Pokerpops ponders poker

[pokerpops]

- hold all thought of celebrating the double CPP Package win though. Apparently Terms & Conditions apply...

Care to elaborate on this?....

The "This week at DTD" thread on there sponsored poker forum clarifies the position. All I will say publicly is that it"s a shame that they waited till now to be so clear.

Bloody good result last week Rob. Well played.

To clarify... I"ve posted this on Blonde too.

I failed to comprehend the importance of the Terms&Conditions attached to the Grand Prix Golden Chips (as, I think, did a few others).
Specifically, the "no cash alternative, non-transferrable" bit.

So, you can imagine my disappointment when it became clear that making the final table two weeks ago didn"t entitle me to anything other than my share of the prize pool since I already had a trip to St Kitts booked.

I want to be clear - I was told that the seat was non-transferrable on Tuesday when I registered and could/should have checked this out. My bad.

But after swapping a few emails with Nick Whiten, DTD have very kindly offered me a seat for the £500 Mega DeepStack at the end of the month. It"s not quite the same value as I"d been hoping for, but maybe I can turn it into something more.

Thank you DTD.

[PHIL_TC]

This still seems a bit "meh" to me though  

Hopefully join you at the £500 though.

Speedos are packed. For St Kitts of course. Not for DTD... although.. might get a few more to fold I guess, might be an idea.

ps looking forward to this evening

pps wont be wearing speedos x

[pokerpops]

This still seems a bit "meh" to me though  

Hopefully join you at the £500 though.

Speedos are packed. For St Kitts of course. Not for DTD... although.. might get a few more to fold I guess, might be an idea.

ps looking forward to this evening

pps wont be wearing speedos x

Wear what you want tonight

xx

[Fatcatstu]

This still seems a bit "meh" to me though  

Hopefully join you at the £500 though.

Speedos are packed. For St Kitts of course. Not for DTD... although.. might get a few more to fold I guess, might be an idea.

ps looking forward to this evening

pps wont be wearing speedos x

Wear what you want tonight

xx

Whats happening tonight?!?!

[PHIL_TC]

Whats happening tonight?!?!

I thought it was Thursday  

Apparently its Wednesday. And this evening I will be wearing speedos.

So its all good x

[pokerpops]

Thursday - G Casino Stockton - The Nobbers gather

[ ] went well

I exited just after the point at which we allow re-entry, played some 25p/50p cash, span up to around £160 profit

[ ] kept it

But it"s always fun to gather with the Nobbers aka the Stockton Massive.

Saturday - G Casino Stockton - £100 20,000 stack GUKPT structure. With an added 4,000 chips for registering before the scheduled start time.

Highlights

Watching guy to my right get it all in with 69 over a bet and a small stacked shove on a 10 7 J flop. To be fair he had a large stack at this point, but nonetheless this was pretty creative. Obviously the 8 fell on the river...

Raised 97dd in mid position two callers. c-bet an AK5 flop two folds including one who folds QQ face up
Flat a small raise with 33, flop a set on an all diamond board, he checks, I bet, called
diamond turn, he bets, about quarter pot, obviously he has the flush, but he"s shortish and I"m not and it"s early so I flat and hope for a paired board
River 3 to give me quads, he checks, I bet 3/4 pot, he calls

Raise 9Js utg, one caller, flop 10 8 7 - we"re all in on the Q turn vs 10 7 off which bricks

Complete sb with 24cc flop A 3 8 rb
Check to button who bets about 1/5 of pot, I call, BB calls
Turn 5 still rb
Get paid the full stack from button who seems likely to have had two pair


Lowlights
Pretty much the whole final table.
Having to raise fold too often.
Getting stubborn when my raise with Q8dd faced a 3 bet and then getting overly stubborn on an 8 high flop. Of course he had aces. I can be such a muppet!

Folding to Brian Fossil Harland"s 4bet shove and being shown tens.

Cashed for £260 in the end, but it felt like a loss considering I had over 200k of 960 at one stage.

Two non-poker events were the major highlights of the evening - Mo Farah"s Gold, and Tom daley"s Bronze. The entire room was cheering Mo on as he came off the final bend, and the entire room were experts on diving too ;-)

Good tournament though - the 30 minute clock worked well with that structure. Look forward to more and to getting more runners for it. The cardoom at Stockton G deserves support.

[pables]

Another nice write David.

Keep em coming and pls continue to run and play good  

[pokerpops]

To the happy hunting ground that is the G Stockton again last night.

The £10+10+10 managed to generate a prizepool of £350 from 9 individual entries. Quite a few re-entered, (including me, more of which later)

It"s a mystery to me why there were so few runners again, the cardroom is so much better than Gala in so many ways.
A dedicated valet all night, better cards (I dealt at Gala last week and the cards were so thin that the draft from the aircon flipped seat seven"s cards twice before we realised that was what was happening), better structure, an all round better atmosphere.
the regulars are a mix of
very social players who seem to view there entry cost as a ticket to an evening"s entertainent
those who want the casino poker experience as a step up from the pub games they started with
a few "kidz" who have some game
some like Brian and I and others of the Massive who want a game but would generally prefer a redhot poker up the rear entry to poker at Gala.
It"s a very friendly atmosphere at the table. When bad plays result in strange results there are no raised voices, although some of us may look at each other with raised eyebrows. Mistakes, like acting out of turn or "string betting" are corrected politely and with a view to the culprit learning the polite way.
The atmosphere is, I think, what makes people want to re-enter even though the prize pool doesn"t justify it at all. It was certainly my motivation.

To the tourney itself. I knew I was in for an interesting evening when I barreled all three streets with J9 on a 69A85 board only to be called with the words "I lose this pot so often, but I call".
I said "Any Ace is good" he showed the mighty A4..

"CHIPS!" - took my two extra loads of 4,000
A little later I made a dramatically bad read and got my stack in drawing totally dead to an utg limper who held A10 on an A 10 8 6 board.

"CHIPS!" I reentered and took the full 12,000 stack (before anyone jumps in and says "take the lot from the start" I"d say yes, in most comps I"d do that, but generally, unless there are others doing the same there feels little value in doing so.

From the outset in my new seat I accumulated steadily.
Something clicked, my reads were good and my value bets got paid. Found a fun spot very player specific and 4bet shoved with 99 vs The Fossil. He insta-folded claiming later to have 3bet me with AJ
Eventually I was HU with The Fossil who rather surprisingly hadn"t been in that position live before, save for the odd week in the Thursday Nobbers game.
I started with a 60/40 advantage and built on it until my KJ failed to improve v Brian"s KQ at which point, at about half one Brian suggested a chop.
I don"t often deal but the timing was right and we took £175 each.
That re-entry had paid off.

In other news

Why couldn"t the Olympics have lasted a whole month!? I miss it already.

[pokerpops]

 My higher buyin poker thus far has been courtesy of satellite wins ( DTD deepstack a few times, UKIPT Nottingham ) and that would still be my preferred route into these events. But most satellites are tourney entry only and a trip to DTD costs a minimum of £100 in fuel and travelogue room which isn"t much in the grand scheme of things but is a drain on the poker roll.
My recent scoops were both shipped into the joint account as pay back to the family for their support.
So I"ve paid my £10 via PayPal and am awaiting my APAT licence to offer staking opportunities. I have no clear plan for this as yet

I"m playing the DTD £500 the week after the APAT event there, I"d love to play the ECOAP but it clashes every year with Leeds Festival which is a must do for me. This year even more so since I"m there as a volunteer steward for Oxfam.

This rambling is leading to no particular conclusion other than a question, or questions for those who may be reading.

Should I be selling a piece of myself to fund expenses? Do others take this route? Maybe reserve staking requests for stuff like UKIPT/GUKPT where I fail on the satellites?

I believe I have the game to run deep in these even at the higher buyin. I went out very close to the money in the Nottingham UKIPT to a runner-runner and my last DTD £500 exit involved losing to a flush with tens v sevens allin pre very late on Day1.

Whatever happens on the staking front between now and November, I am planning on selling some of the side events in St Kitts, a track record beyond the GP binks would be handy before then.

[pables]

David,

You could just check out other staking forums or look as a good indicator at Dan Owstons staking request for the PS wcoop. A proven alcoholic selling out at 1.3 ............... A good tourney man (as he is) will get the backing and I"m sure you will too!

GL

Ian

ps I was speaking to Phil TC about the Leeds festival and he"s chuffed you"re there and not at your counting house  

[Swinebag]

Staking to cover expenses is fine just don"t include it in the price.

E.g. It is bad form to put "playing £550 tourney with about £150 expenses = £700. Selling at 1:1 so 10% costs £70"

I"ll reserve 5% btw

[George2Loose]

Are the places you play at self dealt?

Do you ever get frustrated with playing comps like a tenner cubed? Not knocking it- I sometimes venture down the local for a live smaller comp but usually ends up with my had exploding no matter how much I try and prepare myself for it!

[pokerpops]

Staking to cover expenses is fine just don"t include it in the price.

E.g. It is bad form to put "playing £550 tourney with about £150 expenses = £700. Selling at 1:1 so 10% costs £70"

I"ll reserve 5% btw

I wouldn"t dream of it Rob, I"d just sell at 1.4

(I won"t)

[pokerpops]

Are the places you play at self dealt?

Do you ever get frustrated with playing comps like a tenner cubed? Not knocking it- I sometimes venture down the local for a live smaller comp but usually ends up with my had exploding no matter how much I try and prepare myself for it!

The thing is, the small fields at G keep it friendly. The bigger fields at Gala can make my head explode too. Last time there I had a blinding headache by the first break.

Sunday & Tuesday are self deal, but the few of us who offer to do it are capable. In the local comps acting as dealer is 0ev for me, it avoids boredom induced spew but can distract.

I play because I enjoy it. It"s social / recreational play and there can be a lot of chatter and banter. The "better" players debate plays and the "others" laugh along with us.

[pokerpops]

Sunday at the G

Surprising amount of entries this week - the prize pool was over £1k and we had three tables for a lot of the evening. Some of the less irritating of the Gala crowd turned up and the game held it"s usual sociable appeal.

Hand 1
I"m small blind, big blind isn"t at the table
One of the active players raises to 125 and gets 4 callers
I squeeze to 950
two callers (orig raiser folds ldo)
Flop  
I have   and bet 1800
One caller
Turn  ( )
I ship the rest of my 6k over the line
and am called by betty the lovely pensioner lady who has  
River bricks
CHIPS!!!

A few short minutes later I 4bet QQ and call the 5bet shove
QQ
CHIPS!

No complaints - it was what it was.

I ran better on my re-entry chips and eventually went out on the FT bubble when I couldn"t find a way to beat 99 with KQ

Cash was fun though - made two full houses in three hands and got paid for both, plus I picked off a semi-bluff when the bearded expert raised my c-bet from £14 to £40 and called all in - not sure what he had, but he seemed to have hit the 7 high board in some way and seemed surprised that I had QQ.
Cashed out for a 1.25 buy in profit.