First post for a while

As the title suggests, this is the first post I have put up for a while (a little over two months) so what has been happening to me in that time? Well I made the tournament of champions in the PokerPlasm Olympics and finished a creditable second behind IBGPN.

In ring games my luck ran very cold for a little while. For about three weeks every time I picked up good cards and hit the flop, someone had picked up a better hand. I lost with straights to flushes (picked up on the river so often I felt convinced the servers hated me!) trips to straights and full boats to bigger full boats. It all seemed to reach a climax when playing on Party Poker and I went all in with the best possible full house and felt sure I was winning only for my opponent to turn over quad nines! I had still not had to deposit any money (since about November last year) but I was beginning to wonder if I was going to have to reach into my own pocket to play. Fortunately after this nadir things started to pick up and my good hands started to stand up again. Not in every case of course but enough of the time for me to start picking up again and the prospect of having to deposit money has become a distant fear once more.

I have also found a new forum for my madness! If you want something a little bit different you could do a lot worse than looking at www.sherbertdip.co.uk.

Anyway enough for now. I am planning to keep on posting so keep watching. Good luck and see you soon.

The Poker Olympics II - RAZZ

I have to admit that before this morning all I knew about RAZZ was that you were supposed to play it when you had got some Red Wine and Cheese! I registered for the PokerPlasm – Poker Olympics – RAZZ more for the one point you get for entering and the fun you have playing than out of any expectation of placing. Once again I have to thank PokerPlasm for the helpful guide on how to play RAZZ (for those of you who don’t know it is basically like seven card stud but instead of a high hand you are trying to get a low one. Straights and Flushes don’t count and Aces are low).

I have been getting a run of rotten cards for the last week or so and I was expecting that to continue. It did. Fortunately in RAZZ 2 3 5 off suit is a pretty good starting hand and I was able to capitalise on my cards. Modesty forbids me to tell you where I finished but the Gold medal and accompanying seven points really helps my bid to get to the Tournament of Champions in June and the prize money helps to make up for bad run in ring games of late!

I am a little worried about the next event in the series as it is Omaha Hi/Lo. This will be the first time I have entered an Olympic event in a game that I have played before (see Omaha he’s making eyes at me) and I think the extra pressure that this brings may adversely affect my game!

Finally I would like to thank Zonetrap for arranging the events (great job man) and to AJDragonfly and Mrs Jester for their support during the match. The esprit de corps in the UK camp was great to see – and it put our American cousins to shame as they splintered and turned on each other early in the game! What fun!

Stay lucky!

The Poker Olympics

I had the honour of representing the UK in the first ever Poker Olympics (organised by Pokerplasm) on Sunday in the seven card stud hi/lo event. This is not one of my strongest events and so I was very happy to get a bronze medal (I am still waiting for the medal to turn up but the cash for third is in my account already so, happy days!).

This has been the highlight of my poker month (it has been a month since I last posted here, partly because I have been so busy but mostly because I lost my username and password for the blog!) and as well as this, my ring game poker is coming on nicely. I have learned the secret of success on ring games and it is….. you have an even bigger chance of getting a call on an all in if the other player can play on afterwards so you really must have the nuts before you try (this is not always the case as it depends on your opponent but it is a good starting proposition). This also means that there is a lot more play (the blinds never go up) so patience is even more important than ever.

I must go now, as Frodo said “I can hear the ring calling me”

Be Lucky!

All in, All in, All in, it must be a freeroll!

I decided to play in a freeroll this evening. Pokerstars had one (with about 8000 players) and I decided to give that a go. On the first table I was at, one player went all in six times in a row. When someone finally called them (I could not call a cab with the cheese I was getting) they had 8s 6h and they went out soon after. My stack went up and down, and I was comfortable when a player on my new table decided to do the all in routine. On his/her fourth consecutive all in I had Ad Jd and decided to give it a go. They turned over pocket queens and my tourney was over. I know I should have waited (the very fact that I am writing this and not playing in the tourney is proof of that) and if I had had to pay to enter then maybe I would have been more disciplined but as it was I suffered from the most unforgiving error you can make in poker, bad timing. It is vital. What would have been a superb steal worthy of a world champion becomes a rather embarrassing exit from a tourney because your opponent had the one hand that they could call you with and there is no worse felling than, when asked how you went out of a tourney, you have to reply “Going all in with Q 6 off suit”.

So here is my challenge to you all, tell me your most embarrassing moment (It does not have to have been at a poker table (come on people, try to be a bit creative here!)) and I will award a virtual prize to the best of them!

Multi Table Mayhem!

Having had a hectic few weeks when I have not had time to play poker, I decided to use my day off in a productive manner and have been playing as much poker as I could. I have played a couple of SNG’s and had made the money in them both. Having come third in an eighteen seat tourney I was feeling confident and when a freeroll appeared I thought “What the hell I may as well give it a crack!” and registered. I had noticed that it was Limit Stud Hi/Lo but I was thinking that as it was a freeroll I literally had nothing to lose. This I now admit was a mistake. I would advise any normal person to avoid playing multiple tables of different disciplines as it is very difficult to get your head around what to do when a window appears and you only have a few seconds not only to decide whether to call a raise in early position but also to remember if As 2d Kc is worth playing in this format of poker (it usually is unless the raise is massive).

After half an hour of this I was down to about half two thirds of my stack (not good in a thousand plus player tourney) in the Stud game but I was also down to about half my stack in a SNG at NL Hold’em and this one I had paid to enter! I made a simple decision and dumped all my chips in the freeroll off to the player who had been most friendly when I joined the table (I know this is not really fair on the other players but as I was leaving the tourney my chips had to go somewhere). Back to playing one discipline I picked up my game and finished third in the NL Hold’em tourney (this is beginning to become my standard position in eighteen seat tourneys) I may not be quite back to winning ways yet but at least I am making money!

Free Money!

At last I have made the cash in a poker academy/pokerplasm freeroll. I came in in third position for a mighty $10 (about £5.72) and I would like to thank the pokerplasm guys for organising this event. My earlier results in these events have been rocky, but after busting out first on my first attempt (my pocket Kings (first hand) did not hold up), I have been slowly improving.

I know that $10 is not a lot of money, although as I did not have to risk a stake it is a great return! I am happier and more satisfied with it than at almost any other time I have made the bubble (I think the only rival to this was the very first time I made the money in a tourney). The reason for this is simple. Normally in a 20 or so seater tourney there are 12-15 fish* and you just have to be patient, pick your spot and fleece them. In the poker academy/pokerplasm games there tends to be 15-18 really good players and maybe 1 or 2 fish if you are lucky. It is the difference between finishing third in your Sunday league tournament and finishing third in league two (I accept that there is still a world of difference between this and the premiership of the WSOP).

Any way you look at it I am going to have a smile on my face all day thanks to last nights result.

*poor players (called fish because they throw their chips at you. Groan)

Omaha, he's making eyes at me!

I have recently decided that as a solid player, playing (largely) by a set play book that I could play more than one tournament at one time, so I decided to give it a go and registered for three consecutive tournaments. All was looking good until on the second one to start I was dealt four hole cards. Now if you are a Hold'em player like me this comes as a bit of a shock! I looked at the title bar and found that I was in an Omaha game. Not only that, it was a variety called Omaha Hi-Lo. Now, whilst I am confident of my Hold'em play I didn't have a clue what the rules were to this game, let alone know what a good hand looked like. So I took the only option that I could see and went onto the poker academy site and cried for help!

My night in shining armour turned out to be Cadmium Lemon who, within about 3 minutes of my asking for help, posted a synopsis of the rules and a recommendation of how to play. I knew that this would be worth following, Cadmium Lemon is a regular in the Bubble* and often a winner in a variety of poker tournaments and his advice is well worth taking. Following his advice (and using a little of my inherent card sense) I was able to see off 4331 players to finish 345^th. This was unfortunately still outside the bubble but was a far better showing than I would have achieved without his advice.

I have learned two things from this tournament that make the whole experience well worth while. Firstly that I should pay attention to the details of a tournament before I register for it, and secondly that Omaha Hi-Lo is a lot of fun to play. I have decided to play a few O8 (as it seems to be called by those in the know) tournaments and see if I can improve on my first showing and make the bubble.

Oh and a final note for the Jester – I think I have found a verity of poker where J 7 suited is (almost) worth playing!

*the Bubble is the paid places in a tournament.