Ace Redman: December 2009

Game selection

I keep changing games, as follows:

as a kid: - I played 7 card stud and 5 card draw

2007 - I studied no limit holdem and tournaments

2008 - I got into limit holdem - the small stakes no foldem holdem type

2008 - then I got into Omaha 8 hi/lo

2009 - now Ive been playing and reading about PLO and HU poker (NL and PLO)

So what am I any good at. I know I have reasonable NL skills in tournaments because I have won some local tournaments, won some in England, and won a bunch online.

I seem to be terrible at NL cash games. I win a bit, lose a bit, win a bit, lose a bit. I can play a game for 3-4 hours slowly chipping up and then losing it all with KK or AA in one hand at then end. I would guess I am a net loser at NL cash games.

Thats why I started playing limit. I would probably lose less money!! In fact after playing a bit and reading a few books I seem to win more often than I lose at limit.

Playing limit omaha 8 was a natural extension because when the limit tables were full at Oceans, there was a spot at an o8 table. I had watched this game for a bit and thought why not give it a go. Then i played at the Venetian and had a big win. I read some books and now play occasionally but I find I can win online and lose when I play live.

I started experimenting with numbers of players - playing NL and limit 6 handed instead of 9 or 10 handed and this seemed to be quite successful for me. Then I was watching an online player (atimus aka jovialGent aka bballer88) play and noticed he posted massive profits playing heads up almost exclusively. So I started reading up on and playing heads up poker a fair bit.

Recently there has been lots of action on Full Tilt high stakes mostly PLO. Also to improve my o8 game I was reading a book called Fahra on Omaha but he talks about all forms of Omaha including PLO. I started playing HU PLO and the players seemed quite bad. So then I started playing 6 handed PLO and have won several buyins.

So that brings me to the title of this post. I sat down at my computer today to play poker, and thought to myself. what the heck do I want to play?

NL tournaments - need 6-8 hours

NL mtt sngs - can play 90 mans in 2.5 hrs and 45 mans in 1.5 hrs

NL stt sng - sometimes I enjoy a session of these as they are quick

turbo mtts - I have played a few of these recently and made nice profits

NL cash - 9 handed, 6 handed, HU

Limit

o8 9 handed, 6handed

PLO HU or 6 handed

PLO tournaments - not played many of these but cashed in 33% so far!

The answer is: I dunno!! Guess I will just update the blog instead.

California poker

So I got back to California towards the end of November and felt a bit flat. First of all in England playing poker was quite social - often with one or both of my brothers at the local pub or club. The pub or club was a 10-15 minute walk or drive away. I would often drink some beer or eat some take-away with our poker playing mates. After the pub game we would sometimes go to the local cardroom until 1 or 2 in the morning playing cheap tournaments or just hanging out. Or we would just chat about how we played.

Here is California I do not have a local poker buddy who is committed to the game like I am. It is quite a solitary life, playing poker out here. If I want to play a live game I have to travel 40 minutes down to Oceanside to my small local casino (cheaper tournaments, good food, nice people and dealers) or brave the LA traffic and drive 1 hour north to high-crime areas to play in the Commerce, Bike, Hoolywood Park, Hustler or Hawaiin Gardens card rooms. Alternatively I can drive east inland about 45-55 minutes to an Indian casino to play in their poker room. The traffic in LA is a nightmare - more like a parking lot. And that is when they are not doing roadworks and closing the freeway, redirecting you into gang-infested south-central LA side streets on a detour at 3am in the morning. And travelling alone I cannot use the carpool lanes so I cannot even share this nightmare. There are occassional newspaper reports of people winning large amounts of cash in the casinos in LA and then being followed home and robbed at gunpoint. At rush housr the 1 hour jounrey to LA becomes a 2-3 hour ride home. Likewise the Oceanside travel goes from 45 mins to 1.5 hours and the Indian casino journey similar.

My final gripe is when you do get to a casino for a big event, sometimes the event was sold out the day before and you join a long line of 500-600 people to buy in as an alterate where you sit down as people get knocked out. Last time at Commerce I sat down starting with 10 big blinds about 5 hours after the tourney started. What a nightmare!!!!

It is almost more tempting for drive to las Vegas (4-5 hours) and stay in a cheap casino to play out there and avoid the hell that is LA traffic.

The final option is playing online. Of course - this is my preference. I realised in England I did not play online so much because it was just as convenient to go to the local pub or cardroom to play. Over here the plain fact is if you live in Orange County (possibly the best place to live in California) then it is not convenient to go to the poker room.

I can play online from the comfort of my house. No travelling involved. Arguably its a little harder to make money than playing live. I still like to play live occasionally. Hence after my flat period I have resumed my once per week travel to Oceans 11 in Oceanside. And I will still play a couple of tournies at Commerce or the Bike when I see something I fancy. But for the most part, my focus will be online poker. Just because I live in California.....

Now the positive stuff - the pros. Arguably unless you live in Las Vegas I have more card rooms available within an hour of me than anywhere in the USA. And the daily tournaments are much bigger than in the UK (100 or so at Oceans, 200+ at the Bike). Also the "special" or large tournaments are far mroe regular with The Bike, Commerve, Oceans 11 and other casinos regularly running tournament series with buyins from 100-500 and big cash prizes. So compared to a lot of people in the USA I am in a great location for poker.

I just hate driving in LA..................

The UK poker revolutuion

My trip home was great because I got to hang out with friends and family while also playing plenty of poker. The poker scene in England has evolved roughly as follows:

2000 - Portsmouth has 4-5 casinos, 1 casino has a once weekly poker game, Thats it!!!

2006 - Now 1 casino has 3-4 times a week poker game, and the local snooker club has started throwing a game.

2007 - Some pub leagues have started up in a few pubs in the area

2008 - 3 or 4 snooker clubs are running occasional games, the pub games are getting popular, the casinos are starting to run tournaments regularly - our local poker casino now runs small tournaments each night.

2009 - 2 dedicated poker clubs have opened locally running small nightly tournaments, the snooker clubs now run a league with regular mid-sized cash mtts, the pub leagues are very popular with a choice of games each night, all local casinos are running poker tournaments and some cash games.

It is an interesting revolution. Poker winnings are NOT taxed in England so you can now make a good living just playing poker. The card rooms are still new and nowhere near as professional (or busy) as in California but I am sure they will grow over the coming years. The owner of Duffs is a nice guy and looks like he is committed to making it work but its tough work. He has to get players in the door to play but they wont come unless there are already players or big guarantees. if you offer big guarantees players will start to come but you will lose money over the first 6-12mths until you have enough regulars. I am convinced long-term the clubs will be amazingly busy and successful.

The skill level is lower locally but nationally I am sure it is on a par with America and may eventually overtake them. Poker is just so available - a lot of young players are going to play over there. In America its still somewhat exclusive to those who live near a casino or card-room. I think first-time players are somewhat intimidated in America when they enter a poker room but not so much in England. Especially if they play pub poker.

Pub poker is interesting. Initially it seems boring as you cannot win any money, but then you realise you can have a night out for a fairly low cost, playing a game you love and enjoying a social night with friends who also love the game. The competitive element is still there (both driven by the pub "league" and you ego on any individual night as you want to be known as the best or at least a good poker player). Often the league game is followed by a small (cheap) single table cash game which if you win it means you have had a night out for no cost. What could be better!!

I did not play any larger events out there but hope to next time. I am lucky my brothers both enjoy playing poker with me so there is plenty of opportunity. They have APAT events costing $100-$200 and GUKPT events costing $300-$1000 and the the EPT and WSOP Europe events costing several thousand pounds. So the opportunity is there to play at many price points not to mention travelling through Europe.

In fact when I got back to California I felt quite flat. For a good week or so I played very little poker as I will explain in my next post.

UK totals - live tournaments

So the UK trip ended, and when all was tallied I made a small profit on the live tournaments I played. Nothing to write home about - but any profit is better than the alternative. The details are shown below.