It's been a busy four weeks - Christmas, the denouement of the Bellybusters season, the New year, flying back to Dublin, catching up with friends/family, having my apartment renovated and of course, feasting at the poker tables. I will attempt to write a flurry of blogs in the next day or two so that I can control-alt-delete them from my brain and begin again to form new memories.
First things first: Christmas is stupid. The two weeks of preparation (I am aware that two weeks is not excessive by some standards) is so time-consuming - the tree shopping (I played hardball with a charming Canadian man and got $5 off our perfectly proportioned beauty!), the food shopping (my mother's discovery of WHOLE FOODS - a veritable Candyland for those of a Vegan/Coeliac/non-dairy and sugar disposition), the shopping shopping (Michelle's perpetual cycle of purchase, return and re-purchase). I just don't get it. The religious significance of the day has no meaning for the vast majority and as a festival of wasteful consumerism, it makes even less sense in the current economic climate. Anyhoo, that's enough bah-humbug!
Congratulations to the Bellybuster victors. Luke Ginnell trounced us all in the Classic, Jacaranda controversially nicked the High-Roller from Dr Fill who himself was the All-Rounder champion of 2008 while I took the $10 Turbo Title. The following are a brief list of noteworthy Bellybuster stats for the '08 season:
*41 tournament were held.
*65 different players turned out (50 in the Classic, 51 in the Turbo and 25 in the High-Roller), 39 of whom played 3 tourneys or more.
*LAPPIN played 40 of the 41 tourneys, Phishingirl played 33, Rounder63 played 26, Robocoonor played 24 and Thefloof played 22.
*LAPPIN finished in the money 17 times with eight wins, four 2nds and five 3rds, Dr Fill was ITM 11 times with three wins, three 2nds and 5 3rds while Phishingirl was ITM 8 times with 0 wins, three 2nds and 5 thirds.
*GINNELL came 4th on 5 occasions out of his 14 games
*Dr Fill won 3 back to back High-Roller tourneys
*Galactus X had the most number of last place finishes with 4 yet was tied for the second biggest number of 1st place finishes with 3.
*Mark Tully finished in the bottom half of 12 of his 14 tourneys and in the bottom 3 in 9 of them.
*Three of Full Tilt's affiliated pros joined us - Michael Craig, Joe Beevers and Adam Noone.
There will be a new season starting up very soon - either this weekend or next with a whole host of new games being included in the tournament roster. As of now, the schedule looks something like this but it is of course subject to change:
SUNDAY, 16.00ET - CLASSIC - $5 - NLHE
SUNDAY, 16.30ET - OMAHA - $5 - PLO
SUNDAY, 17.00ET - THE 69er - $69 - NLHE
WEDNESDAY, 16.00ET - HYPNO - $2 TURBO REBUY - NLHE
WEDNESDAY, 17.00ET - NITRO - $3.50 SUPER TURBO - AIOF HOLD 'EM
WEDNESDAY, 20.00ET - INSOMNIAC - $24 TURBO KO ($10 PER KO) - NLHE