blonde poker forum

Selling 35% of the WSOP 5k 8max at 1.25

This'll be my 5th Vegas trip. The WSOP fields are always amazing and they've made the structure so much better this year, so I feel it'll be an amazing tournament. 8 max gives a lot more room for manoeuvre than 10 handed (which standard bracelet events are), yet is without the stigma attached to it that 6-max has that puts off recreationals.

I feel my exploitative game is as good as it ever has been, but have noticed leaks in my ranges when attempting to play GTO vs strong regs in cash games, so have been putting a lot of work into that recently and consequently feel stronger playing against the better players. Whilst I recognise the limited use of this in tournaments, in this field that'll be extremely mixed I feel it's imperative to have both sides of your game as sharp as possible, and adjusting between playing very exploitable vs the recs and as unexploitable as is optimum, particularly when deep, vs the beasts is paramount.

Will likely sell some of the later 3ks and 2.5ks so all that buy in the 5k will have first option on those.

I'll take the rough with the smooth with the exchange rate. You send at whatever xe.com says at the time you send (must be before the event). Any returns you'll get at the rate I get when I swap back, but that'll very likely be the spot rate too.

10% = $625
2% (min) = $125

Hendonmob: http://pokerdb.thehendonmob.com/player.php?a=r&n=186500 (highlights: €84k 1st WPTN, €80k 2nd EPT side, £77k 1st DTD Monte Carlo)

2 please

2.5 pls

2% please Alex.

all booked thanks guys

2% please

make it 4% please

Booked bobalike (got yr pm, that's fine, thanks) and 2 gone pm 12.5 gone 22.5 left

5% please.

Sent to Stars Al, hope ok

Booked thanks Lord G.

Sold another 8% off the forum, so there's 5% left now. Will play regardless.

Yes Nick, OK to send stars or bank.

Sold out

good luck alex. i think in general people underestimate how big live skills are at the wsop. i think its huge. sometimes you've you just gotta look a man in his eye!

Remind me Alex, have I paid for this yet?

If not, let me know, & I'll send it across.

When do you arrive in Vegas?

Need your bank details. Thought I had them but no. Or I could bank transfer to Mitch or give Mitch cash at DTD.
Let me know.

Who's going this year Alex? Stato Mitch thigh Keith?

Good luck Alex

wl 3%

If you want to free up another 5% Alex, I would like the remaining 2.

Just checked the records and no, not yet sir, but no fret.

I arrive on the 9th, this will be my first event!

Stato Mitch Keith and Deadman. I'm rooming with fat scott so I'm afraid he's part of the gang this time too. Deadmans stag do is 3rd weekend of June!

Toms- both first on the waitlist.

OK, will send across tonight.

Bugger, clean forgot this again.

I've just sent £82 across to you by bank TX, if it is a tad more or less, I'll settle up out here in cash.

(http://i1210.photobucket.com/albums/cc416/cambridgealex/46ECC388-F637-4242-A04D-0C514ADA7ED9_zpspzk7wwhs.jpg) (http://s1210.photobucket.com/user/cambridgealex/media/46ECC388-F637-4242-A04D-0C514ADA7ED9_zpspzk7wwhs.jpg.html)

Kick off in T - 51 minutes

:)

Glglgl

Get it won

Good luck Alex.  Was thinking of popping over but can't imagine mad queues for the 1k omaha.  Sure getting up late isn't going to be an issue.  Good luck Shola too. 

I plan to buy in tonight, but no, doubt there will be much of a queue tomorrow.

See you there.

Good luck Akexander Goulder.

Good table that, I'd take that every day of the year.

Was on v good table, moved to tough one now, oop to Craig and Martin Jacobsen here too plus other young regs. Looking around looks like a good field though.

Lost two 3bet pots peeling TT and AQ and having to fold postflop in semi standard spots.

20k from 25k starting. 75/150

Ouch, down to 10k. HH later.

Played a cool hand, hero called river for most of my stack (wouldve had 1500 left), back up to 20k. 100/200

33k going into 500bb, it's been a tough day so far but finally making some progress.

Doubled thru Jacobsen, turn nut flush vs his nut straight.

Very soon after lost big one vs aejones.

42k 600bb

GL Alex!

Day two with 62k, about average. Returning to 1200bb tomorrow.

I'm exhausted by all that! What a tough day. Played with some absolute beasts. Fabian Quoss, Galen Hall, Joe Cheung on my 3rd table for the last couple hours, but most of the day with Craig Mc, Martin Jacobsen and aejones.

Troughed 8700 early doors, and peaked at 87k late doors. 62 seems like a great result though all things considered.

Will write up some hands tomorrow if I wake up in time, which I very likely will (2pm restart) but for now I'm completely zonked, so will leave it there.

Must mention the highlight of the day though. Reporter is hanging around our table, presumably because of Martin Jacobsen. I get involved in a big pot with said reigning world champ and she is scribbling away. I end up doubling up through him, and she comes over to ask my name (fair enough obv, Martin is the attraction here) and a few details about the hand (which clearly showed she didn't have a scooby what had gone on).

Half hour later I scroll to see a "Goulder doubles up" sort of headline. I read the hand just to see how badly she's botched it. No mention of Martin, no mention of reigning world champion. He's just referred to as "the big blind" for the whole hand :D

it got 498 runners btw, and, not that it bears thinking about yet, but $565k ftw. About 195 left overnight.

Should cover a July 4th weekend at Hakkasan ;D


Best of luck tomorrow, Alex!

Not over $600k for the win?

Not worth waking back up for!

   Good Luck Alex. Show 'em how it's done.

+1

gl Al, lol @ Reporter!

+565,000

Excellent battling back from a stinking start.

Go onnnn Allen!

Gl alex best of British

Bouncing Back

Right so not over jet lag - got a mean 4.5hours sleep and wide awake now (830am local time) but will hopefully be able to catch another hour or two in a bit. Time for some hands from yesterday.

I used to be able to remember hands so well, now they're all just a clusterfk and I can't remember much even from just a few hours ago. I should write them down as I go along, but would rather be concentrating at the table.

Most of the pots I lost early were unavoidable. Hands like this:

Hand 1

Open TT utg 300 (50/100), young reg who's come from other table with 15k from 25k starting so lost a big one early on, 3bets MP to 800. Folds to me, I have an easy call here.

Flop 723r I check, he bets 800, I obviously call.
Turn A I check, he checks. Would've been happier with a bet than a check. Think I'm pretty much always losing now.
River A I check and he bets 1800. I fold.

A few other ones like that, and I've dribbled down to 20k.

Hand 2

Then a oldish guy opens utg 450, at 75/150. I call Jd Td from utg2 and the sb calls. Flop Kd 6s 4h, sb checks, he cbets 800. I felt he might be cbetting all his pocket pairs here, and only really has sets, AK and AA that can continue on the turn, so with 60% of a straight flush I decided to float. This could be bad, esp with it being 3way so the sb can just have Kx or set too, but on this board, I feel like this guys gonna have to give up his non nutted hands everytime on the turn, as there's no draws, no air I can have, I have to have Kx or a set. That was my logic anyway.

Turn 9d which is gin for us. He bets 2100. Now I know he has AK or AA for sure. I'm obviously not folding, but I decided to raise to 5100, thinking he could fold those hands. From his perspective, I've called a bet on K64r 3ways, and now raised a 9 turn. Even though I'm repping really thin (66/44), what bluffs can I possibly have? I thought this guy wouldn't want to risk his whole stack in level 2 with one pair (and he has to be worried about an allin river bet once the pot gets this big).

This could be way off and it turns out, it was - the guy was David Einhorn, billionaire hedge fund owner, so probably isn't too bothered about whether his AK is good in a $5k, even if I am "supposed" to have a set!

We're risking 5100 to win 5200, and given I have 12 outs to the nuts and implied odds for the rest of his stack if we're wrong and he does call us, it can't be that bad.

So I made it 5100 and he thought for a while before calling. River paired the 9 and I snap gave up once he checked (he had AK).

Hand 3

The weakest player on the table raised to 450 from mp, the David Einhorn called on the btn, and I called in the bb with Jc 9c playing 8.5k

Jd Td 4s I check, guy bets 800, DE calls, I overcall.

3s I decided that I needed to lead this card for value and protection, and also define their ranges much easier this way than guessing if one of them bets. I bet 1900 and the original raiser calls and DE folds. Putting him on draws and better Jx / overpairs.

4d I obviously check, he very quickly bets 3500. I have 5k left. I think this is an easy hero call if you think about it. This size is not a nutted size, when the pot is 7.6k and I have 5k left, so thought flush was unlikely, also he took slightly too long to call on the turn to have a flush draw, which given he raised preflop would likely be nutted with a gutshot as well. Obviously that's not solid, but just another thing that was on my mind, his timing felt more like an AK, AQ, KQ sort of call that he wasn't sure about, rather than a nutted combo draw.

And I ruled out AJ, QQ+ with a high degree of certainty because he bet so quickly when the flop flush draw got there. He'd be worried about this card with these hands and either check back or think then bet. So i called pretty happily, and won vs KQo.

Hand 4

There mustve been some pot that got me to 30 odd k, because that's what I started the hand with Jacobsen with. The details aren't important, basically I raised Ac 9c, he peeled bb with 89o, flop 7c 6c 5s he check raises, I call, turn Kc he bets I call, river 5d he puts me in for like 17k into like 25k and I call. Buzzing now! Briefly...

Hand 5

Now I didn't know who this guy was at the time, he'd played semi straight forward, with one bad bluff (imo) so didn't think he was particularly good, otherwise would just flat pre here.

250/500/50 he opens mp 1100, Im mp2 with Jc Jh and 3bet to 2600, he calls.

5s 2c 2h he checks, I bet 2200, he calls
3s he checks, I bet 5100, he calls.
7s Pot is 21k he has 32k back.

Here's my mistake. I didn't check. I should check this. He has 10 combos of boats/quads, AKss, AQss, AJss 3 combos, and QQ probably doesn't 4bet this deep, so lets say 5 combos of QQ, that call or raise us. Total: 18 combos.

Worse hands that can call us, 44,66, 88, 99,TT, 30 combos. Probability of him calling these hands - debatable, could be 5% could be 80% . Spoken to some players I really respect about this, and they say we'd have to assume he's a pretty big fish to value bet this. I think without a spade in our hand it makes it even more of a check.

Sizing-wise I went for about 30% pot, 7400, think this is OK if we are going to bet. He went all-in. Damn it.

He can be bluffing with Aspades Kx, Aspades Q as two ideal bluffing combos. Game theory wise it's kinda suicidal to turn any hand without the Aspades in into a bluff, but he could make an exploitative adjustment vs my sizing (thinking I'm not nutted) and turn everything into a bluff here. I didn't think he would at the time. He's risking 32k to win 29k, laying himself 0.9:1 so I need to call him with 45% of my range to make him indifferent to bluffing. I'll obviously be folding all my bluffs, but given I've bet 30% pot, I have like 4:1 value:bluffs so need to fold about a third of my value range as well. JJ no spade obviously is an ideal combo to bet/fold.

So I'm happy with the river fold, even if he was making an exploitative bluff with 44, I can exploit that in the future by having a stronger range when I bet here (not value betting JJ) and using this sizing for my nut flushes as well. In theory...:D

Hand 6

So we got moved, and had about 45k on the new table, with many faces I recognised. I ran like god in the first 10 hands here. had AA vs KK vs a 17k stack, and found QQ and TT in cold 4bet spots when Joe Cheung had 3bet from a small stack, he folded both times, I chipped up in one or two other small ones, and had 87k at peak.

I 3bet folded once, and then played the final hand of note with Joe Cheung. He opens CO 2k, at 500/1k, I peeled bb with Qc Jc.

Kd Td 6h I check he bets 2500, I call.
Turn 5d I check he checks.
River 7s. I decide that this is pretty much the worst hand I can have in this spot, everyyhing I call the flop with is now either a pair, flush, straight, two pair etc. QJ and J9 more or less only air given I'd probably just get in AJ and AQ vs his 25bb stack. and can rep Kx, flushes and Tx with a 5500 bet here. It's not too small that he has to pick it off really wide, and it's not too big to polarise me. He obviously felt differently and called with 22.

So we bagged up 63k. Felt like I got put through it a bit today, but I learned some good lessons, and am ready to battle again later on today. Some nicer table draws would be nice though...

In hand two, calling with five to act behind you seems interesting. Are these >$3k comps not quite tricky/reggy compared to the smaller ones? Is there not a tendency for players to squeeze behind (pleno excepted)?

Or do you just say, if someone squeezes, we will be last to act and can decide our fate then?

Players are more or less likely to iso-raise an oldish guy's UTG+1 open when the guy who flats to his left is Unknown Youngish Brit? His hand will be very well defined by his response to a raise, making it easier for the squeezer to play it out from there.

Early in the comp, plenty of chips to play with, keen to play pots, blue paint. Is it that simple?

Just interested in the dynamics of the call there. Think I raise or fold more in those situations [than perhaps I should].



VBOL today, sir. Do wins.

Reading that back, I wouldn't blame anyone for thinking - blimey he's had a mare here! And you could be right. Lots of debatable decisions and plays. I don't claim to have played well yesterday, I've just written the hands honestly and given my reasoning and thoughts at the time.

Will strive to play better today :)

Yeh I may get squeezed behind by a good player. That possibility is not enough of a reason to fold JT suited to 450chip raise 100+bbs deep though. Or a reason to 3bet it and bloat the pot vs a strong range.

Even if it gets squeezed behind to 1500 or whatever, if the utg raiser calls I have an easy overcall and if he folds I could still maybe justify a call vs some. JTs is premium in my book.

Your book is worth reading. Thanks for the answer. Maybe work on focusing hard on the river when you have a universe draw, too. :)

I think your blue paint comments at the end some it up Tal, people might cold 4 as we rep kinda thin pre and its hard to fight back against. Don't want to be seen to be isolating the presumed fish really wide early on, so try to take 3 with a really good multiway hand.

Mr Cheung doesn't give a fuck.

Thoughts on folding J9cc otf? Hard to improve and lots of bad cards

Yeh considered it, very possibly the best play.

Restarting now. Table looks much better, just Melanie Weisner and Matt Waxmax (short) that I recognised from the names.

64k @600/1200 leggo!

4th hand hj shoves 15k with bb sat out, I have 88 on sb, snap, lose to QQ. 47k

Firmly in the danger zone after calling the turn with a double gutshot, that would have been so nicely disguised had it came in...

23400 and blinds just gone up to 1600.

Played a really cool hand to get back up to 47k. Jammed river, not sure whether guy folded better or worse :D

So wrote hand cos had long break.

I was in bb for 1600 with QTo playing 27k. Utg2 opens 3500, mp peels I peel.

Q66r I check, utg2 bets 3900, mp call I overcall. I know I'm beat a lot here but getting 6:1 and think they're gonna have to play super honest.

Turn is a 8 and it checks round. The utg2 player would 100% bet AQ+ and he was older on the tight side so not putting many worse KQ and QJ in his range. Once mp checks back he's capped at KQ too imo.

River is a 2 and I jam for 17k into 20k thinking my hand looks like 6x and only 6x and KQ/QJ have to fold. I could obviously be good anyway, but they both folded (mp gave me a good sweat which was fun!)

2k bb now.

First hand back from break run AQ into AK bvb after BTN min. Luckily he was only player at the table I covered so still have 9k to spin...

97s> Melanie's KJo for first double....

Spin mode: engaged

Double up two: complete

Out of the danger zone oioi

21bbs :D

 ;goodluck;

Not played a hand since last update, and as a result, we have....

9 bigs.

Just one double up away from...something...

(40 off the money btw)

Good luck.

Last few posts had me thinking this was teeks' diary :)

Tosser.

💤

Yes it's sounding that way isn't it...

On break 32k going back to 1500/3000.

Marv.

TT vs AK....


Held! 76k. Dizzy...

Won a couple nice ones since the double, 138k. 13 off the money, been a nice turnaround today!

Been on Alex's rail for a few hours almost. He's playing rly fkn good. So in the zone.

Gogogogo

Yup, just like me.

Sorry for the copy and paste job but...

In the money of the 5k 👌😎💵🇺🇸 Around 50 players left between me and $567k first prize! Got just under avg stack (40bbs) for after dinner.

Yes Al. Nice spin up. glglglgl

✔️

I'm so pleased to finally get a cash on a blonde staking thread!

Back from dinner, 210k at 5k bb, vamos!

Down to 130k, important level now 3/6k 1k ante

New table.

Danger zone alert- 103k going back to 4/8k

We've been here before, so no fret...

    Marvellous read. Keep it going .

Excellent. Wp Alex. Gl.

Gg 31st. Jammed sb QTs for 13.5bbs over katchalov cutoff open. Lost to ATo. Felt pretty standard. Made some tight folds in similar spots today but this one felt like I had to go with.

Got around $13.5k.

Not exactly what we wanted but profit's profit. Will sort returns asap.

very well played, great start to your summer

WP Alex

Well played Alex!

Excellent start Alex.

WP Alex.

Decent morning squeeze.

Looking forward to some new ones being ripped.

Nice start to Vegas, well done mate

Exact amount cashed for: $13578
1% = $135.78

Will bank transfer at todays exchange rate to Bobalike and Ian (1.549, 1% = £87.60). PM me your details.

Ryan, Tikay and Nick I can do the same, or USD cash when I see you next?

wp, usd when I see you would be fine cheers

Great effort Alex, well done.

Hi Alex,

Whatever best suits you, I don't mind either way.

Cashes by you & Thewy haver been jolly handy though, as I've been burning money so far.

  Well done Alex. Ed is going to PM bank details. Great run and great sweat.

PM sent, cheers.

Well played Alex, unlucky for more.

"Just send it to the boy"

Brilliant.

Payment received, thanks Alex.

If you decide to sell for any more WSOP Events, I'd like to reserve a few % please.