room with no bathroom and I would have to use a shared bath and toilet instead. Already gutted I carried my suitcase up 7 flights of stairs and walked into a room, nay, cupboard, that made my student house in 2001 look like a palace. The bed looked like a loaf of bread with a tea towel on it and this sink looked like, well, I have no analogies for that but it looked fucking awful.
So I went to the WSOPE VIP party and made sure I got as pissed as I possibly could, not for fun but to not care anymore as I lay in that ‘bed’. I come home wankered and manage to sleep a little. Waking up with a hangover is made thrice as bad when its in a total shithole like that. There was no way I was going anywhere near the bathroom and I hate to admit that I pissed in the sink like I assume many have done before me in that place.
I packed up my stuff, went downstairs, nobody was there so I left a note and the key and did a runner. I then proceeded to smell for the rest of the day at the Empire Casino until I checked in to the most glorius Travellodge I have ever seen (Actually, it’s the worst but that doesn’t matter right now). I had a shower and my god never has a lukewarm, wonky shower felt so good.
The WSOPE so far has been interesting. I met my hero (and sort of boss) Tony G and was surprised he knew who I was. I also got interviewed by the Sik Tilt boys so maybe I’ll have a link to that soon.
Back to the casino for me, HORSE is boring and confusing but the buffet was ok, I don’t care right now because at least I am clean again.
I’m in Central London for the World Series of Poker Europe (Yes, I know, silly name). I’m getting paid by the good folks at Pokenews and rather than making an expenses claim, I simply am getting a bigger fee and have to make my own arrangements. I then hit upon the brainwave that the next 12 days would be a money saving exercise, and thus would leave more money for me to spend on nice things for me.
So my shit ignorant eyes sparkled when I saw a room as cheap as £30 a night slap bang in the middle of London. Packed it, booked it, fucked off as they say.
I arrived just as the Police where grilling the Hotel owner about one of their staff. When they left she gave me the bad news that she made a mistake and booked me into a room with no bathroom and I would have to use a shared bath and toilet instead. Already gutted I carried my suitcase up 7 flights of stairs and walked into a room, nay, cupboard, that made my student house in 2001 look like a palace. The bed looked like a loaf of bread with a tea towel on it and this sink looked like, well, I have no analogies for that but it looked fucking awful.
So I went to the WSOPE VIP party and made sure I got as pissed as I possibly could, not for fun but to not care anymore as I lay in that ‘bed’. I come home wankered and manage to sleep a little. Waking up with a hangover is made thrice as bad when its in a total shithole like that. There was no way I was going anywhere near the bathroom and I hate to admit that I pissed in the sink like I assume many have done before me in that place.
I packed up my stuff, went downstairs, nobody was there so I left a note and the key and did a runner. I then proceeded to smell for the rest of the day at the Empire Casino until I checked in to the most glorius Travellodge I have ever seen (Actually, it’s the worst but that doesn’t matter right now). I had a shower and my god never has a lukewarm, wonky shower felt so good.
The WSOPE so far has been interesting. I met my hero (and sort of boss) Tony G and was surprised he knew who I was. I also got interviewed by the Sik Tilt boys so maybe I’ll have a link to that soon.
Back to the casino for me, HORSE is boring and confusing but the buffet was ok, I don’t care right now because at least I am clean again.
Behind the Rail - The Curse of the Blogger
Taken from my Pokernews column - Behind the Rail
Last year I went part time at my old office job to concentrate on playing poker. It went well and I also started writing more and more, which was also proving financially rewarding. At the start of this year I left the 9-5 forever and I spend about 40% of my time writing about poker and 60% playing. When things are going well I tell people I’m a professional poker player and when they are not I’m just a writer.
This Thursday I put down the cards and pick up my jotter pad and pen where for the next 12 days I will be one of those people you see hanging round a poker table trying to guesstimate the amount of chips Daniel Negreanu has. Poker blogging, as it is known, for Pokernews at the WSOPE.
Poker blogging requires one to wander around the tournament floor and count how many chips the players have. It’s about looking out for some of the craziest hands and bust outs and then reporting them back in real time on your website. Anyone who blogs about poker is a poker player, and a good one at that, they have to be to report it back effectively.
Blogging is loads of fun at times but unbelievably frustrating too. When you are equally used to being the one sat at the table, having to stand behind Roland De Wolfe as he contemplates a call can be demoralising. I liken it to being a League 2 footballer having to be a kit man for the England squad during the World Cup – you tell yourself you would do anything to be there but you think you’re above it when you do.
The most hugely frustrating thing about blogging is standing watching the action as some internet qualifier is making some of the most amateur moves at the table. You see some plucky Scandinavian min reraising with king-seven, getting lucky on the flop and scooping one pot more on their way to a fortune and you wonder how the hell you came to be jotting it down on a notepad.
Sometimes you just want to scream out “Just call you idiot” or “That’s it, give me your cards, you can’t play anymore, GIVE ME YOUR CARDS!”. Watching a cagey heads up match is the most frustrating, I know these guys have millions on the line and every decision is crucial to them, but don’t they realise that we want to go out and drink after 3 or 4 exhausting days watching them? I have a friend who got into trouble with the website he blogs for when he screamed “Throw a diamond out there, please god throw us a diamond!” at the table during hour 8 of a gruelling heads up match.
Of course I’m making it sound awful but in fact, its tremendous fun. Bloggers are a fun bunch and the chance to meet some of the greatest players on the planet is worth the journey alone. I’ll be looking to score a few pictures stood next to Ivey, Negreanu and Brunson on my trip and thus losing any credibility I may have had.
The WSOPE is quite simply the biggest event outside of Las Vegas and I cannot justify £10,000 of my bankroll to play in it, but I wouldn’t miss it for the world. You can see all my WSOPE Live Updates here.
Last year I went part time at my old office job to concentrate on playing poker. It went well and I also started writing more and more, which was also proving financially rewarding. At the start of this year I left the 9-5 forever and I spend about 40% of my time writing about poker and 60% playing. When things are going well I tell people I’m a professional poker player and when they are not I’m just a writer.
This Thursday I put down the cards and pick up my jotter pad and pen where for the next 12 days I will be one of those people you see hanging round a poker table trying to guesstimate the amount of chips Daniel Negreanu has. Poker blogging, as it is known, for Pokernews at the WSOPE.
Poker blogging requires one to wander around the tournament floor and count how many chips the players have. It’s about looking out for some of the craziest hands and bust outs and then reporting them back in real time on your website. Anyone who blogs about poker is a poker player, and a good one at that, they have to be to report it back effectively.
Blogging is loads of fun at times but unbelievably frustrating too. When you are equally used to being the one sat at the table, having to stand behind Roland De Wolfe as he contemplates a call can be demoralising. I liken it to being a League 2 footballer having to be a kit man for the England squad during the World Cup – you tell yourself you would do anything to be there but you think you’re above it when you do.
The most hugely frustrating thing about blogging is standing watching the action as some internet qualifier is making some of the most amateur moves at the table. You see some plucky Scandinavian min reraising with king-seven, getting lucky on the flop and scooping one pot more on their way to a fortune and you wonder how the hell you came to be jotting it down on a notepad.
Sometimes you just want to scream out “Just call you idiot” or “That’s it, give me your cards, you can’t play anymore, GIVE ME YOUR CARDS!”. Watching a cagey heads up match is the most frustrating, I know these guys have millions on the line and every decision is crucial to them, but don’t they realise that we want to go out and drink after 3 or 4 exhausting days watching them? I have a friend who got into trouble with the website he blogs for when he screamed “Throw a diamond out there, please god throw us a diamond!” at the table during hour 8 of a gruelling heads up match.
Of course I’m making it sound awful but in fact, its tremendous fun. Bloggers are a fun bunch and the chance to meet some of the greatest players on the planet is worth the journey alone. I’ll be looking to score a few pictures stood next to Ivey, Negreanu and Brunson on my trip and thus losing any credibility I may have had.
The WSOPE is quite simply the biggest event outside of Las Vegas and I cannot justify £10,000 of my bankroll to play in it, but I wouldn’t miss it for the world. You can see all my WSOPE Live Updates here.
Edinburgh Festival
I've just returned from my first ever Edinburgh Festival and would recommend it highly to anyone. I've always wanted to go to the Comedy Festival since I was a teenager and it didn't dissapoint.
After a 4 hour train ride we arrived and started drinking on the Edinburgh mile watching the street performers. It was a bit stressful at first because we had no bearings at all but found our way to the first show, Swingers, a play about, well swingers. It was ok, nothing special and regretably no boobies to report.
Then on to see none other than Frank Skinner it a tiny little venue. He was very good, did a cracking paedophile joke (which is the in thing at the moment with comics) and his banter with the crowd was top notch. The next show was a bargain, the BBC Stand Up show which featured 6 comedians including Adam Bloom who was good as ever. 6 comedians for 10 quid was great and they were all ok.
Now for the shite, Phil Jupitus. His show called Phil Jupitus reads Dickens was a little too literal than we imagined. We expected either a funny take on the work of Charles Dickens or him to crack jokes between paragraphs.
Nope, he just opened the book and read from it, for an hour, and he only stopped when his stopwatch went off. Call me a philistine if you want but an hour of watching a man read from a book is not entertaining and to charge a tenner for it is arrogant.
Thankfully Rich Hall and Phil Nicol were both excellent and nearly wiped the memory of a fat man reading a book from our banks.
Great week and christ did we walk, I bet we did 6-10 miles a day. Regretably most walks were to resteraunts or pubs so any benefit was swiftly nulified.
We're definatley going again next year.
Behind the Rail: Is Poker Cool?
Taken from my Pokernews column Behind the Rail
Of course it is.
When I tell people I make a living playing and writing about poker its always a mixed response. Surprise is always there, some people are fascinated, others are sceptical, some are jealous and some pity me. Whatever their own issues with the game, the also have a preconception about what a poker player looks like.
Some get very excited, women especially. They think Monte Carlo, James Bond, Tuxedos and men that can afford to buy them a lot of shoes. Some guys have images of you out until the wee hours every night with a bunny girl on each arm. Poker is cool.
Then there is the other, pole opposite, preconception. That poker players are in fact, nerds. That poker and Star Trek go hand in hand, their image of a poker pro is of an overweight bespectacled man playing online in his parents loft.
So which is it? Of course we all think poker is cool, its what we do. Fishermen think Fishing is cool, Landscape gardeners think lawnmowers are cool and darts players think Phil Taylor is their version of the Fonz.
Poker is Cool
The casino is an iconic image of cool. Its open til the wee hours of the morning, serves alcohol and has a lot of beautiful women walking around. Las Vegas is the gambling mecca and, although cheesy, is undeniably cool.
The casino and gambling in general has an element of danger to it, and danger is always cool. Whether it's the danger of losing your money or the chances that Robert De Niro is going to take you into the back room and smash your knuckles in with a hammer, there is always an undercurrent of risk, which is cool.
We then have the players who epitomise cool. The Devilfish is arguably cool, he looks like a James Bond villain and has a quirky name. Gus Hansen is one of those guys that men want to be and women want to be with. We even have our own bit of Hollywood in the form of Jennifer 'I can't believe she's nearly 50' Tily.
But the number one argument in the favour of cool is a recent one, James Bond. Casino Royale is the best Bond movie and rebranded the franchise with a grittier, harder and cooler Bond. Poker replaced Baccarat in this remake and, if we forget the final hand, Poker was painted in a complementary light. If Bond plays poker, poker is cool.
Poker is for Geeks
For every Gus Hansen, there is about 100 22 year old virgins who make a small fortune in their bedrooms while their Mum makes their dinner. For every Phil Ivey there is a Phil Hellmuth, for every Antonio Esfandiari there is a Phil Laak. If you go to any ranking poker tournament there s invariably a few spotty kids and a lot of overweight men.
The catalyst for all this is of course the internet. The internet is cool, because of its endless possibilities, but people who use the internet are not cool, because of the lack of a social and sex life. I'm sorry but if you spend most of your day infront of a laptop in your PJs then you are a nerd in the majority's eye.
Just like drugs are bad, mckay, so is problem gambling. It's very hard to argue that poker is cool when it can be linked with problem gambling. Drinking too much, smoking too much and doing drugs are all things those of us with a public conscience should go out of their way not to glorify, so even though we would all say Poker is not gambling in its purist form, perhaps its linked just enough for us to be irresponsible to say its cool? I'm not sure.
But perhaps the main argument poker being cool comes from something we all learnt very early at school. That Maths is very very uncool. Nobody liked maths at school and we were all well within our rights to bully the kids that were good at it. You don't need to be Carol Vorderman to play poker but you do need a solid understanding of odds and probabilities, and that I'm afraid is enough to warrant your head being flushed down then toilet by the older boys.
Of course it is.
When I tell people I make a living playing and writing about poker its always a mixed response. Surprise is always there, some people are fascinated, others are sceptical, some are jealous and some pity me. Whatever their own issues with the game, the also have a preconception about what a poker player looks like.
Some get very excited, women especially. They think Monte Carlo, James Bond, Tuxedos and men that can afford to buy them a lot of shoes. Some guys have images of you out until the wee hours every night with a bunny girl on each arm. Poker is cool.
Then there is the other, pole opposite, preconception. That poker players are in fact, nerds. That poker and Star Trek go hand in hand, their image of a poker pro is of an overweight bespectacled man playing online in his parents loft.
So which is it? Of course we all think poker is cool, its what we do. Fishermen think Fishing is cool, Landscape gardeners think lawnmowers are cool and darts players think Phil Taylor is their version of the Fonz.
Poker is Cool
The casino is an iconic image of cool. Its open til the wee hours of the morning, serves alcohol and has a lot of beautiful women walking around. Las Vegas is the gambling mecca and, although cheesy, is undeniably cool.
The casino and gambling in general has an element of danger to it, and danger is always cool. Whether it's the danger of losing your money or the chances that Robert De Niro is going to take you into the back room and smash your knuckles in with a hammer, there is always an undercurrent of risk, which is cool.
We then have the players who epitomise cool. The Devilfish is arguably cool, he looks like a James Bond villain and has a quirky name. Gus Hansen is one of those guys that men want to be and women want to be with. We even have our own bit of Hollywood in the form of Jennifer 'I can't believe she's nearly 50' Tily.
But the number one argument in the favour of cool is a recent one, James Bond. Casino Royale is the best Bond movie and rebranded the franchise with a grittier, harder and cooler Bond. Poker replaced Baccarat in this remake and, if we forget the final hand, Poker was painted in a complementary light. If Bond plays poker, poker is cool.
Poker is for Geeks
For every Gus Hansen, there is about 100 22 year old virgins who make a small fortune in their bedrooms while their Mum makes their dinner. For every Phil Ivey there is a Phil Hellmuth, for every Antonio Esfandiari there is a Phil Laak. If you go to any ranking poker tournament there s invariably a few spotty kids and a lot of overweight men.
The catalyst for all this is of course the internet. The internet is cool, because of its endless possibilities, but people who use the internet are not cool, because of the lack of a social and sex life. I'm sorry but if you spend most of your day infront of a laptop in your PJs then you are a nerd in the majority's eye.
Just like drugs are bad, mckay, so is problem gambling. It's very hard to argue that poker is cool when it can be linked with problem gambling. Drinking too much, smoking too much and doing drugs are all things those of us with a public conscience should go out of their way not to glorify, so even though we would all say Poker is not gambling in its purist form, perhaps its linked just enough for us to be irresponsible to say its cool? I'm not sure.
But perhaps the main argument poker being cool comes from something we all learnt very early at school. That Maths is very very uncool. Nobody liked maths at school and we were all well within our rights to bully the kids that were good at it. You don't need to be Carol Vorderman to play poker but you do need a solid understanding of odds and probabilities, and that I'm afraid is enough to warrant your head being flushed down then toilet by the older boys.
Napoleons Summer Festival £300 Freezeout
This was the first time I've played live since I chopped the £200 event at the other Napoleons last month, and I cant believe I've gone all this time without a live game. Only 60 people turned out for it (as most of the players are at the Gala Leeds event) but it was a very tough field, including Ash Hussein, Tony Kendall, Paul Gourlay, Barry Neville and Julian Thew.
I had a nice steady tournament, never really got short and slowly kept my chips above average throughout. When it got to the final table bubble I was actually 2nd in chips but a few moments of madness saw me nursing the short stack.
When we got to the final I got all in against the only person shorter than me, lost and found myself with 200 chips when the blinds were 800-1600 and the average stack had about 30,000. Amazingly I managed to outlast another player to take 9th place instead of my destined 10th.
It was a fun little comp, even though I did have to suffer the embarrassment of nursing less than a blind for an obscene amount of time. I also had the pleasure of playing at the same table as Julian Thew who is a true gent (unlike the dick who was sat next to him at one point who I wont name).
Its great playing in Naps now they dont allow smoking anymore.
I had a nice steady tournament, never really got short and slowly kept my chips above average throughout. When it got to the final table bubble I was actually 2nd in chips but a few moments of madness saw me nursing the short stack.
When we got to the final I got all in against the only person shorter than me, lost and found myself with 200 chips when the blinds were 800-1600 and the average stack had about 30,000. Amazingly I managed to outlast another player to take 9th place instead of my destined 10th.
It was a fun little comp, even though I did have to suffer the embarrassment of nursing less than a blind for an obscene amount of time. I also had the pleasure of playing at the same table as Julian Thew who is a true gent (unlike the dick who was sat next to him at one point who I wont name).
Its great playing in Naps now they dont allow smoking anymore.
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