Friday, May 09, 2008

CAPT Innsbruck


It is good to see that the CAPT event taking place at Casinos Austria, Innsbruck is including a €200 Pot Limit tournament, starting at 2pm today.

Pot Limit deserves a wider audience. In most scenarios, players are unable to cram their chips into the middle, pre flop and so it forces them to make more decisions, playing down the streets: it can easily been seen as the thinking person’s game of poker. It’s never been very popular in America. Make of that what you will.

In Pot Limit, it is pretty impossible to force players, pre-flop, off their small to mid pairs so you see a lot more flopped sets. This is where the game becomes particularly interesting. Experienced Hold ‘em players will regularly lose their stack as they are unable to throw away big pockets, not realising that the pre-flop caller is now perched on three snowmen, dangling a carrot of a small bet into the raiser. It can be carnage but it can also be very rewarding if you prefer a game that requires a little more stealth.

Predictably, however, the biggest prize on offer at the CAPT Innsbruck is €2000 NL Freezeout which begins at 2pm Saturday and concludes on Sunday. Although the NL game will always be more popular as it has greater razzmatazz and forces players to call more coin-flips, PL can provide a cheaper alternative. It is also a great place to hone your skills.

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