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• The Eight Points of Enlightenment: Melbourne Champs

  July 08, 2009

  When Steve Topakas pushed all in holding just ten-high on a board reading with Tudor Kondevski making the call holding we saw another champion crowned.

  As the Melbourne Poker Championship wrap up for another year, here continued tournament summary with The Eight Points of Enlightenment: Melbourne Poker Championships.

  1 – Affordable: Having affordable side events is a must so as to attract the small-stakes tournament grinders such as myself. Similar to the Joe Hachem Deep Stack Series, side events were on the very affordable side ranging from the $120 Morning Series to $175, $230 and $340. Basically being able to get a taste of tournament poker without breaking the bank is a must in any local championships series (in my opinion).

  2 – Side Events Too Long: I’m not sure if the structure was too good or if the players had improved, but all the side events ran way into the early hours of the morning. With all events playing down till just one remained, maybe returning the next for the final table would have been a better option then the 5am finishes.

  3 – Big Names Not In Attendance: The one thing that let the Melbourne Poker Championships down (if any) was the lack of attendance by some of the big names of Australian poker. Jay ‘Seabeast’ Kinade, Joel ‘StrongPlay’ Dodds, Dean ‘dinhjo’ Nyberg and Jarred ‘FlopNutsOnYou’ Graham were just a few that played the ANZPT Feature Event only not to play the Main Event. A few other notables that didn’t partake in either included Michael Pedley, Joe Hachem and Jason Gray.
  Now it is understandable that some would miss out due to the World Series of Poker kicking off on May 27th, but instead of having to choose maybe scheduling the Melbourne Champs a week earlier would open the door up for a few more players to make both trips.

  4 – Secondary Feature Event: Over the past few years Jonno Pittock and Crown have always implemented a Feature Event into the championship that is separate to the Main Event; the 100k Challenge, State of Origin and now the PokerStars.net ANZPT Melbourne. Having this $2,700 buy-in event attracted a great array of poker players and satellite winners from around the country.
  I think this not only boosted the class of the Melbourne Poker Championships but also reinforced that poker is still going as strong as ever even through the tough economic conditions.

  5 – Morning Series: The Morning Series is a series of four events during the first week where you gain points to play a qualifying freeroll for a seat into the Main Event. With a buy-in of only $120 and Holdem, Omaha Hi Lo, Mixed Stud and Crazy Pineapple on offer, everyone gets a chance at playing a wide variety of games.
  The prizepools may be small but the players that turn out are there for some fun knowing that a four-figure collect is unlikely, but a few hours of fun and laughs is more probable!
  (it also gains a bonus mention as I made the Mixed Stud final table!)

  6 – Main Event Structure: The Main Event structure was different to anything I have seen before. Apart from it being a repechage; which helps boost the prizepool, the structure was different to anything I’ve seen before. Day one played nine 40-minute levels, while day two switched to 60-minute levels, and once at the final table they were extended again; this time to 75-minutes.
  I thought this was interesting as I think it benefits the better player as the tournament goes on. As I previously said however, I think I would have preferred day one being extended so as to reduce the day two starting field – but when it comes to tournament structure . . . no one is ever happy!

  7 – Mad Ass Huge Trophies: Crown always produce really nice trophies and for the Melbourne Poker Championships it was no exception! They stepped things up for this series by increasing the size of them – no joke, these things were absolutely massive and for the ANZPT feature event they even had two for the winner!

  8 – Tudor Who?: Unlike previous Main Event’s that I have covered for PokerNetwork we always knew that the money would remain in the local poker industry. However with Tudor Kondevski capturing the $150,000 first prize we have no idea if he’ll use it to ‘stimulate’ the poker landscape like others before him or tuck it away in his home safe.

  * * * * * * * *

  With another successful series on home turf, all the attention can be turned to the Mecca of poker tournaments with the World Series of Poker just a flight away.

  So make sure to stay logged on to Tilted Behaviour as the updates are going to flow hard and fast with plenty of action from the Rio coming your way

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• The Eight Points of Enlightenment: Joe Hachem Deep Stack Series

  March 30, 2009

  The Joe Hachem Deep Stack Series is all wrapped up after Daniel Botta took care of Sam Higgs to capture the $100,000 first prize with the beautiful all in on the flop against Higgs' with the final board running out .

  In a continuation from my re-cap of the ANZPT Adelaide here is the The Eight Points of Enlightenment: Joe Hachem Deep Stack Series.

  * * * * * * * *

  Eight Points of Enlightenment
  1 - Affordable: Following the Aussie Millions where events start at that four-figure mark, and Main Event's around the country that fluctuate around that $3,000 mark; its good to have a Championship series that is truly affordable for the tournament junkie. With most buy-ins at the $230, $340 and $550 mark, players can take their shot at being crowned a Champion without it hurting the wallet too deeply.

  2 - Tournament Structures (part one): The structures for these tournaments were excellent! The deep starting stacks and slow levels provided incredible value for money - and there can be no arguments; all you have to do is look at the vast improvements from last year’s structures. As for the buy-in amounts, you couldn't ask anymore from the Jonno and the Crown staff as they catered for those that are looking to play some deep-stack tournament poker.

  3 - Tournament Structures (part two): At some points the structures were too good with finishing times stretching into breakfast where pancakes were the order of the day instead of check-raises and open limping (which is definitely not smart at any point). This does support the argument for players and their need for adequate structures with maximum play - but on occasions this can be negative.

  4 - PokerPro Problems: Most may be unaware of the persistent problems Crown have experienced with the PokerPro machines, and most recently it effected Event #5: $165 Poker Pro. With problems all tournament long, by the time they reached the final table they had no choice but to vacate the machines and play the tournament on actual felt. This totally changed the game as the time it took to get through hands doubled, and with the turbo-like structure the final table played faster then most on it would have liked.
  If Crown wish to continue running Championship tournaments on the PokerPro machines - and I believe they should - then they really need to take a look at rectifying the existing problems.

  5 - Lack of Chips: This really wasn't a problem, but more of a funny scenario come flight two and three of the Main Event. With 17,960,000 chips in play, the majority of them were bagged during flight one meaning that the following two flights were left with physically less chips. Therefore the 25,000-denomination chips were out early so as to make sure that flight three had enough to play with - on a side note it was funny seeing people with two or three 25,000-chips and nothing else when trying to post a 1,600 big blind (me inclusive)!

  6 - Repechage Main Event: Personally I'm not a fan of a repechage because it changes the way the game is played; but poker-wise I think it's great. To allow people to rebuy if they bust on the first two days means that the prizepool will always be boosted, and be of excellent value to those that don't repechage and those that do (as it gives them a second chance).
  However only playing eight levels during the first two flights means that the numbers that returned for flight three were lower then they could have been. By playing ten levels and an extra 90 minutes means that day two will on average be shorter and that more people will bust and therefore repechage into flight three - consequently a greater prizepool with more money on offer.

  7 - Half Million Dollar Prizepool: Well nearly - it was $449,000, but for a $550 buy-in event it was unbelievable to get such a huge prizepool. I assured a few young Adelaide boys that a $100,000 first prize would be reached, and even through they had heavy doubts it was still achieved! The prizepool may have appeared a little skewed, but on closer inspection it was pretty industry standard - however the only change that should have been made was changing the payouts from 81 to 72 as to represent the 705 unique players that took their seat.

  8 - The Money Isn't Going Nowhere (again): Just like in Adelaide, the money is staying firmly in Australia, and most importantly in Victoria following local Daniel Botta's victory in under three hours on day three. Hopefully this will drag more amateur and pub poker players into the Crown Poker Room knowing that for just $550 and three days work - they can be $100,000 richer too!

  * * * * * * * *

  I hope now that it is clear why so many people enjoy the Joe Hachem Deep Stack Series and will hopefully venture back down to Melbourne in 2010 for the best value deep stack tournaments on this side of the world.

  With the dilemma that is the 2009 WSOP and whether or not Tilted Behaviour will be there the current issue at hand; it will be only a matter of weeks before we're back at it with the ANZPT Sydney (23rd April to May 1st) and then the Melbourne Poker Championships (17th May to 1st June).

  The road ahead for this poker journalist is definitely going to be interesting, so make sure to stay tuned over the upcoming weeks for your poker fix!

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• The Eight Points of Enlightenment: ANZPT Adelaide

  February 18, 2009

  So the inaugural ANZPT Adelaide event is now all wrapped up with Melbournian Karl Krautschneider taking home the $170,000 first prize after flushing out my mate Tony Dunst in second holding .

  However, I’m not going to bore you with a re-cap of each day and the overall tournament, but rather provide you with something new . . . The Eight Points of Enlightenment: ANZPT Adelaide.

  * * * * * * * *

  Eight Points of Enlightenment
  1 – Great Food Service: The SkyCity Poker Zone had the best food service of any casino I’ve been to. Wedges, Roasts, Toasted Sandwiches, Nachos – you name it and they pretty much have. Also it’s fairly cheap ranging from $5 to $12 and gets delivered fairly quickly.

  2 – Chip Difficulties: On day 1b they changed the colour of the 1,000-chips due to lack of numbers, and once both days merged they changed the others. Late on day 2 they also changed out all the 5,000-chips as they looked too similar to the 10,000-chips. This way not seem like a major issue, but combined with how out-dated they are it reflects badly on the city that gave birth to Australian poker.

  3 – Affordable Side Events: Looking at the proposed Sydney schedule it seems this is going to be a regular feature in the preliminary events of ANZPT’s. It can be viewed as a negative aspect of the tournament but I think it can still generate decent prizepools, and with the economic slump, it helps in keeping the numbers up at an event that could really see Australian poker boom over the next few years.

  4 – Cash Games and Rake: The cash games the SkyCity Poker Zone spread weren’t too flash with a $2-3NLH game at $60 to $180 buy-in which to me (and many others) seemed stupid, especially when you factor in the higher than average rake. There was never a high-stakes game (which would easily be filled) or mixed game and I only saw the occasional limit game spread.

  5 - $50 Squeeze Baccarat: Being such a baccarat degen, finding out that SkyCity had $50 squeeze baccarat awoke my inner baccarat junkie that had been resting since pre-Aussie Millions. Although I barely squeezed, knowing that you could potential squeeze and call out “DINGA” and “CHOI” for such a cheap price was definitely a PLUS in my book!

  6 – Dealer Errors: My pet hate about poker is dealer errors and blunders. Being able to count chips so easy it baffles me to see dealers count player all-ins incorrectly during the tournament – it’s like they’ve never dealt with this before!
  Another thing that Adelaide dealers do terribly is when a player moves all-in they just feel their stack in their hand rather than cutting it down to be sure it amounts to twenty-chips. I saw on at least six occasions of dealers feeling for twenty-chips, leaving it for some time before a player would point out that it was incorrect. In all honesty – pretty poor training standards.

  7 – Main Event Structure: To implement a successful tournament, and consequently a successful poker tour you need to have a main event structure that has minimal flaws; and in the case of the ANZPT, Tournament Director Danny McDonagh has achieved this. With great level increase the best innovation is the minimum 40-big blind to average stack guarantee once the final table is reached with the clock being winded back as far as necessary.

  8- The Money Isn’t Going Nowhere: With a final table stacked with pros and Australians it was great to see the majority of the prizepool remaining in the pockets of Australians. This will not only attract more players to take their seat in the tour, but may also bring about a new poker boom knowing that for $33 and three days work you can parlay that into over $170,000 and change!

  * * * * * * * *

  So now that you have a better understanding of Adelaide and the ANZPT, there is no need for any further questions . . . I hope.

  An APL event this weekend followed by a few weeks of rest down at my parent’s house before everything kicks off again with Joe Hachem Deep Stack Series, ANZPT Sydney, Melbourne Poker Championships and then back to the Mecca of poker tournaments . . . the 2009 WSOP!

  The road for this poker journalist may be on a long desert-bound track, but I’ll do my best to fill you in on some interesting and quirky happenings in the industry. Stay tuned!

  For more blog entries like this head to Tilted Behaviour.

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