Party Poker World Open IV !!!!11!1
This contains spoilers so if you do want to hang on the edge of your seat for 6 months until this is televised then look away now ...
So as I have mentioned elsewhere, I took my reservations about playing poker on TV, stuffed them into a small box and jumped up and down on the lid so they will never escape. Never ! And coughed up for the latest Matchroom/Channel 5 production, which is being filmed in East London this week. I turned up just as the Celeb heat was wrapping up, which was totally worthwhile for the purposes of ogling the two female players who were both smoking hot :-) Then there was a ton of hanging around, which I did expect to be fair, before Jesse did the intros and described me as an "anorak". TBH I would have been on firmer ground to contest this if I hadn't been sitting in the corner reading a fantasy novel at the time. Once we were ushered onto the set I did have an attack of the nerves, it was a lot like when I used to play football before a big game (as big as they got in College 2nd XI anyway). So much so that I couldn't remember my screen-name on Betfair when another player asked me, and they had to shoot an intro twice because I couldn't grasp the fairly straightforward instruction to follow the previous player onto the set.
I was still a bit edgy for the first level but settled down after I took the blinds once or twice. It was super hot under the lights which also took some getting used to. However, as the blinds moved up, once we were in resteal and then pushbot territory I was fine because I had played these spots 1000 times before online so I was much more comfortable with that than the other players I think. I'll save any hand discussion for the airdate, but long story short I won hooray. So I'll be back on Thursday for the semi-final which should be really interesting.
The other players were all friendly and really nice guys, with one exception, and everyone who was there will know who I mean, who was giving out huge "I don't want to fucking be here" vibes so I just let him get on with it. In particular Min Patel, the "Celeb qualifier" was very friendly and clearly took his poker very seriously. He was proud to tell me that he won the Party $300K last year, and justifiably so. I didn't have the heart to tell him I've won it twice :-). But if I had been asked to pick the "celeb" sight unseen I would have struggled, and then got it wrong, definitely.
Now I'm in the comfortable position of waiting to see who else makes the semis. If you're interested, they're doing live updates on the Matchroom Forum. I will probably pop down again on Monday as there are two heats and a turbo semi, and you can see all the hole cards in the Green Room [1]. Now that does sound anoraky I admit. But I have $40K equity in this thing at the moment so I think a few hours homework is well in order !
Update : I just had a look on that Forum and I see Jesse has described me a cross between Neil Channing and Annette Obrestad, lol. That's a bit more flattering than an anorak. I think. Seriously I like Jesse and you can see how good he is at his job when you're there, whatever you think of his commentating style (and I don't mind it).
[1] I don't know how previous shows have worked, but in this one active players were not allowed to sneak into the Green Room to check hands before they were knocked out, and quite right too.
So as I have mentioned elsewhere, I took my reservations about playing poker on TV, stuffed them into a small box and jumped up and down on the lid so they will never escape. Never ! And coughed up for the latest Matchroom/Channel 5 production, which is being filmed in East London this week. I turned up just as the Celeb heat was wrapping up, which was totally worthwhile for the purposes of ogling the two female players who were both smoking hot :-) Then there was a ton of hanging around, which I did expect to be fair, before Jesse did the intros and described me as an "anorak". TBH I would have been on firmer ground to contest this if I hadn't been sitting in the corner reading a fantasy novel at the time. Once we were ushered onto the set I did have an attack of the nerves, it was a lot like when I used to play football before a big game (as big as they got in College 2nd XI anyway). So much so that I couldn't remember my screen-name on Betfair when another player asked me, and they had to shoot an intro twice because I couldn't grasp the fairly straightforward instruction to follow the previous player onto the set.
I was still a bit edgy for the first level but settled down after I took the blinds once or twice. It was super hot under the lights which also took some getting used to. However, as the blinds moved up, once we were in resteal and then pushbot territory I was fine because I had played these spots 1000 times before online so I was much more comfortable with that than the other players I think. I'll save any hand discussion for the airdate, but long story short I won hooray. So I'll be back on Thursday for the semi-final which should be really interesting.
The other players were all friendly and really nice guys, with one exception, and everyone who was there will know who I mean, who was giving out huge "I don't want to fucking be here" vibes so I just let him get on with it. In particular Min Patel, the "Celeb qualifier" was very friendly and clearly took his poker very seriously. He was proud to tell me that he won the Party $300K last year, and justifiably so. I didn't have the heart to tell him I've won it twice :-). But if I had been asked to pick the "celeb" sight unseen I would have struggled, and then got it wrong, definitely.
Now I'm in the comfortable position of waiting to see who else makes the semis. If you're interested, they're doing live updates on the Matchroom Forum. I will probably pop down again on Monday as there are two heats and a turbo semi, and you can see all the hole cards in the Green Room [1]. Now that does sound anoraky I admit. But I have $40K equity in this thing at the moment so I think a few hours homework is well in order !
Update : I just had a look on that Forum and I see Jesse has described me a cross between Neil Channing and Annette Obrestad, lol. That's a bit more flattering than an anorak. I think. Seriously I like Jesse and you can see how good he is at his job when you're there, whatever you think of his commentating style (and I don't mind it).
[1] I don't know how previous shows have worked, but in this one active players were not allowed to sneak into the Green Room to check hands before they were knocked out, and quite right too.
3 Comments:
Who else was in your heat Andy?
And as for the anorak comment, definitely time for the offensive t-shirt in the semis... that should sort.
WD on the result.
Craig Burgess, Dave Gregory, Porfiris Lytras, Luke Patten, Min Patel.
Cheers ; I don't think the offensive T-shirts are coming out just yet. We'll see what they say next time :-)
Lionel Hutz
AHhhhhhhhhhh why were you not wearing our top!!!!
Good luck in the semi mate
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