On Thursday I headed into Los Angeles to play the $345 Heads Up tournament at the LAPC. It was my first trip to the Commerce Casino and I’d been looking forward to it for a while but sadly, I didn’t last very long.
It was kind of a frustrating day right from the start. After the 2 hour car ride up there and an hour and a half wait at the casino, I drew a seat in the second sitting for the first round and had to wait 2 more hours to play. I drew Shan Jing for my first opponent and realised pretty quickly after googling him that he was going to be a good player. The match started out well and I had quite a few good starting hands which I played aggressively but it went downhill from there. I managed to get my chips back after spewing a bit on missed draws and a straight vs his full house, only to flop top pair against his bottom pair and get called every street to the river where he made 2 pair. Ouch. That was pretty much it for me.
It was a good experience for me as I’ve been working on my HU game and wanted to road test a bit of it without risking a huge buy in. Shan was definitely a better player though, so it’s no surprise he won. He seemed like a nice guy too. A bit bemused by the antics of one of the players in the match next to us; a young guy who seemed to like standing up and yelling the word ‘donkaments’ at every big hand. And it really did seem like every hand was a big hand for him. Gotta be honest, it was a little annoying and distracting.
I’ve just arrived in Las Vegas where we’ll be filming the Premier League very soon. It’s going to be a full couple of weeks out here with work and I’ll be blogging pretty much every day once it starts, hopefully with a few photos to make it more interesting for you guys!
PartyPoker’s Premier League is about to kick off this week in Las Vegas. Today we profile 3 of the qualifiers for the Premier League play-offs. These guys have qualified playing online at PartyPoker and now have a chance of winning the seat in the Premier League main event but are also in the running for the professional poker sponsorship and a place in the TeamParty.
Copacabana
I have played in the WSOP Main Event twice and in various EPTs including EPT Monte Carlo Grand Finale. My experience was exceptional but unfortunately I wasn’t able to win one of these bigger tournaments thus far. It’s a great feeling to play with other well known poker players and to have a shot at millions of dollars in prize money.
I was able to win an EPT Side Event in Monte Carlo 2007 with around 450 players and finished 11th in the Party Poker Cruise 2008.
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Today PartyPoker player Bobbes22 tells how his Las Vegas poker dream came true for less than $4 in a PartyPoker qualifier.
Also cirneco2000, who is a lawyer, tells of a rollercoaster qualifier ride that brought him to Premier League Poker play-offs.
Bobbes22 (pictured)
It was a long but a cheap way to win the 9k package for The Poker Premier League IV. I went through all German qualifiers.
I played the $2 rebuy qualifier only for Germans. I made no rebuy, only the add-on! In this tournament I qualified for the $52 qualifier.
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Premier League Poker is near. Next week 16 PartyPoker qualifiers alongside top pros will make their journey to Las Vegas for this event.
Today we profile two players that are in with a chance of winning the seat at the main event but also earning the professional poker sponsorship from PartyPoker.
XooOooX (pictured)
I played a 52$ Satellite Tournament and qualified for the 480$ in January. 20 players battled for one package to Partypoker Premier League in Las Vegas.
The tournament didn’t start well for me, in the first hands I lost with AA and so the half of my chips were gone.
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Luke “FullFlush” Schwartz sent an email with his thoughts on the opponents at PartyPoker’s Premier League Poker in Las Vegas.
These are Luke’s thoughts in full, unedited and uncensored:
- Phil Hellmuth all mouth well past it won 20 years ago against the lolest of fields
- Tony G about as much mouth and skill as Hellmuth
- David Benyamine I can feel the equity already in his Hold ‘em leaks
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3:09. Tyron Krost is the new Aussie Millions champion!!
2:41. We got two Party Poker players heads up! Fredrik started the raising by betting $250,000 from early position. Tyron reraised from the small blind to $775,000 and Mizzi went all in. Fredrik got out of the way and Tyron called. The cards revealed sevens for Mizzi and As Ks for Tyron. Flop comes K 10 5 all hearts which is good news to Tyron. Mizzi has no hearts with his sevens and are only drawing to another seven. Turn 8d and finally a 2h on the river and the room goes berserk!
Frederik is Awaiting his Destiny
More Drama
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Palladium VIP's at the Australian Open
It’s summer time in Australia, which was a shock to the system of those of us that flew in from the recently snow ravaged region of London! We are down under for the Main Event of the Aussie Millions, a tournament that continues to grow in popularity, especially for players from countries around the world. The event is held at Crown Casino, which is an amazing complex of hotels, shops, restaurants, entertainment and of course a casino!
43 PartyPoker.com players made the trip to Melbourne with us, flying in from 14 different countries. The group of players includes several of our Palladium VIP poker players, who earned their way into the tournament by grinding it out in our November Gladiator promotion.
- Crown Casino Fireshow
The PartyGaming staff arrived early to get the players checked in on Friday. Players were given an amazing, retro line of PartyPoker.com clothing to wear. In other words, hats, t-shirts and polo shirts with the Party logo! Yes, we do things in style. The staff here done under include myself, Naomi and Lucinda (our very own Party Girls) and Justin and Henrik.
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Australia Day is coming to a close and what a day it has been. In fact, what a few days it has been!
Part of my deal with PartyPoker is that for some major events I will have my own personal concierge and Jessie has been at my beck and call 24 hours a day since the weekend. When we sat down and negotiated this, the guys at PartyPoker.com didn’t think I was being serious and laughed – I kept bringing it up, they kept laughing it off but eventually I got my own way. What a contract I have signed!
Even Julius Caesar didn’t have his own personal concierge
I know top VIP players in Party’s VIP scheme get a top notch concierge service but let me say – it has to be nothing compared to what the G gets. The personal concierge could just be the best thing about this deal! I cannot believe that PartyPoker.com buckled to this in the end! Phil Hellmuth eat your heart out – even Julius Caesar didn’t have his own personal concierge and I don’t get to look ridiculous like Hellmuth does.
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As a gesture of our goodwill to play money players affected by the implementation of new account limits, we are running two special tournaments this Sunday.
- For all non-US play money players we are running a special $1,000 freeroll with cash prizes for first, second and third place winners.
- For all the US play money players [*] we are running a special tournament with the winner set to scoop an amazing, all-expenses paid trip for two to watch this month’s fabulous PartyPoker Premier League tournament in Las Vegas.
Here are the full details:
Non-US play money players:
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We recently implemented a new policy that restricts play money accounts to a maximum number of chips. This decision has the vast majority of our play money players in mind, and is intended to stop the transferring of chips from account-to-account outside of regular hands of poker.
Although this may have affected some play money players in the short term, the decision was made in the interest of our play money games and the fair play benefits it will bring. We will not reverse our decision.
As a gesture of our goodwill to play money players, we are going to run a special $1,000 freeroll plus the chance to win an all-expenses paid trip for two to watch this month’s PartyPoker Premier League tournament in Las Vegas – click here for details!
I
‘ve spent this week enjoying a bit of sunshine at home and trying to gain some ground on my resolution to eat a bit more healthily this year. I’ll be in Las Vegas in a week with Team Party where I’ll be hosting the Premier League and before I get there I want to at least TRY to be a bit more healthy in my eating habits.
Spending the last few years travelling the poker circuits for work has apparently given me high cholesterol. It’s no surprise really. Staying up late and eating whatever looked good when the waitresses brought plates to the other players at the tables… well it’s not going to make anyone a poster child for healthy living.
Premier League Poker: fun but slightly bacchanalian fortnight
I’m blaming the travel and not myself, obviously. I can’t count the number of smoky casinos in random European cities where I’ve eaten a club sandwich. All in all, not good for the heart apparently. So I’m working on making better choices between trips now. The last time I was in Las Vegas I ate french toast for breakfast 4 days out of 5. Bad choices.
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Go Seat Four and Five!
- Seat 1: Sorel Mizzi – 6,033,000
- Seat 2: Stephen Shelley – 991,000
- Seat 3: Annette Obrestad – 1,349,000
- Seat 4: Tyron Krost - 1,869,000
- Seat 5: Frederik Jensen – 1,754,000
- Seat 6: Kosta Varoxis – 635,000
- Seat 7: Peter Jetten – 1,700,000
- Seat 8: Steven Friedlander – 694,000
PartyPoker’s Tony G reports: Congratulations to PartyPoker.com online qualifiers Frederik Jensen and Tyron Krost for making the final table in the Aussie Millions Main Event!
Second and third in chips is massive for these guys and I wish them the very best of luck. Annette, Sorel and the rest all need to get on their bikes. I know PartyPoker.com always have someone on hand to fantastically look after their players but I give Frederik and Tyron permission to borrow my personal concierge Jessie… but not for too long though. To paraphrase Ricky Springfield’s 1981 hit ‘Jessie’s Girl’: “You wish that you were Jessie’s boys, where do you find a woman like that!”
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