you forgot to tip me

ok i wont be playing many but i am hoping to make it to the bahamas one way or another i have never gone on holiday to somewhere warm in my life and i think this will be a start
just waiting for stars to start tehre sats

Best of luck, mate!

i am going to need more than luck

A plane ticket?

I posted this in the blondpedia  thread in response to a post by Tikay (in response to a post by Flushy) about WSOP double starting stacks this year. Somehow it seems to fit here better:

There's a excel spreadsheet called Poker Tournament Formula developed by Arnold Snyder, called Poker Tournament Formula PAtience Factor - you put in the blind structure, level length and starting stack and it gives you a number on how long it will take you to blind off if you don't play a hand (above 10 is good, GUKPT = 49.81, Stars Million = 14.48, turbo sng 1.45)

So I ran some numbers for the $1500 WSOP Events in 2006 and 2007 (purely as i'm playing the last one this year and was intrigued)

A $1500 event last year (starting chips 1500, blinds 25-25, 25-50, 50-100, 100-200, one hour levels) has a patience factor of 14.06 - blind off time 3.75hrs

A $1500 event this year (starting chips 3000, blinds 25-50, 50-100, 100-200, 100-200/25) has a patience factor of 14.93, blind off time 3.86hrs.

However the real bite, apparently, is coming at the FT with them lasting approx half the time (did someone post this on blonde from 2+2 or do i read too many fourms?)

FWIW if you put the structre for the Venetian DeepStack's $330 thru the tournament formula gizmo (40 minute levels, 6000 chips, 25-50, 50-100, 100-200, 100-200/25 etc) it's patience factor is 14.79.

Now considering the Venentian's $1000 deepstacks (and $500?) give you 10,000 chips and one hour levels it's not hard to see why many players are heading there.

Very nice ..I think i  wil become a dealer....They also said thst this year it would be constructered differently to accomodate the dealers better..wow ..............

They also said they'd improve the structures this year......

They have haven't they?

I am aware thety have doubled the Starting Chips, but removed some Levels. I don't know if that equates to "improved", but it well may.

They haven't IMO - I imagine it might give players a little bit more play at the beginning of the lower buy-in events, but if you use Arnold Snyder's Poker Tournament Formula spreadsheet (essentially it equates how long it'd take you to blind off without playing a hand) there is virtually no difference.

A $1500 event last year (starting chips 1500, blinds 25-25, 25-50, 50-100, 100-200, one hour levels) has a patience factor of 14.06 - blind off time 3.75hrs

A $1500 event this year (starting chips 3000, blinds 25-50, 50-100, 100-200, 100-200/25) has a patience factor of 14.93, blind off time 3.86hrs.

However the real bite, apparently, is coming at the FT with them lasting approx half the time (did someone post this on blonde from 2+2 or do i read too many fourms?)

FWIW if you put the structre for the Venetian DeepStack's $330 thru the tournament formula gizmo (40 minute levels, 6000 chips, 25-50, 50-100, 100-200, 100-200/25 etc) it's patience factor is 14.79.

Now considering the Venentian's $1000 deepstacks (and $500?) give you 10,000 chips and one hour levels it's not hard to see why many players are heading there.

Are there people who actively avoid the WSOP rather than put up with that kind of nonsense (as well as the double stacks/double structure scam)?

Reading between the lines and following several players blogs (Rob Sherwoods a good example) about their WSOP experiences it seems that clued up players are using their feet this year. Many it seems, are playing in better strcutured tournaments at The Venetian,The Bellagio and Binions rather than brave some of the inconsistencies at the WSOP.

P.S Tikay good move, Eskimo Clark nearly popped his clogs in the Poker Sauna.

[Factors that say it'll go up:]

How many runners will this $50K HORSE event attract this year ?

100, 200 ? Somewhere in between would be my guess.

There were 143 last year, tbh I think the numbers will rise this year.

Factors that say it'll go up:

- It's now in its second year, and players can see how much attention it got last year
- It's getting more air time from ESPN this year
- It'll be played as H.O.R.S.E to the end
- H.O.R.S.E is now more popular online so may get some internet kids buying in (e.g Bodogari)
- They're running $2500 sats to it at the Rio (they did last year too) no idea if these are generating seats though
- It's a five day event (this could be a negative too)

Factors that say it'll go down:

- Poker Rooms less likely to give sponosred players 50k to spunk in one tournament given current climate (will backers?)
- Last year there were a number of online qualifiers, who qualified on Full Tilt, they've ran qualifiers again this year, but if they chuck 50k into your account are you going to enter the h.o.r.s.e tournament or keep the cash/spend it on a bunch of tournaments?

Fingers crossed for Dan Carter. I know he's playing three of them for sure, Barcelona, London and obv Bahamas lol - wonder why he chose that one - for the golf? O rly?*

And for a non biased choice I hope Ben Grundy has a big score.  He always seems to go deep before taking a beat that you usually only find online, kinda ironic really.

*waits for someone to post a pic of the O rly owl*

Just had the one look but noticed some problems in terms of 'flow', this is not knocking Tim, just providing a professional opinion as I write about poker for a living.

1) There are too many questions in the article. Asking questions in features is bad, as a writer you should be providing the anwsers.

2) There's no link between the paragrpahs, Tim jumps between subjects. Ideally the first line of the new paragraph should link in someway to the last one. For instance: par two to par three could be improved thus: (i've put in italics a sentence to link the two smoothly)

(par 2)Pete expects to make an ESPN final table, and he hopes to obtain big sponsorships.
 
(Back in 1998, a young player called Daniel Negreanu shared the same hopes and, as we know, he is currently part of Team PokerStars

(par 3) In 1998, Daniel Negreanu exploded onto the poker scene by being (Negreanu became) the youngest person to ever win a bracelet...

3) Repetition and using three or four words where one will do: e.g Pete O’Donnell, who finished 8th in the $1500 Limit Hold’em event at the 2007 WSOP, quit his job just two weeks before entering the 2007 WSOP. the series.

Have to say top work on the wsop results section, great as you say not having to search thru long lists.

Cheers, I have a contact at WSOP in Nolan Dolla (some of you may recognise them) who sends them through. He's a great help and does whatever he can to get the official list through as soon as he can, not to mention the cool piccies we've been receiving. So thanks to him. Might be a bit a delay whilst I'm heading over the Atlantic, but all the hotels have wifi these days, so I should be able to keep up to speed.

About time we had a Brit win tho! My spider senses inform me that the HORSE Event won't be the one.

By the way, does anyone know if any Brits are playing this one?

Snoopy,
IIRC from last year there were three Brits in the field - DevilFish, Ram and Nick Gibson (i think), can't remember if Ben Roberts played, Roland didn't. Can't see it being any different this year tbh.

Edit: misread OP Andy W is criticizing ESPN not Harrahs.

Although this is wrong, I actually don't think this cock up was down to Harrahs it was actually down to ESPN. I read somewhere last night - probably on pokernews - that they stopped it at ten players so the ESPN film crew could film Hellmuth breaking T.J's record for most final table appearences and have T.J in the audience for a ceremonial handshake etc. I believe there wasn't a film crew on hand when they were ten handed the night before.

Doesn't make it any better, but for once I believe this wasn't down to Harrahs

Andrew/Keith:

In the heads up bracelet who *technically* makes the final table? Just the last two? The last four? The last eight?

Woot nice one John.

I fairly sure tabloid journalists are second to last on this poll - it was a statistic always thrown at me whilst at journalism college - however, according to a poll on which jobs attracted the opposite sex, journalism was right up there with Doctor, Lawyer etc.

29 players left after day one, blinds about to go 1500/3000/300 avg 48,300: Top 12 paid

Quite a few well knowns and blondites left in. Mike Tindall is chip daddy with 106,000, Jen is 3rd (I think) with 77k as Grub Smith has 85k. Paul Jackson has 68k ish, Steve Holden still in with 52k. Ian Cox, Mark Herron and myself all hovering around average, as are Pete Singleton and Robert Butt. It all starts at 2pm tomorrow, I heard a rumour that Norman Pace may do updates...

Sorry to hear about your problems Denis, I would imagine this is the first time Bournemouth has run a festival but still bad customer service. Their festivals have a curious rule of no spectators! As i'm often a spectator at the GUKPT's (in a working capacity) I feel that the crowd adds to the atmosphere.

I played the event tonight went out at 300/600/50 when kings were no good against queens AIP for a 16kish pot.

Anyway onto the event in itself, as IrishDenis said mostly locals, although I had Stephen Holden four to my left on my opening table, which was, for the most part very very passive and multiple limped pots and passive post flop play including a hand where i had -4h (half wilson?), the river gave me a straight and my opponent who'd flopped trip 10s paid me off.

And Denis is right Flushy will have fun! Btw Flushy, Matt's mobile ran out of battery.

I played the event tonight went out at 300/600/50 when kings were no good against queens AIP for a 16kish pot.

Anyway onto the event in itself, as IrishDenis said mostly locals, although I had Stephen Holden four to my left on my opening table, which was, for the most part very very passive and multiple limped pots and passive post flop play including a hand where i had -4h (half wilson?), the river gave me a straight and my opponent who'd flopped trip 10s paid me off.

And Denis is right Flushy will have fun! Btw Flushy, Matt's mobile ran out of battery.