Perhaps getting lucky in love has brought a little luck to David Benyamine's poker game as well. The pro, who got engaged earlier this year to fellow Full Tilt Poker pro Erica Schoenberg, had quite the productive week online.
According to HighStakesReport.com and HighStakesdb.com, Benyamine has had several winning sessions of hundreds of thousands of dollars this past week.
His streak for the week began Aug. 4 when he picked up $314,000 over 21 sessions of Pot-Limit Omaha on Full Tilt Poker. Most of that money came from EDEE's wallet.
EDEE ended up losing about $500k for the day to various opponents online. About $100k of his losses were from one of his hands against Benyamine. Women poker players.
Benyamine was in the small blind with EDEE in the big blind, and Benyamine calls the big blind. EDEE raises it up to $1,200, which Benyamine promptly calls.
The flop comes 6c-8d-Qs, and EDEE bets $2,400 with Benyamine calling.
The turn brings a king of spades, and EDEE checks and then raises it to $16,800 after Benyamine bets $3,200. Benyamine then goes all-in and gets a call from EDEE. Play $500 match poker bonus.
Benyamine turns up 7c-5c-8c-8s to EDEE's 9s-8h-Js-Ah. The river pairs up the queen on the board giving Benyamine a full house and the $100,792 pot.
He rolled in some more cash on Tuesday with a little $1,000/$2,000 H.O.R.S.E. action on the poker site as well.
At a table that also included Eli Elezra and Doyle Brunson, Benyamine boosted his bankroll by $143,000 during the session. Brunson, who plays as texdolly, also pulled off a $69k win, while Elezra put a $142,000 dent in his bankroll according to HighStakesReport.com.
Benyamine was back at a little H.O.R.S.E. play the following day and his winning ways were still with him. Play route 66 poker.
Elezra returned for a little more punishment, and Gus Hansen and Andy Bloch also took a seat at Benyamine's table. After 620 hands of play, Benyamine was up another $163,000, while Elezra took a $22,000 hit, and Hansen was down $81,000. Download poker wallpapers.
The next day Benyamine took on the $200/$400 Pot-Limit Omaha, but didn't get the same results. Sitting at a table with Hansen again, Benyamine lost $129,000, while Hansen more than made up for his H.O.R.S.E. loss with a $432,000 winning session.
Switching to $1,000/$2,000 Limit Omaha Hi-Lo that same day, Benyamine got his revenge and took a big chunk of his $427,000 winnings from that session directly from Gus Hansen's pocket. Hansen shipped $293,000 over to Benyamine during the game. Stay tuned to our poker blog for latest updates.
Andy Bloch even joined in and ended up losing $74,000 in the process.
The Bar Poker League will have venues in Wisconsin starting in September, according to the league's creator the World Poker Store.
WPS announced this week it had expanded into Wisconsin, spreading its services and the Bar Poker League even further across the U.S. It also opened up another corporate office in Fort Myers, Fla., in order to support the Bar Poker League and gaming partners in the Southeast.
"As part of the company's growth initiatives, offices in Minnesota, The Netherlands and now Florida will serve as headquarters for operations in their respective regions both domestic and overseas," says the company in a press release. Women poker.
According to Greg Needham, WPS vice president of marketing and business development, the company felt another office in Florida was necessary to support the multiple business models in each are the company has expanded into. Play $500 match poker bonus.
"The expansion of the league to Wisconsin is a prime example of how our Minnesota offices will allow us to open throughout the Midwest, and we expect similar impact in Europe and the Southeast region of the U.S.," Needham said.
"We are excited to launch the league in Wisconsin and look forward to adding more venues to the Bar Poker League poker tournament family."
The company already had successful operations running in Minnesota and Florida before heading into Wisconsin and Europe. There are also plans to expand the league into 23 other U.S. states where it will be legal to set up the games.
The league continues to add new members and open new venues for its free No-Limit Hold'em games as well. It currently has more than 100 tournaments running per week in bars and restaurants. Online poker.
To help with expansion and taking the Bar Poker League and the World Poker Store into the future, the company recently added several top poker pros from around the world to its advisory board.
Phil Hellmuth, Johnny Chan, Marcel Luske, Hoyt Corkins, Patrik Antonius and Liz Lieu have all signed on to advise the company on current poker trends as well as make promotional appearances wearing the WPS logo. Stay tuned to our poker blog for latest updates.
NETeller's U.S. customers who had money frozen in their accounts for more than six months are already seeing results as withdrawal procedures finally became available on Monday. Several customers have reported the money is already in their bank accounts.
Poker pro and author Lou Krieger, who reported in his blog on Monday that he had received the e-mail from NETeller and started the process to withdraw funds, reported yesterday the money was already in his account. Download poker wallpapers.
"I'm happy to report that those funds were transferred to my checking account today, no more than 24 hours after I requested them," he wrote.
He said he's glad it worked out as well as it did and hopes every U.S.-based customer has access to their funds as quickly as he did.
"Sometimes speed doesn't kill. Sometimes it's wonderful," Kreiger said.
He isn't the only one reporting positive results. Members of the NETeller Customer Coalition are reporting successful withdrawals already as well. Play route 66 poker.
The group's forum is filling up with comments about a less than 24-hour turnaround in some cases to seeing their funds deposited in bank accounts.
When the group was first formed, the moderator told PokerListings.com that members had a total of more than $500,000 locked up in NETeller after U.S. customer accounts associated with online poker & gambling were frozen. The group has since grown to more than 800 members looking to get their money from the e-wallet.
Now that people are getting their money back, the moderator of the group chose to step down and said the forum will be shut down in a few months once most of its members have received their money. He also pointed them to another site to continue their support of poker and each other.
One of his parting comments was to encourage members to support poker players rights to gamble online.
"On behalf of the poker players & women poker players out there, I DO think there is one last thing you should do if you haven't done it already," he writes in the forum.
"You've got 'found money,' put it to good use. Outside of finding me at a poker table and donking some cash to me (which would be much appreciated), join and donate some money to the Poker Players Alliance. They have 800k members to our 800 and are truly working the bigger issue."
To request funds, after U.S. customers receive an e-mail from NETeller, they can sign into their accounts and request the release of their funds.
U.S. customers will have until Jan. 26, 2008, to make their request and have funds transferred to the bank account on record or sent to their mailing address in check form. NETeller will not charge withdrawal fees. Play $500 match poker bonus.
"As NETeller is rturning $94 million to hundreds of thousands of U.S. customers, it will take some time for all payments to be processed," says the e-wallet on its site.
With all the doping scandals in other sports, this might be a good time to get the doping issues in poker out in the open. Whenever a player is engaged in an activity such as poker or sports betting for a long period of time, the tempation to use performance enhancing drugs increases even for online poker & gambling as well.
The 2003 WPT Bellagio 5 Diamonds champion Paul Phillips openly admitted in Slate.com that he took Adderall (a prescription drug used to treat Attention Deficit Disorder) for the express purpose of gaining an edge on opponents. Play $500 match poker bonus.
Phillips further admitted openly that he was taking Modafinil during the 2005 WSOP, the same stimulant that disgraced former world champion sprinter Kelli White was caught taking, to gain an edge. Download poker wallpapers.
We are all aware that Caffeine (a stimulant) is the most popular performance-enhancing drug among tournament poker players, ingested primarily in the form of energy drinks. The amount of caffeine present in 2-3 cans of energy drinks (equivalent to about 5 cups of coffee consumed per hour) is sufficient for a poker player & women poker player to fail an WADA/IOC-administered drug test if that drug test were administered to tournament poker players.
I am certainly aware of other performance-enhancing poker drugs out there:
1. Sleeping pills, as a "downer" for players after a long day at the tournament table
2. Sudafed, a cold medicine that can be used as a stimulant and is banned by the IOC.
3. Beta Blockers, a class of medicine prescribed to treat irregular heart beats, can be used by poker players to slow down heart rates and reduce physical tells. The IOC banned beta blockers over 30 years ago because archers and shooters used the drug to gain an edge.
4. Amphetamines, or "greenies", which were widely abused as a stimulant by baseball players until MLB banned the drug (Neifi Perez of the Detroit Tigers was caught recently.)
There are probably a bunch of others.
The big question: how much of an edge, if any, does a gambler gain against a bookmaker or a poker player gain against the rest of the field in a poker tournament?
Furthermore, will there ever come a time that gamblers may be tested and treated in the same manner as athletes?
Wyoming Valley Motorcycle Club honors memory of Charlie Burke.
More than 100 motorcyclists on Sunday gathered at Riders World on Coal Street and took to the road to honor the memory of one of their fallen brother riders.
The Wyoming Valley Motorcycle Club staged its fourth annual Charlie Burke Memorial Poker Run, with subsequent stops at the Tombstone Inn in Mehoopany, the Lopez Winery, Ricketts Glen Hotel and Ragz Restaurant in Dallas.
Riders paid a $15 registration fee and picked up a playing card at each stop. The three with the best poker hands at the end of the run won cash prizes.
“We use this ride as a fundraiser for our club. But it’s a celebration of Charlie’s memory with all his club brothers and sisters,” said club secretary Wayne Miller. Online poker.
Burke died at age 40 from injuries suffered in a snowmobile crash in February 2003.
The club had a similar memorial ride in the spring for club member Mary Beth Richards, of Wilkes-Barre, who died in June 2005. Miller said he expects the club will begin an annual run next year for member George Thompson, also of Wilkes-Barre, who died three weeks ago.
“It’s a way to keep our deceased members’ memories alive. … You can see by virtue of all the motorcycles here, a lot of people loved Charlie,” Miller said.
Burke’s mother, Mary Jean Burke, 81, of Plains Township, said she was touched by the club’s memorial, and proud of her son’s involvement with the club and “other worthwhile projects.” Download poker wallpapers.
Burke’s sisters, Sue Horvath and Candy Kennedy, both of Wilkes-Barre, said bikers are often stereotyped in a bad light.
“They do a lot of good things for the community and people don’t realize it,” Horvath said.
Kennedy said her brother liked that the club promoted safety. “I don’t think he would ever go riding without a helmet or without his steel-toe boots,” she said.
For Motorcycle Awareness Month in May, the club ran public service announcements on 97.9 FM and posted a “Share the Road” message on a billboard in Wilkes-Barre, Miller said. Women poker players.
Miller said the club has a charity run for the Wyoming Valley SPCA every spring and has had runs every fall that benefited charities such as the Teddy Bear Patrol, St. Vincent de Paul Kitchen and the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation.
Club members also attend other clubs’ charity runs, and Burke presence is missed, Miller said.
Club member Jim Desiderio described Burke as a “nice guy who liked to have fun and do a lot of different things, anything to support the club. Play online poker.
“I’m glad we can do something to help the club and his family. And it’s for a good cause. That’s what it’s all about,” he said.
Four players, including Canadian Tuan Lam, remained at the final table of the World Series of Poker's main event after British player Jon Kalmar lost a head-to-head bet against South African Raymond Rahme on Tuesday.
Kalmar, 34, said he was thrilled to have made nearly US$1.26 million with his fifth-place finish, and said he intended to use his winnings to pay bills and perhaps buy a car back home in Chorly, England. Women poker players.
His failed gambit to double his dwindling cache of chips boosted Rahme, a 62-year-old former bed and breakfast inn owner from Johannesburg, to a distant second behind Jerry Yang.
Yang used aggressive play to eliminate three other players in the first five hours of the no-limit Texas Hold 'em tournament.
Only minutes earlier, Hevad Khan, 22, from Poughkeepsie, N.Y., became the fourth player eliminated when his ace and queen of spades couldn't top a pair of jacks belonging to a surging Yang. Download poker wallpapers.
Khan didn't seem disappointed with sixth place and his $956,243 payday as he celebrated with friends in the audience.
When play resumed, Jack Effel, tournament director, offered congratulations to the remaining five players.
"You are all millionaires," he said before guards brought in metal cases and unloaded the winner's $8.25 million share on a table. Play $500 match poker bonus.
Kalmar bet all his chips on an ace of spades and king of hearts, but lost to Rahme's pocket jacks when the common cards provided neither player any help. The pot was 10.4 million chips.
Yang, a Hmong psychologist from Temecula, Calif., who says he uses his ability to read players as a weapon, piled up a 71.3 million in chips by Kalmar's ouster. He faced an eclectic group of poker unknowns including Rahme, a grandfather from South Africa who vowed not to be bullied, and Lam, a Vietnamese Canadian who once couldn't get hired as a dishwasher but read through a bluff by former champ Scotty Nguyen on his way to the final table.
Rahme had 30.1 million in chips, followed by Lam, a 40-year-old online poker player from Mississauga, Ont., via Kitchener, with 17.5 million. Alex Kravchenko, a 36-year-old businessman from Moscow, had 8.7 million.
"I'm very nervous coming into the finals," Lam was quoted by the Waterloo Region Record. "I didn't know that I would go that far but I always have confidence in myself."
Lam used past poker winnings to buy a house in Mississauga two years ago, the Record said.
The elimination of Kalmar and Khan followed exits by poker pro Lee Watkinson and computer engineer Lee Childs, who both lost head-to-head, all-in bets against Yang. Yang, 39, started the day eighth in chips before quickly building his pile.
"I was playing for the bracelet," Watkinson, a 40-year-old animal rights activist from Cheney, Wash., who finished eighth and took home $585,699. "I wasn't going for third, fourth or even second. I wanted to make a play and be a contender."
Childs a 35-year-old from Reston, Va., who quit his job a month ago to play poker for a living won $705,229 for his seventh-place finish.
"My goal when I came in to the tournament was to trust my instincts, make the right decision and hopefully not get unlucky," Childs said. "I was that close to doubling up."
First to fall was Philip Hilm, a 31-year-old Dane who lives in England. He won $525,934 for his ninth-place finish after busting out on the day's 15th hand. Play route 66 poker.
Watkinson's exit left Kravchenko as the only one at the table with a World Series bracelet. Watkinson won a pot-limit Omaha event last year, while Kravchenko, a 36-year-old businessman from Moscow, became the first Russian to win a bracelet with the $1,500 buy-in Omaha High-Low event this year.
Play began shortly after noon and was expected to continue into the night. The finalists ranged in age from 22 to 62, and hailed from five nations: the U.S., Canada, Russia, England and South Africa. By birthplace, players also were from Laos, Vietnam and Denmark.
"The final table says a lot about the globality of poker and the globality of our fans," said Jeffrey Pollack, World Series of Poker commissioner for event owner Harrah's Entertainment Inc.
The nine players who began the day were all that remained from a field of 6,358 players that began to play down in stages July 6. Everyone paid or won $10,000 to enter the main event, the biggest poker tournament of the year.
The only thing that's flashy about David Singer is the collection of silver rings that choke nearly all his fingers at the tournament table.
Other than that, the Full Tilt Poker pro doesn't attract much fanfare by keeping a low-profile and preferring Stud to today's big-balling No-Limit games.
That's why it came as such as surprise when the native New Yorker, former environmental lawyer and retired commercial fisherman was in the media spotlight this week after being knocked out of the World Series of Poker Main Event on a controversial ruling about cell phone use during a hand.
Singer discussed his disappointing end to this year's Series - not to mention his living situation and bizarre superstitions - with PokerListings.com recently.
So, you had an interesting Series this year.
I did. For the first time in years - I think since 2001 - I wasn't out here for the whole World Series. I planned to be but less than a week before the World Series my father had to have emergency heart surgery. So I went to New York and he had all kinds of complications. He's on the mend now, but he spent four weeks in intensive care and I felt like I should be there. Obviously that was more important than playing poker for me.
Finally when he moved out of intensive care I came back the next day - I'm lucky I have siblings who can look after him. I came back right before the H.O.R.S.E. tournament and I was lucky enough to do well in that and make the final table and finish sixth, in the same position I did last year.
Last year I was disappointed in the sixth place finish because I thought I should have done better at the final table even though it was one of the hardest final tables ever. I feel like I made mistakes. Last year the Rio managed the tournament wrong and they made us play 19 hours before the final day and I only got an hour of sleep. I was kind of out of it for the final table and I made some mistakes.
But this year I finished sixth and I didn't think there was much I could do about it. In Razz I lost with one of the best hands you can have - a six low in Razz at the final table, that was the hand that crushed me. Besides that I didn't get too many cards. So I finished sixth in the H.O.R.S.E. I would have liked to do better but I don't blame myself for my finish; there was nothing I could do at the final table.
And then the next tournament I cashed in - the $2,000 No-Limit. So I had a pretty good World Series. And then I got knocked out of the Main Event on the first day. I didn't play that well, but I got a really bad ruling that led to my ultimate demise.
So tell me about the ruling. Most of us have heard about it now but give us the rundown now.
I've talked about it so much it's probably boring people now. Basically, my opponent bet after the flop and I raised. I raised him all-in. He bet about $3,000 and I raised him all in for about $9,500 or something like that. He was thinking about whether to call and his phone started ringing. He had it in his shirt pocket; it wasn't a flip phone. He pulled it out of his pocket, looked at it, and pressed a button and the ringing stopped and he put it away.
According to everything I heard at the Rio - they make an announcement six or seven times a day telling you not to use your cell phones at the table, telling you your hand will be dead if you do use the cell phone. According to everything I've seen and everything I've heard in these announcements, his hand should have been dead. So I told the dealer his hand should be dead and obviously then my opponent knew I didn't want him to call and he called. I had a pair and a flush draw, so I was semi-bluffing in a hand; I was pretty sure he had me beat.
The floor person ruled his hand was live. I asked to appeal it. Obviously I wouldn't have given away the information about my hand if I wasn't 100% sure his hand should be dead. The floor person was Steve Fraser and I asked if I was entitled to get a ruling from a higher person on that shift. He told me there was no one higher on. Turns out there was a higher person on. Not only that, Jack Effel, the tournament director, subsequently told me that in any kind of controversy like that the floor people are instructed to call him if he's not there. It was around 10:30 at night, so he wasn't there but he should have been called.
So not only do I feel like I got the wrong call, the floor person didn't do his job in letting me appeal to a higher authority before he made the ultimate decision. Anyway, I went on to lose the hand and get knocked out. I feel like I should get my money back from the poker tournament. I really feel like I should've been allowed to play it on another Day 1, but that didn't happen; I guess I didn't pursue it enough.
At this time I've talked to Jack Effel about it. He said he's not going to do anything for me. I think he just wants to stand by the decision. I don't know, basically to show solidarity to the floor people. He tells me now that he would have made the same decision, but I honestly don't believe it if he would have come to the table. I've also talked to Jeffrey Pollack, the commissioner of the World Series of Poker, about it. He's going to review it. I just have a feeling he may be more fair and give me my money back. I've even told him, I know it looks like I'm angle-shooting or trying to get my money back, so I've offered to give half the money to a nature conservancy, a charity that buys up land tries to protect the environment.
I feel like I really got a bad call. Almost everyone I've asked in poker about it - when I've presented it without saying which side of the controversy I was on - almost everyone has agreed that the hand should have been dead. Almost everyone who's spent time in the Rio agreed the hand should have been dead. Download poker wallpapers.
I think it's pretty clear that it's a mistake that the Rio made and for some reason they just don't want to admit it or give me my money back.
What's the next step with this?
I'm supposed to file a report with the gaming commission, but I'd rather not do that since I talked to Jeffrey Pollack I said I'd send him an e-mail and I expect him to look into it. He seems like a fair guy and I do expect that they'll give me at least a portion of my money back.
Howard Lederer - he actually was one of the few people who didn't take a side on whether the ruling was right or not - but he was figuring out how many chips I had left and what my equity was in the pot and he was suggesting maybe, since I was below average in chips, that they didn't give me back the full buy-in but some of the buy-in.
I've talked about this a lot in the press and I kind of want to get passed it and get it resolved already. It still does bother me. Obviously, I'd like to still be in the Main Event - the best tournament of the year.
Every player feels terrible after getting knocked out of any tournament, especially the Main Event. Did this make it even worse?
It makes it much worse. I didn't play that well in the Main Event. I misplayed some hands and I played too many hands, but it's pretty disappointing to go out like that. Play online poker.
I had my hand killed in another tournament just for having my cell phone open. Jennifer Harman told me the same thing. Multiple people have come up to me and said they've had their hands killed at other tournaments and it was just a glaring inconsistency there.
Are you a person who believes this was just bum luck, or are you superstitious at all?
I'm superstitious about some things, but not this. A series of bad things had to happen. This particular floor person had to come over - Steve Fraser, who I'm sorry to say, I think is kind of spineless and didn't want to make a tough ruling. When he came over to the table, other players had to tell him my opponent didn't speak English, which I didn't know; he just got moved to the table and I don't think that should have been a factor in the decision. Once I think he made the decision, I think the Rio wanted to stick behind it.
I've heard you are a superstitious guy though. Is this true?
Most of my life I've only had one superstition: I have to put on my left shoe before my right shoe and tie it (laughs) which is pretty silly, I know. Now I have a few more.
It doesn't relate to poker but I always have to... (Laughs.) Believe it or not, I always have to wear underwear with lobsters on them. (Laughs.)
Why?
This doesn't come from poker. My dad was in the hospital in intensive care for four weeks and he had some pretty rough times where it looked like he was in bad shape and wasn't getting any better. I had gone to New York because he was having heart surgery and I didn't bring any clothes with me. So I ended up going to the GAP to get clothes and I accidentally got some boxers with lobsters on them. And the first day I wore the boxers with lobsters on them my father finally started showing some improvement. Play route 66 poker.
He had bad pneumonia and was in grave danger and he got better the one day I wore the lobsters. So I had a bunch of pairs of the lobsters and I felt like I had to wear them every day. And so far I haven't stopped wearing them.
How many do you own now?
(Laughs.) I probably own about 50 pairs. Not just boxers - briefs: they come in two different colors. So I change it up, but I wear them every day. That's a superstition I developed. I also started wearing a new shirt every day from June until July. I just needed to buy new clothes when I was in New York and my dad was in the hospital. But I've since stopped that one. I'm not that crazy. I'm getting away from a few superstitions.
I hear you're living with poker player Bill Gazes during the World Series. How's that going?
It's good. Billy's one of my good friends; he was planning on not playing the whole World Series. He actually came the day before my dad had to have the emergency surgery. The next morning he drove me to the airport and it was pretty fortunate that he was there because I made my plane by two minutes. The fact that I made it might have saved my father's life. I'm thankful that Billy was there to drive me to the plane. It was just luck.
So you're willing to overlook him leaving his socks on the floor?
Yeah, if he leaves his socks on the floor, that's cool with me. But no, Billy's one of my best friends. We both share an interest in the environment and feel a lot more has to be done on environmental issues and I think we're both trying to use whatever notoriety we have in poker to get people to think more about doing good things for the environment, trying to get our politicians to do more about global warming. Billy's a good roommate.
You should start with recycling around the Rio during the WSOP. There's a lot of waste here.
That's a lot of waste. Las Vegas in general is pretty bad with recycling. I'd like to see some of the hotels start using florescent light bulbs. That's one of the things I've thought of doing - going to the administrators at the hotels and trying to change the way they do things and do things in an environmentally sound way. But Las Vegas has a long way to go. There are a lot of cities in North America that are a lot more proactive in protecting the environment and recycling and using alternative energy. Women poker players.
What are your plans now?
My plans are now, I'm not going to play much poker in the near future. I'm going back to New York to see my father in about a week. He's still in the hospital but on the road to recovery. Then I'm going to go on vacation to Cape Cod, which is one of my favorite places. I'm renting a house with my sister and her family, like I do every year, and I'm going to enjoy the summer and get back to poker around the end of August.
And the next World Series of Poker: Are you going to make any predictions about a third year at the H.O.R.S.E. final table?
Next year I plan to win it.
I still need to work on playing the flop games. The Stud games are my forte and there are three Stud games and only two flop games and a lot of people don't play the Stud games too well. I know a lot of my opponents would say I don't play the Stud games too well (laughs) but I have faith in my Stud game and I think that's why I've done well two years in a row, along with some luck. I don't rank myself among the very top players. I think I've had some good fortune and played well at the time.
Whether there is luck involved or not, there's no doubt David Singer is fortunate. He has more than $2.5 million in career tournament winnings and honor of final tabling the most respected tournament in the poker industry two years in a row.
He might have walked from the Main Event to the rail mired in controversy, but his exit this year is hardly his defining moment at the World Series of Poker.
Perhaps getting lucky in love has brought a little luck to David Benyamine's poker game as well. The pro, who got engaged earlier this year to fellow Full Tilt Poker pro Erica Schoenberg, had quite the productive week online.
