The Micros: All Episodes

All the episodes of this awesome poker comedy series back to back...
Perfect cure against tilt, downswings, bad temper and/ or lousy days. Watch until smiling. Repeat regularly if necessary.

Poker's Not Dead: Big Tournaments In May

Yeah, PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker no longer operate in the US but that doesn't mean this is the end of online poker. This weekend both poker rooms launch a series of multi-table tournaments at reasonably priced buy-ins. Last chance to hit a big score before Summer!

The PokerStars Spring Championship of Online Poker (SCOOP) is back for 2011. This year’s series includes 38 events and a massive guaranteed prize pool of $25,000,000. Each tournament has a low, medium and high buy in level, which makes SCOOP the series that everyone can play. Check out the full schedule here.

Full Tilt runs MiniFTOPS XX this May. Get in on the action and win your share of millions in guaranteed prize money. MiniFTOPS XX features seventeen Multi-Entry Tournaments, each allowing you to register for the same tournament numerous times, giving you multiple chances to make a big score. Additionally, eight events are scheduled as Rush Poker Tournaments.
See the full MiniFTOPS Schedule for more details on all 45 events.

Good luck at the tables!

Taking Down The Tilt Monkey

Seven weeks ago I got back from Cambodia. The return to the day job and the daily poker grind quickly turned into a big cluster fuck. The first few weeks, the memories of the beach still fresh and alive, were all right. Then there were a few bumps in the road. Where running bad slowly turns into playing bad turns into feeling low and miserable...
Bleak days on endless monkey tilt.
Fuck this.
Why lose hundreds of dollars a day playing poker when Angry Birds is only €3,99 in the App store?

After Angry Birds I was still not #winning so I ended up taking a few pictures here and there. This made me feel strangely at ease.
When the shutter closes there's only now. The lens provides perspective. Framing shots requires considering different points of view. It's hard to stay stressed out while looking for the bigger picture... There's more in life than online poker after all.

Enjoy today to keep the tilt monkey away...

The Baller Weekend

*

14th place in MiniFTOPS Event #15 (out of over 12000 entries) / playing with The Ultimate Hipster (Huckleberry Seed) in MiniFTOPS Event #20 / crushing 100NL Rush poker on the side

An excellent return on investment

 for a weekend at home on my own...

*

The Times They Are A-Changin'

In October 2010, PokerStars announced its partnership with Circus Groupe, making it possible to offer online poker under the regulation of the Belgian Gaming Commission. As a result of this, PokerStars launched its Belgian client today. For now it's only a Beta Testing project but on a later date (probably somewhere in April or May) all existing Belgian players will be migrated to the .BE client...

Due to legal restrictions the minimum age will be 21 and new Belgian players are no longer eligible for a first deposit bonus. (So if you're Belgian and don't have a PokerStars account yet, now's your last chance to sign up and get that bonus...) Belgian players will still be able to play tournaments against .COM players but cash games will be .BE exclusive.

Is this the end of online poker in Belgium or a new dawn? It depends. A regulated poker client will attract new, inexperienced players (aka fish aka more money for the regulars). But real gamblers and degenerates don't really care that much about laws and regulations anyway. Will the new players make up for the .COM cash games we are about to lose? I seriously doubt it. If you're a Belgian cash game player on Stars, you're fucked.

There might be a sparkle of hope, though: Full Tilt Poker.

Howard Lederer, the strong man behind Full Tilt and the most powerful man in poker (Number 1 in Bluff Magazine's Power Top 20), has been running his poker client for years in a legal grey (well, grey at best) area in the USA.
While PokerStars's always first to follow new laws, Full Tilt seem to prefer a more relaxed approach. As long as Belgian players can deposit and withdraw I don't see Full Tilt leaving the Belgian market any time soon. It all depends on how hard Belgium will try to enforce this new gambling law... If it's just another dead-letter-law we will be fine. It's hard to enforce laws online (the PirateBay is still here) and when we don't even have a real government (over 250 days and counting). Belgian cash game grinders probably will have to ship there bankroll to Full Tilt but that's about it for now.

No worries, in my opinion.
We still have Rush poker.

(and if it turns out I'm totally wrong about all this it might be a good time to relocate. Life's much better in the sun...)

True Grind

(On Variance)

***

*

Back home and wondering
Where to go? What to do?
Life on the beach was sweet.
Got no fucking clue what to now.
So I focus on poker instead.
I'll deal with life later.

Returning to the grind with a passion.
Exchanged a bunch of Iron Man medals for a big cash bonus.
Excessive hours of 100NL Rush required to unlock it...

It's still hard to put in huge volumes. But I'm working on it. Played about 5K hands this weekend. That's as much as I could handle. My arm hurts from a million mouse clicks, my brain feels fried and my back hurts like hell. The results looked pretty bleak at first. But one great session on Sunday afternoon turned things around. Made about 5 buy-ins plus rakeback and bonus money...
That's about all the motivation I need.
A dedicated return to poker it is.

Grinding out a profit while trying to figure out where to go from here...

"LockDown Weekend"

March on Tilt: MiniFTOPS XIX

Play in the new MiniFTOPS this March for your chance to turn a small buy-in into a huge score. There's $8 million in guaranteed prize money...

Starting on Sunday, March 6th, MiniFTOPS features 45 events.
Series highlights include:

• The new $1,000 + $60 No Limit Hold ‘em Heads Up Event with a guaranteed prize pool of $100K
• Multi-Entry Tournaments
• The MiniFTOPS Two-Day Event, featuring a $200 + $16 buy-in and $600K guaranteed
• The MiniFTOPS Main Event, with a $70 + $5 buy-in and $1.25 million in guaranteed prize money

MiniFTOPS events feature huge starting fields and slow tournament structures, offering a lot of play for a little money. See the full MiniFTOPS Schedule for more details.

You can buy in to any MiniFTOPS event directly or satellite your way in for as little as $0.50 or 50 Full Tilt Points.

Now you can get multiple chances in the same tournament to make a big score with Multi-Entry Tournaments, a tournament format exclusive to Full Tilt Poker. Multi-Entry Tournaments allow you to register for the same tournament numerous times, meaning you can “multi-table” a single tournament...

MiniFTOPS XIX features nine Multi-Entry Tournaments:

• Event #3: $30 + $3 NLH Rush Multi-Entry Tournament, $100K guaranteed
• Event #10: $10 + $1 NLH – 6-Max Rebuy Multi-Entry Tournament, $250K guaranteed
• Event #15: $31 + $2 NLH Super Turbo Multi-Entry Tournament, $150K guaranteed
• Event #22: $12 + $1 NLH Knockout Multi-Entry Tournament, $300K guaranteed
• Event #24: $30 + $3 NLH Multi-Entry Tournament, $500K guaranteed
• Event #27: $100 + $9 NLH Multi-Entry Tournament, $350K guaranteed
• Event #30: $50 + $5 9-Game, 6-Max Multi-Entry Tournament, $50K guaranteed
• Event #37: $20 + $2 NLH – 6-Max Multi-Entry Tournament, $200K guaranteed
• Main Event: $70 + $5 NLH Multi-Entry Tournament, $1.25 million guaranteed

Follow these steps to register for any MiniFTOPS event:

• If you haven't done so already, download Full Tilt Poker and install the game software on your computer.
• Create an account.
• Open the game software and click on the Lobby menu, then select Choose Lobby View > Standard View.
• In the browse area, click on Tournament and then FTOPS.
• Find the MiniFTOPS event you'd like to play in, click the Register Now button and get ready to play for your share of the prize money.

Good luck at the tables!

Money, Money, Money

Got this Beatles song stuck in my head:

The best things in live are free

but you can keep them for the birds and bees

now give me money (that's what I want)

A new year, a new start...
While the rest of my life felt like a series of bad beats, I crushed 100NL full ring Rush poker like never before. A picture speaks louder than words, so here's the graph...
My first week of poker in 2011:

BOOM!

Monkey Off My Back

Shipped it! Tonight I took down a $12 Rush on Demand tournament on Full Tilt for about $720. Survived a field of 252 players by mostly quick folding my way to decent spots. At the final table a good mixture of balanced aggression and some rungoot helped me along. First place, baby!

Maybe it's not exactly a MiniFTOPS Event but winning is good. Winning a multi-table tournament is always awesome... So, at least now I know I can win. Got this big, fat and ugly monkey off my back. I can win.

Earlier today I had a pretty nice run at 100NL Full Ring Rush as well... $$$

So, maybe it was another cold and lonely Saturday. Way too much snow. Frost broke the water pipes again. But fuck it, tonight I really don't care. I made +$1K today and that feels pretty damn sweet...

Dispatches from MiniFTOPS XVIII

For a long time I frowned upon tournament poker. It’s just too slow. There’s too much luck involved in making a deep run in a single tournament. It’s a ‘one hit wonder‘-game. Cash games ar so much better, especially Rush: making and losing large amounts of $$$ in a matter of minutes. That’s how I like to roll.

But, alas, there needs to be more in the life than just Rush poker. The search for happiness and fulfillment, for example Tried to solve that one many times. Like by being married or, most recently, online dating... Failed miserably. It's the edges, you know. They are too thin.

Then yet another weekend comes around and there's not much going on. Suddenly playing tournaments doesn't seem so bad. A small investement for hours of poker. Turn a dark, depressing December weekend into something challenging and hopeful. Maybe in these MiniFTOPS I won’t fail. Maybe this time I’ll succeed in something. And maybe I’ll add some cool tunes, cold beers and a relaxing spliff to the mix... Just to make sure I'll at least enjoy the ride.

So I started Friday night with 10 big blinds in MiniFTOPS #6, a Super Turbo tournament. Quick and dirty poker is my cup of tea. Everyone goes crazy here. Shoving all kinds of trash from any position. So I just seriously nit it up and stay cool all the way down to 3 big blinds or so. Shove better hands and don’t get unlucky, that’s my strategy. It all went smooth. Passed the bubble and made my way deeper and deeper into the monies. With only 200 players left I had over 15 big blinds. That’s huge in a super turbo. Hell yeah, on my way to victory!
Smang it, baby!
Then my Aces got cracked.
A few hands later I went busto...



Anyway, finished in 169th for about $120.
First tournament, first cash. Not a bad start.

On Saturday I played Event #10, a Turbo tournament, but never got anything going. Nursing a shortstack for an hour and a half before busting out anonymously somewhere in the middle of the pack. An uneventful night...

Sunday there was Event #11, a very reasonably priced knock-out tournament with a $250K Guarantee. Over 25.000 players registered. In this huge field, I busted somewhere in the middle of the pack once again. No monies here.

In Event #12, the heads-up tournament, I won my first match. 99 versus AK was good for a ticket to round two. There I ran into a big, fishy panda who outflopped me... My AK was no good against his K7 on a KQ7 board. Busto. The end. No big scores. No great moments of glory.

Four MiniFTOPS tournaments, 1 cash. Exactly break even. Right where I started.
Nothing but another mellow weekend. But I learned that tournament poker isn't that bad after all...

I'll just keep on trying
'till I get somewhere.
Any road will do.
Anywhere is fine.

Full Ring Rush Poker Strategy Guide

After playing 6 max Rush poker for a while, I recently switched to full ring Rush poker. It turned out to be a great move. It's still fast and hectic poker but the games are much softer. The regulars are way more weak-passive (no Praz Bansi here) and there are just a lot more fish swimming around...




Play Online Poker

Here are few basic strategy tips:

• Don't try to soul read your opponents. I't a big game with lots of players. Game dynamic rarely exists. Sticking to simple, solid poker is a safer, straighter path to success. 
• Be a nit. Because of the quick fold button and the full table; the ranges tend to be very, very tight. An over pair is definitely not the nuts. In fact, it's not that uncommon to get it in with a pair of kings versus a pair of aces. Ace-king is another hand that should be played more cautiously here. Just nit it up.
• Be a wild pig in late position. Stealing the blinds successfully is a key factor to improve your winrate. Open a wide range in late position. But be aware that the blinds will 3bet a wider range too. So consider increasing your 4betting range... Or, when you play from he blinds, try 5bet shoving light to counter this late-position aggression.
• Variance can be huge. It's less outrages than 6-max Rush but it can still be a bumpy ride... In the long run it's a very profitable game. Just make sure you're bankrolled to play a crazy amount of hands before the money comes rolling in...

This are just a few thoughts on how to beat full ring Rush. Playing a ton of hand and reviewing your own game will be the best way to improve. But following these tips will give you a solid head start.

Good luck at the tables!
Go crush the Rush...

How To Get The Highest Rakeback At Full Tilt

Okay, the rakeback is fixed at 27% at Full Tilt, but a lot of players cost themselves a lot of their rakeback by making unnecessary withdrawals and deposits to their Full Tilt accounts. Every time you make a deposit you get charged. That means that your total rake is reduced and therefore your rakeback is calculated and you end up getting way less than 27% rakeback.

This are a few tips on how to improve your return at Full Tilt Poker:

• Don’t make unnecessary withdrawals from your Full Tilt account. If you don’t need the cash and will probably re-deposit it later then you should leave the money where it is. This will save you about 10-20% of you actual rakeback!
• Play Rush Poker! By playing Rush Poker you can play 3-4 times as many hands per hour and therefore increase your rakeback by 300-400%!
• Try multi-tabling... If Rush Poker isn’t your cup of tea then you should try opening a second or third table. Again depending on how many tables you open you can increase your rake and rakeback by that amount. 2 tables would be 200%, 4 tables 400% etc.
• If you’re brave enough to try multi-tabling Rush Poker then you could increase your rakeback by anything from 800-2400%
• Play during Happy Hour and earn multiple points! Look for daily Happy Hours to begin earning your Full Tilt Points two to three times faster than usual. Your bonus points will automatically appear in your account so all you have to worry about is how to spend them.
• Get player to player transfers instead of depositing. If you need to get cash on to your Full Tilt account, try asking a friend who has excess funds to make a player to player transfer for you and then pay them via their bank account or in cash! This way you both avoid all deposit and withdrawal fees!
• Become a Black Card Member and exchange points for cash! Black Card members earn double points on all their play and you can then buy cash bonuses with your points and boost your rakeback to 40-50% while clearing the bonuses.

Good luck at the tables!

MiniFTOPS XVIII Coming up...

Play in the Full Tilt MiniFTOPS this December for a chance to turn a small buy-in into a big win. There is over $6 million in guaranteed prize money...

It all starts tomorrow on Wednesday, December 8th.

You can buy in to any MiniFTOPS event directly or satellite your way in for as little as $0.50 or 50 Full Tilt Points.

Series highlights include:

• The MiniFTOPS Two-Day Event, featuring a $200 + $16 buy-in and $600K guaranteed
• The MiniFTOPS Main Event, with a $70 + $5 buy-in and $1 million in guaranteed prize money
• Seven Rush Poker Tournaments, including Event #9, a $10 + $1 NLH Rush Rebuy with $300K guaranteed.

All these events feature large starting fields and a good tournament structure, giving you a lot of play for a small investment. See the full MiniFTOPS Schedule for more details.

Follow these steps to register for any MiniFTOPS event:

1. If you haven't done so already, download Full Tilt Poker and install the game software on your computer.
2. Create an account.
3. Open the game software and click on the Lobby menu, then select Choose Lobby View > Standard View.
4. In the browse area, click on Tournament and then FTOPS.
5. Find the MiniFTOPS event you'd like to play in, click the Register Now button and get ready to play for your share of the prize money.

Good luck at the tables!

The Full Tilt Iron Man Year-End Bonus

You've played at Full Tilt Poker this year. You’ve shown your determination. You’ve dedicated your time. Now it's time to reap the rewards with a nice Iron Man Year-End Bonus.

Qualify for any of the four Iron Man status levels in December and receive a bonus at the beginning of January. The bonus is based on the number of months you’ve qualified for the Iron Man Challenge during the second half of 2010 (July through December) and the status levels you achieved each month:

Bronze - $25/Month
Silver - $50/Month
Gold - $75/Month
Iron - $100/Month

For example, if you qualified for one month at Bronze, two months at Silver, one month at Gold and two months at Iron, you’ll receive a bonus of $400. If you’ve committed yourself to earning Iron Man status each month starting in July, you’ll receive a bonus of $600. Even if you haven’t qualified for any Iron Man level during the second half of the year, you can still earn a bonus by participating in the Iron Man Challenge in December.

You need to opt-in to the Iron Man Challenge in December and reach Bronze, Silver, Gold or Iron status to qualify for the bonus. Opt-in and check your bonus status on your personal Iron Man Status page by going to My Promotions in the Cashier at Full Tilt Poker.

Once you’ve qualified for your bonus, you’ll have from January 1st to February 14th to clear your bonus money by earning Full Tilt Points in real-money games.

Don’t miss the opportunity to cash in on all your months of hard work.
Participate in the Iron Man Challenge this December, and then start January with a brand new bonus!

The Return Of Rush Week

Rush Week is back;
Seven days of speed at Full Tilt Poker.
Experience the blistering pace and intensity of Rush Poker, the world’s fastest poker game, to earn up to $250 in cash and win free entry to an exclusive $50K Rush Week Freeroll.

Running from Monday, November 29th to Sunday, December 5th, Rush Week offers even more reasons to play Rush Poker. Accumulate enough Full Tilt Points by playing Rush Poker ring games, Sit & Gos and tournaments during Rush Week and you could earn up to $250 in cash. In addition, all players who make the final table of a Rush Poker Tournament or Sit & Go will receive entry into the exclusive $50K Rush Week Freeroll. Even players with limited time or a limited bankroll can still earn some extra cash; earn 10 Full Tilt Points a day during 4 days of Rush Week and get $5 for free...

All Rush Poker Tournaments with a guarantee will have it doubled for the duration of Rush Week, while Saturday’s $80K Guarantee and the Sunday Brawl will be converted to Rush Poker Tournaments.

Full Tilt Rush Poker Goes Mobile

Full Tilt Poker launches Rush Poker Mobile.
Now there's really no need to ever stop playing the world's fastest poker game.
Stuck in traffic, while shopping with the misses, at school, at work, during family dinners, at parties, funerals, weddings,... Anywhere, anytime is a good time to get that quick gambling fix. All you need is a mobile device that supports Flash v10.1 or higher and you're good to go.



So Rush Poker Mobile lets you play the world’s fastest poker game anywhere, anytime.
Start playing on a web browser by going to http://mobile.fulltiltpoker.com. Android users can download the mobile application there. Make sure to get 27% rakeback on every hand you play by signing up for Full Tilt Rakeback first...

Good luck at the mobile tables!

The Luck Of The Draw

Autumn is in full swing here in Europe, so it's the perfect time to stay at home and play poker all weekend long... Draw games, for example. This is a form of poker where players have the opportunity to replace any of the cards in their hand by drawing new cards from the deck. A great alternative whenever the usual no-limit hold 'em gets boring... Full Tilt Poker offers now five variants: 2-7 Triple Draw, 2-7 Single Draw, A-5 Triple Draw, Badugi and 5-Card Draw.

Pot limit 5-Card Draw (6 max) is my personal favorite.

Although it's really old school, pot limit makes it fresh, exciting and easy to get all the chips in the middle fast...
As with Hold 'em, the goal in 5-Card Draw is to make the best five-card high hand. Once the blinds are posted, players are dealt five pocket cards, followed by the first round of betting. Then players have the chance to discard any or all of the cards in their hand and replace them by drawing new ones. After the draw, a final round of betting takes place, followed by a showdown to determine who wins the pot. That's it! Enjoying a few beers while playing any draw games will enhance the 'old skool' experience and make you appreciate the true beauty of these games even more...

But if you're somehow still reluctant to put money on the line in drawing games, Full Tilt Sit & Go Madness is back this weekend (November 5th 'till November 7th). Super turbo's are now included in the Madness, so you can play a ton of games easily and maximize you're chances to win a fair share of $150K in cash and Madness prizes...

Never mind the grey and dull autumn weather,
Full Tilt Poker is the place to be.

The Black Card

Full Tilt Poker recently launched The Black Card.
It's the ultimate recognition of baller status.
It takes an average of 500 Full Tilt Points a day over a rolling 100 day period (and you'll need to maintain the average afterwards) but you do get a slick Full Tilt Black Card in the mail.
Black Card holders receive double Full Tilt Points which they can exchange for cash bonuses, luxury gifts and tournament entries. They'll receive VIP treatment at live tournaments, dedicated support from the Black Card support team and much more...
Of course, the good stuff requires serious dedication and lots of hard work.
It will take a big bankroll and the work schedule of an average Indonesian sweat shop worker to get and maintain a 500FTP/day average. There will be little or no time to waste on things like your social life, your wife and your kids. But the real question is "Is it worth it?"
Definitely yes.
Sign up at Full Tilt Poker through our rakeback-program and start the race to Black Card ownership today!

Career Opportunities

I don't wanna be a soldier, mama (I don't wanna die)
I don't wanna be a politician, mama (I don't wanna lie)
I don't wanna be a Catholic priest, mama (I don't wanna make small boys cry)

It's hard to find a satisfying, well-paid profession these days.
A career opportunity, largely overlooked by mainstream media, is being a

Rakeback Whore

Nevertheless, it's a great choice with numerous benefits.
You can work in the comfort of your own home (with your clothes on), you don't need to spend any money on an outstanding training site (like DeucesCracked) and you don't need to be particulary intelligent.
The simple necessaries are a good rakeback deal, a poker client and a basic strategy for past-paced games like Rush Poker or Super Turbo Sit 'n Go's. All these can be found right here, be clicking on the appropriate link.
Now deposit your start-up funds in your poker account and mass-table the game of your choice for as many hours a day as you can handle... Every week you will be rewarded with a nice rakeback-paycheck that will fill your heart with happiness and make all the hours well worth your time ($$$!)...

Happy whoring!

Resurrection

Sometimes you've got to move down to find the way up again...

After watching the intro of terryfan's new DC-series 'Rush it to NL' I decided to take a whole new approach to the game. Dropped all the way down to 50NL and switched to full ring Rush Poker.

5000 hands later I'm up about 10 buy-in's...

It's a whole different game down here. Random fish donate with random holdings. Keeping variance in check with simple, solid fundamentals is all it takes (and some rungoot, of course)... Yes, it is painful to move down in stakes. There are those feelings of failure and the knowledge that there's less to gain. But, you know what they say, 'no pain no game' (no pain, no profit). So moving down is far superior than being stubborn and tilting of all the monies at the higher levels. Sometimes soothing the ego and rebuilding the bankroll at the low-stakes can be the fastest way up...