Grandmaster Maxime Vachier-Lagrave suffered the primary bad beat of his poker career. "Apparently because for the primary time in my life I played a tight hand!" he said.
Maxime, referred to as "MVL" is likely one of the top ten chessplayers within the World, known for his aggressive and uncompromising play. Maxime explained the hand history that eliminated him from the primary ever combined chess/poker tournament, held as an official side event (£200+20) on the UKIPT at PokerStars headquarters in Isle of Man:
"I raised preflop to 600 (at 100/200/25), only the button calls. Flop 9s6d5d, I bet a thousand something, call. Turn Qs, I check, guy (overbets) shoves I snap call with QQ. Button had AsKs, and got the Js at the river."
Dozens of chess players responded to this hand history, including seven-time Russian Chess Champion Peter Svidler and chess/poker pro Alex Barnett, who liked Maxime's turn check. Grandmaster David Gormally the recipient of Maxime's chips, ended up in fifth place, for £450. Gormally, who described himself as "skint", joked "GREAT POINT I cashed as otherwise, I WOULD NOT was in a position to afford to eat the (delicious) kabobs here!"
"This was my Main Event," said Gaby Livshitz, a Supernova from Israel, who's also a world Master in chess. Gaby traveled to the Isle of Man specifically so he could take part in the official chess/poker UKIPT side event. After bagging UKIPT Main chips on 1A, Gaby played his dream tournament and was in sights of the official trophy, before ultimately finishing in 4th place for £570. "Playing a mixed poker and chess event enabled me to prove my skill in both skill games, to prove to my family/wife, who don't understand poker and just call me a card player!"
As PokerStars Mind Sports ambassador, the festivities started that morning for me, with a speech to the IOM Junior Chamber of Congress at the intersections of chess, poker and business. I then played a novel six-player combined poker/chess simul. My opponents included two of my favorite poker players Team Online pros Ike Haxton (fortunately, I faced him in Heads-up chess) and Mickey Peterson.
I also played against Alex Dreyfus of the worldwide Poker Index in both poker and a chess warm-up. Dreyfus bubbled the combined event, however the highlight for him was an attacking victory within the chess competition, checkmating with only a few seconds left on his clock.
I was happy to attain 5 points within the simul, as I MADE UP MY MIND my expected score to just a little over 4. Baard Dahl was the only real winner, as evidenced by the grin on this photo. A premonition of a bigger triumph that evening!
Baard Dahl is the Sit n Go manager at PokerStars, and the combined poker chess tournament was perfect for him. He grew up in Norway, as one of the vital talented young players. He's naturally keen on Magnus Carlsen, the reigning World Champion who hails from Norway: "I LOVE the way in which he makes chess like a sport. Some people criticize him for just "outlasting" his opponents, but I LIKE how he squeezes every drop from a position."Dahl was also a certified poker players for several years before he began working for PokerStars. Baard was probably the most first players on Stars, signing up in 2001. Baard also holds claim to without equal humble brag: "I won a Sunday Million long before it was a Sunday Million."
Every entrant to the chess/poker event was guaranteed 8000 chips, despite the fact that they bombed the chess portion, which offered a max of 5K bonus chips. Several poker professionals who had never played a significant game of chess participated because they knew that at worst, they'd start with a stack around 20% below average. I played one such player, the defending UKIPT Isle of Man champ Duncan McLellan. After our game, I showed him rules like castling and en passant. Later on the poker table, an identical exchange happened. Baard Dahl explained to poker newcomer Grandmaster Daniel Fridman of Germany about minimum raise amounts and the idea that behind "tight is correct". Baard then stacked the Grandmaster with aces a couple of orbits later. "I will need to have known he was never bluffing there," Fridman told me later. The cross-game learning was what it was all about!
Alex Dreyfus of GPI and GM Mark Hebden Photo Fiona Steil-Antoni
Baard scored 2/5 within the blitz chess tournament, so he started the poker with 10000 chips. At around one AM, he was heads-up with Grandmaster Mark Hebden. IM and supernova elite PLO player Simon Ansell was rooting on his friend Mark till late within the night, and described Hebden because the "ultimate chess grinder." Baard concurred: "Mark have been capable of make a living from it for an excessively long time....so it's a must to respect that during". the overall hand, Baard's ace-four triumphed over Mark's king-five suited. Mark won £1240 for his second place finish while Baard took £1800 and the trophy.
Baard says it is a thrill to have one of the most top chessplayers on the planet within the Isle of Man for the PokerStars IOM Chess International, and he's particularly excited to look Grandmaster Julio Granda Zuniga of Peru. "In 1986 in Norway, I met him on the World Junior Championship. Nobody had heard of him at the moment. He was playing such clean positional chess and he was our favourite player, much more than former World Champion Anand, also playing within the event."
After buzz spread concerning the combined poker/chess event, Vicky Coren and Chris Moneymaker of Team Pro said they want they'd played.
After meeting Vicky, everything began to go well for Nigel. Because the UKIPT wrapped up, the chessplayers battled through nine rounds of the first PokerStars Isle of Man International. Though Nigel Short was only ranked 9th going into the event, he's some of the famous Grandmasters, because of his World Championship title match vs. Garry Kasparov in 1993. Nigel won the International with 7.5 points out of 9 games. A SUPER performance in the sort of strong field. ""I'M ecstatic," Nigel said after his last round victory over young British GM David Howell.
Find all of the games and details at the event here.
Read More... [Source: PokerStarsBlog.com :: PokerStars news]
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