Sent: 28 September 2016 18:13
Subject: Grand Prix Leaderboard

Hi,
Congratulations on winning a £550 WPT500 Seat on the £100K Grand Prix Leaderboard.
Your prize will be added as a WPT500 specific ticket to your partypoker in the coming weeks.
You will be able to use the ticket for any Live or Online Day 1!
If you have any questions please feel free to ask!
Kind Regards,
Glenn Townsend
Grand Prix Poker Tour

Play poker when you can tick ALL of this list…STOP when you don’t simples…

1. Rested,
2. No drugs or alcohol in your system
3. Emotionally stable
4. Postive calm attitude
5. Making good decisions
6. In a game you have an edge

Ignore this advice and you’ll only end up with a good story to tell…David Williams came 2nd in the 2004 WSOP main Event. A friend notified him there was a $100,000 pay jump for the next elimination with about 15 left he immediately raised K9 and called a shove that put him all in  to get the bad news he was facing Jacks. Lucked out on the turn when a king came, guy has too much gamble.

I love this hand and I loved Tom Dwan (Durrr) . I remember the Bluff magazine cover “King of the Nosebleeds” with a black and white image with a red trickle of blood coming from his nose.

Playing hands like this may explain why he seems to have become extinct, never try to bluff anyone off an ace. Bluff when the villain has shown weakness not strength, if they called your check raise, keep your powder dry, there are better spots in poker.

Sammy “Any two” George that was a whole different story.

Some more analysis from Doug Polk, notice that even Fedor can’t bluff a guy off an ace!

I was playing a 22$ 10x 109$ tickets gtd tournament 15 left and chip lead. I’m SB and the BB is the second biggest chip stack, I raise with 89 and he calls on an 8 high flop with two hearts. I bet 3/4 pot and he re-raises, I ship “I’m the daddy of this table not you” I think . He calls me with a Queen high flush draw and hits it on the turn. I go from chip lead to 14th with 15 players remaining. A poker table is no place for ego, I screwed 2 hrs work in one hand. I ground my way back up and managed to get a seat, but I was lucky, very lucky. I shoved A6 from the  button and was called by the big blinds A4, he hit two pair on the flop but a 6 on the turn gave me full double up.

Pulp Fiction covered this topic

[Marsellus is telling Butch to take a dive]
Marsellus: The night of the fight, you may feel a slight sting. That’s pride fucking with you. Fuck pride. Pride only hurts, it never helps.

I’m reading the Poker Blueprint which is an excellent book and I thought I’d show you my poker library.

Seems I have lost my Harrington Volume 3 The Workbook. I like the way that Dusty Schmidt writes about the game, he has some great insights. I am also watching some great hand analysis by Doug Polk on YouTube and have joined his Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/UpswingPoker1 .

‘

Played 5 x $22 $109 satellites and didn’t make one ticket

In the last one I came 18th with 10 seats Gtd shoving 15BB into a big stack with A5o when he had KK. Perhaps I should have min raised and folded to a shove. I will review tomorrow.

In another, suspicious of a slightly over min raise I still shoved with AK against my intuition and ran into Kings. I could have folded my way to the money, instead I lost a 3rd of my stack with AK and in the next hand I lost a flip with QQ and then it was all over, penthouse to pavement in 3 hands.

Stack preservation is the key to these tournaments, if you get a double up avoid high variance plays by playing small ball poker.

I found myself at a great steady table no one out of line. I was getting walk after walk and then Andy Black joined and sat on my left.  I told him what a pleasure it had been for me watching him play the 2005 WSOP, where he finished 5th.  Somehow I had managed to bet the turn and river for value, OOP with 3rd pair. I’d defended Dan’s pre-flop raise from MP with 89o in the BB. Andy Black saw me drag the pot and was curious of the action. “Thin value on the river, sometimes you just know where you are…” was my commentary.

The small blind looked at his cards and I read him as weak and told him so, SB responded by raising to 11K with blinds 5,000/2,500 I defended with Q60. Flop was 579 giving me  a gutshot and the SB raised to 11,500K I re-reraised to 28,000 and took the pot down then showed bluff – Big mistake. A mistake that would cost me in the very next hand.

“Do I have to put you all in to get a fold?” he queried

“You could try” I responded

Next hand  Alan Kelleher raised to 11K from the hijack and I made it 25,00 with AQ0 from the SB, Andy Black folds his BB.

Mistake 1. Showing the bluff the hand before.

Mistake 2. Re-raise large OOP as I want to take the pot down pre I should have made it 32K as 2 out of 3 times I’ll be Ace high only after the flop.

Mistake 3. I check the QJ5 flop – Always bet your big hands! There is 60K in the pot I need to take it down, I’m vulnerable to an over card and draws.

Mistake 4. Lead the 2 turn for 30K this should be 50K I make it too cheap and get a call

Mistake 5. I shove the river, I believe I’m being called with all aces and I wanted to make it look like a bluff shove by insta shoving. If you don’t know where you are don’t bet your tournament life  away. Alan’s K 10o made him a rivered straight and eliminated me. Alan came 2nd for 55K  the next day and it could have been me!

“Fucker” I screamed, it felt like I’d been punched by Tyson, they were verifying that Alan had me covered. Andy Black shook my hand, but I was out for the count, I’d fucked myself for no good reason.

I left the table, I hope I wished everyone well and Alan good luck but I can’t be sure. I hope to lose with grace and say “That’s poker, good luck everyone, it was a pleasure playing with you…” but in this instance I worry my only words were “Fucker”. Let’s hope I’m wrong, I don’t want to be that guy.

Correct play, bet 45K on the flop and shove the turn, if he’s hit a set or two pair so be it. He’ll tell you if you are beat, Alan may have shoved over a decent flop bet with his draw but deal with a problem when/if it arises. With the information I had, my top pair top kicker was good. Aces and Kings would have been re-raise pre-flop, I’m only losing to Jacks, JQ, Queens unlikely as I have one and slow played aces. Get the job done bet hard and move forward in the tournament.

It is hard to get to these spots in high buy-in tournaments and you can’t afford to make such basic mistakes. At the end levels of tournaments the point of honesty moves forward in the hand, if my raise is bigger I maybe get the job done but by showing the bluff, Alan an older player became more stubborn and it cost me. Two bad mistakes. It won’t happen again.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfYMisDMclE

I came 40th out of 260 runners in the WPT main event 1,100 Euro entry 260,000 Euro prize pool 27 paid.

Day one played tight avoided trouble hands and found one or two spots to steal. I was very card dead and very patient. Every hand can be your last so before you open a hand ask if you’ll be happy to go bust with it. If they have aces are you going to go bust with top pair?

Marc MacDonnell was the most active player at the table. He was the only one 3-betting and twice took down pots on the button to mid-position raises when they were followed by a call. I made sure everyone was aware of my observation and told him he better get ready for some light 4-betting. He raised the button to 1,500 and the small blind completed, I re-raised to 6,000. Marc checked me over and finally re-raised to 21,000 leaving me no fold equity to my 30K stack, I muck showing my Q5o and he tells me he had A8 later in the bar and that I had raised to quickly so he’d put me on a bluff. I found out later who Marc was from a player at the table who said they’d found it funny I wanted to play with one of the best in Ireland and clearly had no idea who he was.

Marc donked himself of 4 betting and calling it off to a 5 bet show AQ against a rocks KK, it was the second time I’d seen him 4-bet AQ not my style for me it turns the hand into a bluff when there is no need. I personally like to flat and keep AJ A10 and A9 in the pot and dominated, rather than bet and have them fold and only be called by better.

Finished day one bagging 67,500 with the average at 80,769.

I over celebrated until 6 am drinking far too may Guinness, slept in my clothes as I didn’t want to wake my brother up. Woke up at 12:30 with 30 minutes to shower and get my head back in the game, before the start of Day 2. Stupid stupid stupid…..celebrate when the game is won not before…I had made the same mistake before Day 1 when after busting the Grand Prix at level 15 (my Kings were cracked by a K7 flush draw all in on the flop) I took full advantage of the hospitality of the PartyPoker  team. I had a great night with Mad Marty Wilson hearing his stories from the circuit in fact it would have been a crime to go to bed any earlier than 5 a.m.

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The game is about information, the correct interpretation of the available information is the source of the poker money won.

When you show your cards without being paid, you are giving away money, sometimes when called I muck my cards face down and hope the villain won’t ask the dealer to flip them over. Even letting people see my bluff cards is information I try to hide.

Leave the ego and meta game one gets from showing bluffs to the young guns play like an pro and never show your cards.