Card Runners

In the May issue we reported that Microgaming planned to return nearly $6 million in player funds that were lost when Tusk, its payment processor, declared bankruptcy. However, months have passed with no progress and few updates. Microgaming is non-committal and liquidators have told players that they will only receive a percentage of the lost money. This would be the fi rst loss of player funds in recent years.

Tom “durrrr” Dwan, the online expert who has already put a 4th-place fi nish at a Foxwoods WPT main event and a 2nd at a Borgata $5,000 event on his tournament resume, has had a hot start to his WSOP. He made the fi nal table of the $10,000 World Championship Mixed Event and was among the chip leaders for most of the $5,000 No Limit 2-7 Draw Lowball with Rebuys event before fi nishing 8th. It appears that Dwan and many other cash game experts are skipping fewer events for cash games than they did last year.

The WSOP is a time not only for poker tournaments but for side betting on those tournaments. Phil Ivey has plenty of action: in a recent PokerRoad video he and Ted Forrest discuss a bet that pays $500,000 to either of them for winning one bracelet and $1 million for two bracelets. He also has other large bets that will pay him 1.8 to 1 if he wins at least one bracelet.

Barry Greenstein has booked a fi nal table bet with Adam Richardson. Richardson owes $5,000 for every fi nal table Greenstein makes, and Greenstein owes $5,000 for every fi nal table Justin “ZeeJustin” Bonomo makes. Early in the WSOP Greenstein also offered to take 1.7 to 1 on his making a fi nal table, but appears not to have booked the bet with anyone.

UltimateBet has released a statement about the superuser scandal. They have admitted that “NioNio” and other accounts were able to see their opponents’ hole cards, and they have refunded all money that was lost to those accounts. Many players have continued to express frustration that the site took several months to publicly address the scandal.

Poker players wondering about the future of Asian poker markets can look to Macau for a new development: a live poker room has opened at the Grand Waldo Casino. Cash games are running, and the Asia Pacifi c Poker Tour will make a stop there in September and feature a main event with a buy-in of HKD $25,000 (approximately USD $3,200). The room seats 160 players and is PokerStars branded.

Doug “WCGRider” Polk is more than an online grinder – he’s a legend. This new CardRunners instructor has worked his way from the smallest stakes online to becoming a formidable presence in the mid-stakes games. Always looking for the next big challenge, he suggested and performed one of the most insane prop bets in online poker history: earning $10,000 in a single month playing $0.10/$0.25 No Limit Hold’em, a game where the maximum buy-in is a mere $25. The bet, which featured a webcam streaming live from Doug’s home 24 hours per day, prompted thousands of responses in popular online poker forums. Doug sat down with us to chat about that bet and crushing the small-stakes games.

BLUFF: When did you fi rst get into poker, and how did you fi nd online poker?

Doug: I made my fi rst deposit to play online poker a little over a year ago. The transition was a fairly natural one. I was a fairly good video game player (at Warcraft III), and a lot of guys had been switching over to poker. It seemed like the natural change for me to follow, as I had plenty of people to talk to for help. The Warcraft background also really helps with your ability to focus on multiple things quickly.

Doug: Ultimately, I failed about halfway through. I had made $3,300 and decided to throw in the towel. The mental and physical effects were absolutely hideous because I didn’t anticipate not being able to sleep. Being constantly tired and unable to focus was absolutely detrimental to my success in the challenge. I wish I could have conquered these things but it frankly was too much pressure and it just became too much outside of the tables.

Doug: I learned that sometimes you overestimate your abilities. Well, that, or you underestimate outside factors. I remember when I was making this bet I really thought I was a huge favorite. I have about 140k hands lifetime at $25 No Limit Hold’em winning at a rate of 7-8 big bets per 100 hands while playing 24 games at a time. I also realized how SICK you can run, both good and bad, for like 40-50k hands at a time. Its just funny how little of a sample that is, even though people take that amount of hands quite seriously.

Doug: I have a lot of history doing these sorts of videos, albeit in other areas, so I’m no newbie to recording. I hope to be able to bring a decent ability to accurately explain concepts and at the same time help people fi gure out how to think. That’s really what’s important. I mean you can watch all the videos on CardRunners and do exactly what they do and not have nearly the success they have had. What you need to get from them is HOW they analyze what they do. That’s what is really priceless from the membership. I mean its great to know how [insert your favorite high stakes pro] plays pocket 3’s on a 2-5-J board versus a loose-aggressive player, but that’s not going to be a fundamental to success. I hope to add to all the great minds that translate such excellent viewpoints into analytical thought, and maybe add a bit of WCGRider Style to it.