Yorky Pud

As you probably all know by now I am currently in Barcelona to help the PokerNews Live Reporting team update you all with the goings on in the EPT Barcelona Main Event. I thought it would be good to keep a daily blog for the next week, time permitting, seeing as I'm a bit of a Little Englander. Maybe I could be poker's answer to Karl Pilkington?

The drive to Manchester Airport was pretty uneventful to say the least, just a nice steady 70 all the way listening to an old "God's Kitchen" CD I forgot I had. I love how I still get a rush when I hear certain tunes despite being a good lad for the past 3-4 years! Anyway, I got to the airport but could I hellers like find the bloody car park I had pre-booked! After a brief panic, I managed to access my email archive on my phone, parked up and got the free shuttle to the airport.

I've not been through Manchester airport recently but I can never remember a time it was so quiet. Usually it is bustling and it really pisses me off how people are rushing around at the last minute and barging past me, but there was none of that, in fact I bet I didn't see more than a couple of hundred people in the time I was there. Good result in my book.

Not knowing when I would get to stuff my fat face again I thought it would be best to buy some massively over-priced food before take-off. Thinking of what would be best for me and my fellow passengers I opted for chilli beef enchiladas, which were actually quite nice, though they've been repeating on me since. Usually, I don't get nervous about flying but this time I was bricking it, so much so I had to numb the old nerves with a couple of double Jim Beam's and cokes. They seemed to do the trick, especially as I had both of them in 15-20 minutes, probably explains why the flight went so quick, but I doubt they had any influence on the tail wind that helped my plane get to Barcelona nearly half hour earlier than expected.

I usually run pretty good at the baggage carousel and this time was no different as my case was the third or fourth one out and after picking it up, being scowled at by the most miserable chuffing passport control woman on the planet, I headed for the exit and waited for a text message from a fellow reporter, Lee Davy, who I'd arranged to get a taxi with to the hotel. However, I did not plan on him landing at a completely different terminal to me, one that was at least three miles away from me! We eventually agreed to meet at the hotel instead of the airport so I went to the taxi rank to see if Spanish taxi drivers are as miserable and psychotic as the ones in the UK.

The answer is yes they are. This 50-odd year old bloke asked if I wanted a taxi, well that's what I reckoned as my knowledge of the Spanish language stops at around "two beers," "please," "thankyou" and "heth heth heth, heth heth heth heth heth, Boutros Boutrols Gali." I pointed out the address to my hotel and he didn't seem too excited about the fact but he did say "come," which either meant he was actually very excited about the thought of driving me or wanted me to get in his car. Despite the language barrier, and the fact he did not say another word for the next 10-15 minutes, I found out he was related to Fernando Alonso, just by his break-neck driving speeds, lack or observation and his willingness to basically drive like a complete knob. When we finally pulled over the meter said €19.85 so I passed him a €20 note but then he pissed about with a load of buttons and it added another €4.10 on! I said, "WTF" and passed him a €10 making for €30. Well, Alonso Snr can't drive and he can't count either as he gave me €1.05 and a €10 note! One-nil Pudding.

The hotel itself is uber-posh and definitely not somewhere I would be able to afford to stop at off my own back. I went hunting for my complementary dressing gown and found the mini bar, mini in that you could by one of the cars cheaper than a bottle of Bud or tube of Pringles. Just everything about the hotel is classy, so God knows what I am doing here. Actually, I tell a lie. Everything here is classy barring the internet, which is free so I shouldn't really moan I suppose. It is so slow it is not even funny and keeps cutting out on me so I doubt I'll be playing any poker here any time soon, though Mr Davy informs me he is playing six-tables with no problems, but he uses a Mac so he doesn't really count! Oh and the bog roll is horrific, though I think they try to distract from that by putting a telephone on the toilet wall. Seriously, WTF?

One of the downsides to such a balla hotel is that the prices reflect this in their services, namely the bar and food! I quite fancied some grub but after seeing it is €30 for a breakfast I decided that a bag of Haribo that I brought from home would be more than suffice for now, though the sugar rush is keeping me awake and I need to sleep!

I'll leave it there for now as I am going to try and get some shut eye as it will be a busy day tomorrow, probably 12+ hours in the casino itself. I'm not nervous at all now, probably because I've had four babs today and their's nothing left in my locker, and I'm quite looking forward to it. Hopefully there will be some fun hands and situations to recall later.

As always, thanks for reading and best of luck at the tables!

Daniel Negreanu is one of a select few players who has won both World Poker Tour (WPT) and World Series of Poker (WSOP) titles but a European Poker Tour (EPT) title has still eluded him. He has made it very clear he is desperate to join Roland de Wolfe and Gavin Griffin in winning poker's "Triple Crown," so much so that he has paid an extra $17,500 to take part in EPT Barcelona!

Negreanu has been in Los Angeles for the past week for the North American Poker Tour Main Event, which was eventually won by Joe Tehan. As he was about to return home to Las Vegas, his assistant informed him of a potential problem with his travel plans. The popular Canadian had planned to fly to Barcelona for the EPT on November 20, stay until the 27th and then a week later fly to Sydney for the Asia Pacific Poker Tour. However, it transpired that his passport was due to expire on December 5.

Knowing of his plans, Negreanu's assistant sent off his renewal application not knowing it takes the Canadian authorities up to four weeks to return passports, which would mean Negreanu would not be able to fulfil obligations to both his sponsor and some people he was going to travel with, who he described in his blog as "VIPs." Thankfully for Negreanu, these so called VIPs were able to pull a few strings for him.

After a frantic six hour drive from Los Angeles to Las Vegas, during which time Negreanu admitted to making songs up about place and road names and talking Patua (Jamaican) out loud to keep him awake, he was informed that if he could make it to the Vancouver passport office within the next six hours he would be able to get a new passport. He discovered that he would not be able to make that time-scale using a domestic flight so instead had to hastily book a private jet and pilot, at a cost of $15,000 with an additional $2,500 return flight! To cut a very long story short, Negreanu got his hands on his new passport and will now be taking part at EPT Barcelona, choosing to play on Day 1B.

Negreanu had snubbed the EPT events in the past but has been a regular on this season's circuit. So far he has managed a win in a side event at EPT Vilamoura, a minor cash in the £5,000 EPT London Main Event and more recently he came extremely close to his first EPT title when he came fourth at EPT Vienna.

Last year 478 players paid the €8,300 to take part in EPT Barcelona, with the eventual winner, Carter Phillips walking away with a massive €850,000. This year's tournament has a lower entry fee after organisers shaved €3,000 from the price, which is good news for Negreanu as he will already be in a $20,000 hole before the tournament even begins!

Peter Eastgate's decision to sell the bracelet he was awarded for winning the 2008 World Series of Poker Main Event has been met with mixed reactions, some delighted that he is trying to raise money for a good cause, others disgusted with him getting rid of one of the most sought after pieces of jewellery on the planet. One man though stands to benefit from it, or should I say his dog is.

Antanas Guoga, better known as Tony G, is never one to shy away from the public eye and he has thrust himself into the forefront of that by making an announcement on his blog that he will not be outbid for Eastgate's gold bracelet. Speaking of the bracelet on his blog, Tony G said, “It's currently trading at $16,500 on eBay and I'm going to lead the bidding at $17,500. I don't expect any further bids and, as I know, there are very few people with the heart and courage to challenge a determined Tony G.”

So what are Tony G's plans for the 168 grams of 18 carat white gold with 291 individual diamonds weighing in at 2.81 carats? Put it in a museum? Have it on display in his home? No, he plans to turn it into a special collar for his pet dog, a German Shepherd called Zasko! The bracelet will be, “The ultimate dog bling -as my gladiator and protector he deserves to be kitted out in such style.”

At first his prediction appeared to be true as the first two days of the auction saw the bracelet's asking price increase by only $700 but there has been a flurry of activity since, a total of 47 bids have now been placed taking the price to $50,100! That is one expensive dog collar!

The current asking price is more than three times the valuation an independent jeweller gave Eastgate before the auction started. That should not bother Tony G though as he has $4,385,950 in live tournament winnings, is a regular in some massive cash games in Russia and has a number of business interests including the PokerNews empire. Whether or not he will live up to his initial statement is yet to be seen but regardless of whether he does or not the charity UNICEF, the chief beneficiary of this auction, are in for a nice little windfall!

The newly formed North American Poker Tour (NAPT) continues to go from strength to strength with substantial turnouts to its Main Events. Being less than a year old it is a little early to be talking about records being set and broken but one was at the recent Los Angeles stop as Joe Tehan eliminated the entire final table on his way to victory!

Over the course of the week the 701 players who ponied up the $5,000 entry fee, creating a prize pool of $3,229,857, were gradually whittled down until just the final table of eight remained. A whole host of well-known names took part including Phil Laak, Adam Junglen, Shane Schleger and Matt Affleck but they failed to make the grade. Of those who did make it t the final table, Jason Mercier was the most recognisable face, though former WSOP Main Event final table member Michael Binger may have questioned him on that!

The final table took eight hours to complete, though Jake Toole did not see much of it. He raised to 115,000 with pocket jacks and then shoved all-in for 1,455,000 over the top of Tehan's three-bet to 300,000. Tehan made the call with AcQh and when the five community cards came out as 8s-Tc-Ad-9h-2d, Toole was eliminated in eighth place worth $60,000.

As the table was quite deep-stacked it took another 90 minutes before another player headed for the rail, this time it was Mercier who fell victim of Tehan. Mercier opened the betting with a min-raise to 120,000 from middle position, both Ray Henson and Chris DeMaci made the call but Tehan, from the big blind, squeezed it to 515,000. Mercier went through his usual routine and finally made another raise to 1,100,000, enough to fold out the rest of his opponents except Tehan, who moved all-in! Mercier simply exclaimed, "Wow!" before calling off his remaining 3,645,000 chips, putting himself at risk. He turned over AsKd whilst Tehan held a very slight advantage with pocket jacks. The 6d-5h-9c flop failed to alter anything and when the turn and river fell 3c and 8h respectively it was game over for the talented 24-year old.

Just two hands later and Tehan took out arguably the second most dangerous player at the table in Binger. Looking down at AcJh and seeing the action had folded around to him in the cut off, Tehan raised to 125,000. Binger, on the button, raised to 330,000, the blinds folded but Tehan had other ideas and four-bet all-in! Binger quickly called off his 1,505,000 stack with TsTd and it looked like a good call as the flop came down 5s-2c-7d but when your opponent is running good you have to avoid all five community cards and not just the flop. Binger did not do this as the dealer put out a red ace on the turn and when the 2h peeled off on the river it was curtains for man who finished third at the 2006 WSOP Main Event.

Tehan's willingness to gamble certainly paid off around an hour and a half after Binger left the table, as he managed to eliminate two players in the same hand! The table had been very aggressive, with plenty of raises being three-bet preflop so maybe that is why Tehan moved all-in from the cut off when the action folded to him, to prevent his opponents coming over the top of him. The plan did not work as both blinds called him! Anh Van Nguyen in the small blind turned over AdQh, Henson in the big blind held AhJc and Tehan sheepishly revealed Kh5d! The 9d-4d-9c flop missed everyone but the Ks on the turn smashed straight into Tehan's hand and made him a 95% favourite in the hand. The 2c on the river completed the hand and with it Henson and Nguyen headed to the rail in fifth and fourth place respectively!

Not content with eliminating five opponents so far, Tehan kept his foot on the gas and claimed victim number six in the shape of the short-stacked Al Grimes just five minutes after his double elimination. Tehan made it 165,000 to play, Grimes three-bet all-in for 590,000 chips in total and Tehan instantly called before turning over Jh9c, around a 3:2 favourite over the 8s7s of his opponent. Tehan fell behind on a Th-7c-3d flop but when you are running hotter than the sun you are never too far behind. He retook the lead with the arrival of the 9h on the turn and when the river came down the Kd, Grimes was eliminated and the tie went on a dinner break before the heads-up battle was to take place.

Going into heads-up Tehan held a substantial 14,595,000 to 6,350,000 chip advantage but it still took around an hour to press that advantage home. Tehan raised to 240,000 preflop, a bet that DeMaci elected to simply call, so both players saw a flop reading 3s-5h-Ks. Tehan kept up the aggression with a continuation bet of 375,000, DeMaci checked his hole cards before moving all-in for around 2,645,000 and Tehan quickly called. DeMaci's Kd4h would usually be the best hand here but not today as Tehan flipped over a dominating KcTh. The turn was the 5s and the river came down as the 4s to bust DeMaci in second place and award the title to Tehan.

The $725,000 won here takes Tehan's lifetime tournament winnings past the $3,000,000 mark and it is almost certain he will be taking part in the next stop of the NAPT in January when it touches down in the Bahamas for the PCA.

Final table results

1.) Joe Tehan: $725,000
2.) Chris DeMaci: $440,000
3.) Al Grimes: $250,000
4.) Anh Van Nguyen: $195,000
5.) Ray henson: $145,000
6.) Michael Binger: $114,000
7.) Jason Mercier: $84,857
8.) Jacob Toole: $60,000

A female poker player by the name of Young-shin Im has become the first woman to win an Asia Pacific Poker Tour (APPT) title as she outlasted 236 hopefuls in the Main Event of APPT Cebu.

Young-shin Im has only been playing poker for two years but she has already managed to cash in five previous APPPT events, before adding this outright win to he rapidly expanding CV. What makes her story even more interesting is that she qualified for this event through a $22 online satellite, meaning her return on investment for this tournament is, quite frankly, huge!

She started the final table of nine fourth in chips but was cool and calculating throughout, choosing her spots extremely well and running good when it mattered the most, including flopping two sets when he opponents had made top pair, which resulted in Jukka Juvonen (seventh place) and Mikael Rosen (fourth place) being eliminated.

The major threat to her at the table was Kim Gap Young, a man who had finished Day 2 and Day 3 as a big chipleader but his relentless aggression was eventually his downfall. After losing several large pots in a row, including running pocket threes into Fabiano Michael's aces, Kim Gap Young found himself down to just 195,000, with blinds at 15,000/30,000/3,000a. He doubled two hands later when his Ts6h turned two pair to crack Michael's queens but instead of biding his time, he moved all-in on the next hand with the Js4h. Michael made the call with 9d9c and when the board ran out 6h-2c-Tc-3h-Qh Kim Gap Youn was eliminated and the tournament entered the heads-up stage.

Fabiano Michael trailed Young-shin Im by 1,600,000 to 2,930,000 chips but it still took two hours of play until the champion was crowned, and when it happened there was a little bit of controversy. In the hand Michael raised to 150,000 and whilst Young-shin Im contemplated her move, the dealer moved her 50,000 big blind into the pile of chips. She eventually called and moved 150,000 chips over the line but it was ruled, by the tournament director, that her actions constituted a raise and that she had to make a min-raise to 300,000. Not only did this confuse her but also her opponent, who then moved all-in for 1,945,000 in total. After another brief pause, Young-shin Im made the call and turned over Ad6c, which was racing against her opponent's pocket fives. She retook the lead on a 7c-2d-Ac flop and stayed ahead on the Ks turn and 2s river to get her hands on the coveted APPT trophy and the 5,810,000 Philippine Pesos ($132,700) first prize.

The APPT has been running since 2007 and visits Manila, Macau, Auckland, the Philippines and Australia with more stops planned in the future. The tour next stops in Sydney, Australia between December 7-12.

Final table finishing positions ($1 equals approximately 43.7 PHP)

1.) Young-shin Im: 5,810,000 PHP
2.) Fabiano Michael: 3,600,000 PHP
3.) Kim Gap Young: 2,045,000 PHP
4.) Mikael Rosen: 1,560,000 PHP
5.) Daren Yoon: 1,290,000 PHP
6.) Basilios Diakokmninos: 1,025,000 PHP
7.) Jukka Juvonen: 805,000 PHP
8.) Richard En: 645,000 PHP
9.) Raymond Lapitan: 485,480 PHP

In just four more sleeps I will be jetting off to Spain to work with the PokerNews Live Reporting team at EPT Barcelona. To say I am looking forward to it is an understatement and ditto on the nervousness!

Whilst I am not your typical little Englander, I am not very well travelled and the times I have travelled abroad I have either gone on a package holiday with family or friends or met someone at the other end that I knew. Just the thought of landing in Barcelona and having to find my way to the hotel is quite daunting if I am honest, though the hotel itself is pretty amazing in my book!

The work itself should come natural enough, and I think that seeing the chip stacks gradually build over the course of the tournament will mean they are much easier to count. When I had my trial at EPT London, there were only 14 players remaining and the stacks were, or at least seemed, huge. When you have gone from playing 99% online to trying to count a 1,600,000 stack it is quite difficult.

I am not bothered about recognising players as I have been a bit of a saddo and looked at some well known players' picture on various websites and some lesser-known players but are still regulars on the European Poker Tour. Plus I am usually really good with faces so once I spot a face and link their name to them I should be rocking and rolling.

To be honest, the hardest part is going to be the actual working away element of the trip. In the last three years I think myself and Mrs Pud have only been apart for more than a night on three occasions so it will be weird to say the least. I do think it will be good for us in the long run though, especially as I am working from home most of the time and we do get sick of seeing each other 24 hours a day! It'll be strange being away from the rug rats too, I have kind of got used to only seeing Pud Jr once a week over the years but I've literally been around my other two all the time.

With it being my first trip I really don't know how I am going to manage my time as I still have work to do for other clients. Plus I want to be able to see some of Barcelona other than the inside of a casino, otherwise what is the point in travelling abroad? The first couple of days will be hard as I'll be in the casino from 1030-1100 up until the early hours of the morning I would expect so it looks like I'll be getting up uber early most days so no partying with 20-odd year old millionaires for me then! Depending on the time I do have available I'll probably blog everyday I am there, though I have been toying with the idea of doing a video blog so you lot can see my fat face and listen to my dulcet tones! Anyway, we'll see how it goes.

Until next time, thanks for reading and best of luck at the tables!

Most people would think you had lost the plot if you decided to start a cash game with Phil Ivey, John Juanda, Chau Giang and Tom Dwan but they would certainly be calling for the men in white coats if you decided to do just that made the blinds $650/$1,300 and then increase them to $1,300/$2,600!

That is exactly what has been happening in Macau, where a number of well-known players have been taking part in the Asian Poker Tour (APT) Macau festival. Whilst the actual tournaments have been quite disappointing, due to lower than expected turnouts, the cash games that have been played are being reported on forums across the world.

Respected tournament director, Matt Savage was the first to break the news via the Two Plus Two forum, posting, “Despite the light turnout at the Asian Poker Tour Macau the cash games are some of the biggest in history as Tom Dwan, Phil Ivey, Chau Giang, and John Juanda are playing HK$5,000-10,000 with some Chinese businessmen. The game plays much bigger and there was about 40 million on the table last night when I saw the game.” The current exchange rate is currently around 7.75 HK$ to one US dollar, meaning there was around $5.16m in play!

Dwan was still in the Main Event when he heard of the massive cash game developing his attention turned to that. Savage reported, “Tom Dwan made it through day one in the 5K main event but only came downstairs to play one hand 10-4 off suit in an attempt to bust and get back to the cash game but instead he doubled up and asked me to call him as soon as he was under 20 BB's. We are down to 35 players and paying 18.” Dwan finally busted in 25th place.

The private cash game begun in the Hard Rock Casino and last 20 hours in total before the players agreed to go on a break and switch to the Starworld casino, which incidentally is the only casino in Macau that is allowed to spread Pot Limit Omaha, where the poker superstars have reportedly been asked to play for stakes of HK$10,000 and HK$20,000 by the Hong Kong businessmen who started the game.

None of the players involved have mentioned this in their tweets or blogs but once they return to home soil I am sure we will here much more about the battles at the felt. News filtering from the “Poker King” poker room is that Ivey is up HK$15,000,000, Dwan HK$4,000,000 and Juanda lost around HL$1,500,000 in the last session but was massively in profit before he left town. Dwan is also reported to have won the biggest pot of the night, which tipped the scales between HK$16,000,000 and HK$20,000,000.

In the photo that accompanies this piece, you can see Juanda sitting with a huge pile of chips. The “normal” sized chips are HK$100,000 each whilst the oversized round chips are HK$1,000,000. It would be amazing if they switched to Pot Limit Omaha in the next session. Stay tuned to see if they do and if there are any more monster pots won and lost.

Tune into any televised poker show from anywhere across the world and you will almost only ever see No Limit Hold'em being played. However, that is about to change as the hit US show “Poker After Dark” has filmed a Pot Limit Omaha edition that will see some of the world's best players do battle with $300/$600 blinds and a $100,000 buy-in.

The new format became common knowledge when CardRunners pro, Brian Hastings, announced his plans on his blog. He wrote, “The reason I am flying to Vegas is that I am going to be on ‘Poker After Dark,’” an elated Hastings wrote. “This will be my first televised poker appearance and I am very excited. Lana (CardRunners Marketing Director) worked very hard to get me on the show and called me Friday afternoon to let me know about it. It totally caught me off-guard, especially since I have a big assignment due Tuesday for my architecture class, but I quickly decided that I was in, got an extension on the assignment, and now here I am flying cross-country”

Along with his role as a lead coach on the training site CardRunners, Hastings is best known for his demolition of the mystery Swedish player, “Isildur1” back in December 2009. Isildur1 first appeared at the nosebleed stakes in April 2009 and crushed everyone before him at the $500/$1,000 tables, including taking Tom “durrrr” Dwan for around $4.5m! He was involved in all ten of the top ten largest-ever pots online and was the first player to lose a seven-figure pot! Whilst he ran over all and sundry at the No Limit Hold'em tables, he was seen as a fish at the Pot Limit Omaha tables, something Hastings took advantage of.

After controversially studying Isildur1's game in December 2009 with fellow CardRunners pros Brian Townend and Cole South, Hastings sat on four $500/$1,000 Heads-up Pot Limit Omaha tables with the unknown Swede and five hours later he had taken him for a staggering $4.2m, the largest winning day by any online poker player in the history of the game.

Although he is bound by a contract not to reveal the results of the ground-breaking Poker After Dark edition, he informed his readers that the likes of Phil “OMGCLAYAIKEN” Galfond, Tom “durrrr” Dwan, and Phil Ivey are definitely playing and that Patrik Antonius, Sammy Farha and Jarad “Harrington25” Bleznick are also waiting in the wings for a seat to become free.

It is great to see a television show that is prepared to deviate from the norm and go with the current trends of the game of poker. The high stakes No Limit Hold'em games have dried up of late, with even Daniel “jungleman12” Cates turning his back on the game in order to mix it up with some Pot Limit Omaha.

As a general rule, the News, Views & Gossip forum on the popular Two Plus Two site is, although very amusing, full of complete garbage. But from time to time it throws up a great story, like the one doing the rounds at the minute that involves a sit 'n' go player by the name of "Whoopsy_Dazy."

Whoospy_Dazy is a solid player, one who has profits (at time of writing) of $79,291 from the 46,762 games he has played so far in his career. His average stake is $22 so many of you who read these pages may have locked horns with him over the years.

Like most poker professionals, he is looking to reduce his variance and have someone stake him or buy pieces of his action over a set number of games he plays. Looking at his recent play, it looks like the SNG grinder has been trying to learn Heads-Up Pot Limit Omaha and had not been doing too great (see the picture at the top of this post for his graph), though over a relatively small sample size, which probably explains why he was trying to get stakes on Part Time Poker, a forum that allows members to buy and sell pieces of themselves.

Obviously a site that allows members to trade percentages of themselves is open to people trying to scam one another but Part Time Poker moderators have thought of a way to help combat this and verify each player's current bankroll situation through a number of methods. One is to log onto a screen sharing program like Team Viewer or Skype and have the moderator check the player's cashier balance, or the other way is to sit at a cash game table, or empty SNG and have the moderator verify their balance.

After ploughing through the mammoth threads on both Two Plus Two and Part Time Poker it appears that Whoopsy_Dazy was looking to sell around $5,000 of himself but he could not prove he had this money online by sitting at a cash game table as he had asked the site to ban him from playing cash games. The moderator suggested he sat at a high stakes SNG to prove he indeed did have $5,000 in his account.

Now most people would choose to sit at a couple of $2,000 9-man SNG that only run occasionally, or even rarely in the case of specialist games such as Omaha Hi/Low but no, Whoopsy_Dazy, a player with almost $80,000 profit decided to sit at a $5,100 No Limit Hold'em Heads-Up SNG and guess what? Yes you are correct, it filled with a winning high stakes regular by the name of "micide," a player with over $250,000 profit from SNG tournaments and micide won the $10,000 prize.

I find it unbelievable that a player who has taken part in close to 50,000 tournaments online decided it was a good idea to sit at a heads-up SNG in order to prove he had the necessary funds in his account. Surely he should have waited until he could have a moderator who actually had a Skype account or screen sharing software on his machine. I seriously doubt he will get his money back unless micide decides he does not like money. If it were me I would keep the money just out of the stupidity of Whoopsy_Dazy!

I was hoping to be able to write a blog entry today about me taking a shot at higher stakes, crushing the game and winning a shed load (for the stakes anyway)) of money. However, something happened last Monday that prevented that from happening. Someone paid me a visit, it was the dreaded Tilt Monster.

Anyone who has ever read any of my blogs will know that one of the biggest hurdles I have been struggling to overcome at the poker tables is keeping tilt at bay. Usually my tilt issues do not see me spunk dozens of stacks away, instead it leads me to chop and change the games I play, which in turn makes me even more disillusioned with the game. Rinse and repeat.

However, last Monday saw me fall of the wagon in spectacular fashion and drop close to nine stacks in one session. All of October I ran like crap, no matter what I did Lady Luck pissed on my chips. Then I started playing pretty badly too, which coupled with Lady Luck making me her bitch, saw me essentially break even and have a very frustrating time at the tables. I was looking forward to starting November on the right foot and well and truly saying goodbye to the previous month but it never happened.

I think it all started when I had aces cracked by 98s all-in preflop and then had AT lose to 82 all-in on a T22 flop. FML. All through October **** like that happened and I simply laughed it off and carried on but this must have tipped me over the edge as I had the bright idea to go play Pot Limit Omaha and the equivalent of seven stacks doing so. Looking at the hands where I lost I look like a complete donkey and God only knows what notes my opponents will have made on me but whatever. To prevent myself from playing, and playing badly, I withdrew my bankroll back to my bank account and took an enforced break.

For the first couple of days I was so angry for allowing myself to go on monkey tilt, especially as I had put in a ton of work to get over the mental side of the game, something that has hindered me from day one. But then I realised that is is not falling down that should be looked at as failure, it is not getting back up and trying again that should be viewed as so. People quitting smoking have a crafty **** and even dieters grab a Greggs whilst out and about their daily business. It does not make them a failure, especially if they manage to reach their end goal of being nicotine-less of less chunky. Blips are to be expected, especially playing short-handed poker, especially playing short-handed poker in the style that I do. I'm still disappointed by the fact I went on tilt but I was always told to not worry about the things you cannot control and as it is now in the past I cannot control it.

I will probably jump right back on the horse tonight once the kids are in bed, as my cashout is now in my account. I have no monetary or volume based goals set though I am going to try and make sure that I play the best I can each session, do not look at my cashier balance or any stats in my Hold'em Manager until I have played a few thousand hands and just let the game go with the flow.

On a side note, only 13 more days until EPT Barcelona!

As always, thanks for reading and best of luck at the tables!