My Mate can Play (2)

A couple of months ago I did a post when a mate of mine scooped the B'pool £100 for the lot http://bigdealinabox.blogspot.com/2009/07/my-mate-can-play.html
Well now my other mate ( I know, I know, I have 2 Mates !! )can play too as he phoned me from the BoylePoker "Sponsor a Pro" comp in Dublin last night trying to be cool.
Mate~ "oh I'm in Dublin"
Me~ "How d'ya get on?"
Mate~ "Oh yeh I won it"
AS cool as you like and very matter of fact. Then got all excited and asked me to stick it on the FurnessPoker forum.
Great Prize for Daz, a 10,000 Euro deal to play in any tourneys he likes I think. Wonder what he will play ???
Unfortunately being a Sponsored player does have it's downside. Look at this hoody he had to wear !!


Here is his story

October 'horror' Accounts

Accounts for September
PokerPlex : up $140
PokerStars: down $320
Bwinpoker: up $50
Playing live: down $640
In total for playing down $770
Bonus this month of $20 and pokerplex rakeback of $20.
So -$730 for the month.

and +$3760 for the year.

CHAMPAGNE SUPERNOVA...............

..........In the words of Liam.

And also in the words of Pokerstars support who sent me a email letting me know I have finally got there. Not that it means much except I get 5 little red stars next to my icon and I earn FPP's (rakeback equivalent) 50% quicker. Having seen my form there in cash recently though might not be worth having after all....probably even detrimental.
Still got 3 freerolls at Stars this Saturday, the $100k, $75k & $30k, although it will be Robo who is playing them for 50% as I swoop out and take on the B'pool £100 monthly game. Let's hope it is no horrow show for me at the tables this Halloween ~ GOD my blog is lame.

Live hand history or two I promise next post.

Try and get lucky guys, JON

Runner, Runner , Quads !! Nice...........NOT

Been running like a dog recently and this hand sums it up.



Also have played the comp in Ireland and the APAT, but unlikely to report much on them as they have been pretty dull without any hands of great interest and sadly no success to report either. Although Ireland was a great, if expensive w/end.

September Accounts

Accounts for September
PokerPlex : up $140
PokerStars: down $650
Boylepoker: up $40
Playing live: down $50
In total for playing down $520
Bonus this month of $30 and pokerplex rakeback of $30, also $100 bonus at Stars
So -$360 for the month.

and +$4490 for the year.

2 Months running Losses .....First time ever I think. Have been playing well though, especially live so not overly concerned and still think I have a big payday coming soon LOL!

Could be this weeend too as I'm off to Dublin for the IPO with HoneyM, Sneaks,Trainglot and the monster that is Devileperch. Should be good and we might even win a buck or two!! Full report promised for next write-up.

Hoping to be lucky, very very lucky Jon.

The Yo-Yo run continues

Been a while since the last update and it has been a mixed one on the real and virtual felt with some long nights.
First off, I had the 2 WCOOP games lined up. Unfortunately had to withdraw from the $320 PLO8 as I was just too knackered from work and couldn't really even start let alone last the near 14 hours that the tourney actually lasted.
Lesson learnt so went to bed early and had the alarm blast me into action at 1am for the $215 NLO8 game. I started slow but after the second break started to make a move up the leaderboard, only to get it all-in with AA23 and get called by some donkey with KKJ9 who flopped a King and even scooped when the board paired and was Hi only ~ 5 hours for nowt !
Next day I was free so popped away for the w/end starting with a trip to the new G at Coventry. What a wonderful Casino - like a small Vegas Casino on the inside and situated so close to the M6 and inside the Ricoh Stadium itself - it is sure to become a very popular venue for big festivals/games. So it was a shock to realise that they had only 8 turn up for the £200 game that I fancied and 4 of them had satellited in ! Anyway they delayed it a little and eventuall we got going with 14 players. It was great to play so deep (15k stack, 25/50 start, 30 min clock) with only 7 at the table. Usually the only time you get to play short handed is at the business end of a tourney when there is so little play left. The standard of play was appalling, especially for a £200 game, and I mean "really, really bad" so I fancied a good cash. Everything was going OKish, a few bad beats by shortstacks but on course and then I got AA when 6 handed and managed to get it all in against JJ and QQ.........happy days or so I thought.
The Board came
2
3
2
6
.
.
.
.
.
.
J

D'oh. top 3 paid and I lose on such a sucker river card for best part of half the chips in play. So with the previous night's bad beat and a tragic week on cash at Stars I was feeling as though my poker bankroll was doomed to dwindle away on DONK beat after beat. Anyway enough of the loser talk and stick with getting your chips in with the best of it.

This has taken me a while , I will save the rest ( and better stuff) for next post soon.

Stay lucky

Long Live Keith Floyd

. Keith Floyd RIP


Just got home from work to find that Keith Floyd has died. I love charachters of life and he was certainly one. I have such vivid memories from uni days of watching his afternoon show and making whatever he was cooking with whatever we had in the house ( NOT MUCH ! ) whilst drinking as much wine, beer or anything else toxic we had lying around...........and the food always tasted great .......Great Days !

Oh and Patrick Swayze has also died , let me tell you how all the girls used to think I was just like him LOL !

Poker has been a bit crap recently, on Stars at least, so I will skip that until the next entry, when I should have a report or two on my big WCOOP games coming up and progress on the local Poker Tour.

Stay Lucky Geezers

WCOOP off and running

Pokerstars' World Championship of Online Poker (WCOOP) has started. It is the online equivalent of the World Series of Poker and has a bracelet for the winner of each event WSOP style.

As I have mentioned here previously, I had targeted 3 events and had already satellited into 2 of them. The 3rd one was starting at 1am last night so I entered a last minute 50 seat g'tee satellite. And hey presto I was in.......


So I had managed to sat into all 3 tourneys, $644 of entries, for less than $150. Now I had to cash !? Which wasn't going to be easy as many of the world's best live and online players are also in. In the later stages of this one I had previous WSOP Main Event winners Joe Hachem and Tom McEvoy at my table at the same time , and it was only a 6 seater table !!!!

Anyway I made the cash and then laddered myself up rather than really go for it and ended up 134th for $240.. ........................

............................................... so all-in-all a good start , here's hoping to stay Lucky for the next two.

August accounts

Accounts for August
PokerPlex : down $160
PokerStars: down $50
Boylepoker: up $90
Playing live: down $490
In total for playing down $610
Bonus this month of $40 and pokerplex rakeback of $50, also $200 bonus at Stars
So -$320 for the month.

and +$4850 for the year.

So not a good month, although I have qualified for $545 worth of Stars WCOOP entries, I don't count these as I can't liquidate them. Also have $400+ of FPPs too that if I do cash will include in Sept figures.

Right off to earn my extra chips on Boyle for the Irish IPO tourney. Stay Lucky guys !

Live dive

So after the Omaha I had the APAT main event on Friday and The B'pool monthly £100er on Saturday. No good in either as far as cashing goes, but some good hands and I do feel I am becoming a better player at the moment, I can actually feel my NLHE live game changing and becoming more LAG and positional.
The APAT game had a mixed starting table with a very good young Irish lad that was raising in position 80% of the time and continuation betting almosty 100%. The table to his left were weak/tight and just folding him a big chip lead. He did venture out of position a couple of times to take me on and we had a few clashes including one where I 4-bet him all-in with just an overpair of JJ on a 3,6,10 board. I would never do that against anyone else when we are playing so deep and was very pleased with myself. Had to endure a 3 minute stare down though !
But the game was never going to be mine and I had my chips in on pre-flops all-ins 4 times and didn't win one of them. I lost with AK v A8, AQ v 99, AQ v J5 and also QQ v 77 when the flop came down 977 for quads. Still I had played fairly well and wasn't too unhappy.
Next day I drive up to Blackpool and arrive a few minutes later to find KK in my first hand. I limp in from mid-pos, it gets raised by guy to my left to 200 and 2 others call. For some reason I decide not to raise it up as I feel it still needs a bit of pot control here. Anyway the flop comes down A high and when the SB bets I can get away, which is just as well as it goes raise, re-raise , re-raise , all-in , call !!!! guy on my left had AA and SB had AK !! I had got away with KK v AK v AA on my first hand and only lost 200 chips..........Phil Helmuth or Phil Iver would have lost a lot more there me thinks. I was well chuffed with myself and then played nicely and got my stack upto 30k and thought I was in for a good run as the table was fairly weak, but a couple of mis-timed raises and then card dead for hours meant I left in about 50th/195, when I pushed in a BB v SB battle with KQ and he called with A4.
So my live casino record is now blank for 9 games and over £600 of entries. It also means I am probably going to have to post a loss for August as online has been a bit downhill the last 10 days or so.

Good news though is that I have qualified for the second of my 3 target games on Pokerstars WCOOP and that is the $320 PLO Hi/Lo, so just the $109 8-game to qualify for now. Looking forward to these.


Also was impressed with a packed DTD last week so Sneaks and I now considering going for the monthly £300 deepstack in October, should be good!

Stay Lucky Punks, I haven't been.

Omaha is a game for Luckboxes

Played the APAT Omaha champs last night at DTD and as you can probably tell from the title I didn't win. Quite enjoyed myself though, here are some of the highlights and my ultimate demise.

Arrived almost 2 hours late due to a delay in Barrow that I could do little about. Stack had whittled down to 8600 from the starting 10k, so not too much damage. I then get KK45 in mid position with 2 limpers, I elect to limp and we get 7 see the flop of 29K...BINGO, I bet the pot and some guy in late position says "where did he come from". I gave it the "got to get my chips" back line hoping he had a smaller set and would call, but they all folded and I was back to level after 1 hand. LOL

Cruise along to the break without much action, but I have clocked the Holdem players and tight players at the table. Then first hand after the break I get A J 10 10 (with the Ace suited in clubs and see an all club flop, giving me the nut straight. guy bets and I elect to call in position as does the SB, pot wasn't big enough to warrant repopping it and I wanted to stear clear of the FH arriving on the turn or river this early. Turn is a blank and same guy comes out betting 2100 so I choose to take the poyt down here and repop it putting me all-in, SB dwells and elects to call for value as he is short stacked, he has trips and blanks the river so I am up to 19k and looking good against what I consider a fairly poor table.

I am now calling in position against raisers as they are all raising with big hands only and I'm looking to take them down, I don't hit anything else but do push a number of players off pots, some are real weak and playing Omaha without a clue really. I'm feeling comfortable, but then run trips into a guy who slowplayed the top set very well and also one hand where i bet the Nut flush draw on the flop only to get re-raised by a short stack that has me priced in to call and I blank out the turn/river leaving me back to my original 10k stack size.
So two hours of picking my spots, people folding way too much to pre-flop raises and although I don't connect with any flops I am holding steady. However when the blinds go to 600-1200 I have to start making a move and yo-yo a bit but never get above 16k. Then with 11k behind this hand comes up where I sense a moment to steal from a limper and he was a nice guy ( ended up 3rd too ) and said I am putting you all-in just hoping to get lucky. I replied "I raised hoping to get lucky", but when he turned them over I could see I was in good shape.



The flop brought him an 8 but also me a Q so it looked real good with me over 80% favourite.



The turn was a blank and left me in great shape now, just got to dodge a J or an 8.



You know what happened next, I can't post it cause it is sick (and hendon mob calc won't let me put up the river). Yep BOOM 8 of hearts, groans and sighs all round "unlucky", "well played mate" etc. But instead of sitting there with above average in a field I really fancied playing against I was on my toes and going home.

Oh well today brings the NLHE main event, so lets hop I am back Sunday for the final. Probably popping to Blackpool for the monthly £100er on Saturday too....MAD FOR IT !!

By the way Barrow Rugby playing at home on Sunday just a point needed to secure the title , hope they have the trophy up ready. 15 years going to almost every home game and we are now going to win something.

WCOOP, GUKPT and APAT

Full of acronyms and all poker !!

First of have noticed that Pokerstars have their annual World Championship of Online Poker (WCOOP) coming up and has 45 events in total all at highish buy-ins.
Well the main event is a bit out of my price range @ $5200 with a $10 MILLION g'tee ! However there are 3 events that I like the look of. The $109 8-game (event 5), the $320 PLO Hi/Lo (event35) and the $215 NLO Hi/Lo (event40).
Well I played a couple of satellites today. One was an impulsive mad $2 rebuy to the $215 RAZZ event and bloody bubbled, but then went and played a $39 sat to the NLO8 game and BINGO



so in one of them now, will try a few more at the other two. Fingers crossed.

Also Blue Square now have a betting market up for the APAT World champs @ DTD on bank hol w/end and I have been priced at 150-1, and although I feel I am probably way above average in this field, there are going to be 300+ runners so not great value, but feel free to have a punt here if you like.

Now GUKPT have added a late mini-date to their schedule and it is at there new Coventry casino and has just a £300 entry. It is on the Saturday after APAT and I might get tempted down to that, it will all hang on if they are using their main event schedule or something similar. I am not getting temoted into a crapshoot like the Manchester £100er.

So updating like mad and giving all you readers some great value the last couple of weeks. The general grind has been a general grind. Gone about 10 tourneys without a cash until the sat win and the cash graph has done all the usual yo-yo stuff as I burn my way to Supernova. No hands saved to pick on, will try and find a juicy one or two for next time.

Stay Lucky.

Had to change....another MTT in the bag

Just finished a 204 runner MTT as top dog again, no deals this time just straight take down.


It is a strange one as it is $5 entry and rebuy (1k chips)and then $25 for an add-on (5k chips). I had entry and add-on for $30 so $680 profit and always nice to actually win them. I knew I was due one and feel there is more to come !

Not much else to report, apart from Barrow rugby's marvellous win against Widnes last night, live on SKY too. Puts them top of the table now with 3 games left. C'mon the Raiders !! Sad I Know , but do love watching it.

Stay lucky like me guys.

Hand replayer trial

Ok Robo sent me this link to replay hands , so posting up a hand (very boring hand at that) just to see if it works.

here goes




Oh that is beautiful !!!!

get ready for death by PLO8 hand analysis.

Tourney downswing

Poker is such a game of variance. I have done OK in tourneys this year and played a fair few online and live. However the last few weeks I have been getting deepish but just not cashing deep, either just falling short of the bubble or busting out early into the cash places, not cashed in a live (local or casino game for last 14 times!). In basics this post is just a moan at 'my bad luck' that I seem to be getting in tourneys at the moment. I say 'bad luck' because I do think that I am running bad in the later stages of tourneys and it isn't just poor play/strategy from me. I feel as though I am playing well but just not getting the rub of the green, a big one is due !!

Anyway enough of the whinging, onto when I am going to get another nice score. I have a few things lined up including getting a seat for the PLO at the APAT festival at the end of the month at DTD. I was in for the main event on the Friday 28th and now have got a seat in the PLO on the Thursday, thru just catching a guy selling his seat on Blonde at the right time. He also has a HORSE seat available for the Sunday which I would love to play too, but not sure if I can blag time off for that one as well.

Playing a lot of cash at Pokerstars, trying to get those points for Supernova status. About 7,000 to go now and also taking advantage of a rare Pokerstars bonus of $300. Most games have been Omaha Hi/Lo but mainly No Limit as opposed to my usual Pot Limit stuff. This is the normal game spread at Stars these days and I think is the only site that really does it, but it does mean there is a lot of chance to push on boards where you think you can 3/4 someone. I have been using the Hendon Mob calculator to work out and annalyse these situations afterwards and thin I have a bit of work to do there, but potentially a very profitable game if I can get my head round it properly as I'm sure many players are making -EV calls or folds when faced with such a big bet relative to the pot. I will try and get some examples up for next time.

Could do with someway to display hands well in this blog. Ideally be able to put the Pokerstars replayer or similar into the post, but no idea how. If anyone has some good suggestions how to display hands more visually please get in touch or leave a comment down below.

Stay Lucky Folks

July accounts

Accounts for July
PokerPlex : up $320
PokerStars: up $850
Full Tilt : up $80
Playing live: down $330 (although this was saved big style by my mates 5% for $410)
In total for playing up $920
Bonus this month of $40 and pokerplex rakeback of $50
So +$1010 for the month.

and +$5170 for the year.


In short ~ a very good month online coupled with a disaster live (not one cash at all in 5 casino and 5 local events, plus a heavy drop on a dealers choice cash game).

Hoping to make August a month when I really hammer it online, would really like to get Supernova status and they have just brought in a bonus special this month to give me that little encouragement.

As for live I have registered for the APAT PLO game on the 27th, but unsure if I will be able to make that and similarly for the Blackpool £100 monthly. Hope to get a few other casino games in while I am off work though.
Also there are a few of us that have comitted to play the IPO in Dublin during October which is the biggest tourney in the world outside the USA. Flights , Hotels and Entry already booked, anyone want to come along as well look here for details.

Till next time, stay lucky !

My Mate can Play !!!

It's true, my mate can play ! We (Me, Adam, Daz, HoneyMonster and my mate)went down to Blackpool for the monthly £100er which drew an amazing 185 runners.

And my mate came 1st for a cool £5490. No poxy deals but the outright winner at 6:10am !!

It was a good game as always and I hopped along nicely and moved upto almost 35k when the average was only 20k. So thought I was going to be in for a good one, but ran a couple of bluffs and raises that got picked off or pushed and I was back down to average. Did my usual creeping along for a while looking for a chance to move and then made a slightly rash move when I got dealt 10,10 under the gun and decided to push all 20k in, with blinds at 1600/800, and duly ran into a crap players Bullets and that was me out in 60th.

That was not the end of the fun though because we got a little dealers choice cash game going with Adam and Daz. About 8 in all including the never dull Howard Plant.
I do love dealer's choice and there was lots of loose money in this game, unfortunately some of it turned out to be mine. Still a +EV game without a doubt, just not on this occassion, and Daz's re-raise from the blinds in 6 card Omaha Hi/Lo didn't help.
I had A34568 double suited and had to call the £40 bet as did 6 others. The flop brought the 2 but also the Jc Kc. Daz is all-in next guy is all-in, next guy calls and I have £85 left so got to call and the pot ends up being around the £700 mark. Turn is a 6 so any low card will do, but it comes 9c and makes my flush, but I know it is too low and sure enough guy on my left flips the Nut flush. RELOAD Please!

So I ended up walknig away in the end £230 down from the cash, by biggest loss for a long time. But hey ho it didn't matter as we watched my mate storm it and my little 5% saver brought me in £275. Nice one and back in bed by 8am !

So live games haven't been too good for me this month, but off down to Bolton tonight I think for their £50 triple chance. Played it on the first of the month and crashed early, I'm due a good one....tonight is the night.
Online has been pretty good though so will have the figures up next time after the weekend for July. Might be the last post for a while as I have an important matter or two to deal with.
So enjoy and stay lucky chumps.

2000+ views and MTT frenzy

Since the last entry I have been hammering the online MTTs, mainly PLO Hi/Lo, but also a bit of Razz, Stud Hi/Lo, HORSE and the Stars 8Game tourneys ( involves, 2-7 triple draw, LHE, Omaha Hi/Lo, Razz, Stud, Stud Hi/Lo, NLHE, PLO) which are great fun.
Been going fairly deep in most but apart from a $260 PLO8 cash for 4/169 on PokerPlex, they have all been low cashes <$100 or busting just short of the cash.
Official Poker Rankings is a good site and has a comprehensive list of all my Pokerstars tourneys, worth a look here

In the money at 18% and a ROI of 35% is worthy of staking, so hoping to keep it up and get some staking for PLO Hi or Hi/Lo tourneys. Preferably live but maybe online as well.

Tried to ring the gambling comission guy about the tour games, but phone turned off all the time and no response to my texts so still up in the air a little.

Played a fair number of local live pub games as well with some success, but last night I made my first bad move for a while.
I was BB and looked down to see pockets 10's. HoneyMonster made a raise from early position....could mean anything....but I was well ahead of his range so was going to push it back over the top......then another Adam, a solid player, dwells in the small blind before pushing all-in himself, I snap called even though in my head I had already placed his range and only 88 & 99 were hands I was ahead of. D'OH sure enough HoneyM got out of the way and he flipped JJ. It was only a £10 pub crap shoot, but still bit miffed as it was a clear mistake and junior play to call just because I had already made my mind up prior to him acting.

However every cloud has a silver lining and it gave me time to play Athers at Snooker afterwards which I really enjoyed. I haven't played pool or snooker for about 10 years and I played a lot in my 'youth' # I could definitely get back into it.

Sneaks, HoneyM, DazN and maybe a couple of others going to Blackpool for the £100 deepstack this Saturday so winners tourney report coming up Sunday Morning ! LOL

Keep in touch with yourself lads n lasses and stay lucky.

2nd tour game and a win at LAST !

Played a few tourneys yesterday and went OK , but only managed a cash in one...but what a cash...1st at last in a proper MTT only my 3rd ever in 300+ tourneys.



Wasn't actually for $1600+ as we did a deal 4 handed with me taking $1000 and then played on for an hour later for the $200 left over. Thought I played it well, although as you have to in PLO8 tourneys I got lucky a couple of times. Still another nice little bankroll boost.

It also pushes my rankings right up on OPR and that could well come in handy if I try to look for some staking later in the year , especially for the GUKPT PLO8 at the Vic in Nov/Dec.

The 2nd tour game wnet well, and you wouldn't Adam 'n' Eve it but I only nailed the correct number of entrants again. Remember in the last entry I put 64 as my guess and spot on I was. So Robo is going to have to cough up and get me another Bottle of Red to make up for the one I left in the bar on Saturday LOL.
Game wasn't as smooth as Dalton CC just because it was harder to get around and see everyone, plus no screen for players to see clock which makes a big difference. However it all finished a little earlier after a big heads-up duel between Daz Naylor and young Callum Stewart ended with Daz as the bridesmaid again. Have to say though Callum really impressed me and seems like a quality player, will have to see if he fancies coming down to Blackpool for the £100 on Saturday 25th this month.

There was a problem though as a geezer from the Gambling commission had phoned to see what was going on, after being passed around to several people who didn't have my number, Chris Salmon talked to him and got the OK for that game on the promise that I will ring him during the week. Too busy today at work, but will do tomorrow..............will be a real shame if he says it cant go on anymore as they have been such good events with 100 people having a great night out without losing much and feeling everything was fair. Will report back once I've found out exactly where we lie.
3 possible outcomes I think:

1. He says what we are doing is fine and a real credit to things being done well, carry on. This is what I would most like.
2. He says I cant do this and that, but got to do this and offer that etc. then you can carry on, although it might reduce how many want to be involved if it is too restrictive. This is the mostly outcome I reckon.
3. He says "No Way" and either completely bans them all and/or throws me in the slammer for 10 years ! This is not really my favourite....gulp !

Oh yeh forgot about the car crash, oh well maybe next time............stay lucky freaks.

June Account

Well lets make this quick, not a lot of action this month but what did happen was OKish.

Accounts for June
PokerPlex : up $90
PokerStars: up $190
Playing live: down $60
In total for playing up $220
Bonus this month of $40 and pokerplex rakeback of $30
So +$290 for the month.

and +$4160 for the year.

In brief played at Blackpool £100 and finished 38/167 after going card dead for the last 4 hours. A Barrow lad was playing his first game in a casino and did very well to finish 7th for £750, but was a bit drunk by the final table so let himself down a little or he felt he did. I was on his table for a few hours and he was pure entertainment, so lively and asking after every mucked hand " what d'ya have then??? " LOL Well played Ben.

I split a local tourney a few days later and then last night got my first few bad beats for a while live, but not too much damage done.

Got Poker Tour game no. 2 coming up on Friday @ The Ambrose and it will be interesting to see how many we get. Ive gone for a slight drop at 64, Robo has gone for 73......we will wait and see, but do feel I will be getting my second bottle of red coming soon :)

Till later, stay lucky punks !!

Tour Game Proves a Hit

Well the First Event of the Poker Tour went ahead as planned and was a fairly good success. We got 69 runners in the end which was exactly the number of players I had bet on with Paul Robo, he had gone for 64, so I'm looking forward to a nice bottle of red for that LOL


There is a report of the comp on this page HERE and thr tour itself with results and future events HERE
Getting all the names in and registering everyone went fairly smoothly but took a bit longer than i had planned for. So we didn't start till 8:10, not that anyone seemed bothered, but it did mean we didn't finish till almost 2:30am which was a bit late really. Get the signup sheet ready with names in alphabetical order next time should do the trick.
Enjoyed the night, people were asking why I wasn't playing, but to be honest wasn't too bothered. It did everything I had wanted and even got a bit of a clap for the little intro i did at the beginning and a fair few came over to say thanks. Didn't get any negative comments at all, which is quite an acheivement at a local game I think. Running the tourney once in play was fairly easy and once I know a few more names will be even easier. Had one guy who pulled a couple of strokes 1. betting all-in out of turn and 2. exposing his cards when facing an all-in, warned him on the first one and let the cards play, 2nd one was just a bit daft really as he only had J8 and was never calling so didn't bother making a judgement.
Anyway got 5 thru to the grand final and if we get similar numbers for the next one on FRI 10th July at the Ambrose 7pm start I will be able to increase and confirm the prizes..........more of that next time when I have worked it out properly.

As for my playing - nothing to report really as I have been too busy with work kids and life to play that much and what I have played online has been neither up or down. Do hope to get out next Saturday to B'pool G for the monthly £100 deepstack tho.

I'll leave you with a few more pics from the tour game, saty lucky guys !!



SNEAKS 'n' DAZ having a good time.....happy geezers ! ! !


SNAPPER living the life of a pro....sad sponsor shirt and shades ! ! !


Kev Buckley and eventual winner John Richardson

May Accounts

Accounts for May
PokerPlex : down $40
PokerStars: down $120
Full Tilt : up $80
Playing live: up $1360
In total for playing up $1280
Bonus this month of $100 and pokerplex rakeback of $70
So +$1450 for the month.

and +$3870 for the year.

Had a good little run at the end on Stars and finally got the 7500 VPPs I needed. I also took part in their two big monthly freerolls, the $100k and the $Million (with added Porsche), and although I am not driving a Porsche today I did pick up $30 and $160 after going fairly deep and losing coin flips for big pots to be eliminated.

Nice though earning money for nothing and pushed my figures for the month up a bit too. Im running about the level I was last year, but do feel I am playing well at moment, especially in the MTTs, and I also got an extra site now worth playing at all times with this SUPERNOVA push at Stars.

All is good, stay lucky.

The Grind is dead...Long live the Grind

As I have mentioned before this month has been an exercise in futility and super grind at PokerStars. I have been desperately trying to achieve their special 80,000 VPPs Bonus by getting 7,500+ this month. I am almost there now, but $315 poorer in the process. Details of the scheme are here. Being supernova does mean you can earn the pokerstars points quicker and also enter a few weekly/monthly freerolls and specials. Don't know why I am really going for it as PokerPlex offer me much better value through Rakeback and bonus. Bit of a status thing I think and also I can play at Stars any time of the day as they have so many games going on.

Will have to get another 12,000 VPPs over the next month or so to actually get the 100,000 needed for supernova status. So 9-tabling PLO8 games is my best way I think although I defo leak playing that many tables .....hence the $315 deficit this month.So the grind is far from over !

When I do finally get there will have 40k points and might well build on that over the following months. Don't quite know what is the best way to go with them, think I can get $160 cash for every 10k, but also beleive you can use them for live events (over$500) if you email them and ask for the concierge service ...oooh posh ! So enough for an event or two at the Blackpool GUKPT would be cool.
The other possibility is to use them on their ridiculously easy Sunday super-turbo sats which I have been doing and got a phenomenal good record in. You can withdraw but they pay T$ so not the best option.
Still feel committed to it now, so unless I spunk too much money will complete.

As for live play I pulled out of going to B'pool for the £100'er and spent much more wholesome activity time with the kids making the most of the hot weather and down the beach.

Did get out last night to the local Pub game, which went well with me taking it down for about $200 without hardly playing any hand of risk except for a lucky 3-bet raise when Heads-up at the end with 93 that hit a 3,3,6 board LOL

Tour idea is coming along nicely, first event going to be Dalton Cricket Club on Sun 14th June 7pm and the mass text message goes out tomorrow night.

Next post will be May accounts and should be fairly good reading due to the GUKPT success. Stay Lucky Folks !!

Tourney report

Here is a report from the other night. I will take it down and link it once it goes on the cumbriapoker.com website.

and here it is gukpt omaha report

Omaha Trophy and sleep ..... NOT !

So drove upto Newcastle last night to play the £250 PLO GUKPT Tournament, courtesy of a 100% sponsorship from Cumbriapoker.com. And look there was a trophy to be won

Along with a champion of champions seat. So with just 54 entrants, this was a really good chance to get a nice trophy, but alas it wasn't to be.
After a driving nightmare entering Newcastle and finding the Casino I ended up there 5 minutes before the start and had to settle for an alternate seat. Quite good they loaded up 7 tables with just 6 players , leaving plenty of room for alternates ( An idea I will use for the Poker Tour of Furness I think)
7 hours 15 minutes late I got dealt my last hand and crashed out in 4th £1350 richer, although got to give Cumbriapoker 35% back. Still it was a great night and I felt completely at home and very comfortable amongst the so called greats of British Poker.
I left the Grosvenor at 3:15am and arrived back less than 2 hours later at 5:10 am . Drifted off to sleep and got my daughter waking me upo jumping on my back saying " come on Daddy time to get up you'll be late for work" LOL love her !

Stars challenge has suffered and will need to hammer it this w/end to get back on track.

Stay Lucky Punks I'm doing alright!

Silence of the Box

Had the evening in last night watching Britains got Talent and Eurovision with my little daughter. She loves it and I'm beginning to get sadder by the day as I am starting to comment as if I like it a bit...........which of course I don't. But watching the crowd there in Moscow it is easy to see it has become a big "EURO thing", heaps of nubile young women dancing for their countries pride ( probably a few nubile men, but I seemed to miss them) and everybody, absolutely everybody was smiling. Jesus not one sad or even neutral face, it is like people are really having a good time there...SICK !

Not that I was paying attention but the British lass did fairly well too, despite a crap song, guess the touch of Andrew Lloyd Webber did the trick. She sang well though and is worth a pic :


The winner was some Norwegian young wanna be poker player who had a classic Euro style tune that ended up being the biggest winning margin ever and now will no doubt be played to death everywhere.


On the poker front played a local game Friday, where i was on fine Trash talking mode, before bowing out to two poor plays from oppos that got Lucky..Story of every poker players life LOL
During eurosingsalong and then afterwards when I watched the brilliant Mr Hopkins in Silence of the Lambs I Played the Full Tilt FTOPS PLOmaha game as practice for Wednesdays GUKPT PLO event and came a respectable 124th out of 2215 runners for only about $100 but nice to feel in form, although I chickenshited a clear continuation bet towards the end that I was kicking myself for afterwards.

Pokerstars challenge sits at 2000 VPPs, +$20/month. Need another 5500 VPPs or 367/day.

Interest grows in the Poker Tour of Furness (PTF) and I am really looking forward to running this. Dates still not finalised but closest thing I have at the moment is this

First game does look like the Sun 14th June at Dalton CC 7pm start. Hope to see you local suckers there....stay lucky.

Sunday drag again

Benn playing a fair bit online this week and got an exciting opportunity coming up next week.

First had two long tourneys yesterday, the Pokerstars $1/4 million where I got well stacked but then crashed out just into the money for hardly any profit. Second one was the weekly VIP $2.5k freeroll on Plex, which I have played about 6 or 7 times without success. Yesterday was chip leader for long periods but then crashed badly on the final table to take a paltry $50 when really should have been making a happy pay day for myself --> so left quite dissapointed.

So online cash has been ticking away on Plex for a slight profit and then crashed last night and lost all that I had made in the previous week, including putting it all-in to a $220 pot with the Nut lo and being a little worried about gettting quartered, but should have been more worried about playing the right game as it was PLO hi only and the pot when scooting acrosss the table to one of my opponents ............. D'OH !!

The other place I have been playing is on PokerStars, where they have a fantastic offer on for UK players only. Basically it is an upgrade on your VPPs, offering a chance to upgrade, including a chance to get 80k VPP bonus for earning 7500VPPs in May. This will then put me just a month or two from gaining supernova status and all the perks that go with that. I started well and was making a little profit as well as earning the VPPs,before I had another bad session and am now down a little. Will go for it as I think it is worth it, Stars is the one site where I seem able to multi-table much more effectively ( upto 9) but not going to go down more than $500 chasing it, although again that might be hard to stop if I am so close to it. On 800 VPPs at moment so about 300/day required .....1 hour/day if nine tabling !!

The other news is an exciting sponsor offer to play the Newcastle GUKPT £250 PLO leg. Tony at http://www.cumbriapoker.com/ has offered to pay me in for 35% returns and just on the ask that I write up a Tourney report afterwards which is something I will quite enjoy doing and gives me a chance to play a game that really is just out of my reach with sensible bankroll management. He has offered the B'pool leg too or just do the one £500 PLO Hi/Lo leg at the Vic in Dec, which is more my game of choice but cant gaurantee I will be able to get free from work for that one, so will play the two PLO instead.

Keep tuned geezers and stay lucky.

I hate crap players

Saturday saw the Monthly deepstack at the G again.
5 of us went down from Barrow and had a fairly good day. I started a little slower than the last few tourneys, but eventually got going after the break with a nice float/bluff play and then a massive hand with my top two pair v. top n bottom v. flush draw stayed clear of trouble and made me comfortable chip leader by the next break. I managed to maintain my stack but then got moved to a new table where all the big stack were. I still went well and was very unlucky when my AK got it all-in v a KQ push only for the board to come down A,2,3,4,5 for a split.
Then with just 15 players left I got AK utg+1, young scandie who i had had a few good clashes with raised utg so i pushed for a total of 80k, a shorter stack of about 60k in mid position dwelled up for a minute before calling and the scandie dwelled himself saying he had AK and surprisingly let it go, flipping it as he did. What did the
shorter stack have??? 9 , 9 !!!! WHY? How can you possibly call with that and think you are ahead?? And what did he say " I knew you two were on AK !!"........what a muppet how can you know that !!
Obviously I missed and then was desperately short , went out soon after and left the tourney hating poor players and feeling I was so close to another £1000+ cash.

As it was HoneyMonster was at his awesome best and went into the final table as chipmonster, but blew away a little and finished 6th , but not before he had landed himself a £1000 deal
I had 5% so eased the entry cost a little.

Interest in the local poker tour grows, so should have dates sealed, stamped and sorted very soon.

Also online I am chomping away on Plex but also a great offer from Pokerstars.......more of which next time.....stay lucky gimps.

Aprils accounts

Accounts for April
PokerPlex : up $110
PokerStars: down $40
Playing live: up $1410
In total for playing up $1480

Bonus this month of $160 and pokerplex rakeback of $130

So +$1770 for the month.

and +$2420 for the year.

BIT MORE LIKE IT ! Obviously helped by my £grand at the G, but ran well towards the end of the month on Plex too plus a few local cashes, made for my confidence returning a little.

Off for a local game tonight and then a Barrow squad are down at B'pool tomorrow for the £100er again.

Same as last month please....Stay lucky guys

Local Poker Tour

More for local Barrow guys, but feel free to comment if you think you have an idea or advice on this.

Over the last couple of months I've put some ideas together to create a local Poker tour, basic idea being trying to get some larger games going and a bit of a local scene rejuvenation. Also lots of places playing but all with their own local crowd so get people out and about into other games etc.

Here is a flyer I have done for it, dates may well change and I will update when they do.


Tried to get everything standard, but basics are

*£25 buy-in with 7pm start, but latecomers can buy-in upto 8:50pm to allow as many as possible to play. Games should finish about 1:15am.
*Their is a very progressive structure with double chance so should allow quite a bit of play even for the aggressive monkeys amongst the runners.
*Leaderboard based on all finishes with a great prize of a £150 seat at the Blackpool GUKPT 2 day side event in November.
*Their will be a 2-day Grand final to the tour with a £60 buy-in and top 3 in the first events will win seats as part of their prize.
*Trying to get the venues to add extra money based on number of players (hopefully £2/player over the initial 25 players) and this will pay for the GUKPT seat, 2 trophies and a little added money to each tourney/final.

Got a couple of the legs sorted but need to finalise the rest will post back when its done, but everyone seems "up for it".

GUKPT crapshoot.........No thanks ! !

I got a bit of freedom Saturday evening, so decided to pop down to Manchester and play the opening side event of the Manchester leg of the Grosvenor UK Poker Tour (GUKPT).
It was a £100 freezeout with almost 200 runners starting at 6pm which should have made for a great comp, but to be honest it was only slightly better if that of a normal evening casino game. You got just 5000 chips which meant lose your first hand of any size and you are under pressure. There are some missing levels on the structure and the clock is just 30 minutes through.
So sounds as though I had a disaster, far from it really, but was still out within 3 1/2 hours.
I started brightly and floated a 4xBB raise hand from the BB with 63 of spades. The flop brought 934 with one spade and I decided to continue to float it versus a pot bet and call. The turn brought the 2 of spades so I was now drawing to the flush and gutshot. Checked it and two players bet pot and called......trap sprung perfect.....pot is the right size, board is low ,players have just enough in front of them and they are both fairly TAG so in I go with a 2k raise. Obligatory stare down from the pre-flop raising DONK who has obviously now got an overpair. minute or so go by and I start thinking "look Dude, your not calling now. For god sake let it go you only got a poxy pair". Sure enough a bit more acting from him and he releases it as does the other guy and I pick up a nice little 2.5k pot.
Not a true float all the way as I was semi-bluffing on the end, but I was very pleased with myself. It is much easier to find a spot in bigger games like this but you still need the balls to pull it off and I would have been very crippled if called and if re-raised would have been committed with my 12 to 15 outs.
I then get my chip stack upto 9k with some nice play and hands before the superb buffet, worth the reg fee alone!
I then tinker through the next level, before this hand:~ On the button I get AJ, decide to push against a raise from a tight guy I have played before and the old guy on the SB wakes up and tanks for about 3 minutes. I know he has AQ, what else could he have here??? and in hindsight I should have said something along the lines of " I ain't got a pair , can promise you that" giving him the impression of AK. But I didn't , I stayed quiet and he made a great call. Original raiser says "I can't call , only got AJ" LOL. He folds and I then tell the old Geezer he has AQ, which he is quite impressed with and duly turns it over. The cruel flop comes AQJ (double LOL) and I miss my only out and am down to a single 50 chip with BB about to go to 600 (triple LOL). Somehow I manage to get my stack upto 1450, and then miss a flop for what would have put me right back in it.
Anyway, that is that for the game report.
Basic premise is I won't bother with another single day GUKPT game as 30 min and the stack doesn't allow enough play. Might play the B'pool £150 GUKPT 2 dayer in Nov, that has 6k chips and 45 min clock with a couple of extra levels, just about worth it.
The monthly B'pool game is by far the best value in terms of playability and will stick with that for now. Talking of which there are two coming up on Sat 2nd and Mon 4th May, anyone fancy coming down for it?

Didn't get the local tour info up but will try to on next entry. Stay Lucky guys

At Last

Well a busy time for me on the live Poker tables this w/end with me playing almost as much this w/end as in total so far all year !

Basics are ~
FRI night local £30 pub tourney, too fast structure but had already doubled my stack slowly before being crippled when I got called by an underpair to my top pair and he sucked out with one of his two outs. Then played cash with a total LAG who was great value for money, got stacked twice before getting it all back for a level day with a great hand where I had Trips with A kicker v. Straight Flush draw on the turn.
SUN night £20 home game around a friends house which are always good fun and the only time I play drinking. Yet despite the red wine I still ran well enough to chop both games we had heads-up for a smallish profit.
MON day & night Played the B'pool 'G' £100 Deepstack game and had a great time despite turning up an hour+ late due to M6 nightmare. So many hands to talk about but not enough space and ended up playing almost an hour for the final table bubble. Once it had burst we ended up not playing any more as it was 3am and we did a chop where 7 got £1000 and top 3 big stacks shared the rest.
You can see the official payout from this NUTZ tv shot and I thought at the time it was a good deal, but looking back probably did myself out of a couple hundred quid according to a chip stack chop and I had a playable stack and could have waited longer to deal really. However when you have been playing 12 hours it is knackering and I really don't know how the WSOP guys do it for 14hoursx7days straight!!

So at last I get a bit of results that I feel my play has deserved in recent live games and gaurantees a decent profit for April. I might even have a shot at a GUKPT Manchester event this next week.

To top it off Barrow Rugby won both games this w/end against Whitehaven and Leigh who are 2 of the top 4 so a great all round performance.

Catch everyone later where I hope to put up some of my plans for a local live Poker Tour.

March Accounts

Accounts for March
PokerPlex : down $120
PokerStars: down $70
Playing live: up $120
In total for playing down $70

Bonus this month of only $90 and pokerplex rakeback of $70

So +$90 for the month.

and +$650 for the year.


All in all a very quiet month. Played alittle on PokerPlex and had some good runs in the SCOOP games on Stars and the Sunday $1/4Million's, but no cash to write home about.

Question that the last few months has brought up is due to my losing the last 3 months at Plex is ~ Can I hold my own in the Plex games by enough too make it worthwhile with the rakeback and bonus?
At the Virgin Festival I heard that Plex had withdrawn the deal I am getting from most players, so if they stick with me I will stick with them and make the most of it while it is still here.

Right enough for now, off to watch Barrow Rugby this afternoon in the local derby against Whitehaven which is going to be a BIG game this year and will put us top if we win !
Then local £30 pub game this evening followed by a Home game Sunday (if I can make it?) which is always fun and then finishing with the £100 deepstack at the G in Blackpool on Easter Monday. Lets hope in the next entry I have lots of success to report on.

Stay Lucky dudes

Great Weekend ~ Poker n Rugby vibes

Just had a great weekend with the Virgin Festival at Newcastle Saturday and then a day at the Rugby watching the mighty Wigan struggle ( a lot) to beat the Barrow "super" Braves !

The Virgin Festival was one I qualified for almost 6 months ago and after struggling to find my way to Aspers I stopped the car on double yellows, wound down the window to ask some local the way. He said " get out, I'll show you". Thinking it must be just round the corner, I left the car unlocked and followed him around the corner. And sure enough he led me straight to the Casino, but only after we had walked about half a mile and taken god knows how many turns. I was running latish so pooped in, picked up my security tag and then thought I'd better go and sort the car out. Got back outside and thought " Jesus which way is it"......somehow I managed to find it almost straight away, but by total luck more than judgement.
Anyway into the tournament and I pick up J,10 of clubs in early position and limp for 50, it goes round to the small blind who pops it up to 300. I planned to get busy early on so as I had position thought I would gamble and called ~ flop came with the 8&Q of clubs. He bet 600, thought about re-raising but just called. The turn brought an Ace and I could just tell that was good for him and sure enough he bet 2000. Didn't want to get this deep this early, but I had so many outs and the pot was getting big. River brought a beautiful K which did put a 3rd diamond on the board so when he bet 5000 I snap called. He indeed have AA and in hindsight I knew that and should have put him in for the rest and given him the first out bounty. Still I was upto 18k after 20 minutes....very nice.
The rest of the tournament was probably my worst ever card dead period.....I never got better than 99 and only got one AK and one AQ in 8 hours play. I did hit a few flops though and pinched a few unwanted pots post flop. Hit my AQ with a AQQ flop but no one bit at my little utg pot builder and somehow James Browning got away from my 64 on a 357 flop, when I min check raised him on the turn (Ace) and made some flippant comment " I'm giving you a way out". Couldn't put him on a hand at all to be honest, so he was probably firing a second bluff bullet anyway.
I made a move when a tight player (SWAMPY online) raised and i decided there was value in pushing with my QJ clubs. Stacks were just right and pot enough, my image had been fairly tight ( as I hadn't had a hand LOL) so still think the move was right and considering he took over a minute to call when holding AK seemed to vindicate my read on him. I got lucky as the board filled with 4 clubs and it sent him over the edge, don't think he thought it was good play from me, but I was happy with the move, albeit I had him on a lesser hand.
Then on the BB with almost 20k left (ave = 25k by now) and Mr. Big Stack limps from mid position !! mmmmm smelt fishy straight away as he had raised 10 hands in the last hour! I had K3 so liked the K57 flop, but was still very cautious and we all checked. The turn brought a 3....BINGO. I put in a half pot bet, sure I was ahead now and Mr Big Stack seemed to reluctantly call. Then a Q hit the river and again I was sure I was leading , but decided the value was to let him bet any AK or AA holding he had, and sure enough he put in a little bet and I immediately pushed back over the top. Not enough for him to fold his top pair or overpair though. He thought about it for half a minute so when he called I thought "Nice one" and was stunned when he flipped QQ for trips and I was gone. I played it well I thought and at the end of the day he hit a two outer on the end. Shame as it would have had me up on 45k and I felt comfortable at the table where I thought there were a few weak spots.

Apart from being ridiculously cramped and breaking any kind of fire regulations they must have there the atmosphere was great and I met a fair few online characters including some Punters Lounge guys and was sat again next to James Browning (sat next to and final tabled a GUKPT side event at Walsall2008). He has just got himself a 6 month sponsorship with William Hills and I hope it goes well for him as he was again very pleasant company at the table. Also sat in seat one was a prolific cash game player called "The Mole", a Scottish guy with classic milk bottle glasses and a LAGGY style to him who seemed to be very entertaining and I was dissapointed when he got shifted tables early doors to sit next to the lovely Kara Scott and knock her out with a "got to make this stupid call for the Bounty" play.
The Barrow contingent were all out early so had some chat with them at the breaks and before heading home.

A few hours sleep and was upto greet the kids back from Grannys before heading out for a few beers and a chance to witness the Rugby League upset of the millenium. However it was not to be as Wigan edged home through a few classy wingers tries in the first half , but Barrow gave them a real scare and it was a great day with the best part of 7,000 crammed in enjoying the Sun and a tremendously proud home team perfromance. Well Done Lads! looking forward to Fridays game against now our seriously big rivals Whitehaven on Friday afternoon.

Even went fairly deep in the 30,000 entry Stars $1/4 million on Sunday Evening although couldn't get into that top 200 odd where the real cash is.
Accounts for March up next time, pretty boring though as hardly played.

A Quiet Month

Not been playing much this month with one or two things going on. Finally got the Neteller farce sorted at what must have been the 10th attempt to send documents.....I beleive the term for their customer service on this is ANAL!

Did have a little local Live game which ended up with me playing heads-up for over an hour, which is great fun live with a dealer. Also as I went into it as a dog and at 24k v 176k at one stage it was pleasing to come out on top and take home the £100 1st place.

Online dabbled a bit at Pokerplex, neither up nor down. Hardly played any where else except for qualifying for a few upcoming events.
I have the Virgin festival on the first w/end of April and starting around the same time is Pokerstars new spring series event which comprises a heap of events each being offered at 3 different levels ~ Lo, Medium and Hi. The Hi means off the wall for sickos, the Medium is for the hi-rollers and the Lo is just about right for me , wlthough will still cost about $1000 to play them all !! Details here..................


I've already satellited into 3 of them and going to try and burn through a few more of my FPPs @ Stars to save me spending quite so much on them. Should be great , with HUGE fields and good structures.....could be good value too !

Feb Accounts

So here we go again, exceptionally dull so feel free to skip straight to the end.

Accounts for February
PokerPlex : down $650
Boylepoker : down $40
Full Tilt: down $30
PokerStars: up $460
Playing live: down $160
In total for playing down $420

Bonus this month of only $170 and pokerplex rakeback of $110

So -$140 for the month.

and +$560 for the year.

By far my worst month ever in terms of $/hr rate. In fact first time I think that my bonus+rakeback hasn't covered any loss on my main site "Pokerplex". I hope this is just a temporary blip, I could really do with a good month just to get my confidence back a little !!

Still having a ridiculous struggle to get Neteller to validate my ID, but I hope to have it laid to rest by MONDAY.

I've also received an invite to be sponsored to play the GUKPT PLO event in Newcastle in May, so will see if that comes to fruition.

Yeh, notes are useful......mmmmmmmm

So here it is, PLO Hi/Lo and I'm on the button with 10,10,7,3 and see a flop of K,7,7. It is checked to me and I check it, too difficult a hand to call a re-raise. Turn is a 5 , check all round. River is a 3, bingo Full House! and no one has bet ( they are all deep) so must be well in front. utg bets the minimum $2 and it gets called twice, I figure they are all palying some Lo or Hi hand so decide to repop it and try to scoop the pot by flushing out all the non premium lo & hi hands. The utg then repops it and Im forced to call hoping he is Lo.


But NO he had slowplayed KK, the nut FH, on all streets and I lose a $120+ pot. I type "wp" in the chat box and begin to curse myself for being so greedy with a hand like mine. Then think I'd better put something about that in his notes. Double click him and realise I already have a note on him. This is it
PLO8 ch F&T NUTSFH (ep) minb on R
which is my shorthand for
PLOmaha Hi/Lo checked the Flop and Turn with the Nuts Full House from early position and a minimum bet on the River. I now cursed myself for not reading this as he had made exactly the same play before and i would NO way have repopped it on the river, but just called it down and saved myself virtually my whole stack.

I don't make notes enough, I should have at least used the ones I have made.
Note to myself: make more notes.

As for my online play taken quite a hit this month on Poker Plex so had a few days off, and will be back in March, Accounts up next post.

Neteller blindfolds me and stabs me you know where

I first started playing poker at the beginning of 2002, over 7 years ago now and started small but built it up quickly with bonuses ( inc. some ridiculous easy to get bonuses on Online casinos....not possible any more i'm afraid all you freeloader you have missed the boat). Almost from the start I used Neteller as an online bank system and used a c/c to deposit , got that credited back to my c/c and have never had to resort to "my cash/bank/credit" since. Probably transfered back and forth on Neteller over $100,000 by now, yet Neteller have just put a hold on my account asked me to produce evidence of my ID !!wtf why now?? Anyway I dont have that much there at the moment but it is the easiest way to move cash into and out of sites, so is damn annoying not to be able to access it.
I have to produce a photo id and utility bill. Dont have a scanner at home and my camera gives too much glare, so had to take everything into work and get it done. They then email me back and say the Passport had expired ( sent on 11th Feb'09 , passport expired on 9th Feb'09 LOL and the utility bill was more than 3 months old) JESUS ! just give me my money back and I will go somewhere else , but NO, cant even get my money before I do this, so will have to repeat at work next week.

This meant I only had $26 in my BlSq account and the Welsh APAT online game this Saturday night costs $55, so had to enter the $5 rebuy sat. For the cost of just the initial buy-in, no more, I cruised my way in.
Thats is two APAT events, The Virgin Festival and even got a mate into the SKY live tour game too, in the last few months. Satellites had always been a weakness of mine but seem to have run/played well recently....I'm definitely more sure of myself on who/when to attack in them. If I run well for the next month or so might go for a few bigger ones !

Right APAT gold medal coming my way if I STAY LUCKY !

Another Week passes by......

... a few things happened, but nothing great so stop reading if you are rushed.

Just finished playing the Pokerstars $200k and couldn't repeat last weeks exploits, but finished a respectable 7,000th LOL, but still over 2,500 from the cash.

I played the Hendon Mob League game this week ( i dont play it regularly but every now and then) and managed to knock out Barney Boatman. Something flashed up on the screen about knocking out a Full Tilt Pro and when I checked my emails I got this:

Hi Robbiebox,

Congratulations on busting Barny Boatman in the following tournament:

Hendon Mob Forum League (76318269)

Your Full Tilt Poker account has been credited with a bounty prize of $10.00.

In addition to your bounty prize money, you've also earned a T-shirt to commemorate your accomplishment. You'll receive a second email that will allow you to claim this shirt and confirm your shipping details.

Remember, Full Tilt Poker offers a bounty for busting any red pro playing in any scheduled real-money tournament with 30 players or more. You can collect a bounty matching the tournament buy-in (not including tournament fee) up to $200.

We're happy to have you playing at Full Tilt Poker - best of luck at the tables!

Sincerely,

Full Tilt Poker

So I have won one of those tacky " I bust a Pro at Full Tilt Poker" T-shirts that I saw 2 people wearing at the APAT comp last w/end. It might as well say "I'm not much of a poker player, but I got lucky once and knocked out this so called pro", personally think the Boatmans are evry average rock type players and would be surprised if they are long term winners as they certainly haven't cahsed much considering the number of tourneys they have been sponsored into, they were just around at the right time and have marketed themselves well.
No way am I wearing it ever, so will have to find some way to give it away.

Last thing for today is the boxing match that two of Denmarks best players have organised between each other as a sporting bet. It is Gus Hansen v Theo Jorgenson, who are best mates and are playing for $25k if Gus wins , $35k if Theo wins. That is just chicken feed to these two so it really is a personal challenge. The one thing that has caught my attention are the odds Nordicbet are offering on a bloody nose at any stage of the fight. A massive 11 to 1, which I think is exceedingly good value, I am going to fill my boots or have a little dabble on that anyway. Think the fight is live online too ! Will try and find the link and post it later.

Stay Lucky Dudes

Played two big tourneys this w/end and came 53rd in both !
So APAT tourney on Saturday at Walsall, had me arriving late due to babysitting times. But 2hr 20 min to Walsall was impressive and meant I arrived only missing one set of blind and just the 150 chips lost from my 10,000. I didn't get any starting hands of note and didn't connect with a thing on the board, but was able to take down a few unwanted pots and stayed at about 11k for the first 2 hours. A loud fella named Scouse was keeping everyone entertained and I clashed with him in two hands where I made good value calls on the river with pocket pairs and this got him a little excited and he started berating me for my play. Out of order stuff really, with a few insults and use of the words retard and idiot, I love that banter/wind-up stuff though and replied with a "not the idiot who bet with nothing" and "I wasn't playing the cards, just the player", give him credit though he came back with "well played Phil" which I thought was a good line. However he didn't know me at the time and I think several players would have taken offence at his comments. He did buy me and a couple of others a beer after he was knocked out and then watched the footy where he got a little excited and expressed himself FULLY! There were a number of players who swore loudly throughout the tourney including a lady so drunk she fell asleep at our table and had to be given a nudge every time it was her turn to act. A few other incidents happened and now there is a fully fledged thread on APAT forum regarding "beer and poker". I personally like to have characters at a poker table and beer often "creates" more character, although swearing out loudly never sits comfortably with me in a public place and I hope that a general consensus comes from the thread http://www.apat.com/forum/index.php?topic=2791.90
The table split and for the rest of the night I got moved to a pleasant table and was stayed card dead and got a little low, until I rode my luck a bit when I moved on the turn with bottom pair and flush draw, got called by top pair and hit on the river. I made a nice move with a re-raise bluff and was avereage or slightly above until just as we reached the last level my AK re-raise ran face first into AA. A King on the flop, so even If i had played it cautiously I still would have gone out in 53rd and 40 min short of Day2. Still thought I had played well with so few cards and so many missed flops, so quite pleased.

Got back after driving home in the snow, to put the kids to bed and sit down to play the $10 entry $200k gtee on Stars. This is now becoming a regular tourney for me and was full last night with 30,000 runners! I gradually built my stack steadily, made the cash and then chipped my way up the prizepool ladder. A few weeks back I had come 216th, well that milestone passed and then we got down to the last hundred and I was starting to get quite excited with first prize of $28,500. With 53 players left I got KK on the button and it was folded round to me, picture story to follow:


So All-in pre-flop....M A G I C



So a little dissapointed, as the pot would have put me right in the mix for a massive payday, but hey-ho $480 and a 53rd from 30 thousand players is a PB in this event....



.........One day it will happen LOL.

Crashes and a $500 pot

Off to the Walsall APAT event today, not leaving till the last minute now, so going to have to rush down. Not a great move as I watched a Fire service presentation on Road safety yesterday at work and have to say found it quite moving....it brought back vivid memories of a motorway pile-up I witnessed 17 years ago and it is incredible how clear a moment like that can be. Even got a little choked up when I told the kids about it at the end. So hope the conditions are good and snow is well clear down there.

My biggest pot for a long time, so for the $500 pot, this is the playback.
PLO Hi/Lo $1/$2 and I have $121 in front of me, everyone else inthe hand is much deeper. I get dealt Ad3d4hJs and see a flop of 2dQd8h so have Nut Lo draw and also A flush draw for the probable Nut Hi --> With two cards to come I need any 34567 for the Lo and any Diamond is my only real way of taking down the Hi.
Anyway the flop betting goes crazy with me getting caught in between the raisers and forced to call all-in against 4 opponents by the end of the round. On the turn of another Queen we lose one as the other two end up getting it all in for atotal pot of almost $1000 and the River comes another Queen, putting trips on the board and destroying any chance I had of taking anything.
One of the guys had 10A39 with two diamonds giving him almost the same lo draw and taking away two of my Hi draw outs and the other guy had Q8xx and took down the grand with Quad Queens. I stuck it into the Omaha8 calculator http://www.thehendonmob.com/pokercalc/index.html and found I was only 34% to win on the flop which surprised me as I thought I would be much higher.
Those pots make a big difference to my bottom line come the end of the month,, By the way if you are reading this and know how I can display hand histories a little better please send me the link in a comment.

Right off to become Emglish amateur champion. Stay lucky geezers i intend to !

OK Jan accounts up now

First here are the Accounts for January

PokerPlex : down $340
Boylepoker : down $20
Full Tilt: up $50
PokerStars: down $30
VirginPoker: down $20
Playing live: up $110
In total for playing down $250

Bonus this month of $520 and pokerplex rakeback of $430

So +$700 for the month.

and +$700 for the year.



Again this shows the power of rakeback and bonuses, and in Feb I will be earning 25% extra bonus for my play as I am now on 7star VIP at Plex



It was also a good month comeback , because I plumetted early in the month to over $600 down, and recovered quite well. Here are my PT stats for the month, showing almost 15,000 hands played. If I can manage that amount this month I will be bringing in $1k+ in bonus and r'back, and if I can win at the rate of the last 2 weeks will end up with $3k or $4k. "IF", "IF" and "IF" .....one month it will happen!

As for live games this year, I really want to focus just on games with deeper stacks, so the monthly £100 ones at Stoke and B'pool are good, APAT games, Virgin Festivals and maybe a side event or two at GUKPT are ones that spring to mind.
One event that I would love to play is the PLOmaha Hi/Lo side event at the GUKPT festivals, only times you can play this game live in the UK but problems are they are only on twice and both times at the Vic in London and they are £500 comps...a bit out of my B'roll really. First one is on 21st March and if I run like God this month and make a fair whack then I might just go for it anyway. The other way is to try and get staked, I got a fair staking from local guys when I planned to play the Bolton GUKPT PLOmaha last Sept and on blonde and punters lounge forums there are active staking sections. Could do with pushing my PT stats into the green as ammunition to get staking there though.

Ducks, Bulldogs and Jan Accounts

Last year I had 1258 views of my blog and 1 month in Jan I have had just 94 views, so my blog is becoming less popular. Not surprising when you consider the poor quality of entry and the fact I haven't had anything really interesting happen to me in the poker world for the last 4 months.

Well Saturday I took down the local comp , disposing of several fish along the way, just had to hit once with AK v 55 but apart from that was never in any trouble, aside a few blatant steals when down to 3. Ended up splitting it heads up with Snapper for £215 which was a nice way to finish the month after a long time off the cash in local games.
A few of the regular players were well plastered, making for an entertaining Saturday night. Also there were two card gaurds that took notice, Robo's stupid "nasty Duck" that was only nasty in the sense I wouldn't want one.
And also Bully's 2 brass bulldogs which he proudly put one on each card every hand.
These are not the real ones but you get the idea.
A bit of a gimmick , but I imagine it would get you noticed and that can be a good thing. I've just read an article about how Pokerstars Pro Haved Khan deliberately was outrageous in the 2006 WSOP so that it drew attention to him and he managed to get a sponsored deal out of it, even though his performance wasn't really that great. He has now cashed a few times, including one big win to make him a "name", but apparently he has played every tourney going (all paid for by Stars) just so he could get some results to be worth talking about. Quite a little business plan, as playing big tourneys from your own bankroll seems to be a very difficult way to get +VE out of poker. If I ever make a big tourney late stages will have to think of some "gimmick" to give me that PR edge !!

Maybe I should dress up in fancy dress, Robo did think I looked like Gimli from Lord of the Rings.

I don't see it myself, but then again I wasn't on my 13th pint of Stella or trying to distract people from my own uncanny similarity to a Butch Gay bloke from San Fran ...............say no more.

I was going to post Jan Accounts, but will save that to later in the week when I get the rakeback details, also will try and target a few live games/ambitions for the year.
APAT game tonight on BlSq, dont forget to get involved in this comp, doesn't matter if you miss the first one you can join in at any time and with 20 weeks it wont make much difference.