The First Blog

"Dude. This guys' from Indiana! He knows!"
- Faraz "The Toilet-0" Jaka on betting roulette based on the gut of a man who walked by with a sweatshirt that read "Indiana" on it.

Hi everyone! This is my first blog. I hope you guys enjoy my random thoughts and stories along with my progress in live and online poker tournaments. I'll be grinding the live circuit hard this year as well keeping up with my online play. Hopefully I'll have interesting and entertaining thoughts for everyone taking their time to read the blog.

Thoughts on the recent WPT Hollywood Open event I attended:
Soft/Small field: It was really easy to tell where the soft spots were in this tournament. It was pretty much a WPT regular or someone from the local area in every seat so the play was very polarized. I am happy I came out for the tournament even though I went out early on the bad end of a race on day 2. Took a 13-hour bus ride to get there which I will never ever do again. Had to be the smallest WPT field in recent history.

Upon busting I jetted to the lobby to grind Sunday online tournaments with Josh "SquintnGo" Goldstein (just met him that day). After a mere 2 hours of grinding Sunday majors the hotel wireless goes out and we were left sitting out of 6-9 tournaments for almost 45 mintues. So painful. I run really bad in disconnecting online. We jetted over to the Holiday Inn for secure internet. My stacks were crippled and I didn't bink anything that night.

On the bus ride to Indiana I met an American Iraqi war veteran who really opened my eyes to what a lucky person I am in this life to be doing what I love and being successful at it. The man had scares on his face and shoulders from shrapnel pieces from the war. He explained to me how the army got him hooked on morphine pills for the pain of his injuries and consequent surgeries thereafter. He was instructed to take 3 60mg doses of Morphine tablets per day and has never been able to get off them. The army left him no plan. He lied to me in the beginning and told me he was taking the bus to go see his cousins before negging on that tale. In truth, he was on his way to a rehab facility to detox and was extremely worried he wouldn't be able to shake his addiction. His wife recently left him and was given custody of his young daughter.

If you read this bro, know that I'm rooting for you. I wish all the best. I know you can do it.

I was happy to have met a lot of cool professionals in Indiana as I seem to wherever I go. The poker world is a really small and facinating sub-culture. I introduced Brian "Sn00wman" Hawkins to slowroll-Style Omaha flipping (100 a pop) which he quickly became giddy for and we had a fun session. There was a session at this past PCA where I left up nearly 2500 from Omaha flipping which included "ImaLucksac" "Floes" "NeverScaredB" "Turko_Man" "Brainwash" and 3 or 4 others I can't recall, but it was epic. We were going 8-ways anywhere between 100-500 a pop. One of the funnest degen moments I've ever been a part of. Omaha flipping is great because it's neutral EV for everyone and usually a fun time.

My schedule right now is to drive out with "Noctus" to the NAPT April 6th, then from there fly to San Remo for the EPT on the 15th. Then, its only a short distance away to the EPT Grand Final in Monte Carlo. I'm super stoked for these big live tournaments as I feel the best parts of my game really shine in the live arena. I play very differently. The ability to read your opponent face-to-face is invaluable and allows me to open up my game much wider than in online play. Sometimes you just know when someone is weak and you can make plays you would never make in an online tournament.

Here is an example from the 10k WPT LAPC Main Event:
I have 77 on the button. Blinds 200/400 with 50 ante. My Stack: Approx. 27k

Folds around to a very aggresive spanish palyer in the cut-off with 76k or so. He raises to 1025 into the very tight small blind and big blind. Normally I flat in this spot but his range was almost any 2 cards when folded around to him and I felt I was well ahead of his range. I raise to 3050.
He asked me how much I have and 4-bets to 8200. Something in the way he asked me was off and didn't seem confident at all. I moved all in for my 27k. Aggresive spanish palyer insta-mucks his hand.

As the hand progressed in the moment, I felt my decisions were somewhat easy. Yet, it's so far from standard to 5-bet all in with 77 for near 70 big blinds in that spot. Especially in such a well-structed tournament (Matt Savage is the man). He even had decent odds to make a call there with a sub-premium holding. Live poker adds so many extra variables to the competition. It's far more complex and fun than playing online.

Hope you guys enjoyed my first blog. Maybe in the future they will be more single topic-oriented but who knows what I'll feel like writing about. Suggestions maybe?

Peace,
Simon Charette
(Pokerbrat13/Tedlogan19)