Other Stuff

This isn't a blog that's going up on Boyles. I seem to be getting caught up a lot in writing over the last year - the bluff column and more recently for the poker supplement in the star and while I enjoy it - I need to be a bit more reader focused then having a good old waffle like I used to here. I always liked blogging but never envisaged my bull being published in magazines and newspapers. The only real conclusion I can come up with on those happenings is the community is severely starved of literary talent.

I never made Vegas this year which I dont really regret, there was a number of factors why I didn't go but the main one was I hit a bad run punting and didn't have a spare 25k lying around. I could of went down the road of selling action but just didn't fancy it, the enthusiasm just wasn't there and I have no regrets of not making a better effort to get over.

The few games I did play over the last month were more piss ups then serious games. Not very professional I know but the buyins were small and killarney and tramore - well its hard not to hit the beer in those spots. I'm a bit involved in putting on the tramore tournament so I'm not 100% comfortable playing it for that reason and might not play it next year.

There's a couple of really good games on the horizon and you wont see me touching a drop at these starting with the EMOP this week.

There's a real change in the landscape of Irish poker this year and while I'm happy to see tours like the emop and unibet hitting these shores. Along with the ukipt They're definitely squeezing the traditional events that existed but if it gives players shots at bigger prizepools then I suppose that's what we want.

The other side of the coin though is I hate seeing tournaments like the winter festival and the Irish Classic dropping buy in to try compete. The classic had a near 300k prizepool in 2008- it looks like it will do well to have 100k one this year. I guess its survival of the fittest and if you dont have a way of mass producing qualifiers your going to suffer in the current macro-eco climate.

On the punting front I lost the plot completely on the golf for a while- punting in grands pre tournament on outright market is just too high variance for my liquidity and that's well reined in. TBH if I spent the time I spent watching and punting golf on my poker game over the last 18 months.......you get the picture.

I'm not sure if anyone still drops in here anymore but I'll try post here the odd time with stuff that I feel falls outside my role with Boyles just to keep the old blog going.

Open Time

On the poker front I played twice the weekend- the monthly game in the poker lounge Waterford where I came third and the summer game in the Cue Club Killarney where I lasted about a third of the time it took me to get there. Still Killarney's always great craic to go out in this time of year so wasn't a wasted trip.

A couple of great event coming up - we have the Boylepoker Waterford Masters next week; the Masters is always a top class little tournament with a great atmosphere. Then the following week the EMOP visits Ireland for the first time. This takes place in Clontraf Castle and a good purse is guaranteed.

This weekend will be spent watching the Open Championship. I'm punting Kaymer; he's been going through a swing change and watching him play in France two weeks ago he looked nearly right to me. He's on record as saying he doesn't love links golf but in reality has a superb links record, he's also one of the best ball strikers in windy conditions which we can expect over the four days. All in all 25/1 looks a very decent price and well worth a bet. I should add however that this tip comes with a public warning, I'm very much out of form punting wise the past two months.