Letter from Doke (5th march 2012)

Hi all

With no live scheduled this week, it was a week of solid online grinding. I had a pretty good week overall, the highlights being winning three Nottingham UKIPT packages, an EMOP Lisbon package tonight, and the Sharkrankings game on Irish Eyes. I booked the flights for Lisbon tonight. Mrs. Doke can't come with me on this trip so instead my friend David Lappin is travelling with me. David's a colourful character to say the least so it should be an interesting trip. Irish Eyes are still running satellites so I hope a few of you will join me there too. Lisbon (or rather Estoril, where the tournament is) is a really beautiful seaside resort.

This week's strategy follows on from last week where we looked at the maths behind raising with AQ out of the small blind is a better play than shoving when the big blind has a 20 big blind stack because when it induces the shove it makes 4.6 bbs on average. This is greater than the 2 bbs he gains if he open shoves and gets it through. While this is always true, there are certain situations in tournaments where the open shove is preferable because the few additional big blinds gained are worth a lot less than the risk of losing a big chunk of our own stack. These situations arise in or around bubbles, particularly in satellites. On the bubble of satellites, a few extra big blinds gained are worth a lot less than those lost when we lose a flip or a 60/40. So in those situations, if you decide to play the hand, it's better to maximise your fold equity by shoving.

A big well done to my good friend and fellow Team Irish Eyes member Mick Mccloskey. Mick came second in this weekend's Western Open and while I know he'll be disappointed not to have won but it's a great run by the veteran.

Finally, Sharkrankings have revamped their online tournament list on Irish Eyes Poker where players can earn Sharkrankings points for the online poker leaderboard. Weekly online tournaments with over €80,000 in prizemoney guaranteed can now be played to earn points. See www.sharkrankings.com for more details.

Good luck at the tables - unless I'm at the same table :)

Doke
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Irish Eyes Poker March Promotions

WSOP Express promotion will see 3 players win a package to this years WSOP (including entry to side event 56). Entry to try and win a package is only 1 earned VIP point.

Sit & Go Most Played Race worth €22,500

Endurance Challenge worth €8,000

6 EMOP Lisbon Iron Man Freerolls worth €2,000 each.