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$1000 Winter Blast @ Training Room
We will be running satelittes for this event non stop, until the Sunday before the event!
905.471.7264
Our last large tournament had 50 Players!
The blind structure for this event will be...
~Start 10,000 chips
~Blinds increase every 20 minutes.
25/50
50/100
100/200
Break
200-400 Ante 100
400-800 Ante 200
400-800 Ante 200
800-1600 Ante 300
1000-2000 Ante 300
Break
1500-3000 Ante 500
2000-4000 Ante 500
3000-6000 Ante 1000
4000-8000 Ante 1000
6000-12000 Ante 2000
Break
8000-16000 Ante 3000
10000-20000 Ante 3000
15000-30000 Ante 4000
20000-40000 Ante 5000
Comments
1) The training room people run a great tournament. The game is well organized, the dealers are professional and fast, and the people running it are good honest people to have resolving disputes.
2) The rake is 15% assuming it hasn't changed, which is not bad but not great. You are unlikely to find a lower rake anywhere in the poker community in Toronto, but at the same time 15% is much higher than any tournament rake you will find in any live Casino or online poker room. Because of the rake, I would say that only 10% of players could make a long term profit in this tournament over hundreds of trials, whereas in an online tournament upwards of 40% of players can make a long term profit. Unless you are a top tournament player, it would be impossible to play this event over the long run and not have lost money overall.
3) The blind structure moves very fast. The first 3 rounds are loads of fun, playing deep stacks and lots of room to maneouver, bluff, take flops with marginal hands. Since levels are 20 minutes long and the blinds double every level (with the new ante it should be even worse), there is simply no time to try to accumulate chips unless you happen to pick up a few monsters in the first 35 hands, which is about all you get in a standard hour of live poker. After the third level, most stacks aren't big enough to withstand the blind pressure and the tournament devolves into an all-in fest, with no play after the flop. Look at the rounds: from 100-200 to 1000-2000/300 in an hour and 40 minutes! That means each round (6000 chips) costs 60% of the starting stack after only 2:40, or the equivalent of about 100 hands!
The average stack at the last two tables has something like 5 big blinds, so the only way to play after this stage is to move all-on and pick on the tight players and the players nursing small stacks. In other words, there is simply no room for a player's postflop skill edge to take over and it becomes a matter of just praying your steals don't run into a good hand. The effect of that is to render the tournament a roll of the dice. Not a good proposition for players who are able to outplay their opponents after the flop, when the decisions are much tougher and no longer based on just two cards. If you're looking for a tournament you can play without a brain, this is it.
That being said, I've cashed a few times in this tournament, so I have been on the lucky side. I have also bubbled in a consecutive string of about 7 of them, so I've seen the other side too. I wouldn't recommend playing in this tournament unless you're looking to just gamble with some fun people. The tournament is run well, but again, the structure and rake make it a serious $-losing proposition. The food is really good, and the cash games are even better; unfortunately, those suffer from an extremely high (but more beatable) rake as well. Of course, as long as the fish (who, as fish, do not understand the implications of the high rake and blind structure) are willing to pay the high rakes and play crapshoot tournaments, don't expect this to change. This is not a players' poker club; its definitely an owners' poker club.
If they were ever to run the same tournament with 40 minute levels, a slower structure (i.e. increasing by 50% instead of doubling every level in the early going), and less rake, I would be there every day. Of course, that would mean starting the tournament at 7 sharp and ending it at 2am, assuming the same 55 players.
Gamblor and all concerned,
1)Thank you, we try very hard to provide the best service we can!
2)Our rake is on par with every other club in Toronto. We cannot be compared to an online poker room, if I had 1000 tables or even 20, I would be raking $1 per hand. The same can be said about casinos, with 400+ slot machines their ability to generate revenue is ot really comparable.
3)The blind structure for the $1000 tournament is still being tinkered with. We plan to try a few things and work out what would be the best for this type of event. We may increase the time duration on the blinds for the next event, we may change the blind structure. It comes to down to trial and error. We do not want the tournaments to be a crap shoot, we want them to be solid tournaments which are well run and fun to play!
As for our cash games,
Our cash games are some of the best available in the city. The action is phenomenal. Our rake is on par with the majority of the other clubs. The only place that rakes less is Benny's. Again the differnce comes down to how many tables a place has, if you are running 100+ tables like an online room, you charge alot less chop.
I am sorry I have not had a chance to respond to you before, We have been open for the last 2 days, and I did not sleep until last night. I am sorry you are disatisfied, and will do what I can to provide better service to you.
Happy to see you out if you come, if not I hope the holidays treat you well!
Thanks for responding; I wouldn't say I'm dissatisfied with any of the games I've ever been to, I'm just pointing out the pitfalls of playing in the clubs in Toronto - I must admit, your cash games are the best in terms of action and the number of idiots at the table just pissing their money away.
Could you post your rake structure? If I recall correctly, it amounts to a small bet in every game. i.e. 10% of every pot to a max of $10 in a 10-20, $15 in a 15-30, $30 in a 30-60, etc. etc.
I don't really play 15-30 live anymore, how often do you have bigger games running? I know it gets kicked up once in a while, is there a night it usually gets up to 30-60 and up?
Thanks,