Left eye:

Right eye:

Now my Optometrist explained what each part of the image is in great detail – unfortunately I’ve forgotten almost everything she said. The big blood vessels are veins, and the smaller ones are arteries. I think the bright dot is the cornea, I can’t remember what the black part is. Ten points for anyone who knows.

Eyes closed

On the way home from poker.

How could I resist? I wish I had a polaroid so I could have placed a copy in his pocket.

Eyes open

Tanya with her Nikon F3. She’s in India with my Canon 24-70 right now, looking forward to what she brings back.

Waterstones

Severin flew over to have some noodles.

And look at Graffiti. My film scanner has problems scanning dark photos, and I end up with things like this.

Eyes down

Jay Luck had another fancy dress Team Freezeout at The International.

I went as a banana, Kevin went as Buzz Lightyear, Nick went as a pimp and ginger Chris refused to wear his flashing police helmet. So Nick wore it. Kevin took second place for our team.

Nick and the hat.

Another scanner screw-up. I’m going to get this printed then scan the print.

Also in the news

We’re fast approaching the end of the financial year. This is when councils dig up the roads and spend as much money as possible. if they don’t spend it, they get less next year.

I wonder what his story is.

There’s something about shaving my head that makes me feel like I’m shrugging off the blandness of the working week, ready for the weekend, freedom and fun.

I’ve booked flights to NYC & Philly for mid-late June with Sean Mayer. Looking forward to seeing some friends across the pond again. And documenting the whole thing!

Geeky stuff: Voigtlander Bessa R2M; 35mm 1.7 Ultron; Kodak TRI-X 400 + 2.

We went to see Roger Hiorn’s ‘Seizure’ on its last day open.

It was set in a derelict mini council estate that is being torn down in 2009. You had to queue for Wellington boots before entering the installation.

Then you had to queue again to get in. All in all about an hour of queueing. ZzZzZz

I didn’t bother taking any pics inside but Tanya did so check out her blog when she puts them up. Worth the wait? Nope, but it was interesting. If they had drained a little water out of the floor it would not be necessary to wait longer than 5 minutes.

Poker

Last Sunday saw the second Gutshot.com forum members live tournament at The International. I only managed to make two photos. Maybe I was shy as it was the first time I had met 90% of the forum guys that turned up; I didn’t play the first live forum event.

‘The H-Train’ on the left, the ‘H-bomb’ Howard (aka pokersmith2) on the right. I think this is the only hand H-Train fodled all night. And I thought I was a maniac.

The Stinkers

The following day Jay Luck’s Christmas Cracker was held at the club. For this tournament, members formed teams of four; whoever won the tournament would share the prize money with his or her team, and second place team would get their money back. My team comprised Jazzy, JJ Hazan and Gutshot.com top dog Barry Martin, who you can see a few shots below wearing my mega-afro. The format was round of each (ROE) – NL Hold’em and Omaha. Our team was ‘The Stinkers’.

As it was fancy dress I decided to play in my Gorilla suit.

JJ went out early then I followed soon after, donking all my chips off in the Omaha rounds. Did I mention the tournament was fancy dress? Meet Jesus and the coconut.

Jazzy (standing) went out some time after I did, so all our hopes were pinned on our fearless leader and his raging afro. They don’t call him Barry ‘The Bully’ Martin for nothing. Maximum pressure at all times.

Barry battling with Steven Mahony in an Omaha round.

After numerous eliminations and sick outdraws we made it to the final table. Other teams at the table were ‘The Minh Dynasty’, ‘So Solid Crew’ (two players), ‘Double Trouble’ et al.

Down to the final three and Barry is still playing quite aggressively, with team tactician Jazzy over his shoulder. The Minh dynasty would soon be eliminated in third place.

Down to just Barry and Andy Achillea. Andy had doubled up in an Omaha hand and was now sitting on a healthy stack. At this point Barry only had 4,000 more chips than Andy so we agreed to split the prize money evenly across both teams. Now to play to the finish for bragging rights!

Jazzy and Barry talk tactics as Andy Achillea looks on.

Andy wanted to play small ball but Barry forced him to play big ball to take him out of his element. Pot-pot-pot-pot pre flop in Omaha and we’re all in!

Andy flopped a set of Jacks but Barry made a straight on the river to take it down for The Stinkers! Ship it!

Many thanks to Jay for organising the event. She rocks.

The Stinkers (minus JJ who had to leave early)

Geeky stuff: Voigtlander Bessa R2M; 35mm 1.7 Ultron; Kodak TRI-X 400 +. Colour photos by Jay Luck

The Hendon Mob’s Joe Beevers

Chris ‘Jesus’ Ferguson

Phil Ivey Hollywooding it on the TV table

Andy Black in traditional wear

Phil Hellmuth getting a massage

Sizing an opponent up

Being part of a documentary

Eli Elezra

Victoria Coren

Nik Persaud. Put those cigs in the bin.

Fan favourite Jennifer Tilly

A short stacked gus Hansen on another TV table

Living legend Doyle Brunson.

During a break Doyle tripped and fell on a camera dolly, cutting his arm in three places. Hopefully he’s made a full recovery now.

Let’s not forget the gorgeous dealers. Here are only two of many.

Anyone know the guy on the right? He asked me to email this to him but put down an incorrect email address.

I also made some B&W shots. I must apologise as I have not cleaned the negatives yet; I’ve been lazy!

The Phil Hellmuth show

Layne Flack

Erica Shoenberg

Freddy Deeb

Hellmuth / Elezra

Daniel Negreanu

Geeky stuff: Canon EOS 20D, 24-70 f2.8L lens; Canon EOS 3, 24-70 and Kodak Tri-x 400 +2 (or 3, can’t remember)

Day 1A
Day 1B

As usual I’m the first person in the media room. One of the WSOP guys just turned up. He was out with some of the pros last night – Phil Hellmuth and John Juanda were betting on the Ryder Cup with Negrenau playing bookmaker. Hellmuth ended up owing Juanda £3,500.

Notable chip stacks

Junglen leads the pack with 84k. Negreanu 75k, Akenhead lies in 6th place with 59k, Willie Tann 52k, Phil Laak 50k, Kabbaj 35k, Bloch 30k, Juanda 27k, , Channing 20k, Surinder Sunar 14k, Erik Seidel 7k.

Game on

The blinds are now 500 – 1,000 with a 100 ante.

James Akenhead is embroiled in a growing pot. He is out of position with one caller and we see the flop.

Check, check. Turn:

Akenhead bets 4,800. Player (with considerably less than Akenhead) calls.

River:

Akenhead checks. Player bets 5,500; he doesn’t have much left. Akenhead folds.

Huge pot back at Daniel Negreanu’s table. As you can see UTG made it 3,800 to go. Daniel called. Button goes all-in for 13,000 more.

Both raiser and Daniel call. Flop:

Check, check. Turn:

Check check. River:

Daniel shows for the Jack-high flush

All-in player shows a pair of tens for an early bath

remaining player shows for the Queen-high flush and scoops a ~50k pot.

Juanda is upstairs, raising limpers like a box of Viagra and taking down pot after pot pre-flop!

Blinds 600 – 1,200, 100 ante.

Akenhead is watching Laak and Negreanu clash horns at his table. Akenhead is the big blind when Laak (UTG +1) calls and Daniel raises to 2,800. Folded round to Laak who calls.

Flop: . Check, check. Turn: .

Laak checks, Daniel bets 3,600. Laak raises to 13,000 pretty quickly.

Daniel thinks then makes the call. River: . Check check.

Laak turns over and Daniel takes the pot with .

A few minutes later Laak is out, short stacked ran into AA with K-J.  James Akenhead is now on Juanda’s table.

This is Sandra Naujoks, from Germany.

She even has her own mini-hat card protector. The girl’s got style.

Second wind

Still short-stacked Erik Seidel moves in with A-J, called by A-K. The cards come 5 5 8 8 6 and he lives to fight another day.

Neil Channing has been quiet so far.

Sandra Naujoks is not allowing anyone to limp on her big blind. Three limpers and she makes it 5,500 to go. All fold.

We like Naujoks.

On a flop of , 2008 bracelet-winner Jesper Hougaard is faced with an all-in bet of 8,000, with a player still to act after him.

He calls, only for the next player to move in over the top. Jesper instantly folds.

All-in player shows

Re-Raiser shows

The turn is , giving the aces the lead. on the river seals the all-in player’s fate.

Jesper folded pocket Queens.

We are now on a break (which is about to finish). 54 players left.

Jesper’s stack

***SICK BEAT***

HUGE pot – On a flop of , with the pot already about a juicy 30,000 chips, a guy goes all-in and is called for the other guy’s remaining 37k.

Raiser:

Caller (and all-in)

Turn: River:

Noujaks doubles up

Yevgeniy Timoshenko (left) raises and a very short stacked Sandra Noujaks pushes. Some settings on my camera were messed up which is why Yevgeniy looks radioactive here.

Timoshenko:

Noujaks:

An ace on the flop is enough to keep her with us, for now!

Spoke too soon?

Our German friend is out; so are a few others and we are now in the money. Blinds are now 1,000 – 2,000 with a 300 ante.

Surinder Sunar just scraped his way into the money. At one point he was in the SB with 1,100 in front of him and he folded. Channing said “Queens?”. Another guy said he’d give him £20 to go all in.

On a board of , facing a bet of 7,200, Neil Channing has shoved it!
Channing asked his opponent if he thought he had 10-2. His opponent eventually resigned from the pot.

(Those purples and browns to the right also belong to Neil, who is just off camera)

I just noticed I have glitter from one of the birthday cakes on my face.

On yet another raggedy flop of , Channing moves in on the same player, again!

Here is the action from three different angles, Matrix-style.

“Ace-Queen no good”.

He mucks again. Channing shows .

Daniel is spontaneously goofing around making silly faces for my photos.

James Akenhead went out while I was in the media room. Willie Tann says has been card dead for the last three hours. Daniel said this guy was a 10-1 favourite to have had braces before. He was correct. Nobody made the bet, though.

We have a new chip leader

On a flop of , a wave of chips went in from three players.

Shortest stack:

Middle stack:

Largest stack:

Turn and river make no change and the pocket Jacks win a LANDSLIDE of chips. Might be up to 200,000 chips here. This was the last hand before the break and the dealer generously offered to stack his chips for him.

Channing moves in on another guy.

This time he is called. Channing has JJ vs the guy’s 88 and wins the pot and sending the chap out of the tournament. We are now down to 3 tables. Daniel N is now a few seats to the left of Channing.

Most of the 100 chips have now been coloured up. We have new chips in play! They are bright orange and worth 5,000.

Short stack on the button goes all-in; Linda Lee in the SB and Willie Tann in the BB call. They check it down to the river.

Board:

Button shows Q-6, Lee shows A-8 and Tann takes it down with J-8 and knocks the player out of the tournament.

Daniel Negreanu was eliminated while I was in the media room after all the chips went in preflop. His 99 was cracked by A-K offsuit. I asked Daniel what happened and he said “I made no mistakes, I just got unlucky!”.

Linda Lee doubles up when her A-Q unsuited outstrikes Fuad Serhan’s 99.

Willie Tann moves in on Jesper’s 10k raise forcing him to fold.

Jesper has another decision to make when Christoph Bommes makes it 10k, Jesper reraises and Christoph moves in.

Jesper has to fold again. Christoph lets him turn over either of his cards. He turns over .

Bloch is still here

120k pot

Jesper and Fuad are at it again. Fuad UTG makes it 16,000. Jesper calls.

Flop:

Fuad bets 19,000, Jesper calls. Turn:

Fuad bets 25,000, Jesper calls. River:

Fuad checks, Jesper goes all in and pushes forward his stack of orange 5,000 chips.

Fuad folds.

Jesper shows .

After this hand the 2-hour dinner break kicked in. At this point I was high of caffeine and had caught a cold (which I still have) because people kept leaving the balcony door open in the media room, and so I had to retire to bed. Jesper went on to win the £1,500 tournament and become the first player to win a WSOP bracelent in America and London in the same year.

Photos from the main event still to come.

Geeky stuff: Canon EOS 20D, 24-70 f2.8L lens.

FIN

The dealers and directors have a meeting to discuss the day ahead.

Poker chip pr0n

WE HAVE MORE CAKE!

Not much going on here in the AM so I’m loitering in the media room…. no one has touched the cakes yet. I’m not going to take a stab at them first! I’ll wait for the WSOP guys to get here, I know they’ll chomp immediately.

Also, they haven’t got the bloody ice cream out in the ice cream place yet. LIFE IS SO DEPRESSING

Annette_15 has just walked in to the media room. I hope she isn’t here to take her cakes. :(

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank all-in energy drink for keeping me awake and ready for action. We have a whole fridge full of them and I’m all over that fridge like white on rice.

Playing today:

Devilfish

Mike Matusow

Howard, also a former Gutshot regular

Erica Shoenberg

Michael Greco

Sandra Noujaks

Hit Squad’s James Akenhead

Howard Lederer

We have Laak

We have Tilly!

Hellmuth

Hit Squad’s Praz Bansi

Jeromme Bradpiece

2007 WSOPE Main event champion Annette_15

Blinds are 50-100.

Howard Lederer is out: overpair vs set. He and Matusow made a bet on the Ryder cup but Howard tells me “neither of them seem to know much about Golf”.

David Williams and Richard Gryko are at the same table. David is getting a massage from one of the Ibiza Angels.

I’ve noticed David discreetly eyeballing Gryko a few times… probably because Gryko is taking pots down with K-4 offsuit.

Pimp my watch

Devilfish is blinged out – take a look at his watch.

Linda Lee has been tearing up her table.

Over and out

Blinds 100-200. two limpers, Annette limps in late position. SB calls, BB checks.

Flop: . Eveyone checks.

Turn:

Everyone checks to Annette who shoves for 3,075.

After some deliberation, both the SB & BB call. Everyone else folds.

River:

Check, check. Annette shows for a pair of sevens and a busted flush draw.

BB shows and it’s goodnight Annette_15.

On a flop of , Michael Greco is all-in again. This time he has chicken skewers.

Hit Squad’s Praz Bansi is up against the bet.

He folds. Greco shows a . Bansi shows a .

Not a happy chappy

Blinds 200-400, 50 ante.

James Akenhead needs chips.

Phil Laak chip stack update

Back to James Akenhead’s table. UTG+1 raises to 1,550. James moves in from middle position.

‘arghhhh’

He finds out how much more it is

And folds.

After the 2 hour dinner break Blinds are 300-600 with a 75 ante.

Andy black makes a straight in the first hand after the break for a nice pot.

Akenhead’s table

UTG makes it 1,500 to go. Two-time WSOP 2008 bracelet winner John Phan calls.

Flop:

UTG checks. Phan bets 4,000. UTG folds. John Phan is one to keep an eye on..

Phan is UTG and raises to 1,600. 3 callers. No respect!
Flop: . All check.

Turn:

Check, big stack bet 2,550, fold, fold, last player folds face-up. Another nice pot for Phan.

Table Laak / Williams / Black

Laak raises UTG, to be re-raised by a short stack in middle position. Laak calls.

Laak:

Short stack:

Community cards come and Laak sends another one home. He admits he was just raising to steal and now his secret is out!

John Phan has been blind and ante- stealing in my absence; the green chips are 25 each.

Ruling!

Andy Black and Phil Laak are in heads-up action.

The board is . Check check.

River:

Andy immediately bets 3,000.

Laak grabs 9,300 in chips, drops 3,000 down then the other 6,300. Between drops, Black quickly tables his pocket Jacks. Arguments ensue and the dealer calls the floor.

Laak demonstrates how he put the chips in. “I didn’t go back, they were in my hand”

The floor rules Laak has to call only. Laak tables and grabs the pot he has won.

Akenhead vs Phan

Akenhead appears to be getting the better of Phan at the moment.
On a board of , Phan faces a 6,000 bet from Akenhead.

Phan folds. Note he has lost all his 1,000 denomination chips (yellow).

Play has ended for the day 1B of the £1,500 NHL freezeout. James Akenhead is now sitting on a nice stack of chips. Phan was eliminated while I was in the media room, as was David Williams. Andy black went out 10 mins before the end of play.

Day 2.

Geeky stuff: Canon EOS 20D, 24-70 f2.8L lens.