Miscellaneous entry

I've been grinding and grinding and grinding with crappy results these past couple weeks. Specifically NL5k is more than rigged, see Exhibit A, Exhibit B and Exhibit C from my session tonight. NL1k has also been super frustrating, my first 35k hands at that limit were breakeven this month! The good news is that I feel great about my game and am confident that the results will return to normalcy before I know it.

My Vienna trip is now booked, I'll be there from March 9th - 15th, just in time for the main event and the second chance tournaments. After that comes EPT San Remo from April 1st - 5th, which I'm really looking forward to because I haven't been to Italy in a long time. That tournament is followed by the EPT Final in Monte Carlo from April 12th - 17th. The time in between the two EPTs I'll probably spend in Italy with some friends just relaxing and taking a little vacation. I don't know if it will be warm enough for beaches, but we'll see. Nothing is set in stone but it's looking like it will all work out.

*Weight loss update: Seb currently weighs just over 95kg, meaning he still has another 10kg to drop before June 3rd. To be completely honest, I'm surprised he even dropped the 4kg so far. I thought he would throw in the towel after 1 week, but he seems determined to lose the weight. Time will tell I suppose...

Cruisin'

One week has passed since my last entry and there's not too much to report about. I've now played 44k hands this month and it has been a rollercoaster to say the least. Sick ups, sicker downs, I've seen it all. At this rate I should play around 65-75k hands this month and as of now it looks like I'm on pace to win the grinding bet vs Seb.

The Spring Poker Festival in Vienna is coming up in the beginning of March and I already have my seat in the €3k main event booked. I'm not sure if I'm going to play the other tourneys, but I definitely want to go there a few days before the main event to hang out. Vienna has always been a good place for me and the tournament organization in the CCC is second to none.

In other news, I bought a PartyPoker Million package from Mr. Sicko aka Tobi Reinkemeier, who played the $650 qualifier 6 times and won a total of 4 packages. Luckily I was able to buy one from him in time, because Party said he can't win any more packages, haha. The tournament is going to take place on a cruise from May 3rd - 10th, making stops in Italy, Greece, Turkey and Croatia. I've never been on a cruise before, so this is something I'm really looking forward to. Who knows, maybe I can even luck around in the main event and win some money :)

WSOP 2008: A first look

This year is no different from last year in that we have rented a house for the full 6 weeks of the WSOP. Starting in the first days of June, this will be my temporary home along with several other German poker players, many of whom were also there last year:






The house has 11 bedrooms with 9 separate bathrooms. Additionally, it has a pool table, poker table, darts board and big screen TV. As you can see in one of the pictures above, it also has a double-sized pool and a jacuzzi. Best of all, apparently it is very close to the Strip! Needless to say, I really can't wait for Vegas this year...

More grinding, more weight loss

As the title suggests, I've been getting my grind on since my return from Dortmund. Averaging just over 5 hours a day, I've had decent results so far, though they have been under expectation. If I can keep up the pace of 5 hours a day for the remainder of the month I'll be a happy man. I have a sidebet with Luckbox on who can win the most money with just grinding in February. No staking, no chinese(!), just grinding. Winner gets $3k flat so that's a nice little motivation for me to keep working.

The funny thing is, I also have another bet with him that he can't lose 14.5kg by the time June rolls around. As of last week he weighed 99kg and wanted to make a weight loss prop bet with me REALLY bad, so we agreed on a bet of $3k flat and a 10% share of the WSOP Main Event. The first thing he did after we made the bet was go to Google and type in "abnehmen ohne Sport."

Money in the bank is what I was thinking....

There are a couple rules such as no surgical operations, no extra supplements/pills that you can't get over the counter and no sabotage by me tampering with his food. Also, if he gains the weight back by September, I'll get half the money back. That goes both ways, though. If he misses the weight loss cut in June but makes it in September, he also gets half the money back. Considering the fact that he is probably the laziest person I know, I'm really confident that I'm going to win this one. His mind is full of dreams right now. But as we all know, don't count your chickens until they're hatched.

EPT Dortmund Day 2

I began Day 2 with just 11k chips and blinds of 400/800/100. The very first hand, a Scandinavian player limped UTG and I shoved with 99 from MP. He folded and I was off to a decent start, up to almost 14k. I was constantly looking for spots to get it in during the next few orbits but no great opportunity presented itself to me. Then came a hand where it was folded to me in the CO and it was a clear any-two situation due to the fact that my stack only consisted of 6.8k. I looked down at my cards anyway (I made the mistake of not doing this once in Vienna and won't be making that mistake again) and was pleasantly surprised to see AKs. Still, I got no callers and so I had 8.8k.

The very next hand, Macel Baran limps UTG and I shove 7d7h for 8.7k, hoping to take down the pot right then and there which wasn't all that unlikely since Marcel had limped UTG a few times already with weak hands. Tobi Reinkemeier was on the button and asked for a chip count, then made the call after a little hesitation. Marcel folded as expected and so it was me HU against Tobi's AQo. The flop came down AhJhJs and I was drawing pretty thin, having just a backdoor flush draw and two outs to my set. Lucky for me, I hit the magical 7 on the turn. Lucky for Tobi, he hit the magical J on the river.

I took it with humor because it's really a waste of time and energy to get all stressed out about busting out. Especially when it's a hand like that where I feel I didn't make any mistakes, there's only so much you can do and then the cards decide your fate. I'm sitting on the train right now back to Berlin and will most likely be using February for some serious grinding as January was pretty expensive for me due to all the live tourneys/travels (made more expensive by a nasty Chinese session last night). I'd like to play 4-6 hours a day and see how long I can last, right now I'm motivated but we all know how quickly that can change.

Here a couple pictures as seen on Pokerolymp.de:

Marcel Baran, Seb, moi, Moritz

Chinese with Seb, Jan, Katja, Vito, Moritz and myself