Gus Hansen

Online action at the highest stake on the planet has once again taken on a roller-coaster characteristic, this time with Phil Galfond coming straight back at the in-form Dane, Gus Hansen, Van Marcus and Scott Palmer.

An incredible Tuesday night session, of only 2,195 hands, saw Galfond walk away with almost $600,000 of other people’s money.

The familiar face-off with Gus Hansen on the Pot Linit Omaha tables created a considerable part of the gigantic hoard. In two of the biggest hands of the week, and what would be some of the biggest hands in history if it were not becoming almost a daily occurrence for such records to change and it is a good thing that record books are now digital and automatically-updateable documents, Galfond squeezed Hansen all-in for a $98,393 with a middling straight and then for $168,785 with a set of 10.

Meanwhile, Galfond wasalso playing 2-7 Draw against different opponents and managed to make a tidy sum against all of them. Just in March, Galfond earned more than $1.67 million dollars playing this modality; he tops the winnerboard for that variation, well ahead of David Oppenheim ($653,070) and Abe “EazyPeazy” Mosseri ($487,098). Blogging on this game, he wrote on Wednesday, that his most recent results were most likely readable as the “opposite side of variance … I still need a lot of work on my 2-7 game (I find myself lost/confused way too often still), and a ton of work on my Stud games, but I think everything’s coming along well.”

Galfond has turned the tables on Hansen to become this week’s biggest winner so far with earnings of $692,355 while Hansen hits the top of the loserboard with losses of $496,337.

“I’ve been grinding nonstop this month. I have had a lot of motivation to rebuild my roll after my massive downswing…Fortunately it’s worked!” Blogged Galfond, who has made $8,244,053 playing online cash games at Full Tilt since 2007. His profit for this year is now $787,230 after having had a terrible January and February which had put him on a deficit of over $1 million, to end March as the biggest winner is an achievement-and-a-half in psychological terms, as well as testament to his own investment of time in improving his game.

Hansen took on Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond on the $300/$600 Pot-Limit Omaha tables and took home some major pots that included the mammoth $155,592 for a sleek straight, but the next two biggest pots went to Galfond with a diamond flush to K bringing in $148,378 and full house of Q over K that sent $133,200 his way. All hands well run twice with the same winner coming out on top. Hansen has also been playing catch with “NoPasaran” over the weekend – a player who earnt a certain level of notoriety for beating the “XWINK” not so long ago. Meeting each other on saem $300/$600 PLO tables, the largest pot in their mutual weekend session saw a $114,188 pot head Hansen’s way with a sweet full house on the first run and some winning 3s on the second.

Moving on to Monday night specifically, Hansen went up a gear to the $500/$1,000 PLO tables to later return to butcher a new victim, Andreas “skjervoy” Torbergsen, from whom he cleared a staggering $166k in 89 hands back on the $300/$600 PLO. Following that, Galfond sought out Hansen and the pair went at it again for a relatively small session of 150 hands that saw neither player able to pull away. Just last night, Hansen pocketed $171K. He dominates the 2011 online winning rankings with a mere 4.7 million in earnings in these (almost-) first three months of the year. Galfond made $107k on the lonely lundi while Tom Dwan and Luke Schwartz picked by tens of thousands in their early-week sessions.

Thanks to his huge win in the “durrrr” Challenge, Daniel “jungleman12″ Cates was up $291,000 for the week to weigh-in as the biggest earner, whereas, not surprisingly, his opponent, Dwan, was done by a heart-stopping $546,000 for last week’s action. Cates is seconed in the year-so.far leaderboard.

Kevin Vandersmissen

Belgian Kevin Vandersmissen takes a huge chip lead into the final table at the European Poker Tour (EPT) Snowfest orgaginzed by PokerStars in the Austrian Alps.

The €3,750 EPT Snowfest event is taking place in theAustrian town of Saalbach-Hinterglemm near Salzburg. Home to the Alpine Ski World Championships in 1991, Saalbach-Hinterglemm, the ski resort is one of Austria’s finest.

Day 4 began with 24 survivors from a starting line-up of 482 hungry horses. The eight players that remain include Romanian former World Cup of Poker (WCP) representative Cristian Dragomir who had to barge his way to the final table by eliminating former WCP team-mate Cristian Tardea to send his friend to the rail in tenth place. clashed with just ten players remaining. The last international big name left in the tournament was Team PokerStars Pro Alex Kravchenko who looked for a place at the bar after leaving in 15th place.

Three Belgians constitute the base of the finalists, with a commanding chip lead being held by Kevin Vandersmissen, his 4.5 million chips almost double the stack of his closest rival, Dragomir. Dane Morten Mortensen holds the short stack, having reached the final table after a solid run that saw him take out former EPT champion and Team PokerStars Pro Sebastian Ruthenberg, who in turn had sent home another former, and very recent EPT champion, Micchael Tureniec.

In related news, the organizers have announced a new EPT Tournament of Champions freeroll, which will take place as part of the season-ending activities at the Grand Final in Madrid. The tournament’s prizes include four different EPT packages for Season 8 tournaments, ranging in value from €50,000 to €25,000 to €15,000 to €10,000, on offer to the what will by then be 70 EPT champions that include the likes of Liv Boeree, Bertrand Grospellier, Toby Lewis, Jake Cody, Patrik Antonius, Ram Vaswani, Jason Mercier, Michael Martin, Michael McDonald, Galen Hall, Harrison Gimbel, Carter Phillips, Aaron Gustavson, Gavin Griffin and Kevin MacPhee.

Kimberly Lansing Returns on WPT Season 9

Even though the present season of the World Poker Tour (WPT) is only partway through, the televised moments from the first few stops will begin to be broadcast from Sunday 13 February on Fox Sports Net.

The new episodes, from Season IX, will be aired at either 8 p.m. or 11 p.m. depending on your U.S. location and will be hosted by Vince Van Patten and commentated by popular pro Mike Sexton. There are a number of changes to the show’s format that are aimed at improving the viewing experience for fans and new viewers.

Firstly, Kimberly Lansing, the former WPT hostess, becomes a booth announcer, handling player interviews and linking in with Van Patten and Sexton. A second important improvement is the addition of another expert commentator to accompany Sexton’s analysis; Pro Tony “Bond18” Dunst debuts on the show with a show-in-a-show segment named “The Raw Deal,” that will talk viewers through hands, criticize play and involve Dunst himself as a participant in the WPT events.

The WPT will broadcast all the events from this season from Day 1, enabling poker fans to gauge and experience the feel of a poker tournament and what it takes to get all the way to the final table.

Steve Heller, the Chief Executive Officer of WPT, announced: “As Season Nine rolls out, fans will find all the great poker action they’ve come to expect with a new, faster-paced, edgier tone. We are introducing new elements, graphics, and talent throughout the season. Each week, viewers are guaranteed to see something unexpected and uniquely WPT.”

The coverage of each tournament will last two episodes; the first two installments on Sunday, 13 February and Sunday 20 February will cover the Bellagio Cup VI. Season IX’s first event ended with arguably the best player of recent times, Phil Ivey, in a final table situation and squaring off against top online pro Justin “Boosted J” Smith in the heads-up.

FOX Sports Net’s VP of Programming, David Sussin, remarked: “We’re very excited about the new season of the World Poker Tour. WPT has really amped up everything about the production and it shows in the product. Sunday nights are again the destination viewing for poker fans.”

Action from the Legends of Poker tournament at the Bicycle Casino in Los Angeles and the Doyle Brunson Five Diamond World Poker Classic from the Bellagio in Las Vegas will provide the highest quality viewing as new episodes still to be added to the season’s fare.

Eugene Katchalov

38 players paid the $100,000 buy in for the Super High Roller event, creating a prize pool of just over 3.7 million dollars. Day 2 of the event saw 23 players return and these were whittled down to just seven who came back to the felt. Well-known professionals Daniel Negreanu from Canada, Bryn Kenney and the Costa Rican star Humberto Brenes were amongst these survivors.

The short stack of Andrew Lichtenberger meant he was very quickly eliminated by Negreanu and was soon followed by Sandor Demjan in sixth place – both players missing out on any part of the prize money that would start at $200,000 for the fifth-pace finisher who turned out to be Brenes. The Costa Rican now has lifetime earnings of $5,820,731.

Americans Nick Schulman and Bryn Kenney fell to the heads-up finalists, Negreanu and Katchalov respectively. The remaining $2.5 million in prize money created an epic battle between these two rather successful players. Eventually coming out on top, 29-year-old Katchalov took home the $1.5 million first-place prize that means his lifetime earnings are now up to $6,452,384. The Ukraine-born North American received his first batch of real attention when he became the winner of the largest single prize for a non-championship event in the World Poker Tour (WPT), earning $2,482,605 for his victory in the 2007 Doyle Brunson Five Diamond World Poker Classic.

Even if Negreanu couldn’t manage to win the tournament, the $1 million runner up prize he banked put him back on the top list of all-time earners with $13,995,908, evicting Phil Ivey from the spot on the top of the ranks.

The Super High Roller event was the second official event of the prestigious PCA festival of poker being held at the Atlantis Resort in the Bahamas. The first event, also now over, was a novelty event that combined both fishing and poker. The fishing competition was won by Dana Weeks, an amateur poker player who runs a family fishing-lodge business in British Columbia’s Haida Gwaii Islands. The poker section of the event was won by Minor League baseball pitcher Wade Townsend, whose third place finish in the fishing meant he claimed the overall crown.

The young Norwegian used to be a predominately online player but she has started to make her presence felt in the live arena. Some of her famous wins include coming first a 180-man tournament despite only looking at her hole cards once and outlasting a field of 20,000 in an $11 tournament.

Having played mainly No-limit Hold’em for most of her career, Annette has been branching out and learning new formats, with Pot-limit Omaha being one of the games she is looking to excel at. It seems as if her studying and hard-work has already started to pay off as she completely dominated the final table of the $1,100 Pot-limit Omaha tournament in Melbourne, Australia.

By the end of the first day, the 160 entrants were whittled down to just the final table of nine with Annette sat third in chips and within touching distance of the title, championship gold ring and the AUD$40,000 first prize money. The players at the final table had no answer for her aggressive style of play and she was responsible for eliminating five of her eight opponents.

The final elimination came after only three hands of heads-up play against Billy Seri. A pot sized raise on the button from Seri saw Annette re-raise enough to put Seri all-in. He called and the players revealed their Omaha poker hands. Seri showed Kh8dJc9h and was trailing Annette’s KcJdJh2s. The board ran out Ac9cAh2cTc and Miss Obrestad’s pair of jacks held up to give her the win and consign Seri to second place.

The win took her live career earnings to over $2,800,000 and cemented her third place in the women’s all-time winnings listings.

The first situation is when you have AA and you are the first or second to act.  In order to have a shot at winning the hand, you are going to need to eliminate some players and the only way to do that is to get some money in the pot.  When you are first or second to act, it is early enough to dissuade callers from getting into the pot with a marginal hand.

You are also going to have a better idea of where your stand against your opponents if they are getting into the pot. As it is unlikely for someone to call you with a marginal hand, you can count on the fact that you are sitting across from a hand that has a high pair in it.  If the board flops babies, you can continue to be aggressive with a little more confidence that you are still sitting on the best hand.  If a K or Q hits the board and you fire with them coming right back over the top, you are probably better off letting the hand go as they will more than likely be sitting on a set and you are reduced to 2 outs.

The second situation where you can throw out a raise is when you have a lot of limpers already in and you are in late position with a drawing hand.  The reason for this is to build up the pot on the hopes that you hit the flop in a big way.  The beauty of this move is that most inexperienced players will check it around to you regardless if they hit or not.  They will hope to hit you with a check raise and if you don’t hit, you have the ability to get a free card on the turn.

Raising here is very effective over the long run as the odds that you are generating off of the initial raise are rather large when compared to the overall investment that you are seeing back on your hand.  If you manage to hit one out of about 8 hands, you will be at the very worst even.  If you can hit two of these hands, you are going to have a very profitable session.

Raising in Omaha is a true weapon and you have to use it wisely.  Don’t abuse it and after you hit a few hands you will be able to pull off a bluff every now and again.  You of course need to mix up your game a bit so you don’t become predictable, but stick to these guidelines for the majority of your play and you can turn profitable sessions when you are raising before the flop.

When you see the flop with multiple callers and you are not on the pair, you absolutely have to let your hand go unless you are on the nut flush or the nut straight draw.  Even then, you are going to have to play very cautiously as any match will crush you.  This will be more of a feel for your opponents at that point, but be very careful.

The best opportunity that you are going to have to steal away the pot is when you are heads-up with a prefop raiser and a small pair hits the board.  As long as you don’t see an A or a K out there, you very well may be able to snatch the hand by keeping the pressure on all the way through the river regardless if you have the matching card or not.  The preflop raise is a definitive sign of a player that is sitting with AA or KK in their hand.

Now when the pair hits the board and you do end up hitting your boat, you have to pay particular attention to how you hit the boat. When that river comes around and you are sitting with the low kicker, you may still paying someone off. Throw the bet out there and see what the reaction is.  If someone is banging you right back, you may have to actually let the hand go.

When you flop the nuts and there is no danger of anyone outdrawing your boat, you want to encourage the action.  You can do this by putting out cautious bets that will now show your hand, but still let everyone know that you have something.  With a little luck, someone with a weaker boat will come over the top and you can drop the hammer on them.

Remember, Omaha Poker is a dangerous game when you are playing on a full table.  More than likely, the nuts are out there on each and every hand so you need to make sure that you don’t go to aggressive on a hand, regardless of its strength, if it is not the nuts.  Learn how to read the board and pay attention to how each and every opponent plays different hands.  Do this, and they will be reloading when you catch them with their hand in the cookie jar.

Ladbrokes Poker Room Details:Country of Origin:GibraltarLicense:GibraltarYear of Foundation:2004Software:MicrogamingSize:NAAudited By:PWCLanguage:EnglishAccepts USA Players:NABonus:Up To $500

Available Games	:	Texas Holdem, Omaha, 5 Card Stud, 7 Card Stud, 5 Card Draw
Deposit Methods	:	VISA, MasterCard, PayPal, Neteller, Moneybookers, Western Union, ClickandBuy, Ukash, Bank Transfer
Withdrawal Methods	:	VISA, MasterCard, PayPal, Neteller, Moneybookers, Western Union, ClickandBuy, Ukash, Bank Transfer
E-mail Support	:	care@ladbrokespoker.com
Telephone Support	:	UK: 0800 032 1133 or International: 00 350 200 43003

Ladbrokes are well-known British bookmakers and the Ladbrokes Poker website is a part of its vast online betting network. It is a great place to begin your poker-playing career as it offers a good sign up bonus apart from which it gives its players an opportunity to play online casino games from the poker website itself. The website also provides various promotions that are introduced time and again. There is a lot that players can look forward to at Ladbrokes Poker. So, if you are still thinking of where to begin, you might just find your ideal solution by opting for Ladbrokes Poker.

Ladbrokes Poker uses the MicroGaming software, which offers simple but useful graphics that make game play easy and quite interesting. The software offers a browser playing facility that allows instant game play. The games run at a good pace and players do not have to wait for games to start, as dealing is quick and there is no time wasted between the hands. The lobby is straightforward and you are able to access the games with no fuss at all. You can also get all the available table stats such as a detailed history of your hands. Also available is a chat facility that enables players to interact with each other and exchange notes.

The ‘My Lobby’ option allows you to view all the games you have played along with a list of all your successfully played games. You can customize the options as per your requirement. A calendar is also available that enables players to organize their time and also mark events they would like to participate in, so that they can receive reminders of the approaching dates. Also you have access to their Sports book that allows you to bet on some of the major Sporting events around the world.

You can even play a demo version of the games before you sign up for a real account. If you do not wish to play for real money even then the website would be a perfect place for you.

The games offered at Ladbrokes Poker include the standard Texas Holdem, Omaha, Omaha High, Omaha Low, 5 Card Stud, 7 Card Stud and 5 Card Draw. There is a huge range of stakes that you can choose from. In Texas Holdem, the available variations are Limit, No Limit, Pot Limit as well as heads up versions. The stakes begin as little as $0.01/$0.02 and can go up to $25/$50.

Also available are a number of tournaments, which include single table, multi-table, sit and go, heads up, ladder and satellite tournaments. You can enter a tournament with a buy-in as little as $2 or play for higher limits that range to thousands of dollars.

Apart from the regular poker games, Ladbrokes poker also allows its players to play casino games that are made available on the poker website. These include Blackjack and Roulette with limits beginning at $1 and going up to $5,000. You can also play Baccarat, 3 Card Poker and multi hand 3 Card Poker, Craps and Cyber Stud Poker. If you are a slot machine enthusiast, there are a lot of slot machines available to suit your fancy.

Ladbrokes Poker offers new players a 100% sign up bonus of up to $500. The players can wager for this bonus by gathering Player Points with 30 times the points against your deposit. You can get these points by playing tournaments and raked hands.

As for promotions there are several offers that keep coming up and each one is more lucrative than the other, thereby attracting a huge amount of traffic to the website. You will never have the regret of being a part of the Ladbrokes poker site because the online poker room strives to provide the best to its customers.

Basic DetailsCountry of Origin:GibraltarLicense:GibraltarYear of Foundation:2002Software:iPoker NetworkSize:11.9 MBAudited By:PWCLanguage:English, French, Italian, SpanishAccepts USA Players:NoBonus:$600

Available Games	:	Texas Holdem in Limit, No Limit, Pot Limit and Limit versions. Limit Omaha, Pot Limit Omaha, Limit Omaha HiLo, Pot Limit Omaha HiLo, 7 Card Stud, 5 Card Stud
Deposit Methods	:	VISA, Masters, Diners Club Credit Cards, Ukash, abaqooo, CLICK2PAY, Monybookers, ECO, wirecard, WebMoney, sofort, UseMyBank, Przelewy24, paysafeCard, POLi, NETELLER, Nordea, my Citadel Wallet, moneta.ru, Bank Transfer, iDEAL, INSTADEBIT, ClickandBuy
Withdrawal Methods	:	VISA, Masters, NETELLER, Moneybookers, ClickandBuy, CLICK2PAY, my Citadel Wallet, ENTROPAY, Local Bank Payment, Bank Draft
E-mail Support	:	Support@WilliamHillPoker.com
Telephone Support	:	UK: 0808-120-3503 International Phone: +44-20-3393-6959

William Hill Poker Review

William Hill Poker, one of the leading bookmakers of the United Kingdom offers poker players a wide range of online poker games. Apart from being major Sports betting provider William Hill has become one of the largest online gaming sites available today. Its growing popularity lies in the reason that it offers some great promotions and bonuses that draw thousands of people to its poker playing website.

It caters to all kinds of players playing at the poker tables, which include players from other gaming sites such as from the online casino, Sports betting and bingo websites. So no matter what kind of player you are, you will always find something to attract your attention at William Hill Poker.

Software:

William Hill Poker is now a part of the iPoker Network and uses the PlayTech software. The software is straightforward and simple to understand and handle. The game play is fast and the software offers some useful features. The menus are easy to manage providing you with quick access to the desired information. With the help of a swift scan you can easily locate the table you wish to play.

You can also get information on the player statistics, flop percentages, average pot size, hands being played and some other useful details. Also available are hand histories on request. The graphics are not of very high standard but do not cause a hindrance to your game play. The software also offers multi-table playing facilities that allow you to play at multiple tables at the same time. Games at

William Hill Poker:

William Hill Poker provides a wide range of games to select from that include the most popular Texas Holdem, Omah, Omaha Hi-Lo, Seven Card Stud, Seven Card Stud Hi-Lo, Five Card Stud and the exciting Blackjack. Stakes can start very low allowing players with smaller budgets to attempt games too. However those keen on making larger wagers can also have their share of the fun at the larger tables.

Apart from the ring games there are also numerous tournaments to play, which include multi-table tournaments, guaranteed tournaments among several others. There are various jackpots to attempt too including the exclusive bad beat jackpot that offers £150 in cash prize.

Bonus/Promotions:

You can get a 100% bonus of up to £600 on your first deposit and you have 60 days in which to wager for this bonus. Apart from this there are daily promotions that attract a lot of traffic to the website. There are freerolls to be won every day and the first winner of the Royal Flush in a day is awarded £100.

William Hill Poker also offers Loyalty Points on every hand and tournament played with real money. These points can either be exchanged for cash or for entries to live tournaments.

Deposit/Withdrawal

Deposit methods include VISA, PayPal, NETeller, Moneybookers, Bank Wire among various others. Withdrawals can be made via FirePay, Citadel, NETeller to name a few.

Customer Support:

Customer Support is available around the clock seven days a week via telephone, live chat facility and email system.