ILX Poker Players Unite

A friend of mine came 4th in the £10K guaranteed at Hills last night - I watched him until I was practically asleep. £750 isn't bad considering he'd won his ticket in a £6 satellite.

Has anyone here played at ultimatebet? A friend of mine is promoting it aggressively, plus there's a good rakeback programme.

I have won my last 2 (two) SNGs and I am playing in a big scary real-life tourney at a Soho members club tonight (I'm not a member but I have contacts, nowotimean). £30 buyin WITH REBUYS omg, but a very generous prize pool and only roughly 40 players. I am, to be fair, bricking myself, more about the social aspect of it (I'll know no-one and feel like a spare arse among all the hyper-confident coked-up TV producers and f-list celebs), but also because I am highly likely to come out of there £100 worse off than I went in.

Ah well, it's all good fun.

You also naturally miss out on the entire social aspect of poker, although, tbh, I'm currently reading Anthony Holden's Big Deal about the year he spent as a poker pro, and the constant travelling, living out of a suitcase, and grinding $10/$20 limit for 18-hour stints sounds pretty depressing to me too.

Essentially, if you are stimulated by the game itself, then online poker can provide a lot of the best bits of playing combined with other positive attributes - it's much quicker, cheaper, with more choice, versatility, opportunities to put it on pause for an hour or two if you like; you can do other things while playing, you can sit in your pants and chuff whenever you like; and you can multi-table, which again speeds it up and also, if you're a winning player, ups your profit.

Also, what Mark said. I played @ a table @ Foxwoods a month or so ago, and after I got over the initial jitters (OMG REAL PEOPLE!), it was great. Maybe I wouldn't be so woo-hoo about it if I didn't win, but whatever. And I think getting slapped down so often online made me much more aware of what could happen if I'm not careful or ever vigilant.

I went out when I drew a straight and got beat by a full house. I basically wagered that Mr. Bluffy McBluff didn't have a pair of fives, but for once, he wasn't bluffing.

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I have, this weekend, switched my poker sites to ones that offer Rakeback (30% at Interpoker, which is a Cryptologic site like William Hill, where I've been playing for the last 6 months, and 35% at RakebackPoker, which is a Prima site). I calculated that this would have saved me about £250 had I done this when I started. Grr.

In other news, I am actually DOWN for November, which sux big donkey balls. 4 days to turn it round...

So, starting early November, I vowed to only play 1 tourney / day, and if I lost, then so be it, that's my limit. I bought into a $10 NL tourney, finished in the top 20, won about $100 or so. Then I figured I'd give ring tables ($.25 NL) another chance. In November, I made up the deficit I was in, am now up $150 overall, and have yet to re-deposit any moolah. Of course, I've been in a holding pattern since my last withdrawal, but whatever.

(good stuff y'all :))

I am currently treading water, which has lasted 3 months. Still £100 away from my Xmas target of a grand clear profit. Very frustrating indeed. I have also dabbled a little bit in limit - am just about up, I think, but it's really just an antidote to the terrifying ups and downs of my first love NL.

Haha Ken - I was having a great SNG run, then didn't finish ITM for 13 of the fuckers. This game is mental.

Also, to those of you that HIT THE WRONG BUTTON when I reraise big and catch your dream flop: eat one rotten cowpie.

ken i also submitted my app for team membership!

Did you lose w/ AA because of the way you played or another player's stubbornness - if you have someone that's calling your big bets chasing a flush or straight that they inevitably catch, you can't do a damn thing except tip your hat and wish them eons of pain.

Yo Yancey! More info on your win, plz! How many folks in the tourney? Did you encounter any fish or donkeys or other forms of wildlife?

In hindsight, I should've seen it coming. I had AA and the flop came up J-8-3. Soon as I raised, Johnny-on-the-spot immediately doubled his bet. He did it so quick. I just looked at him for a second, and called him anyway. He had J-J.

I should've figured that out, just the way he freakin' jumped in there like that. But when you got a pair of aces, you don't feel rightly mortal to those kind of sheniangans.

Yeah, I know that intellectually, but I get too wound up when DoucheBoy hits his dream draw that I wig out and get all Matusowy on the guy. And then I get called "poopshits".

That tourney sounds awesome, BTW!

If anyone is interested (and it's just me talking about poker), I have a poker blog you can fnd here. Let me know what you think!

SNGs are teh suck for me. Been trying them lately - HOSE CITY. I did, however, manage to make it into the money in thee hot-to-trot 50K unlimited rebuy hoohah. Lucky me, I played when "only" 600 folks entered. Ended up finishing 55th or so, only because douchebag big stacked honker decided to call my AQ off AI preflop w/ AT suited, and he caught a flop featuring both a T and two suited cards. Jerk.

Nice bloggo, btw!

PS from my previous post - the buy in for that 50K was $30. I ended up winning $175!

I get the rakeback through a rakeback website who seem pretty decent. The downside is you can't get it on sites where you are already subscribed. However, if you swap to a site which does offer rakeback and uses the same network (e.g I used to play at William Hill but now play at Interpoker, on the same tables only with a slightly different interface and 30% rakeback) then effectively nothing has changed other than the money coming into your account :)

If you want to email me I'll happily give you all the details and refer you!

It was all a blur. Flop was showing Q-A-9. He called all-in with $33. I had close to eighty with K-Q suited in the pocket. I figured that he might have the Ace, but I had the three spades and a pair already. Really, like an idiot, I called him. He had A-3. The next card was the ten of spades. I had four spades now, but was still nervous as hell. The river was a Jack, giving me a straight.

I feel kinda bad because I beat the host (who's been a great host), and he's never won one before. But he went all-in first, which was a good move though maybe not in hindsight.

Anyway, maybe you could say I showed some (blind, dumb, wreckless, stupid) BALLS and came out ahead. Nine out of ten times I would've lost, but I got it this time.

Anyone else feel guilty for winning hands that they walked backwards into? It's hard to feel that bad when you did what you were supposed to even if you weren't supposed to that.

I've had a good few days playing at Party, with my last six $10+$1 SNG results coming 2nd, 1st, 2nd, 2nd, 7th*, & 1st. If anyone's interested, I posted the complete hand history (i.e. the 32 hands where I saw a flop or was in the last three) of the SNG I won yesterday on the bijou poker forum on which I also post - you can find it here. Comments more than welcome!

*99 in pocket, pushed when shortstacked, came up against AA. Flop Q9x, woohoo! Turn Q, river... Q, giving him a higher full house. I HATE being beaten by the board.

i had QQ and made these two folks go all-in pre-flop with their one A.

Flop: 2 Q 5
Turn: 4
River: 3

heh. i roffled.

and also. when i have the slicks it had to be when someone else has rockets.