The Race - Day 0

I took advantage of the fact that I'm on the west coast and played a little bit tonight on Carbon poker after the day changed over and it became May on Carbon time. Inexplicably, Carbon is on Central time! WTF is that about! When I logged on at 9 pacific ready to go I found out that I'd have to wait another hour to get started.

The good news is I played a few hundred hands and the games were fantastic. Granted it's Friday night, but all the regulars are there on Pokerstars and AP so I'm guess I'll see some of these jokers again.

I got off to a terrible start and my $1,700 Carbon roll was down to $700 at one point. But with a little luck and after I figured out that these clowns are all a bunch of whackjobs (think raising 24 or capping Q9s vs 2 players out of position), I got back to even before calling it a night.

I picked up 700 points which isn't a ton, but it's a start. Tomorrow I'm really going to put the heat on and see what I can do.

"The Race" Big Bucks for Me?

Carbon Poker (Carbon Poker? - yes Carbon Poker - not surprised you haven't heard of it) is running a promotion in May called "The Race." It is going to be a big deal for me.

I heard about Carbon Poker through the website that does my rakeback (rakebacknation.com) and I opened an account there in January with the hopes of getting some unqualified people to play head up against me. At the time there were very few if any limit games going on the site. But in April Carbon joined up with a bunch of poker rooms that were being run by various sports betting websites and now they have some actual traffic (those of you who read my tweets will know that I took $1,000 off two $10/$20 games there yesterday).

So what is this race all about? Well, like all poker websites carbon has a points system (and a VIP system with levels like pokerstars). The way it works is for every dollar you pay in rake you get 10 points. Pay $100 in rake, get 1,000 points.

The race is essentially 15 point milestones that each come with a cash prize. The lowest is 250 points and pays $2.50. As soon as you earn 250 points (or in other words pay $25 in rake) you get $2.50 in your account. The next level is 500. After you earn ANOTHER 500 points you get $5. Another 1,000 and you get $10 more dollars. There are actually 15 levels with the top level being 100,000 points which pays an insane $15,000.

They call it the race, because there are only a certain number of prizes at each level. The first level has 1,500, $2.50 prizes. The next level has 1,250 $5 prizes and so on.

Here is a chart with all of the levels (sorry this chart looks like shit! It didn't past very well!).

Level Points Prize Total Prizes
1 250 $2.50 1,500
2 500 $5 1,250
3 1,000 $10 1,000
4 2,000 $20 700
5 2,500 $30 600
6 3,000 $40 500
7 3,500 $70 400
8 5,000 $125 300
9 7,500 $200 200
10 10,000 $250 125
11 15,000 $750 75
12 25,000 $1,000 50
13 50,000 $2,500 25
14 75,000 $5,000 10
15 100,000 $15,000 5

So what are my chances of hitting all 15 levels? I'd say less than 1%. If you add it all up I'd have to pay $30,000 in rake to hit the top level. I've actually done that much in a month before. In fact in December 2008 on my way to Supernova Elite I paid about $45,000 in rake. But that was on pokerstars playing 6 $10/$20 games, many hours a day, 30 of 31 days that month (I lost over $10,000 that month). There just aren't that many games on Carbon poker and I don't want to torture myself like that again.

Last month I raked about $11,000 on AP and Cake combined without working too hard at it. That's kind of my baseline. I know I'm going to have to play $5/$10 games and even $3/$6 games which is going to be boring, but it should be worth it.

If I can rake $12,500 I'll pick up $5,002 in bonus money from this promotion alone. I'll also get a $1,000 bonus from rakeback nation when for raking more than $5,000 in a month and I'll get back 35% of whatever rake I pay as part of my rakeback deal. Add that up and it's $10,377!

But wait! There's more! If that wasn't enough Carbon poker has a ridiculously complex VIP system with various levels and rewards! A quick set of dirty calculations has me picking up an extra $2,000 by cashing in the points I earn and hitting other goofy ass milestones and parameters that they've set up.

So I'm going to pay $12,500 in rake and get back 99% of it. That's my plan.

If I go buck nuts and make it to $20,000 in rake which would be enough to hit level 14 of "The Race" I'll get about $23,000 in bonuses which is 115% rakeback!

Three things are going to hold me back and make it tough to do as much as I want. First and foremost is a potential lack of games. Right now there is one $10/$20 and three $3/$6 games. Nothing bigger or in between. If that line up was available 24/7 I think I could do it. Typically there has been at least one $10/$20 and one $5/$10 going the past few days with smattering of lower games. I'm hoping that I'll be able to help start more games since I'm willing to play heads up.

The second thing that's going to hold me back is money. Right now I have $1,700 in Carbon Poker and it's going to take me a few days to get more in. The only way for me to get money in there is through ewalletexpress.com. I can send money to ewallet from my bank, but I have to pay them 8.8% of whatever I deposit. Not a great option. The other way is to cashout from AP or Cake to ewallet and then send it over to carbon. I've started the process, but it's going to take a few days. So if I run bad at the start I could blow though my $1,700 and have to wait a day or two to resume play. Working for me in this regard is Carbon pays rakeback every day and I'll get the race prizes as soon as I earn them.

Third, the SCOOP. I might trim down my SCOOP schedule, but I'm still going to be playing one or two tournaments a day for two weeks.

Actually there is a 4th concern which is minute, but still there. And that it that I could have some competition for the prizes. I don't see anyway for 25 people to rake $12,500 on Carbon poker. There are hundreds who do that on pokerstars and fulltilt, but not on Carbon. I'm going to log on at minute 1 and start play to make sure I don't get jacked out of the first few prizes which I'm sure will be hit by the limiting number of players pretty quickly.

May is going to be a looooooong month, but I'm hoping it's a profitable one! Let's hope I have the mental fortitude to make this happen!

Early SCOOP Schedule

I bricked in the cashout FTOPS without winning a single pot. My last hand was QQ vs AA. BOO!

After 7 tournaments my FTOPS/SCOOP Bankroll is up to $7753 from $7,500. Not great but as they say, better than a kick in the nuts!

I'm taking today off with plans of playing little if at all on Friday and Saturday so I can rest up for playing 15 days is a row.

Here the first week of my SCOOP schedule (I might add or subtract one or two tournaments). Man it looks like a lot! I copy and pasted from the web so all of the times are eastern.

May 2 13:00 NL Hold’em [6-max]$215
May 2 17:00 NL Hold’em [2-day] $215
May 3 14:00 NL Hold’em [6-Max, Rebuys] $55
May 3 17:00 FL Badugi $162
May 3 20:00 PL Omaha [Turbo, 1R1A] Low: $11 Med: $109
May 4 14:00 PL 5-Card Draw $109
May 4 17:00 NL Hold’em [Heads-Up Match Play] $162
May 5 14:00 Mixed Hold’em [6-Max] Low: $22 Med: $215
May 6 17:00 NL Hold’em [Knockout] $265
May 7 14:00 NL Hold’em [Ante Up!] $162
May 7 17:00 FL Omaha Hi-Lo $55
May 7 20:00 NL Hold’em [2X Chance, Turbo] Low: $16.50 Med: $162
May 8 14:00 NL NL Hold’em - Triple Shootout $215
May 8 17:00 PL Omaha [6-Max, Rebuys] $16.50
May 8 20:00 FL Hold’em [Turbo] Low: $22 Med: $215


Sunday is going to be a big day. On top of the two SCOOP events I've also decided to fire in FTOPS event #28 $256 NLH knockout 6-max and the $640 FTOPS main event ($3,000,000 guaranteed prize pool for that one - 1st should be over $500,000!!). Cancel all of your plans and start your laptops charging now!

$50/$100 Beat Down

First of all thanks to whoever posted the comment on the Cashout tournament strategy. That makes perfect sense. Not sure I'll be able to resist the temptation to cashout, but I'll hold out as long as I can.

While I was playing the HORSE tournament I was also playing cash games. Normally, I find myself in the $10/$20 and $15/$30 limit games on absolute poker, but from time to time I will sometimes venture higher if conditions are right.

Yesterday I looked at a $50/$100 6-max game that had 5 players sitting at it. 3 were average, $15/$30 players who are pretty much break even, one was a solid $30/$60+ regular and the other was a total fish who I've played before and just dumps money at any limit. The seat open was to the left of the fish and I have visions of his stack pouring into mine.

On the other hand $50/$100 is a terrifying limit. It's not hard to drop 5 grand if you lose your composure and it is 5 times my normal limit. But I've been playing great lately so I decided to give it a shot. Here is a recap of a session was very short but went perfectly (the highlight was hand #14).

On hand #1 I got dealt KQ suited in the big blind. The under the gun player raised, I called and the flop came Q high. I check raised him and he three bet me. The turn was an ace and we both checked. I bet the river and he folded. A very normal pot. +$272 so far.

On hand #2 I got dealt AJ in the small blind. I three bet the cutoff, flopped an ace and won with a bet. +$469.

Hand #3 94o.
Hand #4 I raised pocket jacks and everyone folded. I avoided the temptation to say "Aw man!" and instead thought "hey I just made $75 in 2 seconds!"
Hand #5 T5o.
Hand #6 Q8o.
Hand #7 62s in the big blind. folded to a raise

Hand #8 I three bet a button raise with 77 and won with a bet on a Q high flop. +$691 for the session.

Hand #9 T5o
Hand#10 J8o
Hand #11 A7o (almost raised this one but opted to fold)
Hand #12 53o
Hand #13 62o

In hand #14 the cutoff raised and I called in the small blind with QT of hearts. The big blind came along too and the flop was 7 6 3 with one heart. The big blind and I both called a bet of $50 on the flop and the turn came down the ace of hearts giving me a flush draw. I decided to go for the check raise semibluff thinking that if my opponent bet, but didn't have an ace I could win with a checkraise. And even if I did get called I could still hit my flush. Like clock work the cutoff bet $100, I made it $200 and the big blind folded.

Not like clockwork my opponent called and the river came the 3 of diamonds. YUCK! But in a moment of sheer bravado I fired another $100 into the pot. My opponent thought and thought for what seemed like an hour and I couldn't help but explicitly think "Holy shit there's $947 out there! I have a god damn thousand bucks riding on this guy calling or folding. I'd have to be nuts playing in this game. What in the world am I doing!?"

And then he folded. "I am the king of all who play poker! Of course he was going to fold. No one would ever put me on a check raise semi bluff!" +$1,138 for the session at that point.

Hand #15 I raised with AJ and got called by the fishy player that I'd been targeting in the first place who was in the big blind. The flop came down 8 5 4 and he called my continuation bet. The turn was an ace (DING!) and he bet into me (DING DING!) I raised him and he called. The rive paired the 5 and he folded when I bet. +$1,510.

In hand #16 I raised A8o and got called by the big blind. The flop came down KK2 and he folded when I fired out $50. +$1,632.

Hand #17 J3.
Hand #18 K3.

And that was it. Maybe I should have kept going, but I'm not above a hit and run every now and then.

I have been on a killer run lately. I've had 6 winning days in a row and the worst of those was +$800. I hope I can keep it up!

Two Tournaments Today

Event #16 $216 7-game mixed games is underway. This is a mix of all the HORSE games plus NL hold'em and PLO.

At 3 I have $216 "cashout." I've never played a cashout tournament before, but here is how I understand that it works. Of my buy in $16 goes to the house, $100 goes to the main prize pool and $100 goes to the cashout prize pool. At any time, but only one time, during the tournament you can "cashout" half of your chips and get paid for their value. For example. If you start the tournament with 5,000 chips on hand 1 you could sell off 2,500 chips for $100 and be left with 2,500 chips. Or if you had 20,000 you could sell off half for $400 and be left with 10,000. I'm not sure what the optimal strategy is, but I hope I'll know the time to cashout when I see it.

FTOPS Event #15 ($535 HORSE) Recap

I liked the structure that full tilt set up for this tournament. Often times you start with so many chips and such small stakes that the first few rounds feel like a major waste of time. Of course when I'm putting up five hundred bucks for one tournament I want some play, but better to start with the stakes a little higher and make the blind increases a little more gradual. I think this tournament had the right balance.

We got 442 entrants which was 58 short of what full tilt needed to meet the $250,000 prize pool guarantee that they'd posted. In the end they had to add just over $13,000 to the prize pool creating a $30 per player overlay.

I got off to a good start. We began with 4,000 chips and my first big pot came up playing Stud. I stared the hand with three big clubs and there was heavy action on 3rd street. I bricked on 4th street, but caught another club on 5th. At this point my opponents went nuts going 3 bets one with only a pair of jacks and the other with I don't know what. I made my flush on 6th street and check raised the pair of jacks. Both players called. On the river I bet, one player folded and the other called me with bare jacks. That took me to 5,500.

I got half of a big Omaha pot a few minutes later when I made the nut low and was up to 6,400. But that was my peak.

I got totally blown up in razz. I had two hands back to back where I was ahead on 5th street (not way ahead, but ahead), got heavy action and caught two bricks.

A little while later in the Stud hi-lo I had a hand where I started with A63 and caught another ace and another 6. My opponent who made a low on 6th street also made a flush on the river and scooped me.

My final demise came in hold'em. I raised with QT of hearts and got 3 bet. The flop came down ace high with two hearts and I check called. The turn was a queen and I check raised. My opponent three bet me all in with AK, and I didn't hit. I finished 295th of 442.

My 2010 WSOP Schedule is Set!

I was worried that I might have to pass on this years WSOP because of cost. But happily I have been on a tear in the limit cash games. While I've had a few $1,500+ losing days this month, I had one day that was +$4,400, and a half dozen that were in the +$2,000 range.

What gives me the most confidence is I made a few significant changes to my tactics after taking a massive beating. I took a day to really look at some of the plays I'd been making and since I've made those changes I've been killing.

If I get my doors blown off in the SCOOP AND I back up a little in the cash games it might be a little tight playing all the WSOP events that I want to play. But I booked my hotel rooms so if I can make it work I'm going to.

Here is my plan! I'm getting to town on June 8th and staying at the Rio for 5 nights. Then I move over to Aria for 4 nights. I got 3 nights free at each hotel and the other 3 nights were $100 each. Not bad for RIO during the WSOP and the newest casino is Vegas!

Here is the schedule of tournaments!

June 9th - $2,000 limit hold'em
June 10th - $1,500 7-card stud
June 11th - $2,500 limit hold'em 6 handed
June 12th - $1,000 no limit hold'em
June 13th - Rest/Party with the wife!
June 14th - $2,500 No Limit Hold'em 6 handed
June 15th - Rest
June 16th - $1,500 HORSE

Total Cost: $11,000.

This is a great schedule for me and I'm pumped that these tournaments lined up the way they did. I like my chances playing limit hold'em and REALLY like my chances playing 6 handed limit. Also working to my advantage is the 6 max limit event is the only tournament that day. In year's past it's gone off at 5 pm on a day when there is a no limit tournament at noon which draws off a lot of the players. This year if you want to play something that day you're playing limit. Hopefully I can nail some of the NL players who think they can play limit.

The 7 card stud tournament is sure to be populated with old times, codgers and your grandpa. I played this event last year and was shocked by the level of play. If I can get a little help for the deck, I'll do great in this one.

Last year they had one $1,000 no limit tournament and it got 6,000 entrants! So this year they have one every weekend. They are sure to be populated with first time WSOP players and fish.

One of my WSOP cashes was $2,500 6 max no limit so I'm going to go for another one.

And of course, HORSE! Last year I finished 28th of 450 in the $3,000 HORSE against the toughest field you're ever seen. I always like my chances at HORSE.

Lastly there is a $10,000 limit event on the 15th. If I make a final table or have a solid five figure cash of some kind I'll probably play that baby as well.

I'll be looking to sell off about half my action. Of course I'l be in touch with my usual backers, but if you haven't backed me before and you want a piece, let me know.

More on the WSOP as the time gets closer. I'm getting fired up already!

Giddy Up!

$535 HORSE tonight at 6 pm PT! I'm taking this one to the house! The HORSE house! To the Barn! Look for updates on twitter.

Sunday Tournament Recap

On Sunday I played 4 tournaments and made the money in 3 of them. The first was $129 Knockout FTOPS, and I went broke right away.

The second was a $55 tournament on pokerstars that started with over 8,000 players and a first place prize of $44,000! I finished about 500th.

The third tournament was a special tournament on pokerstars called the "turbo takedown." This tournament goes off once a month, the buy in is 3,000 FPPs and it has a prize pool of $1,000,000 regardless of the number of entrants. In this case we had 18,000 entrants. I went on a monster tear like I can't ever remember having. It started with beating AA with AK when the flop came with TWO kings. After that I took out 4 players in about 10 minutes! When we were down to 6,000 or so players I was in first place with a stack that was 7 times average! I fizzeled a little down the stretch, but finished around 700th which paid $170.

Lastly there was the pokerstars Sunday Million. I want to keep this post short so let's just say that I finished 783rd out of 8776 and got paid $421.

I planned to play the $322 NLH FTOPS event #9, but after 5 or 6 hours of steady play I didn't think I had it in me to stay focused long enough to go deep.

The knockout and Sunday Million were part of my FTOPS/SCOOP package. My backers will be happy to hear that I'm ahead $1,220 after four tournaments.

My Near Future Schedule (With Times!)

Since I did so well in Event #1 I'm adding a few more FTOPS tournaments to the schedule. My original plan was to play 3 FTOPS tournaments as a warm up for the SCOOP. But instead of 3 it looks like it's going to be more like 5 or 6.

Today I'm going to play three tournaments:
1) $129 NL hold'em Knock out which is event #7. For every player I bust I get $20. Start Time - 11 PT.
2) $322 No Limit Hold'em which is Event #9. Start Time - 3 PT.
3) $215 Pokerstars Sunday Milion. Start Time - 1:30 (Backers you're in for this one too. I'm adding it to the FTOPS/SCOOP package).

I'll probably register late for all of these and skip the first few mind numbing levels.

Here are other events and the percentage that I'll be playing them:
1) $535 HORSE at 6 PT on Tuesday (99%)
2)$216 7-game mixed games at 11 PT on Wednesday (99%)
3)$216 NL hold'em "cashout" at 3 PT on Wednesday (50%)
4)$216 NL hold'em 6-max at 11 PT on Friday ((35%)
5)$256 NL knockout 6 max at 11 PT on Sunday May 2nd (50%)
6 $640 NL hold'em "Main Event" on Sunday May 2nd (30%)

The SCOOP starts May 2nd. More on my precice SCOOP schedule later.