Live Updates European Amateur Poker Champ Sat 7/Sun 8 Dec 2013

[fandango]

Would like to put my own views on what has been mentioned above..

Paulie hit the nail on the head.. i was indeed "lied" to by the hotel, i (Emma) make every effort to ensure where ever we stay the disabled facilities are adequate for my needs.
I was in contact with the Akcent via email a few times regarding the disabled access they had and promised me that access into the hotel was "disabled friendly", this was clearly not the case on arrival with a flight of stairs into reception and then a ramp to get to the reception desk wich was basically a joke!! Emma in fact injured her back trying to push me up the ramp, this put an instant dampner onto the start of the trip. The room was spacious as promised and comfatable for the time i spent in there.

The casino... hmmmm well i "presumed" as the casino was part of the hotel that indeed it would have lifts and disabled facilaties  , so didnt call and confirm that this was the case, and this was a error on my behalf! as stated above i make every effort to check these things in the uk so not checking Prague was a school boy error.
I was mortified on entering the casino and then being faced by a flight of 12 rather steep steps down to cardroom floor, and when asking where the lift was and being told there wasnt one my stress levels rose and Emma was ready to catch the next flight home  .

Now as it happened if i knew the information before hand i would definatly not of agreed to make the trip to Prague, it would of just not been the right thing to do.. But the honour of being England skip and defending my ECOAP title rather i think i would of travelled to Timbukto  .

Im 110% sure this is just a honest oversight on APATs part, Des understood from the word go the upheavle for myself differs from most other members and understood if it was not a viable trip then he would understand my decision not to commit.. Im sure if Des or anyone else had been to the cardroom before hand realised the lack of facilities then i would of been told and not offered the position.. As i have already said it was a error on my behalf to assume the lift would be there  .

Lets not worry about this anymore its the past  .. The support offered to me was bloody incredible!! in true APAT style the guys got together and just simply constructed an awesome "human elevator" of my very own simples.. Kev was amazing and i know from overhearing him speak that he wasnt drinking excessivley because he wanted to make sure i got back up the stairs in one piece   what a true star!!

ECOAP was immense! lets not forget this, apart from the obv dissapointment not winning the team event for me and not defending my title, the poker, fun, people, friends old and new, and all round awsomeness of the few days outweighed the few hurdles put in my path.

Roll on WCOAP !!

Absolutely shocked to hear this Carl and you have my heartfelt apologies. 

When I booked this tournament several months ago it was not made clear that the venue was not wheelchair friendly, and had it been made clear I can assure you I wouldn"t have agreed to send APAT there, or indeed Everest Poker.  Similarly Tom has had detailed player briefing discussions with them and again this situation was not identified.  I should have picked it up, so hands up from me, and I"m truly sorry that this impacted your and Emma"s trip.

Two things I"ll say - 1) I"ll be voicing by dissatisfaction in the strongest terms to the festival organiser; who we are dealing with at the highest level.  2) We"ll never go back to this venue unless this disgraceful situation is rectified.  Whether we have any disabled players in the field or not.

Finally, thanks to the community for supporting Carl"s needs in Prague.  That"s a great thing and is what makes this group of people extraordinary.

Des i dont think you need to apologise, to be fair i made my own measures to make sure the hotel was suitable, and obv that their "disabled friendly" to our "disabled friendly" are poles apart!!.. I should of called the casino i checked myself, i have learned from past experiences not to "assume".. IMO the casino card room was a worthy venue, just not if you are disabled.

[Paulie_D]

I was going to save this part of it for my blog but perhaps it"s worth mentioning it here.

I absolutely think that APAT were right to be there for a number of reasons.

The event was top notch throughout. The TD, floor managers and dealers were all extremely professional...not surprising since they were imported especially for the whole Prague Poker Festival but they added a great deal to the experience and not just on the visual side.

As for Carl"s issue (or in fact any other less than wholly mobile person) then that certainly should, and I trust will, be brought to the event organiser"s attention.

As a (mostly) mobile person it is, perhaps, normal not to automatically consider the needs of the lesser able. Carl"s experience took the blinkers off for me when considering hotels and casinos and I"m sure that it has done the same for the APAT PTB.

[fandango]

I absolutely think that APAT were right to be there for a number of reasons.

The event was top notch throughout. The TD, floor managers and dealers were all extremely professional...not surprising since they were imported especially for the whole Prague Poker Festival but they added a great deal to the experience and not just on the visual side.

+1

[Swinebag]

Sighing reading this.


Sadly some countries definition of "disabled friendly" is to merely be friendly to people with disabilities.

Heart warming to hear the troops rallying round, not that I would expect any less from this great community.


Thought the updates were really good for this event. It"s unfair to compare them to a tighty/chip collaboration, so I will just say that I enjoyed them and to thank the guys for a tremendous effort over 4 days.

Oh and 1 more thing: Tom and Jerry - just awesome!!

[DodgyEnd (Tom APAT.be)]

Hi everyone,

I also want to share my views on the tournament, but everything pretty much has been said. I"vebeen a member of the community here for some time now, playing in a few of the online events... Unfortunately regulation in Belgium only allows to play on a few regulated poker rooms and of course the APAT one isn"t part of that. That prevented me from playing online, although I still have a few bucks on my account. And I think I will be playing at least some of the events :p

During my time here I met some great people and I was hoping to meet some of you guys in real life. Being asked by Des to captain a Belgian team in Prague was the ideal occassion for that!

And what a great time we had!!! The atmosphere around the tables was always so amazing!!
2 people that I shared some staking with (Carl and GiMac), finally we met.

The entire Scottish team... We had a great time together, including a quick dinner break. Especially our team member Jan owes GiMac one... Jan is a professional trader of white slaves, but since the economic crisis, it is really though for him. GiMac suggested to focus on the black market instead, and that will be a life changer for Jan!! That was just hilarious
And Duffy, she is quite a character

The English team, with captain Carl...also Tony is a great personality. He always provided an extra laugh!

The Irish team, especially our talks with Kev. And the amazing John Murray, who knocked 2 Belgians out of the ME in the same hand... Lol... Great comeback at the start of Day 2, too bad that run ended too soon.

The German team with Matze and Alex. 2 great guys!!

IrishTom and Presty who did a great job... And all the other guys we talked to the last few days.

And to finish, I am so proud of my team Belgium!! After the first 2 SnGs we were only 6th and were all a bit of unhappy with our play, and sometimes a bit unlucky... But that"s poker of course.

But then the HU play boosted our confidence again when we won all 4 of them, including 2 against direct opponents England and Ireland.

Before the start of Day 2 I said to my team: let"s show everyone what we are worth and let"s try to get at least a table win!
Well, what an amazing round of SnGs we had on Day 2! We had 2 wins, a 2nd and a 3rd. And all of a sudden closing in on Germany who had a rocky start of the day, but in the end deserved the win.

Oh yes, and there were some extra laughs because of the "Tom and Jerry" in our team... I do understand that, and no offence taken :p

Thanks for all the kind words we received from our opponents... And I think we did our best to join in on the fun!!



Thank you Christoff, Jan and Jerry for joining me in Prague!!! We"ll try to do 1 better next year


Tom, a very proud captain of Team Belgium

[Quadran666 (Christoff Apat.be)]

Hi everyone,

I also want to share my views on the tournament, but everything pretty much has been said. I"vebeen a member of the community here for some time now, playing in a few of the online events... Unfortunately regulation in Belgium only allows to play on a few regulated poker rooms and of course the APAT one isn"t part of that. That prevented me from playing online, although I still have a few bucks on my account. And I think I will be playing at least some of the events :p

During my time here I met some great people and I was hoping to meet some of you guys in real life. Being asked by Des to captain a Belgian team in Prague was the ideal occassion for that!

And what a great time we had!!! The atmosphere around the tables was always so amazing!!
2 people that I shared some staking with (Carl and GiMac), finally we met.

The entire Scottish team... We had a great time together, including a quick dinner break. Especially our team member Jan owes GiMac one... Jan is a professional trader of white slaves, but since the economic crisis, it is really though for him. GiMac suggested to focus on the black market instead, and that will be a life changer for Jan!! That was just hilarious
And Duffy, she is quite a character

The English team, with captain Carl...also Tony is a great personality. He always provided an extra laugh!

The Irish team, especially our talks with Kev. And the amazing John Murray, who knocked 2 Belgians out of the ME in the same hand... Lol... Great comeback at the start of Day 2, too bad that run ended too soon.

The German team with Matze and Alex. 2 great guys!!

IrishTom and Presty who did a great job... And all the other guys we talked to the last few days.

And to finish, I am so proud of my team Belgium!! After the first 2 SnGs we were only 6th and were all a bit of unhappy with our play, and sometimes a bit unlucky... But that"s poker of course.

But then the HU play boosted our confidence again when we won all 4 of them, including 2 against direct opponents England and Ireland.

Before the start of Day 2 I said to my team: let"s show everyone what we are worth and let"s try to get at least a table win!
Well, what an amazing round of SnGs we had on Day 2! We had 2 wins, a 2nd and a 3rd. And all of a sudden closing in on Germany who had a rocky start of the day, but in the end deserved the win.

Oh yes, and there were some extra laughs because of the "Tom and Jerry" in our team... I do understand that, and no offence taken :p

Thanks for all the kind words we received from our opponents... And I think we did our best to join in on the fun!!



Thank you Christoff, Jan and Jerry for joining me in Prague!!! We"ll try to do 1 better next year


Tom, a very proud captain of Team Belgium

I must second that as a member of Team Belgium. We came with no expectations and went home with silver.

We were able to adjust our games on day2 in a way to beat our competitors. Great atmosphere, great organisation (apart from Carl"s problem, which is a pitty, but I must agree it"s a great venue for non disabled persons) and although we kept cheering for Scotland I must say I also liked all the other teams.

That"s also why i regged during the APAT weekend on this forum and hopefully I"ll become a regular posting member.

Hope to see you guys soon.

Anyway we took ours and APAT's p.r. seriously and got published in the biggest Belgian newspaper this morning. Here"s the link: (it"s in Dutch though...): http://www.nieuwsblad.be/article/detail.aspx?articleid=dmf20131212_00884803

[LombBomb]

Hi everyone,

I also want to share my views on the tournament, but everything pretty much has been said. I"vebeen a member of the community here for some time now, playing in a few of the online events... Unfortunately regulation in Belgium only allows to play on a few regulated poker rooms and of course the APAT one isn"t part of that. That prevented me from playing online, although I still have a few bucks on my account. And I think I will be playing at least some of the events :p

During my time here I met some great people and I was hoping to meet some of you guys in real life. Being asked by Des to captain a Belgian team in Prague was the ideal occassion for that!

And what a great time we had!!! The atmosphere around the tables was always so amazing!!
2 people that I shared some staking with (Carl and GiMac), finally we met.

The entire Scottish team... We had a great time together, including a quick dinner break. Especially our team member Jan owes GiMac one... Jan is a professional trader of white slaves, but since the economic crisis, it is really though for him. GiMac suggested to focus on the black market instead, and that will be a life changer for Jan!! That was just hilarious
And Duffy, she is quite a character

The English team, with captain Carl...also Tony is a great personality. He always provided an extra laugh!

The Irish team, especially our talks with Kev. And the amazing John Murray, who knocked 2 Belgians out of the ME in the same hand... Lol... Great comeback at the start of Day 2, too bad that run ended too soon.

The German team with Matze and Alex. 2 great guys!!

IrishTom and Presty who did a great job... And all the other guys we talked to the last few days.

And to finish, I am so proud of my team Belgium!! After the first 2 SnGs we were only 6th and were all a bit of unhappy with our play, and sometimes a bit unlucky... But that"s poker of course.

But then the HU play boosted our confidence again when we won all 4 of them, including 2 against direct opponents England and Ireland.

Before the start of Day 2 I said to my team: let"s show everyone what we are worth and let"s try to get at least a table win!
Well, what an amazing round of SnGs we had on Day 2! We had 2 wins, a 2nd and a 3rd. And all of a sudden closing in on Germany who had a rocky start of the day, but in the end deserved the win.

Oh yes, and there were some extra laughs because of the "Tom and Jerry" in our team... I do understand that, and no offence taken :p

Thanks for all the kind words we received from our opponents... And I think we did our best to join in on the fun!!



Thank you Christoff, Jan and Jerry for joining me in Prague!!! We"ll try to do 1 better next year


Tom, a very proud captain of Team Belgium

I must second that as a member of Team Belgium. We came with no expectations and went home with silver.

We were able to adjust our games on day2 in a way to beat our competitors. Great atmosphere, great organisation (apart from Carl"s problem, which is a pitty, but I must agree it"s a great venue for non disabled persons) and although we kept cheering for Scotland I must say I also liked all the other teams.

That"s also why i regged during the APAT weekend on this forum and hopefully I"ll become a regular posting member.

Hope to see you guys soon.

Anyway we took ours and APAT's p.r. seriously and got published in the biggest Belgian newspaper this morning. Here"s the link: (it"s in Dutch though...): http://www.nieuwsblad.be/article/detail.aspx?articleid=dmf20131212_00884803

Nice bit of publicity for you guys and well deserved  Hopefully see you all again in a few months!

[Matt D]

Fantastic stuff! Glad to hear you (and it sounds like just about everyone else playing) enjoyed the Team Event so much I think Tom excelled himself with the organisation of this, and the format was one I thought worked very well.

Thank you very much for the publicity in the paper too! It"s very impressive to be featured in such a popular paper!.

[Curlarge]

Fantastic stuff! Glad to hear you (and it sounds like just about everyone else playing) enjoyed the Team Event so much I think Tom excelled himself with the organisation of this, and the format was one I thought worked very well.

Thank you very much for the publicity in the paper too! It"s very impressive to be featured in such a popular paper!.

The contribution of Presty should not be under-estimated as well. They are a formidable team imho.