2009 and all that.

Well I think it is about time I got around to redoing my blog on a regular basis? So will do it monthly from now on (promise!!!).
2009 has been a difficult year with so many things going on and one major decision to make regarding my future something had to give and sadly it had to be the blog. However now I know what direction my life is going in hopefully my mind we be alot clearer and I will have more free time.
So guess the thing to do is review 2009 on a gambling front ,then in a week or so will bring you the humorous stuff that happened in 2009. As Dave Maudlin says "there's always a story". More about the pigeons, pigs, fish fingers, taxis,joiners,eastenders,suitcase robbery next time.
So over to the boring bit poker and the likes.
2008 was a good year on my travels and a bad year locally.2009 was a complete reversal with back to the norm at poker locally but poker on the road I can,t believe the positions I was in only to come away with very little.
This year saw Edinburgh,Bristol, Manchester, Leeds,Vegas and god knows how many other places.
Rather than go on about Individual competitions maybe best to select a few hands I witnessed or was involved in.
Going great guns in the £1000.00 main event at Newcastle and down to the last 17 the following hand occurred.
Andreas Hoivold from Sweden was a consistent raiser and played very aggressively when once again he raised my big blind but this time I had a hand to at least see a flop.
The flop came k 10 4 a good flop for me as I was holding pocket fours. I checked hoping for a bet from Mr aggressive and was,nt disappointed as he duly obliged, I instantly moved all in as I was getting a bit low in chips. Thomas went into the tank and nearly passed twice before I decided I needed to issue some verbals and talk him into calling. It did,nt take much as I said " the amount of time you have taken I must be ahead as I thought I was behind" he instantly called declaring "you have ace 10", and flipped over pocket queens. I should of learnt to keep my big mouth shut as a queen on the river sent me to the rails one short of the money and what would of been my fourth cash in the gukpt main event.

The other hand which I was involved in albeit a small way was again the gukpt main event this time at Manchester.
Down to 14 players I was very low in chips and desperately looking for a spot where I could get me chips in. A guy who had a load of chips kept raising in first position raised once again and I looked down at my hole cards pocket tens. I moved all in then next to act behind me Dave Maudlin spoke. "BLOODY HELL I can,t . ass ,sorry bud, oh no" etc. What I am pointing out is Dave made it known that we were m8s and everyone on the table new he had a hand. Dave announces all in a whole 178k worth of chips. Back to the original raiser who then thinks, he has 20k invested in the pot and is sat on a stack of 220k well above average. The amount of time he was taking lead me to believe he had pocket kings, however he called and proudly flipped over pocket queens. WTF!!!!!!!!!!! THE WORST CALL i HAVE SEEN FOR A LONG TIME. Dave flipped over his kings and they held up knocking me out and decimating the lunatic in the process. Dave went on to finish 6Th and cashing for
11k while I received £2500.00 for my efforts.

I made my first visit to Dusk To Dawn in August and what a place. If carlsburg could make a poker club well this would be it. I have made it my next ambition to win the £300.00 main event. So far I have cashed once out of 4 attempts and finished 3rd in the £50.00 but no victories to speak of.

I won the William Hill sponsored event held at Newcastle for £4k outright finally getting the better of my opponent at 9.30 in the morning after starting at 4pm the previous day.

Cash games have been good and stayed well ahead of the game both locally and on my travels.

Trading activities have gone from strength to strength and is now the future.

Sport betting has once again proved very rewarding. I now post my tips on
www.aworldofpoker.com
sports and betting section.
I am currently 50 points up for the season which is excellent. So if you had done £100.00 a point you would now be in profit of £5000.00. Not bad in 5 months.

Well that's about it for my first blog of 2010 will do this every month as close as I can to the first of the month

L8