Gbecks (also known as Garrett Beckman) overcame 1,678 players & women poker players, including host Roland De Wolf, to take home first place at Event 5 of the FTOPS V, No-Limit Hold'em w/re-buys $300K guarantee. Even better, Gbecks did it all while being severely short-stacked at times.
It was another crazy day of poker at the FTOPS V. Although Allen Cunningham and Andy Bloch both cashed it was mostly lesser-known players that rose to the occasion.
For most of the day it looked like GB2005 was a virtual lock to win the poker tournament. GB2005 used a massive chip stack to bully his way through the event. Finally it was down to the last nine and GB2005 had a million more chips than his closest competitor. GB2005 also had rock star status with his custom avatar that he won during FTOPS II. The virtual railbirds were definitely impressed.
Alas, GB2005 dominance was not to last.
Approximately halfway through the final table GB2005's chip lead began to decay. Losing several large hands to Gbecks and darkbet, GB2005 was suddenly short-stacked. GB2005 was finally ousted in fifth by flopdisasta who hit a set of 10s. Download poker wallpapers.
20KJAY took GB2005's position as chip leader and continued his aggressive play which eventually got him a spot in heads-up play. It was 20KJAY with six million versus Gbecks with one million.
Unfortunately the aggressive play that got 20KJAY to heads-up seemed to disappear when he faced off against Gbecks. Gbecks, who was being cheered on by his friend and Full Tilt Pro Jeff Madsen, went on the offensive and was relentless in his betting. Online poker. The turning point came when Gbecks bet $2 million on a board of A-J-A-J-9. With more than a million of his own chips already invested in the pot 20KJAY mucked his hand and relinquished the chip lead to Gbecks.
In the last hand of the tournament 20KJAY pushed all-in with K-5 suited and was called by Gbeck's A-7. Gbecks spiked an ace on the turn and the rest is history. Play route 66 poker.
Gbecks takes home $102,383 for first while 20KJAY had to settle for $66,668. The top nine results are as follows:
Place
Player
Prize
1
GBecks
$102,383
2.
20KJAY
$66,668
3.
flopdisasta
$48,215
4.
darkbet
$38,691
5.
GB2005
$29,191
6.
LaJune
$21,429
7.
ontherocksuga
$13,809
8.
Doobie75
$10,000
9.
Vanssi
$7,081
Stay tuned to PokerListings.com tomorrow for news from Event 6, which played out Sunday, and Event 7, which plays tonight with a $1,000+$60 buy-in for a $1 million guaranteed prize pool.
Winners Receive a Seat Into the Ladies Event During the Caesars Palace Classic in October
In this new "Strip Poker" series, Card Player covers the Las Vegas poker scene — on the Strip and around the city.
Caesars Palace on the Las Vegas Strip is looking to bank on the growing popularity of poker among women by resuming its weekly ladies poker tournament.
The $75 buy-in ladies tournament is every Tuesday night at 6 p.m. Players receive $2,500 in starting chips and the poker tournament has 30-minute blind levels. On top of the first-place prize money, the winner is awarded a seat into the $300 buy-in ladies event of the Caesars Palace Classic tournament series taking place in October. The money for the seat comes out of the casino’s pocket, not the prize pool.
The ladies event is the last preliminary event of the series and is scheduled for October 21 at 11 a.m. This is the day before the $10,000 buy-in main event, which begins at noon on October 22. Play route 66 poker.
For more information on the ladies tournament or the Caesars Palace Classic, call the poker room at 702-785-6566. Play online poker.
It shouldn’t come as a surprise that a poker pro is wanting to play more poker, but it certainly is nice for fans of Michael "The Grinder" Mizrachi that the pro will be spending more time with them. The 2006 Card Player Player of the Year has signed with Planet Hollywood Hotel and Casino to play in poker tournaments, and a recent change has doubled the number of tourneys he will play in. Rather than the previously scheduled three nights a week, Mizrachi will play every night except Saturday, taking his seat at 7pm. Another nice surprise is the buy in reduction from $580 to $120, giving more players a chance to participate. Play $500 match poker bonus.
A recent report by the UK body that oversees gambling has told the tale that some 700k new players in the UK have joined the online poker crowd. This represents an increase in online poker players & women poker players in the UK of about 1%, according to the Gambling Commission report. There are a lot of forms of gambling that are available to British gamblers, but online poker ranks number two, right behind the number one gambling pastime, the National Lottery. With the World Series of Poker heading to London this year for the WSOP Europe, there may be even more British players joining the online poker community this year. Play route 66 poker.
The Casino Affiliate Programs convention taking place in Barcelona this October has already sold out all its booth space. Designed to bring together the top online poker and casino affiliates, this convention is on its way to being the biggest event so far, according to CAP officials.
"CAP Euro Barcelona is going to be a stellar event," said Lou Fabiano, CAP founder. "All the ingredients for success are there."
He continued saying, "It's in Barcelona, one of Europe's most exciting cities, we have top notch speakers and work shops, we have parties and social events that are clearly the best in the industry and we have the most important factor - our community members!" Play $500 match poker bonus.
The convention is supported by more than 45 programs, and the CAP organization said registrations are pouring in every day.
"You will have all the top affiliates in the world in one place. What could be more powerful than that?" said Fabiano. "My bags are already packed!"
The CAP Euro doesn't charge affiliates a fee to attend the event, giving them a chance to attend a conference, exhibition, networking events, the Affiliate Series of Poker and much more. Download poker wallpapers.
The convention will take place Oct. 4-7, with the following schedule:
Oct. 4
* Evening: Sponsored party following last day of EIG.
Oct. 5
* Morning: Expo and conference open * After Lunch: Affiliate series of poker within the expo room with free bar running throughout afternoon * Evening: Sponsored opening party
Oct. 6
* Morning: Conference and exhibition with final conference session after lunch * Mid Afternoon: Final table of ASOP with free bar for all delegates in expo room * Evening: Sponsored party
Oct. 7
* Morning: New networking event * Midday and late evening: The Sunday Session, where all the delegates, sponsors, exhibitors descend on a venue to network in a relaxed environment and share stories of the last few days. Play online poker.
During those four days, participants will have access to comprehensive information on all online gambling advertising avenues, speeches from keynote speakers, topic driven panels discussing the newest techniques and tools, sponsored networking activities.
"Another way in which CAP Euro separates itself from other events is that it creates a perfect balance of intense education, fun and exciting networking events and Barcelona will definitely not disappoint," said the CAP organization in a press release.
One of the fun events on the schedule is the Affiliate Series of Poker (ASOP). The poker tournament will consist of six players at six different tables playing Texas Hold'em for a $10,000 prize pool plus $10,000 towards accommodation and flights to the next CAP event.
Previous ASOP champion Ace Jones had this to say about the tournament:
"The ASOP was a great tournament filled with skilled competition! If you love this industry as I do, you have to be at CAP Euro and play in the ASOP. Please note, I won't go down without a fight in defending my championship! Good luck."
Some of the sponsors for the CAP Euro and ASOP include Ladbrokes Poker, Purple Lounge Poker, PKR.com, Full Tilt Poker, GNUF, the Microgaming Network, Everest Poker and more.
Registration to attend the conference is open and available online at CapEuro.com.
The Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) wrapped up its Man vs Machine Poker Challenge yesterday, and, as we had suspected, the human element won out, although the margin of victory was not overly large.
Poker is a tricky game to teach a machine. Computers are inherently deterministic and uncreative, which is why a game of "imperfect information", such as poker, is challenging to reduce to mathematical formulae sufficiently adaptable to handle chaotic real life scenarios yet reducible to stable computer code. Although a computer can calculate to perfection the odds of receiving a particular hand of cards, which is certainly a big part of the game, it cannot form judgments about whether a certain player is lying or not - which many poker devotees argue is even more important. Play online poker.
It can, however, approximate such judgments by storing an internal record of how a particular player plays certain kinds of hands to search for tendencies. This is where most of the AI work on computerized poker games goes: developing algorithms that track opponents' betting habits.
Games such as chess or checkers can be replicated well on a computer since such playing style judgments, though occasionally helpful in chess, for example, sheer number crunching can map out an overwhelming number of possible outcomes. The chess board is a closed, determinative place, easily modeled in code. Download poker wallpapers.
The Man vs Machine Poker Challenge sought to eliminate as much of the luck as possible by playing a poker variant known as duplicate poker, in which one teammate plays the same hand as the other teammate's opponent, and vice versa. By eliminating luck, duplicate poker reduces the game to its strategic fundamentals.
Phil "the Unabomber" Laak and Ali "the Prince" Eslami, professional players known for their mathematical dexterity, edged out the University of Alberta's computer poker program Polaris by about $400 over the course of the two day low limit match.
The more interesting work is yet to come, however; playing Texas Hold'em poker tournament against one person, where only two cards are unknown, and one player's tendencies are to be studied, has been challenging enough for those keen on developing championship caliber poker software. Developing software that deals with multiple lying individuals and ten or more unknown cards will be exponentially more difficult.
Duplicate poker may be helpful in measuring scientifically how different individuals react to comparable situations, but the variant itself is something of a red herring, at least when it comes to developing strategic poker software. For one thing, by eliminating luck, the variant rewards the mathematically gifted, which plays to the computer's strength. Play route 66 poker.
The variant also eliminates one of the most powerful psychological components of the game itself - the winning (or losing) streak. Such a psychological component may not exist in the program itself, but when it comes to the analyzing the psychological habits of an opponent, buffeted as that player may be by the randomness of the cards, the complexity of the game magnifies with the good or bad fortune that befalls that player.
Players & women poker players may change their strategies - not to mention the amount of the wager - completely based on how confident or wealthy they feel at that time, and what cards have been good to them. Gamblers are a superstitious lot, and superstition has no rhyme or reason.
New World Series of Poker champion Jerry Yang, a 39-year-old psychologist from Temecula, Calif., proclaimed his faith in God when he won $8.25 million and the Texas hold'em world championship event at 4 a.m. Wednesday at the Rio.
Yang, a born-again Christian, said he prayed often during the tournament, asked God for guidance and a high pair when he needed the cards.
Only one former world poker champion was still in the room when the poker tournament ended -- 2000 winner Chris "Jesus" Ferguson, nicknamed for his shoulder-length hair and dark beard.
Harrah's Entertainment Chairman and CEO Gary Loveman and several executives from Harrah's buyer Texas Pacific Group paid a visit to the Rio on Tuesday night during the final table of the World Series of Poker. Texas Pacific and Apollo Management are purchasing Harrah's for $17.1 billion.
The Golden Gate, the oldest hotel downtown, no longer has the oldest slot machines.
Owner Mark Brandenburg replaced the coin-operated slots with ticket in-ticket out machines, which are less labor intensive than coin-operated machines. The move should reduce costs for the 101-year-old casino. Download poker wallpapers.
Longtime customer Alma Margaret Creel, 94, was given card No. 1, as the founding member of the new slot club.
Just when it seemed Nevada's tourism boosters couldn't get any more mileage from Elvis, The King is biking the Silver State back country.
A national advertising campaign is using Las Vegas icons to promote outdoor destinations in Nevada.
Sponsored by the Nevada Commission on Tourism, the ads feature mountain bikers dressed in Elvis costumes racing down the Flume Trail near Lake Tahoe. Other ads include a tuxedo-wearing Wayne Newton fly fishing, showgirls skiing and golfing, and the Blue Man Group paddling a kayak. Women poker.
The campaign will play on the Travel Channel, Discovery and Fox News. Print versions will appear in Outside, Travel and Leisure and two National Geographic publications.
Tamares Las Vegas Properties, which is selling the Gold Spike for $15.6 million, is cutting back services at its other downtown casinos.
The hotel at the Western has closed and the Upper Deck Restaurant at the Las Vegas Club was shut down. Play online poker.
Kenneth Landfield, chief operating officer for the U.S. real estate division of Tamares' parent company, said via e-mail that Tamares is evaluating the best use of its downtown real-estate holdings.
The Inside Gaming column is compiled by Review-Journal gaming and tourism writers Howard Stutz, Benjamin Spillman and Arnold M. Knightly. Send your tips about the gaming and tourism industry to insidegaming@reviewjournal.com. Stay tuned to our poker blog for latest updates.
The Asian Poker Classic (APC) has announced that it will be returning to Goa next year with a bigger total pot and a host of professional players.
Sponsored by MaharajahClub.net, APC 2007 was the richest poker tournament ever staged in India when it was held in March with 140 players & women poker players from over a dozen nations competing for their share of the one million dollar prize pool.
The event eventually saw an unknown player named Carl Hostrup from Denmark take the crown with its £320,000 prize after beating off a host of professional players such as Willie Tann, Mel Judah and Surinder Sunar. Online poker.
“We are extremely excited about coming back in 2008,” said Imran Hassan, Director of Operations for APC.
“The inaugural APC was a huge success so, of course, the planning started right after to produce a bigger, better and even more luxurious poker tournament in India. Asian Poker Classic is no doubt poised to be one of the biggest tournaments in the region.”
This year’s event was held at the Intercontinental The Grand Resort Goa surrounded by the beauty of the Indian coastline but it is still being decided where to hold the event for next March.
Gbecks (also known as Garrett Beckman) overcame 1,678 players & women poker players, including host Roland De Wolf, to take home first place at Event 5 of the FTOPS V, No-Limit Hold'em w/re-buys $300K guarantee. Even better, Gbecks did it all while being severely short-stacked at times. 
