Poker From The Rail
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Posted by AlCantHang | Filed under Bloggers on the Rail
The poker world became a little more interesting in the spring of 2009 when Tom Dwan announced the “durrrr Challenge”. It was big news when he said he would play anyone (except Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond) for 50,000 hands of $200/$400 heads up PLO or NLHE across four tables. His propostion was $1.5m of his money versus his opponents $500k, whoever was ahead after 50,000 hands would collect the prop bet. There were other restrictions placed on the bet but those are the basic nuts and bolts. Full Tilt’s Patrik Antonius was the first to step up and everyone gathered around the tables in anticpation.
After a slight pause in the action for the 2009 WSOP, a little player named “Isildur1″ soon had everyone’s attention including both Dwan and Antonius. While the “durrrr Challenge” was an entertaining concept, it was far more interesting for the players to climb in levels for a chance to eat some “Swedish fish”. While the nosebleed action has slowed down while “Isildur1″ licks his wounds, other things continued to cause a delay in the action between Dwan and Antonius. Dwan leads the first Challenge with +10,000 hands remaining before it is officially decided and Dwan’s lead sitting over $2,000,000.
Recently word began circulating about other players taking up the challenge versus Dwan with “durrrr” himself indicating in a Bluff article he would be playing Brian Townsend next. Rumors began flying about when/where/who would be the next player to sit down with Dwan. We now have the who and when. Next up with be Daniel “Jungleman12″ Cates and we can expect the games to kick off at any time. The tables are now ready to roll.
I had a chance to sit down for a few minutes with Dwan on Wednesday to get an update and he thought there was a great chance play in the next challenge would begin sometime on Thursday, August 26th.
There are still a few thousand hands remaining againt Patrik Antonius, how do you feel about your play against him?
Patrik’s a really good player and I definitely got pretty lucky versus him overall. I’m happy I’m up so much and obviously I’m a big favorite to win and I hope I do, but he’s still a super good player and there are a few hands left play, I’m not a lock by any means. I felt like I played pretty well and ran pretty well and that’s a good combo.
It was originally reported Brian Townsend would be your next Challenger. Will you be playing both Townsend and Jungleman12 at the same time?
I wanted to work out playing both of them but was busy the last few weeks so I think I’m just going to play Jungleman12 on 6 tables and hopefully crank out a bunch of hands. And then if Townsend wants to play, I can play him then.
Are you playing the same stakes and same level ($200/$400)? (Edit: they are playing NLHE instead of PLO)
Yeah, need to do 4 tables minimum. It’s his choice if he wants to do more, I’ll definitely do up to 6 (tables) and probably do 8. He said he thinks he’ll only want to do 6 so I’m fine with that.
Have you played much against Jungleman12? Any strategy difference between him and Antonius?
No, not too much at all. We played some. I saw somewhere online that it was 15,000 hands or something like that which seems like way more than I remember playing him but maybe. I have some idea how he plays, hopefully I’ll have a better idea in a little bit and a little more money too.
A quick internet search tells me Daniel “Jungleman12″ Cates is an economics student at the University of Maryland. He quickly moved up in stakes until he was soon battling in the biggest games on the site and survived losing ~$600,000 to “Isildur1″. He seems to employ an aggressive style of bankroll management but will play anyone at anytime. Looking over the small sample size of hands, the match seems pretty even on paper.
While the Antonius battle has drug on for over 18 months, Dwan believes the battle versus Jungleman12 will be done quickly with both ready to grind away the hands on as many as 8 tables at a time. Standby for updates and stats.
Edit: Until the official stats page is completed, we are tracking his results here at durrrr Challenge 2: durrrr vs. Jungleman12
You can see who’s online from Team Full Tilt here.
Tags: AlCantHang, Bloggers on the Rail, durrrr, durrrr Challenge, Tom Dwan
Posted by AlCantHang | Filed under Bloggers on the Rail
It’s Shark Week on the Discovery Channel here in the states (I’m too lazy to see if the Discovery Channel and Shark Week are available outside the lower 48) and appropriately enough the huge cash games on Full Tilt Poker began hitting up at the same time. The “durrrr” Challenge resumed after a summer hiatus, Ivey stomped some mud-holes, and other big games were running on a regular basis. The poker sharks have come out to play.
After a short pause for the WSOP, Tom “durrrr” Dwan and Patrik Antonius put a jolt back in their heads up challenge by playing a few hands over the last two days. Antonius came out on the wrong side of both sessions with Dwan taking several huge 6-digit pots yesterday alone. The lead for Dwan has been stretched to over $2,000,000 making Antonius a long shot to come out on top. The Challenge is nearly 80% and just over 10,000 hands remain to be played before someone has to pay off their bet. You can track the Challenge stats, replay hands, and get updates on the “durrrr” Challenge Stats page.
I first noticed things were going to pick up on the big games this week when Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond tweeted on Monday “Making the same mistake I’ve made time and time again… Playing Ivey”. He may have underestimated his chances playing Heads Up $500/$1,000 Pot Limit Omaha ($40,000 cap) because he finished the day taking a decent chunk of cash from Ivey. On the other hand we had several players (Luukie21 and IHateJuice) who would take Galfond’s spot at the table and proceed to dust off over $1,000,000 back to Ivey.
Those were just a few of the games running. Dwan seems to be constantly sitting at empty tables waiting for competitors, at the time of this post he is playing games from$50/$100 HU PLO, $200/$400 6-max PLO, $500/$1,000 HU PLO, and $1,500/$3,000 7-game mix. With several weeks of big-time online poker tournament about to kick off, it seems the cash games may explode at the same time. Railbirds should have the Full Tilt client fired up and keep an eye on the biggest online cash games in existence.
You can find out quickly whether they are playing the “durrrr” Challenge by checking the top of the “durrrr” Challenge stats page and check which of your favorite members of Team Full Tilt are online by clicking on the “Full Tilt See Who’s Online” link.
Tom “durrrr” Dwan Challenge progress chart
Tags: AlCantHang, Bloggers on the Rail, durrrr, durrrr Challenge, OMGClayAiken, Phil Galfond, Phil Ivey, Tom Dwan
Posted by Dave McCarthy | Filed under Uncategorized
Tom “durrrr” Dwan entered the final day of Event #55: $10,000 PLO with a huge chip lead. He quickly lost 70% of his chips before a near triple-up put him back at the top of the leaderboard. Thinking this might be another epic run at a bracelet with the biggest names in poker sweating (literally), I spent some time on his rail.
Unfortunately, Durrrr didn’t make the final table, but there were still a few interesting sights and sounds from the rail.
Posted by AlCantHang | Filed under Bloggers on the Rail
After going through about 10 days of the doldrums here in the Rio I finally feel the buzz back in the hallways. Each year it’s tough moving through the last week of preliminary events with the Main Event on the horizon but still just seeing the same schedule of mid-buyin festivals of push and pray poker. We no longer have any new open events except for the big one on Monday but we will see a room full of celebrities today for the Ante Up for Africa charity game. Fans and spectators have packed the Rio hallways between the Amazon and Pavilion Room searching for the favorite actor/player/athlete for an autograph. The buzz is definitely back.
It may also have something to do with one of our final events, Tom “durrrr” Dwan begins Day 3 of the $10,000 Pot Limit Omaha event with a nice size chip lead over second place but the remaining field of 33 is stacked from top to bottom with top players. The plan is to play down to a winner which will likely take until sunrise tomorrow. Some of those remaining outside the top ten are Phill Helmuth, Michael Binger, John Racener, “Devilfish” Ulliott, Daniel Alaei, Leandro Pimentel, Fabrice Soulier, Tony Cousineau, Ben “benba” Lamb, and Nenad Medic. The table to watch will have Dwan, Hellmuth, Jason Mercier, John Racener, and Jordan Smith.
We could find ourselves in another situation where the big bankroll players in Vegas begin trickling in during the day to (literally) sweat Dwan in another deep run. If we’ve learned anything this summer, anything can happen.
$10,000 Pot Limit Omaha Championship top ten chip counts:
1 – Tom “durrrr” Dwan – 910,000
2 – Danny Wong – 563,000
3 – Julio Marines – 539,000
4 – Ludovic Lacay – 528,000
5 – Seamus Cahill – 495,000
6 – Daniel Harmetz – 490,000
7 – Miguel Proulx – 468,000
8 – Dmitry Stelmak – 448,000
9 – Alessio Isaia – 443,000
10 – Ville Mattila – 416,000
The other big story today is Frank Kassela vitually putting his stamp on the 2010 Player of the Year title as he goes for his 3rd WSOP bracelet with a $25,000 NLH 6-handed final table appearance this afternoon. He comes in 2nd in chips behind Dan “djk123″ Kelly and his massive chip lead. It won’t be an easy path for his 3rd victory but each place higher will put him one more step in front of John Juanda and the rest. That final table can be viewed live on ESPN3.com throughout the entire run.
$25,000 No Limit Hold’em 6-handed final table:
1 – Dan “djk123″ Kelly – 5,895,000
2 – Frank Kassela – 2,610,000
3 – Shawn Buchanan – 2,110,000
4 – Jason Somerville – 1,665,000
5 – Mikael Thuritz – 1,535,000
6 – Eugene Katchalov – 475,000
Tags: 2010 World Series of Poker, AlCantHang, Bloggers on the Rail, durrrr, Tom Dwan, WSOP
Posted by Dave McCarthy | Filed under Uncategorized
Poker fans with a fondness for social media will be happy to learn that Tom “durrrr” Dwan has now joined the ranks of active Tweeters. Durrrr’s Twitter page is twitter.com/Tom_Dwan. There were previously a lot of fake Tom Dwan Twitter pages. This one is real.
The Full Tilt WSOP coverage site collects durrrr and other Full Tilt pros’ tweets, so you can go to one place to find 140 character updates from the likes of Durrrr, Annette Obrestad, John Juanda, Andy Bloch, Howard Lederer, Erik Seidel, and others.
Posted by Dave McCarthy | Filed under Bloggers Corner
With all durrrr’s bracelet prop bets this Series, his run at a WSOP title was all the more compelling than just another great player going for his first bracelet. Here are the eight most interesting things (in chronological order) I saw and heard while spending the day on Durrrr’s rail. Durrrr began the final day of Event #11 ($1500 NLHE) as chipleader.
#8. “Nothing better than playing shorthanded with Durrrr as chipleader on your left…”
- Nicholas “ISpewChips” Phillips, seated immediately to Durrrr’s right, after Durrrr wins his third straight pot with 12 players remaining.
#7. A few minutes into the final table, Huck Seed walks up to me near the table and asks how Durrrr’s doing. As he’s asking, Durrrr takes down a pot with a preflop raise. “There’s a lot of that going on…he was running them over shorthanded a little bit ago.” I say.
“They shouldn’t be letting him do that,” Huck says. “They should know better.” Huck has faded Durrrr in the latter’s bracelet bets.
#6. A few eliminations later, 4th place finisher Austin McCormick finds himself all in w/ J10 vs. chipleader David Randall’s A10. The flop gives McCormick nothing but a backdoor flush draw. One of Randall’s railbirds sarcastically shouts “Put a diamond up! A teaser!” When the diamond materializes on the turn but the river bricks, the railbird high-fives a friend. He is one happy Two Plus Two regular.
#5. Durrrr, also playing Event #15 ($10k Stud/8b), hustles over to his dwindling stack at Event #11′s dinner break. Immediately to his left is Chris Ferguson. I try to take a picture of them laughing with my camera phone but this is all I get.
#4. As the final table gets shorthanded, the rails begin to fill with bigshots. David Benefield, Brandon Adams, and Lee Childs are all watching. At various times throughout the night, Chris Ferguson, Michael Craig, Eli Elezra, Barry Greenstein, and David Benyamine all make their way through the ropes to take a look.
#3. @RealKidPoker (Daniel Negreanu) tweeting from the Stud/8b event (a stone’s throw away in the Amazon room):
The atmosphere in the room is electric. So many of us have bets against Durrr winning. 3 left and we are sweating hard!
A couple hours later:
Durr just doubled up and the rail cheered while most of the people in the stud 8 moaned and cried.
#2. That 2nd tweet was a reference to this:
With the blinds at 20k/40k, Durrrr open shoves from the SB with 79, Randall calls w/ A10. The flop comes 7-high. A railbird yells, “7 on the turn!” A 7 comes on the turn. Durrrr doubles up. A good looking blond woman runs from the rails and high-fives Durrrr. Durrrr does not appear to know who she is.
#1. Heads up and shortstacked, Durrrr pushes on the button with Q6 and is called by Simon Watt with 99. Durrrr doesn’t catch up, giving him a 2nd place finish. Cries of relief come from the Stud/8b area that has just finished its final hand of the night.
Posted by Dave McCarthy | Filed under Bloggers Corner, WSOP
For a guy like Tom Dwan who routinely wins and loses hundreds of thousands of dollars in a day, the World Series of Poker isn’t quite the same as it is for the average pro.
Durrrr showed up for the $50k Player’s Championship a couple hours late and was one of the only 11 players to bust on Day 1. The online star spent much of the time on the phone, probably frustrated by the fact that the WSOP dealers were failing to issue 300 hands per hour. He was back Saturday and Sunday for $1k and $1.5k events, respectively. $1k is the big blind in Dwan’s regular games. Dwan again spent much of the tournament on the phone and busted quickly.
But if the prestige of a WSOP bracelet isn’t enough, durrrr’s got plenty of bracelet prop bets to keep him honest. He’s been pretty active on the durrrr blog, listing his various bets and soliciting action. If you’ve got $10k and a Two plus Two account, you can bet him, though the lines will have to be modified as they were offered before the WSOP began.
Durrrr’s most recent blog post ends with the intriguing line “I made a ton of bets, and winning a bracelet would definitely be my biggest winning day ever at this point – so you can extrapolate from there.”
Check out his blog for the details of durrrr’s 2010 WSOP prop bets.
(Note: When he refers to “London” he means the WSOP-Europe. In other words, these bracelet prop bets count for WSOP and WSOP-Europe events.)
Posted by Dave McCarthy | Filed under Bloggers Corner
Top 5 Stories of the Week, March 29 – April 4:
#5 - $1 WSOP Satellites started today at Full Tilt…
#4 - April Fools jokes everywhere in the poker world…
#3 - durrrr takes Ziigmund for $1.2m at $3k/$9k PLO…
#2 – A Massachusetts bill to license gambling would criminalize online poker…
#1 – Isildur1 to appear on TV!
Posted by Dave McCarthy | Filed under Bloggers Corner
Tom “durrrr” Dwan is not “pencilled in for a key role in Rounders 2.” At least, not as far as we know. Here are a couple other ideas we were considering for April Fool’s day. Full versions are after the jump (click the “Read the rest of this entry link”).
- Durrrr Challenge 2: Durrrr vs. Ivey – Loser to have a finger severed
- Socrates named member of Team Full Tilt
Tags: April Fools, durrrr, Socrates
Posted by Dave McCarthy | Filed under Bloggers Corner
With a number of sources in Hollywood confirming last week’s rumor that Miramax Films has purchased a screenplay for Rounders 2, a new detail has emerged: Tom “durrrr” Dwan has been penciled in for a key role.
The sequel is expected to focus on the world of online poker, so the role would be a natural fit for durrrr. This morning, a 2+2 poster identifying himself as “a Miramax talent coordinator authorized to disclose limited information” said the screenplay features durrrr in an intense early scene.
When asked by another poster if the early scene would parallel the opening of Rounders (in which Matt Damon goes broke), the Miramax employee replied: “All I can say is that a misclick is involved. A huge misclick.”
**Keep reading for artwork…**
Tags: durrrr, rounders 2
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