THE POKER ACADEMY

What is the Poker Academy?

2006-09-14T04:54:00.000-07:00

We are a forum of keen Poker players of all levels looking to improve. It is a place to share ideas, meet new people and have your say on all things Poker. Since we created it in November of 2004 I have been lucky enough to meet some great new people and I attribute a great deal of the improvement in my game to the advice and encouragement received here. I hope you enjoy this forum a fraction as much as I have.

Dan Hofinger

Our forum has always encouraged opinions and thrived on the informed debate shared by our members. We have never had reason to censor posts and I hope this continues to be the case. As of today however only registered members will be allowed to post as I believe that if someone has something to say or contribute they should do so openly. Registering is free and simple and requires only an email address. We guarantee not to pass your e-mail to a third party and to respect your privacy.

Dark

2006-09-01T13:22:00.000-07:00

So summer is drawing to a close, the nights are getting longer and colder. Not that it makes a blind bit of difference to me; I rarely see sunlight at the best of times. In fact its testament to my nocturnal life that 5 weeks in the desert and I picked up the kind of tan that, were they to sell in bottles, would likely be called factor one “grubby”.

I have tried to adopt normal waking hours, the problem is that the easiest cash games always seem to take place at 4 in the morning whereas trying to grind out a living playing the daytime crowd is a far less lucrative proposition. I assume its because the types of people who are playing in the early hours of the morning are more likely to be drunk or chasing their money but I have notice a staggering number of people who are just crap.

They tend to sit down with a fraction of the buy in wait for a really good hands, more often than not you can force them to fold almost anything by just putting them all in, after all if they do call and win its hardly going to make a dent in your stack. Then there are the “experts” who having read one or other of the available books on poker sit about waiting for aces. They deal with the boredom of this type of game by commenting on the starting hands all of the bigger stacks are winning showdowns with. “How can you play J2 from early position?”

It is apparently their job to let people know whether they are fish or not and what a valuable service they provide scaring away the actual fish and causing good loose aggressive players to shake their heads and turn the chat off. They are proof of the fact that there is nothing quite so dangerous as thinking you have nothing left to learn.

What they don’t seem to understand is that Poker cannot be played to some formula, well good poker can’t. Real poker is about Putting your opponent on a hand, working out what hand he thinks you have and then deciding what hand you are going to represent. It has little or nothing to do with the cards you actually have. If the table is tight passive then why shouldn’t I raise out from early position with garbage I’m not expecting to have to go all the way to the river in any case.

Its amazing how much money you can make from these experts while they sit around the table as if Poker were a spectator sport. Missing out on the few hours of sunlight we get everyday in England is a small price to pay.

2006-07-24T16:56:00.000-07:00

Still no bracelet though I did manage to congratulate John Gale on his, let me tell you he is one of the nicest guys in Poker and this should prove beyond any doubt that he deserves to be taken seriously at the table. Theo was on Dan Harringtons table so I also got to thank the great man for his books - I am reading 3 now and it is better than the first two!

Although Theo went out in 89th he played outstandingly well and just could not catch the breaks when he needed them. The pivotal hand was AK he raised out from third position 6000 (blinds 600/1200) utg who had limped dwelt up then called. The flop came K 10 4 rainbow and first to act checked to him. Now let me tell you that Theo was not playing to finish high up in the money he was playing to win and had built an excellent table image, mostly people were staying out of his way. Having put UTG on a mid or low pair he wanted to slow play for maximum value, when UTG bet out 8000 on a blank Theo min raised it to 16000 confident that he was still well ahead once again the dwell up and a call. The river was an ace that gave him 2 pair but before he UTG pushed all in a call would have crippled him if he lost. What would you do?

Great players can get away from this sort of hand, I am damn sure he was right to fold - it felt to me from the outset that UTG was on QJ and later on one of the railbirds claimed to have seen them. The next big hand was AK again and this time he played it the only way he could have done and pushed all in over the top of a raise only to be called by 7s Anna Kournikova we call it that for a reason.

This was Theo's first event in the WSOP and he made 89th out of 2050 which any of us could be rightly proud of but in common with other real players he was down about it feeling that the title was there to be won and it was. He not only took a pot off Dan Harrington with AQ that he played just right but on several occaisions Action Dan tapped the table as a sign of respect. Jealous I am, green really isnt my colour either. You will be seeing more of the New Yorker they call the "Phenom" and just like Gale when he finally wins a big one - it couldnt happen to a nicer guy

2006-07-22T12:23:00.000-07:00

Today is quite possibly the day that we take down a bracelet! Yesterday Theo entered the $2000 N/L along with roughly 2000 other people today he is sitting in 31st with only 144 left and already in the money. When you consider that we were out at a party the G suite at the palms till 6:00 in the am and that I was so hungover that I could barely stand and have no recollection of last few hours of the party whatsoever, his efforts start to look a bit special.

I have a good feeling about today I know he has a good game - we have been playing heads up all week - I am well ahead hehe however the good players can raise their game when needed and that is just what he has been doing. So far he has built a tight table image and has the respect of everyone on it and that includes "Action" Dan Harrington!

The players sit back down at 14:00 and by the early hours this young New York "Phenom" may take down his first bracelet and the first by a Syndicate player, my only concern is that I am going to have an even worse hangover after the party that would follow a win!

P.S. I won the $1k guarantee on William Hill yesterday as well but that hardly compares does it.

Academy On the Road

2006-07-11T19:48:00.000-07:00

Its the night before John and I drive from New York to Las Vegas baby and with a 6:00 a.m. start we are both getting an early night. I am of course excited by the prospect of travelling through America and have romantic visions of a Kerouac style Odyssey, not encouraged I feel I must add by John pointing out that we will not be stopping unless the car needs to - so in short if the car is full of fuel and I am then I may find myself filling an empty snapple bottle or two on the way.

What a car it is too I only wish my flight over had been as comfortable. I know there are those among you who will look down your noses at us for driving a Hummer, I have been told that it requires a saudi oil field to operate day and night just to provide the fuel for us to have the AC on, but let me tell you when those speakers kick its all worth it baby! The Sin mobile is the closest thing to Knight rider I have ever sat in there is a navigation system in it that can order pizza for you and automatically orders rescue for you if the airbags deploy! We will be arriving in Vegas in style we even have flags to attach to the front of the car.

We have with us a DVD camcorder to record our time in Vegas so I will keep you all posted on where to see the footage, please bare in mind though that I am in charge of getting it to work and I struggle with mobile phones so patience may be necessary.

Thanks to all who sent me best wishes for the trip, I will be keeping a diary on here to keep you all informed.

Wagons Roll!

The Forum Rivals Cup

2006-05-11T08:06:00.000-07:00

The future starts here!

2006-03-27T05:37:00.000-08:00

Most of you will be aware that I have been working on a project which has occupied a lot of my time and attention, one which I have felt would change the face of Poker. I have'nt gone into any details because we have been working to a launch when all would be revealed, a day when everything we have been planning would be explained. Today is that day. The future starts here.

What this means for Academy members is that we now have a site we can play on, and own! I will be creating private tournaments, free rolls and can finally establish Aledans Idea of an interforum competition.

I am more than happy to answer any questions or hear any ideas and feedback and can be reached on the pokeracademy forum or via email pokeracademy@gmail.com or AIM ThePokerAcademy

Hofinger

Press release.

Poker Syndicate Announced Today the Acquisition

& Consolidation of Imperial Poker

LONDON, UK, March 27, 2006 / -- IGV Limited, (privately held), which owns and operates the web site, www.PokerSyndicate.com, announced today the acquisition of www.ImperialPoker.com. Imperial Poker will undergo a re-branding and will be consolidated with the company’s www.PokerSyndicate.com web site.

Founded by a determined group of poker professionals that grew tired of seeing the poker player taken advantage of, www.PokerSyndicate.com has launched a novel, proprietary concept that will revolutionize the industry.

www.PokerSyndicate.com is a “For Players….by Players” player friendly site. It is the only site in the world that is 100% owned by those who play on the site. It is not only the site you play on. It is the site you own. The concept is simple. Poker sites make money by charging, either, a rake at the cash game tables or a tournament entry fee. Every time one of the players logs on and plays at www.PokerSyndicate.com, they will receive a credit back of 50% of all of the rake they paid and the entry fee they paid, in the form of stockholder equity ownership in the site. “The more you play, the more you own”.

It is hard equity ownership, not a profit sharing scheme, nor a participation of profits that go into a trust, where the players receive a small participation percentage. The shares earned are the players to keep and do with as they please. If a player stops playing on the site, the player still retains the shares they have earned and will continue to receive dividends. In fact, not only do the players participate in the appreciated value of their share ownership, the Company has announced that it will continuously distribute a minimum of 50% of all profits derived, to shareholders on a quarterly basis, beginning the end of the third fiscal Quarter, September 30, 2006.

The company is very optimistic as to its future success. The reception from the Poker Community has, thus far, been very favorable, and specifically, the Company’s proprietary concept has been extremely well received.

____________________________

CONTACT:

shareholderinformation@pokersyndicate.com

mediacenter@pokersyndicate.com

Tin Foil Hat Wearers

2006-02-26T18:25:00.000-08:00

I can put up with being cold called during the football by someone in India that is looking to save me money on my utilities, I can chat for hours to visiting Jehovas witnesses but when it comes to the people who go on about how poker sites are rigged I am losing the will to live. For this to be true, sites would have to go out of their way to design hands to generate maximum value, which is not an easy undertaking. The benefit to them? Well in theory they would make a little bit more money but since once you get to the higher limit cash games the rake is fixed anyway they would really only make money on the smaller tables. Each site is thoroughly audited, the total hands played are analyzed against expected statistics, i.e. does a pair of Aces get dealt the expected once every 220 on average, what is the frequency with which the big hands occur and so on. The more logical among you will have deduced that since the sites continue to operate, these audits have not thus far revealed any deviation from what would be expected, In fact they are so close to what you would expect that we can say mathematically there is no evidence that any hands are engineered.

Surprised? Of course not, why would companies making money faster than any others in history bother putting their businesses at risk for the little extra that they might make, they are not that hard up just yet. People have told me that sites are rigged almost everyday I have played, I am sure they have offered you the benefit of their experience and I have no doubt that a lot of them, if not all, believe it wholeheartedly. Ask them for proof and you realize that you might as well been asking a theological question. You will before long come across the truth that for these people this is a question of faith not proof. They have anecdotal evidence galore, and fail to realize that for all such evidence there is vastly more that would not support their theory. I point out to them that if I am to believe that sites rig hands because of something unusual that happened to them then surely they should be convinced that the contrary must be true because of all the hands I have played which fit what you would expect.

One person told me that since he was a winning player on Pokerstars and was thusfar a losing player on Crypto that proved something was wrong. Its still a little short of being a smoking gun but I have to say from what I saw of his game, I was more suspicious of his claim to be a winning player on any site!

Another opponent matter of factly shared this gem with me, apparently the second best hand always wins in tournaments, I thanked him and asked him why he didn’t just play weaker hands as a result? In the finest spirit of scientific pioneering he went on to demonstrate his theory during the tournament, I suppose you have to say he was at least partially right, he managed to win two all-ins with the weaker hand before the third exposed a flaw in his thinking. Having crashed out I felt he would use the time to change his view from the second best hand always winning to often winning. Perhaps he needs to keep experimenting I would be happy to help in any level cash game of his choice.

These people are everywhere so are psychics, mediums, witches and spoon benders, Aledan refers to them as tin foil hat wearers, which I think says it best. After all if the sites are rigged then they are not allowed in on it, sites are always rigged against them! Imagine trying to stay balanced, knowing that sites are going out of their way to take money off you just to give to other people! The struggle to stay sane may well have been lost by the majority of them so please forgive their ranting about the beat you just put on them. They may well all be paranoid but that doesn’t mean that everyone doesn’t hate them.

As for Bots, some of you will remember we had our own bots on the DOJO and I think we can all agree that they were easy as hell to rinse, if people are using Bots I say fair play to them and wish them luck, I follow the principle that if you want a job doing right get on and do it yourself. That said I am offering anyone at all to PROVE sites are rigged on this forum, I am happy to eat humble pie if I am wrong so feel free to post anything you consider to prove it. Hope you wont be offended if I don’t hold my breath.

Super Sunday

2006-02-20T15:24:00.000-08:00

First off congratulations to Cadmium Lemon for his highly impressive 3rd place out of 1728 in a $10 party tournament in the early hours of Monday morning, I watched him play good aggressive poker all the way to the end, a write up of the latter stages is available in the forum. Watching was not particularly good for my health, at times he pushed his chips in with reckless abandon but it was certainly instructive! I have known for sometime that pure aggression gets results in these tournaments but there is a huge gap between knowing you have to push and doing it.

Not to say I havent had my own little taste of success, I managed to win the $1500 guaranteed on William Hill just hours before Cad eclipsed me. I also managed to win it with the Nabilly which should bring a smile to Nabsy's face, it seems it is a powerhouse hand after all!

Cad and I are planning a pub session to celebrate and I promise we will not let the academy down by remaining in the least bit sobre!!

2006-02-16T14:12:00.000-08:00

Rhythms

Since giving up the traditional nine to five I have found myself becoming increasingly nocturnal, if for no other reason than the fact that a lot of the players I find it easiest to take money from also seem to come out after dark. In fact if you trawl through the N/L tables from 3 to 7 am you will find that there are a lot of people online who seem to be determined to give their money away. This coupled with the normally decent players who are chasing their losses and those that are playing on despite having to keep their eyes open with matchsticks, mean that the alert half decent player can make money far more quickly than during normal hours.

With all that said I have spent the last week trying to change over to days, not just because I have developed the prison pallor of a lifer and now require sunglasses to open the fridge but last week a far more worrying incident had me rummaging around for my alarm clock. I actually called Talksport – a talk radio station, to join in a discussion on best before dates on food products!!

They do say that you have to reach rock bottom before you can start the long road to recovery and I hope that my brief chat on air will mark the start of a new chapter! True the rich pickings will be missed but the truth is I have found that I do not play at my best in the early hours either, but in any case what price dignity! With all that said it is proving difficult to change what has now become my body’s natural rhythm. I have therefore taken the precaution of not listening to the radio at night. Not strictly true since I have become a devout listener of the newly created Academy Radio, and let me tell you there are some tunes on there! May I recommend that you delay no longer and get yourself an account set up at last fm so that you to can join in the fun – details in the Not poker section of the forum – or email me at: thepokeracademy@gmail.com for further info.

Bouncing Back

2006-02-01T11:23:00.000-08:00

With January behind me I can finally breath a huge sigh of relief, December was so bad that I was genuinely worried I would have to give up the Poker life all together. How bad was it? In the last year I had one month in the red, unfortunately it was the first full month since taking the decision to turn Pro when I could least afford to lose money.

Thankfully I had enough put aside in case of just such an eventuality but my bankroll took a proper pasting. Worse than that my confidence was in terrible shape and as much as I told myself it was all variance I couldn’t help but begin to doubt my abilities. I dropped down from the £3/£6 limit all the way to 50p/ £1 and still kept shedding money, the problem with trying to win money back is that it is far harder to stay patient and wait for the right spots you end up trying to force the game which is not the ideal way to play when your confidence is low.

The worse my situation got the longer I played and the less daylight I saw, when I did finally try and get some sleep it was usually not enough and more than once I fell asleep at the computer, tiredness definitely kills bankrolls. Overall my situation was grim but I would not have had the confidence to go Pro if it hadn’t been for the fact that I could rely on John the Greek for good advice and as ever he didn’t let down. His advice was simple, play less!

Having forced myself to take a break the next step was to take a philosophical view of my losses, Rudyard Kippling asserts that all the world is yours and that you are a man, if among other things, you can make a heap of all your winnings and risk them on one turn of pitch and toss! This seemed to be exactly what I had done in December so taking the long view I guessed I could look forward to global rewards and affirmation of maleness, what can I say when a man makes cakes exceedingly well I am more inclined to pay attention to his musings!

Ultimately however it was not the philosophy that changed it was the game – I moved to No Limit and the rewards where instant. From the 5^th of January I have been on my best ever run my and on the last day of the month I had officially won back all I had lost in December as well as making my January target which is the equivalent of doing two months in one, Im Back!

January was also a good month for Tabloid who despite having to be encouraged to sit down at the £50 pot limit game at the Gutshot now seems to be a permanent fixture there parked behind a chip mountain. I haven’t seen much of his game yet as I have been grinding away with less spectacular results on the pony table but I have played on those tables more than enough to know that the kind of results he has been having are no fluke, he definitely has game. In fact I am trying to get him to make the trip to Vegas this summer.

I am hoping to meet even more academy members in February after at long last meeting the Jester who was actually remarkably sane and humble! If you are in London and looking to play let me know

Academy on Television!

2006-01-15T23:04:00.000-08:00

Tabloid and I took full advantage of our flexible working hours to accept an open invitation on the Gutshot forum to appear in a BBC 3 Documentary. It was surely only a matter of time before Aunty jumped on the Poker ratings winning bandwagon, I wouldn't be at all surprised if Poker features heavily in the coming year. This project seemed straightforward if a little uninspiring, the ideas being that they would take two newbies and get them to play against players of various levels before sending them on to the WPT. I was looking forward to a game and tried not to have any preconceptions about the premise of the show although at the back of my mind was the fact that with all the creative genius in television maybe they could do better than rework the same ideas over and over again. Then of course I remembered that that is largely all that is on television!

Having arrive punctually to meet up outside a cafe near bank we were told that we were not needed yet and that we could wait in a pub if we wanted, I was ordering my first beer of the day moments later. Having been told we would be needed till 15:30 we were actually still in the pub at around that time and as all of you who have seen me drink before will no doubt testify I hold my drink as well as colander. Fortunately we were called to the set before any further drinking would have required anything filmed with me in it to require a post watershed slot. We were taken into a small room off the main room to be briefed and introduced to the two players we were to be up against.

Shortly after a brief chat and being miked up we were lead to the table. I must say that the settings were the plushest I have yet played in and quite a change from the surroundings I am used to. The game itself was Hold’em in a tournament format with everyone getting a very healthy chipstack I had to fancy my chances and was feeling even more confident when I looked down to see rockets! A nice bet was called a little too quickly by the TV player immediately to my left and whilst still deciding how to play the flop I found that I now had a set. I raised a large amount because there were 2 spades on the flop and was a little disappointed at the turn being a spade, I adjusted my bet on the turn to give myself odds for a boat chase when the river far from filling me up brought the 4^th Spade!!! I checked and the TV player went all in, which naturally I couldn’t call, tossing my aces face up into the muck and very glad of the size of the starting stacks.

The game progressed a while without incident until the same TV guy ripped a card while shuffling – no mean feat with plastic cards and we had to have a new deck. The next thing I knew I was dealt 8’s which is decent enough on a 5 handed table so being in first position I decided to raise up which I did only to find everyone calling to Liv ( the other not TV player who some of you will have seen from the TV show that Lee was in) reraised me by quite a bit, I decided that with the amount in the pot it was worth a call if I could catch an eight I could potentially treble up, TV fella from before calls as well but his friend folds as does Tabloid – the only thing they can do in the circumstances. The flop is an Ace and the 10 and 8 of hearts, right now the only hands I am losing to are rockets and tens – although that said anyone with a straight and flush draw would be level as well. I push all in to protect against the flush and praying that Liv had Anna Kournikova and sure that TV would have to fold – he didn’t !!! She then went all in and he called!!!! I looked at Tab as if to say I believe I am ahead here he was still getting over his fold since he had passed the pocket 10s!!!! Liv however quite unbelievably showed rockets and TV the J9 of hearts – basically with a straight flush, flush and straight draw and more outs than Gay pride. I am preparing to be eliminated of course when the turn brings quads – and having said sorry to Liv and tipping my head back in relief at not being first out I hear Tabloid say “ A STRAIGHT FLUSH!!!! The penny dropped just behind my jaw. Ok I said, look I know I have been paid to be here and its not like I have been paid to be here but this is fixed – to which the two TV players looked shocked at my suggestion, what do you mean fixed. There is no way in the world my quads just got beat by a straight flush on the river in a hand where someone had flopped trip aces and another person had folded a set of 10s. It then turned out that the other player had folded Ks preflop so to summarise,

4 PLAYERS PREFLOP DEALT POCKET PAIRS

3 OF THEM MAKE A SET ON THE FLOP

ONE THEN TURNS QUADS

THE ONLY PLAYER WITHOUT A PAIR RIVERS A STRAIGHT FLUSH HITTING A ONE OUTER!!!!

Im no mathematician but even I could see this scenario was at least billions to one! They still tried to convince us that this was possible the other guy actually said “this hand will have been played before” NO I said it wont have but if it happened in a cash game someone would be leaving their limbless!

Of course that had been exactly the reaction they had been looking for and they quickly admitted that the project was actually to find how easy it would be to cheat at poker and get away with it. They went on to explain that we had given exactly the reaction they had been looking for and that surprisingly no one had yet sussed it, a fact I still doubt can be true. I know very few players who would not have spotted that one coming.

This hand will have been played before indeed! In fact come to think of it I think I remember a similar hand played between the easter bunny, santa claus and SuperMan and if memory serves Santa won it! The cheating fuck!

A Christmas Message

2005-12-25T03:12:00.000-08:00

It has been a very good first year for the Academy. See I resisted the Anus Horibilis and associated puns! I wanted to wish you all a Merry Christmas and thank you for making the Academy a place I look forward to visiting as many of you do daily!

There are great things planned for the new year, which I can't wait to share with you but for now flop onto the sofa, turn on the television and enjoy rivers of booze.

A very Merry Christmas to you all!

All Hail the New Champion!

2005-11-17T02:34:00.000-08:00

The first ever Academy Cup hosted by William Hill was contested at midnight last night. Despite a lower turnout than hoped, competition as ever was fierce. Personally I was not too disappointed to finish 5th I made a steal attempt with A9o into Lee's pair of Queens, which illustrates perfectly the foolishness of an all in to steal the pot, you can after all only really expect to get called when you are well behind. I did actually get good cards as well I just couldn’t make them pay, someone who did get real value for his cards Cadmium Lemon.

Allowing myself to bask in his reflected glory I did actually tip him as the player to watch, I have had the dubious pleasure of losing money to him in live games and until last night the Academy had not really seen the best of him. I thought he played an excellent fearless and aggressive game and think everyone would agree that he deserved to win.

Second place was Jab and I'm sure he wont mind me saying that that is an outstanding achievement for someone still so new to the game. I hope he takes encouragement from such a strong performance and puts in another similarly good performance in the next one.

Woolfy at last turned in the sort of game we all know he has in him and shock of all shocks he didn’t whinge about the cards once! I thought for a while he might win it, he managed to move me off pots too regularly for my liking and was playing a winning game right up until the end when he picked the wrong spot to bluff and was knocked out in third. Still an excellent performance.

Lee a.k.a Manfishcake for reasons known only to himself, was unfortunately playing on a BT line that kept cutting out in fairness I would have had more sympathy for him if it hadn’t been his Queens that knocked me out in one of the few periods of the game later on where he did have a connection. Fourth is an excellent finish, I would say that as I finished 5th! Well done the bubble boy!

As for the rest absolutely no one disgraced themselves well unless you call crashing out first hand an embarrassment but I didn’t see it so wont comment. AJ did not qualify for the wooded spoon but can certainly have one if desired.

Well done to all who played, shame disgrace and humiliation on those who did not, if you appreciated how much trouble they are to set up grumble grumble.

Academy Cup

2005-11-16T10:18:00.000-08:00

Tonight (16/11/05) at midnight GMT on William Hill glorious members of the Academy will scrap it out to determine who really is the Champion of the site. You can find the tournament under Multi Table Tournaments and under the Private tab. Buy in is £10 and the password is School.

EVERYONE IS WELCOME and GOOD LUCK

Skill Vs Chance

2005-10-26T08:26:00.000-07:00

With London's best card room, The Gutshot, having to defend themselves in court against the charge of profiting from games of chance, the issue of whether Poker is predominately a game of skill or luck looks set to surface yet again.

My take on it is simple unless possessed of psychic powers and the ability to see into the future there will always be an element of chance in any competitive event. David Beckham, when taking a penalty must hope that he is not unlucky enough to trip at the last minute or that the goal keeper does not guess the direction he intends to kick the ball. Of course the keeper will be scrutinizing him for the slightest clue and make a decision based on factors ranging from body language to previous efforts, this is exactly what poker players do.

If played properly a good player will consistently have the edge over a weaker player in just the same way that one boxer will be able more often than not to knock out another, that is unless felled by a lucky punch!

Our gaming laws are outdated far from protecting people from the lure of gambling they encourage a society where slot machines take pride of place in every pub and chip shop and where everyone over the age of 16 can buy scratch cards, visit a Bingo Hall or walk into a bookmaker at will, yet we seek to actively discourage them from taking part in a pastime that requires years of learning to become good at. If Poker really where more chance than skill, it would be impossible for people to make a living playing it. Since there is a healthy and growing community of such players surely the case should be closed.

The Academy Cup

2005-08-30T04:17:00.000-07:00

Firstly a big thank you to all of you who logged in on Friday night to play the first ever Academy Cup, apologies of you were not able to get a seat- may I suggest in future you follow Nabsy's example and turn up 6 hours early for the next tournament, the online equivelent of putting a towel on a sun lounger!

The competition itself was fierce, the standard incredibly high. Given that we were playing for pride rather than cold hard cash I was delighted to see how seriously everyone took it. The first Academy Champion was Markelby who played a good aggressive game. There was a follow up game right after which was won by Carlbet who having finished the first game in third is now on top of the leader board for points won- it is still very early days however.

Markelby and Carlbets names have now been placed on the Academy Cup table as a reminder to everyone who takes part in the next one who the current champions are - lets see if they can defend their titles.

Once again well done to all.

Who Rules The School?

2005-08-11T07:18:00.000-07:00

We are a competitive bunch here at the Academy. Not content to learn from each other and improve together into the best we can be, hell no we each of us want to prove we are the best of a good bunch.

What was needed we felt was a tournament straight forward - the winner is the Champ with full bragging rights and carte blanche to rub everyone elses noses in it. Previous attempts to determine who could beat who fell down because of the difficulty in getting people together in one place at short notice. That has all changed. The Game Is ON!

Friday the 26th August - You can find the full details in the forum the more the merrier.
Particularly as I am definitely going to win and so the more of you that enter the bigger my prize will be.

Hofinger

Bad Beat JACKPOT!

2005-06-07T09:00:00.000-07:00

Oh man. AAAA... beaten by KKKK. Well, maybe not beaten, but there's no doubt which hand made the most money.

That said, no-one lost this hand. I folded 85s preflop and made the best part of £20!

There's a screenshot (and the full hand history) in this forum thread.

Congratulations to Kuroshiro! Fear his slow play...

TAKE THE POKER TEST!!

2005-02-08T04:20:00.000-08:00

Not having Office on my PC, I hadn't had a chance to take the Poker Test myself until last night, and consequently was unaware of how excellent it is. It's - very excellent. Hofinger is incensed that I only managed to get an 80% rating on it, but in my defence, I didn't write the thing, and he did.

Do I make myself clear? TAKE THE POKER TEST! It's superb. When you're done, come and tell us your scores on the forum.

As for me, I've just opened a BlueSquare account, and will be getting a review up soonish. If you're looking to sign up to a new site right now and can't wait that long, we've heard good things about PokerRoom.com (use "joevb sent me" as a promotional code to get a free $25, plus 20% of your deposit on top). Seamless, that was. Absolutely seamless.

Do YOU have a problem?

2005-01-25T07:42:00.000-08:00

Let's face it, if you're on this site, the answer's probably yes. Still, better to be safe than sorry; consult Hofinger's ingenious Poker Test to get the definitive answer to the question - are you a poker addict? And, more importantly, how much of an addict are you?

Click this, download the file, and answer the questions contained therein. (It's an Excel spreadsheet type thing, so if you don't have Excel, it's probaly not worth the (minimal) effort). And then, when you're done, make sure you email it to everyone you know who plays poker! They'll be sure to thank you*.

*We can not guarantee the truth of this statement.

Twelftfphth night

2005-01-06T11:10:00.000-08:00

Isn't twelfth a great word? Twel...ffphth. It's also great because it relates to twelfth night, which happens to be my favourite day of the year. Why? Because it's the day that EFFING CHRISTMAS finally pisses off, not to be heard from again until early November, (unless the nation's advertisers decide we should start feeling festive even earlier in 2005 - they're probably pencilling the Chrimbo advertising onslaught for August as I type).

So, yeah. Bah, humbug, signed and in triplicate. Sadly, we've not really had much of an opportunity to crack on with the site's development over the last few weeks, but now all that festive nonsense is out of the way, the only thing preventing us from implementing the next phase of the plan is the amount of time we're spending actually *playing* poker, as opposed to just writing about it. Nonetheless, we're working away whenever we get a chance on all manner of excellent stuff for the site,and hopefully we'll be able to launch some of it real soon. In the meantime, don't forget to check out our forums, which continue to grow at an alarming rate.

Oh, and Happy New Year, and good luck!

Welcome to... thepokeracademy.co.uk!

2004-12-02T06:39:00.000-08:00

That's right, we've got a fancy new web address. The first of many alterations to the site as it evolves from blog to fully fledged website; within the next fortnight we'll start working on the next phase of our plan to take over the world. (I'm moving house on Monday, so we've had to put global domination on hold for a short while). Still - http://www.thepokeracademy.co.uk/. Tell your friends. Tell your family. Sod it, tell everybody.

In the meantime, the forum goes from strength to strength; Academy members picked up not one, but TWO multitable tournament wins yesterday, there's a couple of new book reviews up, I landed a sweet straight flush that I felt compelled to screenshot and post images of, and (in case you missed it last time we plugged it) don't forget to check out the picture of Academy member LuckyFlop's juicy ROYAL FLUSH. All this, and more, in the space of our first week! Be a part of it - register on the forum, swap ideas, strategies and stories, talk about great plays and bad beats, and improve your game in the process. The more the wealthier, as they (should) say.

More on that ROYAL, and some site news

2004-11-28T06:00:00.000-08:00

Hello folks - Cadmium Lemon here (don't ask why I'm called that, it's complicated. And dull). Some info on some of the stuff we're doing with the site in a moment, but first; a bit more on that ROYAL FLUSH.

It was me wot saw it; one seat to the right of me, in fact. Must remember to thank that dealer. Anyway, it was in the middle stages of a multitable tournament, 75/150 blinds, and I'd folded Kc3d before the flop. (I knew what was coming, honest). There were some tasty raises to start with, and eventually three players coughed up 750 chips to see the flop. One of them was LuckyFlop, who got just that when holding KJ of diamonds - the flop came QTA, pure carbon crystals. One player, already pot committed, went all in, the second called, and you can work the rest out for youself.

They say the odds on getting a Royal Flush are about 650,000-1, and that a poker player can expect to get one 0.15 times in his lifetime. I reckon that means I'll probably never even *see* one again, never mind get one, but at least I was able to grab a screenshot of it; and here it is - probably the last time I'll ever see a Royal Flush. But all credit to LuckyFlop - nice hand, that man.

So, what else is new? The Poker Academy Forum is coming along nicely, and we've already built up a nice little community of players, after all of four days. Join us. JOIN US. Seriously. Join the forum. It's great, and it's getting greater - we've got some really excellent stuff lined up for it in the next few weeks; so keep an eye on it! And right now, (in addition to actual, factual screenshots of that real life Royal Flush), we've got a hand history for my first ever multitable win (why not study my game, note my tactics, then use it to beat me? I'm practically *giving* you my money here...), and the first installment in what will be a long-running series - THE HAND CLINIC, where we offer manicures, wart removals... oh. Hofinger's telling me I've got it wrong; apparently it's a place where you can submit hands that you've played (or seen), and then the Academy will analyse the plays and discuss the best tactics to use. Yes, that does make more sense than an online nail bar... good idea, Hofinger!

All that, and much more to come in the next few weeks. Watch this space, as they say.

Community News...and a ROYAL FLUSH!

2004-11-24T09:28:00.000-08:00

Hello... just a quick post to let you know that there is now an email address for The Poker Academy, which is...

thepokeracademy@gmail.com

And if that wasn't enough excitement for one day, try this -

THE POKER ACADEMY FORUM!!!

Yeah, you heard me.

28/11/04 - EDIT - The forum's growing quickly - and we've already got one member who had a royal flush this week, and a screenshot of ANOTHER royal flush that another member saw just now. Want to know what a Royal Flush looks like? Click this link for the screenshot!

And huge congratulations to LuckyFlop, who was the player who pickedup that not-even-once-in-a-lifetime hand. And yes, he did flop it!

(And Lucky, if you're reading this, come to the forum and tell us about it - we could use players like you in the Academy!)

Poker is the New Porn! Join the Academy

2004-11-23T04:19:00.000-08:00

The internet may well be making the world smaller and bringing people closer together but until not so long ago, when they got together, all they seemed to want to do was swap sexually explicit material. Whilst I am not going to suggest that this would ever have becoming boring there can be little doubt that people were ready for another reason to sit staring at their screens in darkened rooms for hours on end.

Poker has given them that reason! Its not hard to see why its so popular, anyone who has played for any amount of time can appreciate the thrill of playing for real money! A gambler once told me that winning money was the most exhilarating experience but that losing money was the next most exhilarating! Gambling appeals to all of us in some way- if it didn’t the lottery jackpot would be a couple of hundred pounds worth of premium bonds - but anyone who has played Poker for long enough knows its only a gamble if you're crap at it, and that if you are good you can actually earn a living.

There are not many pastimes you can turn professional with low start up costs from your own bedroom whilst being able to decide which hours you work and still earn as much and often more than you would in a 9-5 wage slave office position, and I know that some of you will be thinking porn again! Poker does offer these sorts of possibilities and not unlike the Porn industry the more people that are getting fucked the more money there is in it!

Anybody just becoming involved in poker, whether they are hoping to make pin money or turn pro will hardly need telling that its a growing community. Expanding coverage on the television, space in broadsheets and an ever increasing percentage of Billboard advertising being dedicated to fuel this growth, means that new people are getting involved daily, and I would like to hear from people who love Poker and want to encourage a free exchange of ideas and knowledge, believe it or not the reason the Internet was conceived!

The idea of the academy is that by pooling the resources of the good players, swapping notes on strategy and advising on which sites and books have helped improve our play, as well as letting each other know where to find it on television and even down to where people are interested in playing live or online against each other, hopefully we can give each other an advantage and improve our winnings.

Enough from me - lights, camera, action... shoot!