Well as if by magic, a knock on the door teh day after posting my last blog and a friendly courier delivering a big box to my door...and yes, Laddies did me proud...hoodie-check, t-shirt-check, chipset and cards-check, coffee mug-check, football-bonus check...alas no baseball cap or beach towel but so chuffed with what they sent I'll let them off! ;-P
So of course the obligatory picture of me in my finest gear!! Thanks Ladbrokes, at least I'll look teh part now even if my poker skills are found to be lacking.
Looking at the grassroots promotion 'leaderboard' around 17 out of the original 40 players have played so far with 3 of them making it into the money in their respective £100 tournaments. So with 7 players making it to the next round via their poker skills, where ladbrokes will sponsor their £300 buy-ins in teh next round, there are 4 spaces left and up for grabs. There are also 7 wildcard spaces for the next round which Ladbrokes will award to those players who may not make teh money in their £100 event but who blog, tweet and facebook in teh spirit of Ladbrokes.
Hmmm...well on the basis that to get a 100% hit rate of 1 out of 1 for my first proper live tounament is unlikely, I've a feeling i may need to rely on teh wildcard route!
So in order to prepare for my first proper live event, this is what i'm doing:
- Wearing my ladbrokes gear out and about to get used to teh admiring looks from passers-by on teh high quality merchandise (c'mon Laddies...that must be worth a bonus wildcard point?!)
- Trawling through my original poker books (Dan Harrington's "Harrington on Hold 'em" and "Tournament Hold 'em" and "Championship Hold 'em" by Cloutier and McEvoy), which got me this far anyway!
- Pre-registering my membership at the Fox Poker Club to minimise fuss on teh day - Monday 28th May
- Planning to attend their 2pm bounty tournament to 'acclimatise' to the surroundings and hopefully get rid of nerves
- Watching Jody (my trainer at fitness bootcamp) #GoHard and #KickAss and win her kickboxing title fight - nothing like a bit of inspiration!
- Tweeting all and sundry for tips on the transition from small ($10 entry) online multi table tournaments (MTTs) to big live £100+ MTTS.
- Reading other grassroots' blogs and updates to see if i can gain an insight into their winning ways/methods. Must admit some of them have been really helpful and are worth a read...
- Planning an early Sunday night and a late start on Tuesday morning after I roll home in teh early hours with my winning wad...think positive - be positive - always enjoy!!
Until teh next time...
...oh and yes, I know i can't spell 'the' properly 90% of teh time...blame it on no auto-correct blog spell checker!!
Firstly, you are quite right about 'teh'! Ha.
ReplyDeleteGreat blog sir, really enjoying reading it. I wish you the best of luck on Monday. The Fox Club really is a lovely venue (thanks for pointing me in the direction of it!). The Monday £100 is also a nice tourney; an alright structure for a one-day event and a good mix of players, quality wise.
I remember my first couple of live tournies vividly. I think my top two tips would be a) take some time to settle in. Fold your first three rounds/whatever it takes to feel comfortable and to understand the way to handle your chips and cards, and to make bets. The 2pm bounty should help you do that, and it's really not rocket science, but it's good to feel comfortable.
My main tip though - and one I always fail to remember, and wish I really really did (and where I failed in my tourney, this Monday), is to ensure I have energy/am awake. When I busted 6th, it was nearly 3am. The tourney started at 7, and there had been three 15 minute breaks in that time. It's really hard to stay focussed and to concentrate for all that time. Go slow, relax, and drink lots of coffee! Just don't peak too early. These tournies really aren't won in the first few rounds - they're won in the last couple of hours.
See my blog for my thoughts on the structure of the Fox tourney (lpgr2012.blogspot.com). I really don't like the top-heavy payout structure - you're going to need to come 5th or 6th to cash (out of about 40 runners); so playing to win, rather that to survive, is (as ever) I think the key.
I talk like an old hand - I'm not. Just my advice based on my experience this week. Then again, whatdoIknow...I came out with the same amount of dollar as I went in with....grrr!
Best of luck with it!
Ian
Cheers Ian, comments appreciated and glad you like the (<-!!!! not teh for once!) blog.
DeleteCertainly good to read the other blogs and must admit find your advice interesting and hopefully will put it to good use on Monday...£100 a big different to teh normal $5 and $10 MTT I play online...but won't let that put me off!
Thankfully no boot camp next week...last day for this month was today, which after coming 2nd in $5 rebut for $100+ dollars which finished at 1am this morning and then up at 5:30am for bootcamp after only 4 hours kip...oh dear! So will be having an early night or too for sure!
As for same money as you went in with...with half players having their turn and only 3 proper places taken you're in a good spot for the next round I'd think so not all bad....although appreciate only getting money back isn't the point.
Maybe see you on Monday if you're trying your luck again!
And thanks for the good luck...appreciated!
Mr G