Not enough talking Katja into a game to high for our bankroll and skill (the $200/400 disaster last Monday) but the very next day I went to our new "friendly" Omaha High Pot Limit game in town. It is played with 500 table stake and 10/20/40 blinds (40 being the usal live straddle) but other than in our Holdem PL game here many players buying in for large amounts, like 3-5k. Also this is not exactly an "easy game" as there are at least 3 full time pros (and I mean online Omaha PL professionals) like Minh, Thang Duc Nguyen (EPT Baden winner) and Paymen. Add strong players like Tony Vardjawand, Katja and highly successful and skilled player Benjamin Kang and you see you're not exactly in DeadMoneyLand. Feeling I still have an edge (lol) I followed the call of "Don Koopeone" who is in every cash game on the planet since his large winning in the Sunday Million and in charge of the live Omaha scene in Hamburg.

Frank "Don Koopeone" Koopman

Right from the start I lost - after a few minutes I flopped top set Aces and lost vs. some ridicoulus draw (backdoor straight, 8 high flush draw) and it went down this way all night - long story short I lost more than 10k euros (Sebastian Luckbox winning more than half of that) and the only reason it was not a few thousand euros more was that I bluffed three players out of a big pot - and each had a better hand! Frank and Kai were all-in, I turned a set of eights on an Js-Ts-Ah-8s board and went all-in into an already large pot: Sebastian folded a set of tens, Jan-Peter Jachtmann folded a straight and Peymen folded a small flush. River was the last ten and I won vs. both all-in players a nice 5k pot.

A hand after 10 minutes of play - Omaha sharks, come to Hamburg!

Btw, there have been some speculations about the amount we lost in that 200/400 game last Monday - ridiculous amounts have been mentioned :D. Actually it was exactly 38 big bets, still enough, but not really that much for a shorthanded limit holdem game. We talked with Patriksjold about the game and the players and compared to the daily swings he sometimes has 38 BB are looking like a piece of cake. I looked up our PT database - overall there are only 4 sessions with 927 hands in the $200/400 game (yet), net loss right now is $5,328 or 13 BB. [***Edit*** I had some of Katja's PT stats publsiehd here but she asked me to remove them ***] ... - so thank you all so much for your offers but we don't need your financial help yet ;). And yes, we might go broke by playing there but not exactly tomorrow ;)

On Wednesday Casino Schenefeld held their first monthly €400 buyin tournament. It was not well known yet so only 26 players showed up but some of those are among the toughest you can find here in North Germany. I busted in about 15th place and was so tired that I left the (smaller) Omaha PL game they had after I won my tournament buyin (lol). While I was sleeping at midnight Katja went on to win the tournament and ease my bankroll pain :D.

Let me pimp my buddies from www.hochgepokert.tv here - they are doing a great job in reporting from WPT Las Vegas!   

Yesterday we had a very unpleasant experience - we have been dominated by player "Pokkermon" on PokerStars. When I came home Katja was playing the 100/200 game and was having a good comeback after a swingful day. Watching her for a while I suggested to take another shot at 200/400 - Katja has done a few so far and they have all been ok or even good. So we decided to sit and play togehter, talking some strategy and exchanging knowledge and thoughts about the players and situations. So far so good, Katja won a few hands and we have almost been ready to stand up and finish for the day when the unavoidable happened - we lost a large key pot vs. a two outer on the river. There was no steaming or tilt but we stayed.

Owned by Pokkermon

Pokkermon had direct position on us (playing 3-5 handed) and suddenly started playing us - I mean directly. Every time Katja raised he reraised, putting in every possible bet the whole way. I guess Katja is the only player there able to lay down hands like bottom pair/weak kicker (at least it fealt like this lol) and he took advantage of that. Add a few better hands, a few suckouts on turn and river, a few missed monster draws like AsJc of spades on a 9s-Ts-Qs board which lost vs hands like 3-3 and you get the picture. This lasted for about an hour.

A friend told us that 'Pokkermon' is a shared account between two guys and one of them is the famous "Texas Limit King" (TLK) - no idea if this is true but that guy played good - better than we, at least yesterday night. Without really wanting to he made us change our game style, becoming to passive and not raising enough. Whenever we tried to break out of this bad style with hands like KQs he called us down with like 5-2 on a T-J-2-7-6 board after raising the flop, calling a third bed and raising the turn, calling a third bet there also. Pretty good reads. I am not saying there was any luck involved, he played perfectly. That does not fealt good but motivated us again to improve our limit holdem game (in fact it fealt terrible). Had a few hands turned out different the result would have been different, sure, but thats not the point. We got to add strategys to handle such situations to our arsenal. Even worse, it was not personal. He just played his style, exploiting every weakness without any long thinking. Sigh.

A friend mailed me this link where guys have their usual monthly "hottest chick" thread on 2+2. Looks like this:

More true words have never been found.

My poker life is much boring - I win small live tourmaments, dominate the seldom holdem and omaha cash games to which I go by playing totally unpredictable and hitting some cards and otherwise dream about the WSOP experience this year. Only a few weeks left until we go - actually I start by playing the very first event, a mixed FL/NL holdem $5,000 event. They play 30 minutes of  each there. No idea how this will work out but as I am playing both games perfectly these days (see what hitting two pair with 74o can make out of you? ;) I really don't care. My WSOP excel sheet is a wet dream, I have planned for not only one event a day, no, on most days I plan to play two events! My plan includes playing the 5 p.m. event even if am still in the noon event - is this crazy? What am I going to do if I reach any second day? Or god beware, make the third day in one? Play like 6 events at the same time?? Well, the answer is - YES!! Damn, give me a super satellite and a laptop, too! I'm hot!

Calming down I watch Katja play limit holdem $100/200 here and then and she is cleaning the game right now. I don't even discuss hands with her anymore as there are so rare situations that I believe to know something better than she is and that must be a hell lot as her results this year are tremendously. I need to keep her out of the higher games (where really though opponents are sitting) by applying brute force sometime :D

Yesterday I went to local Casino Schenefeld for the first in a few weeks again. Katja, my mother and I had a nice and extended dinner before and arrived in time to play the local tournament. The have modified the rules a little, giving now 2,500 chips instead of 1,500 and now 20 minute level time instead of the 15 before. Tis way it took over an hour to bust the first of the 19 players, not many playing because of the easter weekend I guess.

I made it to 7th place, not being able to play a single hand on the "final table". I was all-in in my BB and lost. I went to the cash game directly, 10/20 pot limit holdem. I had enough of folding and played like crazy, re-raising with hands like 75o, calling re-raises with 74s and the like. To make a long stoy short, I absolutly killed the table.

Hassan arrived to the table and when we talked a little he told me that he would like me arrange a "revenge session" with those young players to whom he obvious lost a large chunk during the recent tournament days. Those are namely Sebastian Ruthenberg, "Seri" and Patrick "patrikskjold". I remember that Hassan went "broke" there soon so he got to take a 10-minute break to pick up like 70,000 euros at home. Apparently the session went not good for him overall but he liked the action (many have played with 5,000+ tablestakes). So boys, if you want some more action contact me - Hassan will play. And given how I run lately I will probably also join the action :D

Seri und Patrick 

Talking about upcoming weeks I have nothing scheduled except office work so expect it to be kind of quite here. On May 31st this will change as we will head for the WSOP then, starting the action with the $5,000 mixed NL/FLH event (no clue how this works btw) the first day.