maandag 9 maart 2009

How to throw a poker run

My first motorcycle was a 1957 Harley Davidson. When I found the bike for sale I had no money, but I knew I needed to have this motorcycle. So I came up with a way to raise the money and throw a great party at the same time. I threw a Poker Run. The concept of the game is easy. Each person tries to make the best 5 card poker hand. The way it is played is, each bike has to ride along a planed rout, every few miles there are checkpoints at each checkpoint along the way each bike must stop and receive a card. Along the rout there are 7 checkpoints, and at the end the rider with the best 5 card poker hand wins the prize Over the years the poker run has been adopted to lovers of many different hobbies. The poker run was originally an event bikers played on their Harley's, but over the years it has been borrowed by boaters and even runners. Throwing a poker run is fairly simple but takes time and some not to hard work. The first thing you need to do is get approval from the towns that your poker run will go thru. There may be some paperwork and fees. You will also need to make sure that at the end of the run is at a park or event hall. Depending on where you live you may also need a permit for the park. Next you will need riders. By figuring out how much you want to have for the prize money and how much the part after the poker ride will cost you can figure out how many riders you will need and how much the entrance fee will be, but it should be no more then $100 per bike. The next thing you will need to do is register riders. The best way to do this is to make a website, go to biker bars and biker events in your area. If you live in New York don’t go to Daytona Bike week to sign up riders, most people will not travel that far for a poker run. Try to get locals. After you have registered the riders you now have to plan for the party. Along with registering riders for your poker run you should also sell tickets so friends and family can join in the party after the ride is over and the poker winner is declared. The best way to advertise the party is on a local radio station and with posters around town. The more people you can get the more money you will have for a prize and for whatever cause you are trying to raise money for. You can either, buy your own food and get some friends to help cook or you can look in the phonebook for a caterer and you should be able to find a caterer who will throw you a great BBQ. Then all you need to do is wait for the big day and enjoy all the bikes, poker, beef and beer.

zondag 22 februari 2009

Beat Your Online Poker Opponent

Playing and winning online poker is a science. It is both a skill and an art of mastering things that most players take for granted. If you are signing up for an online poker game, keep in mind never to choose the “any game at this limit” option. By choosing this, you are also hindering your capacity to take control of your position on every sign up list. There are options that give you the privilege of having the top position by winning and giving up the place by quitting and at the same time you could still rejoin and have you name at the bottom of the list. Always look for a card room that fits your style. This way you always get the upper hand. If luck strikes in and you get on a bad round, look around the page for another table. Playing two games at the same time seems a nice idea. It seems that by doing this, you could double your money in one playing hour. This could be true for some players, but remember, it happens for a few and not for everybody. Besides, playing two games at a time would definitely lay down your small blind more and you sure are most likely to tilt. Keep yourself focused on one game. This way you could have the upper hand especially if you’re playing a major, drawn-out pot. Playing one game at a time also helps you play straightforwardly with only one opponent to concentrate on. There is online software that has proved to be marvelous. However, there are minor glitches that you need to stay away from. This is the “in-turn” button. This button allows the player to act on hand before your actual turn and allows him to go back trying on other moves. But there may be instances that the internet connection may not be at their best. There may be a time that while clicking the “check in-turn button,” the action may already be on you. What will happen is that the “call” button might be popping out on your screen in the place where you are supposed to click the “check” button. In poker, the only sure way of winning is by showing down the best hand. This is true not only for casinos but for online as well. However, there a number of reasonable ways a smart player could increase his chances of winning. The sure way of acquiring winning poker skills is by checking out how players deal with their games and keeping in mind the right moves.

dinsdag 13 januari 2009

A Great Poker Chip Set: A Must Have For Your Next Game.

A great poker chip set is a must have for your next game. There are so many different types, how do you know which one to choose? Follow these easy tips for choosing the right poker chip set, and you will add another dimension to your next poker. One thing to keep in mind is how many players are invited to your next game. You need a poker chip set that will be able to bankroll all of the players. If you only have three or four players, your poker chip set will probably only need to have three or four different color denominations, but if you have seven or eight players coming to your next game, you will probably need four or five colors to represent different size bets. Second , your poker chip set has to be big enough so that you don’t need to keep cashing in, trading chips and wasting the time that could be used dealing cards. Buying a poker chip set can be a real investment, so why not do it right the first time? If your weekly game is only yourself and two or three of your best friends, you probably only need about three hundred chips. But if you ever want to host a bigger game, you will probably need closer to five hundred pieces. So why not buy a standard poker chip set with 500 pieces. If you only buy 300 pieces, you may have to deal with the hassle of finding matching pieces in the future. So don’t gamble on this decision and buy a set that is too small. Third, what type of materials do you want your poker chip set to be made of? From clay to metal to plastic, each has its own advantages and disadvantages. A clay poker chip set is what the majority of the casinos use worldwide, but the chips can be very expensive. If you don’t want to set down a serious amount of cash, consider going with a composite chip (often made of clay and plastic or clay and metal). A composite poker chip set will last a long time, be affordable for the regular player and the chips are almost unbreakable. The only problem with a composite poker chip set is that the color will sometimes wear off of the chip with time. Because the color is applied onto the clay, and does not go all the way through the chip, after a couple of years of use, you may start to notice discolorations in your poker chip set. The third most popular type is a poker chip set made of plastic. The advantage of plastic is that it is cheap and durable. The disadvantages is that everything about it is cheap. Imagine showing up to your next game and throwing around flimsy little discs. The sound they make when you stack them and throw them onto the felt table won’t exactly sound real, and won’t impress your friends. If you are going to impress your friends on your next game night, make sure you follow these tips to make this purchase a great gamble. Invest in a poker chip set that will last a lifetime, look good and play just like in a real casino.

maandag 8 december 2008

A Glossary of Online Poker Terms

Let us know what is first?. Poker is a name set to huge sum of card games. What they have in common is that they are on the status of five card hands. The undeveloped games fairly easy to learn. The object of the game is to win the money bet by having the best classification hands. Poker is mostly played with in a smallest of two players but around five to seven players is more practical. The instructions of special games vary immensely. The quantity of to each player, the methods of bookmaking and the position of the hand can all differ. Even games of the same name will over and over again be in a sort of ways. It is therefore important to confirm that you entirely understand the rubric before you lead playing. In reserved games you play against all additional players. In order to win you need to beat all of your . Each actor turns at heart the seller. When you play in nightclub, you have two options. You can either bet against further players or against the casino. In the previous, the gaming house materials the dealer, charging a cut of the pot( the money bet) for this provision. A withdrawal around ten percent is common. Alternatively, the gaming club may make an hourly charge for the use of facilities. Let us look at some poker Ante:- a bet made before any cards have been dealt. Babies:- slight value cards. Bicycle:- see helm. Blind Bet:- a bet made without looking at your . Bluff:- tricking the new players into discerning that you have in actual fact good hand. Board:- the community cards in games such as Holdem and Omaha . Bone:- a new name for a chip. Call:- a verbal avowal that thespian will match the previous bet. Calling Station:- a play-actor who by the skin of your teeth ever raise. Dead man’s hand:- two pair of aces over eights. Draw:- in your hand for from the deck. Flop:- the deal where the first three community cards are revealed in Holdem and Omaha. Full House:- cards of the same value with pair, for example aces and two sixes.

donderdag 13 november 2008

#1 Secret Poker Strategy

If you have ever played poker before you know that you can obviously see all the players around you since you play in a circle (unless you’re playing online poker). You just figured out the most important part of poker. You may be thinking that that’s impossible. You probably think that the most important part is the cards; what cards you get how to use them, ECT... These are very important, you are correct, but it all starts with your ability to use your body language to your advantage. The cards are going to be relatively the same for all the players. Luck usually doesn’t factor in well in poker since everyone has the same chance to get the same cards. In case luck begins to play a large role in your game then what can you does? A player always has 4 basic choices; you can check, bet or call, raise, or fold. If you are not getting good cards you can always fold right? This is not always a good idea. You may be leaving large amounts of money on the table in the long run after a few initial folds. Sure you seemingly get away with losing less but you give up the chance to even try. Bluffing is the art of misguidance. You want them to think you have a bad hand one second and the next a great hand with all the best cards that are sure to win you the pot. How do you accomplish such a thing? Simply with your body language this can be done. If you have good cards act happy. You may not want them to know that you have good cards but it’s a way to change there thinking; now every time you act "happy" they will think you have good cards and may fold. If you have bad cards and you act happy they might fold because now they are afraid. What you want to do is create a complicated pattern of sad, happy, indifferent, ecstatic, angry, ECT. Actions for certain hands. You want to throw them off but try and lure them into a safe zone where they think they understand your bluffing pattern and then hit them with the reality. As long as they are trying to keep up with whatever pattern you have, you will have them all under your control. In one game of poker tournament I was playing in I decided to create very complex poker faces. They where not good they where not bad. I scrunched my face, grabbed my lip and scratched my leg; I did the craziest thing that nobody understood. They had no idea what my faces meant so they assumed that when I didn’t raise that my cards where not good and they would raise and raise. When it came time to show, guess who took home the pot. The moral of this little story is that you have to be creative. This is step two of poker (after learning the basics and learning them by heart), body language is very important. If you are known as a newbie and you come in they will expect you to show your cards loud and clear through your body language. You can mislead and kill your competition with a good poker face.

maandag 27 oktober 2008

Texas Hold'em Hand Odds And Probabilities

Odds are an important part of Texas Holdem. If you don't know how to calculate hand odds, poker odds and pot odds you will have a hard time playing your Texas Holdem hands correctly in difficult situations. Although many successful poker players claim to play by "feel," a solid grounding in math is vital for successful poker play. Texas Hold'em, like all other forms of gambling, is based on odds.

The likelihood of something happening vs. how much you get paid if it does happen is the basis for all gambling propositions. This likelihood is referred to as odds, and it will be very difficult for you to bet or call bets correctly if you do not understand Texas Hold'em odds. Download a good poker odds calculator and you've got this covered.

What are the chances of hitting a flush draw? What are the chances of your pocket pair improving to a set on the flop. You will find the answers to these questions, and many more, on this page. It's difficult to memorize all this information, but you should at least have a basic understanding of the texas holdem probabilities if you want to become a winning Texas Holdem player.

Texas Calculatem Holdem Odds Calculator
Calculating texas holdem odds is easy, and we will explain how to do it below, but if you need expert help we recommend a texas holdem odds calculator from Texas Calculatem. This advanced poker software breaks down every possible Holdem scenario and instantly delivers your exact texas holdem odds of winning as you play. With the help of the Texas Calculatem odds calculator you will know exactly where you stand and what the odds of success are, at every step in every hand.

How to calculate Texas Holdem odds
As mentioned above, all gambling is based on odds. If the odds of a horse winning a race are 10-to-1 against, you win ten times your bet if the horse you're betting on wins the race. If the horse wins just once for every ten times it loses, you break even. If it wins more often you should win and if it wins less often you come out behind. In most bets, like a horse race, you do not get the opportunity for repeated trials, so you either have to be lucky enough to have placed your bet the one time out of eleven that the horse wins, or you need to continually make bets where the odds of hitting are shorter than the odds you are getting paid off at.

Pot Odds in Texas Hold'em

Pot odds in Texas Hold'em work exactly the same way. If the bet is $1 to you and there is $5 in the pot, you are getting 5-to-1 pot odds. Just as in the horse race, you need to win that pot once for every five times you lose it to break even. If you'll win the pot more often, you have positive expected value or +EV. If you'll win it less often, you have a negative expected value play (-EV).

Calculating Pot Odds in Poker

Usually, the bet will be more than $1 to you. Simply reduce the ratio by dividing the size of the pot by the size of the bet to you. For example if there is a $10 bet to you and you have a chance to win a $50 pot, divide 50 by 10 to reach 5-to-1 pot odds. If the pot is $97 and the bet is $25 to you, you are getting about 4-to-1; these calculations do not need to be exact (it's 3.88-to-1 exactly, but this precision is not worth the distraction during an in-game situation).

Using Pot Odds in Poker Games

Once you know how to calculate pot odds, you'll know whether you should call a bet by knowing your odds of winning the hand, also known as poker odds. This can be established by calculating the ratio of cards remaining to cards that will give you the win.

Poker odds most often come into play when you are on a drawing hand. You'll want to know if the odds the pot is offering you are better than your actual odds of hitting your hand. To calculate your odds of making your hand, simply count the number of cards that you can consider to be "outs," cards that will complete your hand, and compare them to the number of cards that remain. For example, let's say you hold AK on a board of 3 9 5 8 and you are convinced your opponent has top pair. This means that any ace or king should give you the pot. This gives you six outs, for the three remaining aces and three remaining kings. Since you know your two cards and the four on the board, there are 46 cards you have not seen, 52 minus six. Out of those 46, six give you the win and 40 do not. This is an odds ratio of 40-to-6, which reduces to about 6.5-to-1. This means you need better than 6.5-to-1 pot odds to continue.

Although these are rough calculations, they still may be difficult to make in a game. For this reason, you should have certain poker odds committed to memory. The most important ones are as follows:

Your odds of flopping a set from a pocket pair are about 8-to-1.

Your odds of making a flush on the next card if you flop a four flush are about 4-to-1, if you get to see both cards it is closer to 2-to-1.

Your odds of making a straight on the next card if you are open-ended are around 5-to-1.

If you have four outs with one card to come you are roughly 11-to-1, two outs and you are around 22-to-1, one out and you are 45-to-1. (That one is easy. There are 46 cards in the deck and only one of them helps you, the other 45 do not.)

In a no limit game, you'll also know how much to bet so that opponents aren't getting the right odds to call to try to hit a draw (a pot-sized bet or greater will usually do the trick if you're not sure).

Texas Holdem odds chart

Probability Percentage Probability / Odds Against
Pair preflop 6 1 in 17 - 16:1
Suited cards preflop 24 1 in 4.2 - 3.2:1
Suited Connectors (2/3, KQ, ...) 4 1 in 25 - 24:1
AA or KK preflop .9 1 in 111 - 110:1
AK preflop 1.2 1 in 83 - 82:1
AKs preflop .3 1 in 332 - 331:1
A in hand preflop 16 1 in 6.25 - 5.25:1
AA, KK, QQ, JJ 1.8 1 in 56 - 55:1
Flop being all one kind (JJJ or QQQ) .24 1 in 425 - 424:1
AA versus KK preflop (heads up) .004 1 in 22560 - 22559:1
AK dealt preflop and hitting an A or K by the river 50 1 in 2 - even
QQ versus AK heads up till river 56 1 in 1.78 - 14:11 favorite
Two cards preflop that are Js or higher 9 1 in 11 - 10:1
Beer Hand (72off) preflop (or any other nonsuited two card combo) .9 1 in 110 - 109:1
Probability Percentage Probability / Odds Against
Four flush completing (JsTs Flop Qs4sAd 6h Ks) 39 1 in 2.6 - 3:2
Open Ended Straight-Flush completing to flush or straight by river 54 1 in 1.85
Open Ended Straight completing (JT Flop Q94 86) 34 1 in 2.9 - ~2:1
Two Pair on flop Improving to Full House 17 1 in 5.8 - ~5:1
Three of a kind (set) on flop improving to Full House or Quads 37 1 in 2.7- ~3:2
Probability Percentage Probability / Odds Against
Pocket pair improving to three of a kind on flop 12 1 in 8 - 7:1
No pair hand preflop improving to a pair on the flop (either card) 32 1 in 3.125 - ~2:1
If you have suited cards, two will flop 11 1 in 9 - 8:1
One pair on flop improving to two pair or three of a kind by river 22 1 in 4.7 - ~4:1
Pocket pair improving to three of a kind after flop 9 1 in 11 - 10:1
Two over cards improving to a pair by river 26 1 in 3.9 - ~3:1
Two over cards and a gutshot improving to pair or straight 43 1 in 2.3 - 4:3
Gutshot straight draw hitting by river 17 1 in 6 - 5:1
Gutshot and pair improving to two pair or better 39 1 in 2.6 - 3:2
Backdoor Flush hitting (5s6s Flop 7sAh9c KsJs) 4 1 in 24 - 23:1
Runner Runner Straight (56 Flop 3TQ 47) 1.5 1 in 68 - 67:1
Backdoor Flush and One Over Card improving to that pair or flush 17 1 in 6 - 5:1
Catching Ace on turn or river (A4 Flop Q63 KA) 13 1 in 8 - 7:1
Backdoor Flush and Gutshot improving to one by river (Ac4c Flop 3s5cKs) 21 1 in 4.8 - 3.8:1
Backdoor Flush And Two Over Cards improving to pair or flush 30 1 in 3.3 - 2.3:1
5 players on flop, that someone has an A when one is on board 58 1 in 1.7
4 players on flop, that someone has an A when one is on board 47 1 in 2.1
3 players on flop, that someone has an A when one is on board 35 1 in 2.9
2 players on flop, that someone has an A when one is on board 23 1 in 4.3
3 of one suit on board and another coming (QsTs2s) if you have one 39 1 in 2.6 - 3:2
5 players in with board paired, chance of one of them having it 43 1 in 2.4
4 players in with board paired, chance of one of them having it 34 1 in 3
3 players in with board paired, chance of one of them having it 26 1 in 4
2 players in with board paired, chance of one of them having it 17 1 in 5.8