Tzen

Feeling young, getting old.

Mar 062013

2,5 weeks ago I grabbed my bike for the first outdoor ride of the year. In those 2,5 weeks I’ve done 7 rides, every day I wake up and go to bed with cycling on my mind and in those 7 rides I have already broken all my personal records. Today I stayed home because I strained my back on Monday after an intense ride on my bike, it’s the same feeling which I had 11/13 years ago when I had a hernia surgery at the age of 17 and a second hernia (no surgery) at the age of 19. I’m motivated to get back on the bike but I’m worried as well.

180 Days:
Start: 14-01-13
End: 12-07-13
Days left: 129

Poker
Goal: 500h
Pace: 144,4h
Played: 112,03h
Remaining: 387,97h

I don’t want to write to much about poker today. Fact is that I should avoid sitting as much as possible but I do feel the urge to write a small blog. I’m 32,4 hours behind schedule which is 4 full days of poker. I’m not happy about it but it’s also not as bad as it looks. I’ve worked 3 days extra at my job which makes up for 24hrs less poker and I will make up those 3 days somewhere in the coming months. Also I’ve worked yesterday which is normally my poker day but instead I’m off on Friday so those are the other 8 hours. This means that if I do what I have to do I’m actually on pace. The only worry is that I wanted to be ahead of pace because of upcoming holidays in the latter part of my challenge. I got to work a bit harder but I’m actually pretty happy with how things are going because the only reason I’m not ahead is because I’m cycling so much and that’s the only acceptable excuse to not be ahead of pace.

The results are okay so far. I think I’m so far break-even on the tables for the year after several ups and downs and at LHE this ain’t so bad because of the high percentage of rake we pay. The 95billion milestone hand promo created a lot of action on the cashgames and I tried to play as much as possible during the promo to try and hit a milestone bonus. This resulted in sometimes playing too much tables but overall these tables were way softer than normal. It’s definitely the greatest promo for cashgames and I can’t wait for the 100billion promo which will probably be even bigger than the previous milestone promo’s. The 7th anniversary Sunday Million promo was also really sick. A 7million guaranteed price pool and a 1million guaranteed first price is sick already but getting almost 50.000 entries, almost a 10million price pool and after a deal 3 players who won over $800.000 is just really really sick. My twitter timeline is full of people playing live events, there are many more online events already scheduled like the MicroMillions (14-24 March) and SCOOP (12-26 May) so poker ain’t dead for sure and I’m still very happy to sit down and play my beloved LHE cashgames 🙂

Lifestyle
Alcohol: 0
Start: 104,7kg
Goal: 95kg
Pace: 101,9kg
Current: 99,7kg
Remaining: 4,7kg

At this moment this is the most difficult part of my 180 day challenge. The first 4/5 weeks not drinking was fine but last Friday was the first evening I was really annoyed I couldn’t drink a beer with my buddies. We were in the pub and around 23:30 I was really done with it. I don’t always need alcohol to have fun but this was one of those evenings which would have been way more fun if I could have a drink. The next morning I went cycling and felt better than ever on the bike so I remembered again why I’m not drinking which was good to put things in perspective. I wasn’t really close to grab a beer but when I start feeling annoyed more often I’m not sure what’s going to happen. 129 days to come, 18 weekends and a lot of evenings to come which will tempt me to start drinking!

I was also getting pretty frustrated about my weight. On the 3rd of February I was 101.8kg but 15 days later I was still 101.3kg so not much happened while I’m not drinking and I was eating healthy. The 16th of February I started cycling outdoors and out of the blue I dropped to exactly 100kg so I was really happy. I couldn’t wait to see 99,5 – 99 – 98,5 but somehow this didn’t happen while most days I stayed below 2.000 calories and I definitely should burn more than that, especially on those days which I cycle. I’m still pretty clueless why I’m not losing more weight but after two weeks staying above the 100kg mark the last two days I’m again below 100kg and I hope that this time it stays this way. Not losing as much weight could indicate I’m gaining some muscle and losing fat is more important anyway then losing weight. However when cycling in the mountains the thing that counts the most are kilo’s and I really want to be < 95kg. There are 129 days left to lose more weight, I’ve reached the first milestone which was < 100kg and I can see that I’ve lost weight by looking at the mirror and looking at my clothes so I’m on the right path!

Cycling
Morning exercise: Avg 3* week
1st at my own strava segment: Not yet
Scheveningen in 2h 40m: Done on 4-3-2013 in 2:39:02
Finish AGR 150km: Not yet
Alp d’Huez in 1,5h: Not yet
Finish Galibier: Not yet

So on the 16th I grabbed my bike for the first outdoor ride of the year together with Eric and Peter. 46,3km on the bike, cold and windy but happy and smiling. The 18th again, another 44km, the 22nd again, trying to break some Strava Segment records with Eric with a temperature of minus zero and a lot of wind. The 23rd a 58km ride while it was still windy and really freezing, a bit too cold actually. 3 days later again on the bike but when I got home I strained my back a little for the first time this year.

I felt fine again last weekend so went for a big ride together with Eric, Klaas and Jeffrey. Rondje Ringvaart, which is a 60km long dike with very few crossings and traffic. Two buddies went a day earlier and did it in 2:07:52 and we were challenged to break that record. While Klaas and Jeffrey hadn’t trained a lot yet, Eric and myself did and were feeling extremely fit. We took the lead for most of the ride and Jeffrey had to give up after roughly 70% of the ride. Klaas kept going but since Eric and I wanted to break the records after 85% we basically sprinted all the way to the finish together and clocked 2:03:14. I never expected that this early in the season I would already be this fit. So happy, so pleased, so fit and feeling so young!

Last Monday suddenly the weather changed and you could feel spring just started. The only thing I could think about was to get on the bike and ride in the sun for the first time this year. One of my 180 days goals was to go solo to Scheveningen and back in 2hr 40m and I wanted to see how far I was already. At the start of the ride I could feel I was still recovering from Saturday but somehow my pace wasn’t slower than normal. 3hr 07m 15s was my previous solo record and I expected to end up around 2hr 50m. Halfway I checked my time and saw roughly 1hr 20m on the clock, pretty good but normally the average goes down and not up so I didn’t think 2hr 40m would be possible, especially since I wasn’t really feeling fit at the start. I kept the pressure on the pedals, tried to do the best I could and was hoping for 2hr 45m. I crossed the finish line in 2hr 39m 2s, wowzers! I hoped to complete this goal somewhere at the end of the 180 days challenge but already completed it after 50. So happy, so pleased, so fit and feeling so young!

When I came home the 95billion milestone was only 4 million hands away so I had to sit down immediately to start play poker. I did jump into the shower first but 10minutes later I was playing 24 tables and played for roughly 1,5hrs. I didn’t play 24tables for a long time but I wanted to increase my chances to hit the big milestone hand, needless to say it was a pretty intense session. After the 95billion hand was dealt I wanted to get out of my office chair but hardly could, fuck! The same thing that happened a week earlier only this time a bit more pain. I tried to sit down as little as possible for the rest of the day but had planned to play some more poker during the evening which I did. The next day (yesterday) I had to work, which means sitting down a lot. The pain felt way worse than last week and when I felt that my leg hurt as well I got really worried since that is a typical hernia symptom. I stayed home today, stayed in bed till 13:00 and tried to sit as little as possible. I went for a walk which is a good idea since it’s important to keep moving as well but I was pretty tired after an hour, a big difference with how I felt after riding my bike, breaking records on Saturday and Monday. I hope that rest will take the pain away and that I can get back on the bike as soon as possible but I’m also afraid to push my body more and more since I know what 5 months stuck in bed feels like. I’m not sure how I should continue, no way that I’m giving up on my cycling goals for this year, especially since it’s going so great. I also know that when this feeling doesn’t go away or keeps coming back that I can’t continue to put more pressure on my body, since I don’t only need my back for cycling!

The weather forecast for this weekend looks pretty bad which might turn out to be a good thing. I’m going back to work tomorrow again unless the pain has gotten worse when I wake up. I was a little worried about injuries when I started this challenge and after the great start I really didn’t expect to hit one already this early. I know that when getting older it often takes more time to recover but I hope to be back on the bike as soon as possible. I’m definitely keeping a closer eye on what I’m doing after an intense ride, sitting for long is definitely a bad idea. The 24th of March I have a 120km tour planned, the 30rd a 150km one and the 13th of April it’s time for the 150km Amstel Gold Race, I can’t wait but I’ll have to be careful with my back as well 🙁

Two steps forward, one step back.

Poker 2 Responses »

Feb 042013

My to-do list is packed with stuff and somewhere on the list is writing a blog. There is just so much else to do but I think that it’s important that I write this blog today. I don’t only write it for you readers but also as a bit of self reflection and since I can’t say things have been going perfect I think it’s important to write this blog. Hopefully I’ll learn from it myself 😉

180 Days:
Start: 14-01-13
End: 12-07-13
Days left: 159

Poker
Goal: 500h
Pace: 58,3h
Played: 60,36h
Remaining: 439,64h

So I’m ahead by 2 hours which might look good but I’m not happy at all with how things have been going. Two weeks ago I had a proper week of poker but last weekend I already dropped the ball. I had a weekend away planned with 29 others and my idea was to go back on Sunday evening so I could play a full Monday and Tuesday. I already regretted the fact I would miss most of the TCOOP but the weekend away was planned way in advance so there was nothing to do about it. Friday after dinner I decided to play the LHE 6-max TCOOP since I didn’t want to miss that one but unfortunately the mobile reception wasn’t that great and I was timing out a lot. After the 3rd break I lost my reception completely and I was shortstacked and would receive both blinds right after the break. When I got my reception back I had only 6 blinds left and 3 hands later I busted 18 spots before the money. Playing on a mobile device is great but my advice is to only do it via WIFI or when you have a good reception to prevent frustrating moments when timing out 😉

In stead of going back on Sunday we went back Monday morning, were home Monday afternoon and when I got home my new mediaplayer (Popcorn Hour a-400) had arrived. I was a bit tired and didn’t want to play poker right away so I started playing with my new mediaplayer which resulted in no poker at all on Monday. On Tuesday basically the same happened also since I had to run a lot of errands that day. The stupid thing is that I can already predict these things to happen and I still let them happen. Somehow I’m not strong enough to do what I have to do first and I get distracted a lot by things which aren’t on my to-do list but seem more fun then playing poker or exercise.

This weekend my plan was to play poker on Saturday which didn’t happen at all due to all kind of things and yesterday I finally sat down again. I started a little later then planned but was doing fine till the moment my girlfriend came home. I was already planning to have a small break but I had the stupid idea to start watching a new TV-Series with her. We picked out House and I like the first episode so much that I wanted to watch another one. Going to bed afterwards seemed like the best plan so I only played 6 hours of poker in stead of the planned 10.

I hope by writing these things down it also becomes more clear to myself that things aren’t working out. I might be 2 hours ahead but saying this is something good would be lying to myself. The good thing is that the next coming 10 weeks I have nothing big planned during the weekends which means I could get into a rhtym for these 10 weeks and normally this is a great help. I also sort of commited myself to playing a lot since I signed up to get 300.000 VPPs by the end of the year. Now I didn’t want to make any VPP commitments this year but PokerStars runs a promotion in which you can earn money if you are on pace after the 1st and 2nd quarter. I need to get 75.000 VPPs before the 4th of April and I’m currently way behind which means I really have to grind the coming two months to get it. I doubted to change my goal to 200.000 because I’m pretty certain I’ll have 50.000 VPPs by the 4th of April but this would probably result in aiming exactly for 50.000 and nothing more. So 75.000 VPPs it is which seems very little compared to what I grinded out in previous years. However I’m playing way less tables and in stead of getting 750+ VPPs/hr nowadays I’m happy to get 350+. I’m also planning for a weekend to do nothing else then poker and I’m confident I’ll push myself to achieving my goals. Normally when doing challanges like this the start is the easiest but maybe it’s not even that bad that I started of with some hick-ups, it’s still early enough to turn things around!

Lifestyle
Alcohol: 0
Start: 104,7kg
Goal: 95kg
Pace: 103,6kg
Current: 101,3kg
Remaining: 6,3kg

So looking at the lifestyle part of the challenge things seem to be going fine. I have to say that staying away from alcohol was pretty easy so far. When we arrived in the big house last weekend everybody was drinking but I was doing fine with some cola light and water. It was also pretty easy to stay away from all the chips and candy but that changed the next day. On Saturday I started eating way to much bad food, there was just too much of it around the house. Somewhere in the back of my mind I was thinking: “I’m already not drinking, I’m not going to force myself eating healthy all weekend as well”. It wasn’t that bad but till that weekend I was losing a small bit of weight every day but when I came back I had gained a little. However at home I have no problem with my healthy lifestyle and I’m again losing a bit of weight every day. 101.3kg really looks good already, with a bit of luck I’m already <100kg by next week but for sure before my next blog! The weirdest part is probably that I’m hardly hungry while I’m eating 1500/1750 calories max every day. I’ll probably start eating a bit more as soon as I work-out more but I think so far the “lifestyle” part of the challenge is going by far the best.

Cycling
Morning exercise: Avg 3* week
1st at my own strava segment: Not yet
Scheveningen in 2h 40m: Not yet
Finish AGR 150km: Not yet
Alp d’Huez in 1,5h: Not yet
Finish Galibier: Not yet

As with poker I also skipped the spinning lessons last week mostly because of lame excuses. While being away for the weekend I skipped my morning exercises as well but since this week I’m already back on track. Friday we had our first “France” group meeting in which we are planning our trip to the Alps. I really want to outperform myself this year in cycling but for that I need to do a lot of training. Today it’s probably the first good day to cycle outside but if it’s raining taking spinning classes in the gym should be the alternative. Sunday morning I had set my alarm at 09:00 to go spinning at 10:15 and I really hated to wake up that early on Sunday. It was however my best spinning class so far so I was pretty happy that I went to the gym. Also on Saturday and today I picked up my morning exercises again and I can see that I’m improving. The plan is still to go spinning on Tuesday and Thursday the only threat to this is work. The spinning class starts at 19:00 and it’s currently really busy at work but I should be able to make it. If it’s not work there shouldn’t be any other excuses for not going!

We also planned at least one organised ride each month:
Sunday 24 February – 75km Snel – Ontwakingstocht
Sunday 24 March – 120km Omloop van Zandvoort
Saturday 30 March – 150km TBD
Saturday 13 April – 150km Amstel Gold Race
Sunday 5 May – 110km Classico Boretti
Saturday 15 June – TBD Mountain training

So there is plenty to look forward for. If we are a bit lucky with the weather this is going to be a great year! All in all things are at least already a lot better than last year. It’s two steps forward, one step back but in the end I’ll get there!

So it begins! My 180 day countdown.

Poker, Social 2 Responses »

Jan 212013

After coming back from the PCA it was time to change a lot of things in my day to day life. A couple of weeks ago I already wrote about my 180 days no alcohol propbet, but it’s much more then that! It’s not about the alcohol, it’s more about playing more poker and getting back into shape. So yes one of the goals is to not drink any alcohol, but my main goal is to play 500 hours of poker in those 180 days, lose a lot of weight and get fit so I’m able to cycle up Alp d’Huez in a new personal record.

180 Days:
Start: 14-01-13
End: 12-07-13
Days left: 173

Poker
Goal: 500h
Pace: 19,4h
Played: 42,81h
Remaining: 457,19h

My goal is pretty simple, play 500 hours of poker, live or online in 180 days. I’m cheating a bit since I started counting the hours from the 1st of January but I’ve only played 11 hours before the 14th of January so that’s not a huge advantage. I’m ahead of schedule but next week I’m away the whole weekend and I have more weekends away planned already so being ahead of pace doesn’t say much. This challenge comes down to roughly 20 hours a week or 2,8 hours a day. Doable for sure but it’s not about doing it for 1 week, I have to do it for 180 days. I didn’t set any VPP or monetary goals and so far this has paid off. Last week I’ve played LHE cashgames, MTTs, Sats and Hyper Turbo SNG’s. I’ve 1 tabled and 16 tabled and enjoyed playing pretty much all the time.

I’ve played LHE cashgames most of the time and things haven’t worked out that well. I’m playing $2/$4 6-max and any full-ring table up to $5/$10. The sample is still small but I would have hoped to do a bit better since I’m playing less tables.

For sure I’m running hot on the $2/$4 Full-Ring tables since that winrate isn’t sustainable but I’m hoping as well that I’m running bad at all other stakes. My overall BB/100 is 1.44 which would be very good so I’m just holding on to that. Yesterday was a really good day at the cashgames, winning $950 so let the hotrun continue 🙂 I did have to host 5 TCOOP final tables yesterday as well so I had to mix playing and hosting which wasn’t optimal for my focus and multitable skills. I also played all the NL TCOOP events and all the deadline satellites but I bricked all of them. In the two Hyperturbo sats I bubbled twice, stone cold with a mandatory all-in from the SB (AT < 77, QQ < KK) where both I would have made it if I would have won the hand. I was really card dead in all MTTs/Sats I played, the opposite of what was happening at my cashgames. Means I’m down for the year in MTTs/SNGs/Sats but I’ve only been playing for one week.

My PC died on me Friday when I was playing some MTTs and that didn’t happen for over a year. I did a Windows Update (patches) just before my session so that was probably the reason. My laptop battery was dead as well and you can only play 4 tables max on your mobile so it was pretty frustrating, especially if 2 of those tourneys are hyper MTTs. After 15 minutes or so I got my laptop to work again but busted every tournament in the 30 minutes after, except the $5 freezout! So I was 1 tabling on my laptop and busted in 41st place, 2.5 hours after busting all the other tournaments, FML! While 1 tabling I was fixing my PC which seemed to work out. On Saturday I had the brilliant idea to test my PC by playing $3 Hyper-Turbo Sats. Playing 8-12 tables, putting some pressure on my PC seemed like a great idea. After the 1st 100 I was down and well, nobody likes to finish down so I kept on playing. I was definitely to loose at the 1st blind level and had to adjust to the bubble play, paying more attention to the stack sizes but in the end I did manage to end with some profit. I did have to play 432 Hypers but it was fun and I might try another session in the coming days/weeks.

Lifestyle
Alcohol: 0
Start: 104,7kg
Goal: 95kg
Pace: 104,3kg
Current: 102,6kg
Remaining: 7,6kg

The day I got back from the PCA I was actually 105.9kg. This was without any sleep which normally is roughly 1kg difference. The next morning I was 104,7kg so that’s the weight I will start this challenge with. I’m currently already 102,6kg which is 2.1kg less in just one week. That’s pretty standard for the first week and I shouldn’t expect to keep this up, 0,7kg a week would be fine and doable until I reach the 95kg. 93kg is my ultimate goal but I didn’t want to push it too much so I’ll leave my goal at 95kg. Of course I didn’t drink any alcohol so far this week. I did have a b-day party of one of my best friends who turned 30 but since this is still the first week it was pretty easy to stay away from alcohol. My friends were pretty happy with it as well since I could drive them 😉 Next week going away for the whole weekend will be a bit more difficult but I still just started so doubt it will get super difficult. In total I’ve bet for $350 which should keep me away from making any exceptions in these 180 days. I’m eating pretty healthy and I’m surprised that I’m not hungry at all so far. I’m eating way less than before but I guess my body has plenty of fat in reserve 😉 So far so good but it’s about the long stretch, not just the results of one week.

I was planning to start last Tuesday with spinning in the gym but the weather was really bad so I didn’t get out of the house. I made up some more lame excuses on Thursday and during the weekend so I’ve not started cycling yet. Tomorrow I hope to start but the weather is again pretty bad, guess I have to do it anyway. I hope the cold weather / snow goes away asap since I would prefer to cycle outside at least during the weekend, we’ll see. I did start doing morning exercises and I still hate them but I did do them every day I planned to do them. The idea is to do them each day I don’t have to work, which means I’ll do them Sat-Tue. It’s a combination of stretches, ab exercises and push-ups. I prefer to wake up and jump behind my computer to check Facebook, Twitter and forums but nowadays I start with getting my heart rate up to 150+. I already see some improvement and I hope that these exercises will keep me fit during these 180 days, old people have to stretch 😉

Other stuff

I also wanted to mention some other stuff which hasn’t got anything to do with my 180 day countdown. First of all Andre Coimbra’s short film has been released, check it out below!

He also started his $100 -> $100k MTT challenge in which he will donate any money won to charity. You can follow the challenge on his blog and check out the video below for some extra info:

As you can see his girlfriend is featuring in his videos and she also plays poker. Andre learned her to play hyper sats and in December she won $20k and made it to Supernova! She keeps a blog as well and I think it’s a great read.

I added two other blogs to my blogroll as well. Both AWice and MouldyOnions are trying to set a new yearly VPP record. Actually they want to go way beyond that and reach 8M VPPs within 1 year. I think this is pretty nuts and currently they are racing to be the first SNE of 2013 (Check out PokerStarsblog to see what’s it all about) after AWice won the race to being the first SN of 2013. MouldyOnions is currently ahead with 629.455 VPPs and AWice is having a huge downswing and currently 2nd at 464.928 VPPs. Seems like Mouldy will be reaching SNE within 1 month which would be pretty insane, especially since up till now he has profit playing hypers as well! Check out their blogs.

Last thing I wanted to add is that since last week you can also subscribe to my blog. In case you want to receive an e-mail as soon as I publish a new blog you can leave your e-mail address at the top right of my website and I will promise to only e-mail you once after I finished another blog post.

I guess that’s it for this week. I should be blogging once every two weeks and I hope I’m still on pace by then! Cya

Highlights of the PCA2013!

Social 3 Responses »

Jan 182013

I’m back home and a couple of hours ago it just started to snow! I would love to have spent a couple of more days at the Bahamas, this was probably the best poker trip I had so far. It wasn’t one thing in particular, it was the combination of all things that made it perfect. Being back home isn’t that bad either, it’s time to start getting into shape and play poker but first I want to show you my highlights of this year’s PCA!

After a pretty easy flight via Atlanta we arrived at the Bahamas around 20:00. We had a limo arranged by the PokerStars VIP Club picking us up and when we arrived in the hotel Lobby some of my fellow Team Online colleagues were already waiting for me 😉 We quickly changed clothes in our room and my first Heineken already waited for me. It had been a year since I saw most of them but it was great to see everybody again. The next day we had a Team Online meeting where I got to meet the new guys, Rohit “GodlikeRoy” Bhasin, Caio “Pessagno” Pessagno, Isaac “Ike Haxton” Haxton & Tatiana ‘Mysters_Y’ Barausova. We all talked about what we had done last year and what our plans were for this year and that alone was already really inspiring. Talking poker just makes me feel like I want to play and because all my friends hardly play poker anymore I normally get pulled out of the “poker zone” pretty quick. Scott “UnMarketing” Stratten did a presentation about social media and since I’m a social media addict this was a pretty welcome meeting topic. Later that evening it was time for some drinks with the team and after Kevin’s (WizardOfAhhs) girlfriend shouted: “Shots, Shots, Shots” things went downhill pretty fast 🙂 I could go on and on about what happened everyday but I’ll try to stick with the highlights from now:

Pool
After breakfast each day started either with tennis or the pool. Two years ago the weather at the Bahamas wasn’t that great. I brought my girlfriend that year and wanted to play a lot of poker so didn’t had a lot of time to hang out with her. Luckily my best buddy brought his girlfriend as well since when the sun isn’t shining you would get bored pretty quick during the day all by yourself. Last year the weather was great but this year it was awesome! 27C, sun and not a lot of wind. I love hanging out at the pool and it makes the whole PCA experience just so much better. My appetite for playing poker during the day also completely disappears when the sun is out, not sure if that’s a good thing but I didn’t really mind!

Tennis
I really wanted to play as much Tennis as possible this year. I brought my own racket and knew Frosty would also bring his. The first day we had the Team Online meeting so the second day we agreed to play at 10:00 during our Team Online drinks the night before. We made a small bet on who would win, knowing that Frosty was wasted that evening so probably had a small hangover at least. Unfortunately he didn’t show up, which meant losing the bet (we stated that pertty clear) but he didn’t really agree on that 😉 We both still wanted to play tennis so we challenged the Belgium PokerStars Team Pro’s, the De Meulder twins. I didn’t do any sports for 5 weeks and no tennis for 5/6 months and was really stiff. The match was pretty bad overall and we lost it but at least I was enjoying my time in the sun 🙂 The next day we played our first singles and Frosty beat me pretty badass, 6-0 6-2. Happy he didn’t show up the day before when we had that bet 🙂 We continued to play every day and also did a Team Online doubles like last year. Vgreen was still on the team last year and he played like Rafael Nadal, this year he was replaced by GodLikeRoy. He hadn’t played any tennis for several years but was not as bad as we expected. Roy teamed with Shane “Shaniac” Schleger and Frosty and I teamed up as well. We won the first match with 6-1 and also won the re-match with 6-4, in which we all played way better. Playing tennis each day out in the sun is just such a good way to start you day. I really got a lot better, fitter and quicker during only one week. I really miss it now I’m back home 🙁

PA for a day
I won the MicroMillions III challenge vs Grzegorz “DaWarsaw” Mikielewicz so DaWarsaw would be my PA for a day. I think he was really afraid that I would make him do a lot of silly stuff but that wasn’t my plan at all. I didn’t say that obvious since the look on his face each time somebody mentioned the bet was way too much fun. We picked out Wednesday and he would be my PA from 10:00 till 22:00. The day before we did a short interview with Pokerstars.TV, check it out below:

So Wednesday after breakfast I handed out a great gift to DaWarsaw. He could wear my Dutch National Soccer Team shirt with my name on the back the whole day, so everybody would recognize that he was my bitch 😉

I think the shirt looked perfect on him. The next thing on the agenda was to go to the pool and chill a bit. DaWarsaw got me some towels, drinks whenever needed and played his role as PA perfect. The most fun part of the day was the part were Frosty and I played a game of tennis. I had never played a match with a ballboy but this was a truly amazing. The speed of the match is so much faster and the annoyance of running out of balls just doesn’t happen. DaWarsaw would cheer whenever I would win a game (not very often), made sure I had enough water and was running around all the time, probably more than I did. I was so happy I didn’t have to play his golf caddy for a day, winning such a small bet (I only beat him by $5) never felt this great 🙂

Obviously he carried my tennis gear back to my room, got me another drink and since we didn’t meet for dinner he was lucky I didn’t pull any stunts during the rest of the day. The bet really happened in good spirit and I hope we both come back next year to the PCA and have another fun bet!

Basketbal
DaWarsaw & I played a basketball match vs Frosty and RJ. We are both slow and tall guys, they are short and fast guys so it was an interesting match-up. We agreed to do a best out of 3, first to 7 points. I think during the total match they had run three times as much as we did and after winning the first game DaWarsaw could hardly run anymore, probably the heat got to him. We lost the second game and since these guys were outrunning us big time I didn’t really believe in it anymore. DaWarsaw and I talked some strategy for the 3th game but we still were 6-4 behind. Somehow we managed to turn it around and DaWarsaw finished it off with a beautiful swish from the deep corner. Such a sweet victory and we had a small bet for some beers which was very welcomed after the match!

Talonchick wins & Luske wins twice!
I didn’t play any poker at all but most others did. For me it just doesn’t make sense due to the Dutch tax laws but for most people this isn’t an issue. Adrienne “talonchick” Rowsome loves her mixed games and participated in the Triple Stud Event. Marcel Luske also made it to the final table but Adrienne was victorious making this a back-to-back win for her! Last year there was no trophy so this year she was extra happy, I think also because half of Team Online was rooting for her heads-up 🙂 Check here for more info.

Marcel Luske likes his Mixed games as well and after busting the Triple Stud final table without reaching the money he tried his luck in the H.O.R.S.E. event the next day. After busting Adrienne he managed to win heads-up vs our new Japanese Team Online member Naoya “nkeyno” Kihara! Marcel probably felt really good after all these mixed games because only a couple of days later he won the 8-game event as well! It’s really great to see him doing so well. Yes he can talk for hours and sure sometimes what he says hardly makes sense (Johan Cruijff of Poker is a good way to describe it) but after all these years he still has so much love for the game and he is one of the friendliest guys in poker. More info about his wins here and here.

Dinner at Nobu, twice!
Most of you know I love sushi and luckily at the Bahamas they have a great Sushi restaurant 🙂 They have other great dishes as well but I didn’t even check that part the menu. The first time Nobu we went with the Team Online group including +1’s and it was great fun to have the whole group together for dinner. Last year we did that at the last day of the PCA and I lost the credit card roulette so I was really happy I dodged it this year! Ordering the yellowtail jalapeno sashimi is a must and I couldn’t wait to order the lobster Roll, whoaha! You just can’t order anything that comes close where I’m from. The 2nd time Nobu we had a PokerStars country dinner with the Belgium and Dutch Team Pro’s. Charlotte wanted to try out the crispy rice roll (middle one) and it was officially crowned as the best sushi by the both of us, so we ordered it three times 😉

We didn’t only have group dinners at Nobu. Every night we went out for dinner with a big group, a great way to start the evening!

Party
I only stayed for 7 days this year so there wasn’t a lot of time to party. I arrived on Saturday but went to bed early and the club is only open Thu/Fri/Sat. Since I was flying home on Saturday I didn’t want to drink on Friday which meant Thursday would be the only night out in the club. The PokerStars party was on Sunday so I missed it and from what I’ve heard it was one of the best ones ever! Ah well, most of the evenings we just hung out in the hotel lobby or Plato’s which is fun as well since it is way easier to talk there. We knew we had to get our dancing shoes ready because Cammie would fly out from Miami again to meet us all. She is a good friend of Caleb who works at the PokerStars VIPClub club and we got to meet her last year and had great fun on the dance floor. On Thursday after dinner (see pic above) we went to the casino bar where they also have a small dance floor, check the results below:

When we go out my name changes to Crazylegs, at least Frosty always calls me that. I just can’t help myself, when there is music I got to move! We had a fun bunch to hang out with a mix of PokerStars employees (Carly, Shirley, Dylan & Caleb) and poker players and their +1’s (Charlotte, Marta, Frosty, DaWarsaw, RJ).

There should be a photo with more of us on it but I have no clue who took that one? So after the warm-up, we moved on to the club! I think more people were waiting for the club to open because it was pretty busy for a Thursday. I wasn’t really wasted but I can’t say I remember much 🙂 I probably had a lot of fun, because that’s what I remember. It was also the last day drinking alcohol for me (my 180 day bet started right after PCA) so it felt kind of weird. I ordered a lot of Heineken, some Tequila and probably no water and just danced as long as I could 🙂

All of the above made this year’s trip just perfect! I’m pretty certain I’ll be there next year again and hopefully a little longer so I don’t miss the PokerStars Party. It was really good to see everybody again and also to meet a lot of great new people. Thx everybody!

Team Online Contract renewed – Happy New Year!

Poker 1 Response »

Dec 312012

I’m not going to write a long blog entry at the last day of the year. 2012 was a great year but I’ve already wrote about all the stuff that happened in my previous blogs. I want to talk a little bit about poker and that’s it.

I’ll start with the good stuff! My contract with PokerStars Team: Online has been renewed for another year. This will be my 3th year and I can only say that I’m really honored. A lot of sponsor contracts were ended after Black Friday, not only at PokerStars, and I’m still a member of PokerStars Team: Online. It feels great to represent PokerStars another year since it’s still the #1 Poker website in the world! 2012 wasn’t a great poker year for me so that means that I’m even more happy since I wouldn’t have been surprised if PokerStars hadn’t renewed my contract. I feel bad about not pushing myself for playing more poker in 2012 and that’s why I’ve come up with my long list of New Year resolutions (see previous blog). I’m really eager to start grinding and if everything goes to plan I’ll start the 2nd of January. I have to interrupt my online grind with the PCA which isn’t really a punishment. I’m not playing the Main Event, I might not play any tournaments at all. The reason for this is the Dutch tax laws, after my 5th place at the MCOP I was really eager to play some more live tournaments and the PCA has a lot of good side events. I was thrilled to register for some of them but it’s just not doable with our current tax laws. I tried to qualify for the Main Event but didn’t manage to do so which means I’m probably not playing a lot of poker at all, I might do just 1 tournament for fun.

Most of PokerStars: Team Online are coming and we have a meeting with the whole bunch so that’s the main reason for going. Last year I had a blast with a lot of people from Team Online and most of them had their contract renewed as well so will be going to the PCA as well. I’m sure we are going to have some fun again and I’m planning to play a bunch of tennis if possible since I want to start working out as soon as possible in the new year. I’m bringing my buddy again and he will be playing some tourneys and I will be buying some % so I still hope to earn some money as well 🙂 I should also not forget the bet with DaWarsaw, he will have to be my personal assistant for a full day, I can’t wait 😉

This month I played a bunch of LHE cashgames and didn’t do that bad but in the end it wasn’t great either. I was playing anything up to $15/$30 focusing on 4-6 tables which was great to test out some new things. At the PCA I hope to study some more and when I’m back I should be putting everything to practice and I’ll start again at the $2/$4 level and see where it gets me. I want at least 20.000 hands before moving up but especially in LHE this is still a small sample size. 8 tables should be my max which means 20.000 hands should take roughly 50/60 hours. By the end of January I’ll know if I can start moving up again. January is already packed with stuff, as mentioned PCA, TCOOP starts right after and I’m also away the last weekend of the month. I want to exercise at least 3 times a week as well but since I’m not drinking I should get full use out of my weekend.

I can’t wait to get started. I hope everybody will have a blast at NYE and wish everybody the best in 2013!

See you next year @PokerStars!

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