Bloggers / Dave Allan / 04 May 2009 / 1 Comments

We are delighted to introduce popular blogger Steve Holden to these pages who will over the next few weeks chart his progress at Black Belt Poker.

In this week's post, Steve explains the Black Belt Poker concept, talks about how he became a poker professional and reflects on his first week as one of the 'Chosen 50' hoping to win that elusive Black Belt.

Sponsorship of any kind nowadays is almost impossible to find unless you're a named celebrity.

The date is Friday 13th March 2009 and this is the start of my journey to become a sponsored poker professional.

I have heard that Neil Channing and Nik Persaud have got together and are forming this BlackBeltPoker Community and they are looking to send eight players out to Vegas with around $20k worth of buy ins each. I send in my application and wait and wait and wait.

One of the key secrets to the success of poker and martial arts is the ability to have patience.

Patience finally pays dividends when I receive an email from Jen Mason on 17th April telling me that I was one of the lucky "50". Enclosed with the email was a video from Neil Channing explaining what's what and what we could expect in return if we complete this grading course.

In a nutshell, the grading will last for four weeks. Pupils will grind away online 5 days per week, Mon, Tues, Wed, and Fri with one of the weekend days. 6 hours play per day, multi tabling 4 screens at one time with a weekly schedule of the limits that we should be playing. Thursdays will be taken up as well as we have to make our way to London for the weekly workshop at the Loose Cannon card room near Cannon Street tube, this meeting is a six-hour session starting at 1pm.

So what makes me want to put myself through this grind?

I started playing poker in 2004 after returning from Vegas (I used to work in copier sales for a Cannock based company and our sales team had won an eight day holiday to Sin City - didn't play while I was out there but was amazed by this game of holdem that everyone was addicted to) hitting the play money tables every night along with every spare minute that I could squeeze in. eventually I started playing satellites for live competitions, more importantly - I started to win some cash, and the bug was born.

I played every spare minute of the day, playing live as often as I could with Walsall being my local. I got a few small wins under my belt; I was playing every day as well as holding down a full-time job.

By April 2007 I had managed to play a couple of GUKPT's having satellited into them for next to nothing, I'd also played the GBPT in Edinburgh and was determined to play all of them as I liked their costs and the way they were structured.

I couldn't buy into the main event in Nottingham as it was sold out and the only way to get in was to win one of the side events. I took down the £200 on the Friday night for £5k and a seat in the main event on the Saturday. On the Sunday evening I picked up a winners cheque for £25k with a seat in the Grand Final later that year, I bagged another trophy along with £14k at Walsall in the £300 Midlands Meltdown in June just before flying out to Vegas for my first WSOP having won a seat for the $10k main event in another satellite. I also sat my way into the Bellegio $10k event and make it back for Day 2 in both of them but fail to cash. I cash in a couple of tourneys in the Venetian Deep Stack returning home after five weeks out there some $35,000 to the better.

I go back to work but my hearts not in it, I got the bug now big time, it's all I want to do now, poker, poker, poker. I pack in my job with aspirations of making a fortune at the felt, I have a good start to turning pro by taking down the Midlands Masters £500 event at Walsall in Nov that year for £13k.

I invested a lot of my money into buying four large properties that I rent out although this was done at the peek of the fixed rate deals for self cert landlords that most poker players have to go down that route having no books - or accounts. I play most of the UK circuit events in 2008 without getting a cash above £5k and my houses start to cost me money when I have no tenants in them and the tenants I have got ain't paying, this is on top of losing my £50k year salary.

At the start of 2009 I am in two minds about returning to work or staying pro as long as I can, I final table in the Walsall leg of the GUKPT after being chip leader 11 from home, I eventually crash out in 9th place for £6k. Two weeks later at the DTD £300 event I exit 15th from 347 runners with another tale of the one that got away.

Black Belt Poker

Eight days after this exit my dreams are rekindled when I am told about this Black Belt Grading and the chance to get on board, not only are the Vegas tickets with $20k of events up for grabs, the chances are that if you can make a Brown belt (criteria for Vegas) should you have a result out there, perform well, and contribute to the poker community within Black Belt Poker then the chances are that you will make the grade and become a BLACK BELT with $10k of events on the European calendar every month.

Sponsorship of any kind nowadays is almost impossible to find unless you're a named celebrity, even then they want their pound of flesh. I have decided that I'm going to play this like a satellite with 50 players and 8 seats up for grabs.

So to the grind and an overview of my first week in the Black Belt Poker house (isn't it about this time of year that Big Brother kicks off) we're having the workshop on Tuesday this week.

Monday is a case of motivating yourself enough to get up and grind away for BBP, I travel down to London ready for Tuesdays meeting and the wireless connection in the hotel is down, bummer. Out comes the Vodaphone dongle, I can only get two green bars in between the signal dropping completely. I manage to complete around 4.5 hrs dropping £95 by the end of the day.

Tuesday after having a lazy start I get down to the Loose Cannon for around mid-day and meet my fellow competitors, most of them I already know either by name or by face, the ones that I don't know I assume are Internet whiz kids of whom I have the greatest of respect for. We get to meet everyone involved with BBP except Jen as she's on some topless beach somewhere but will be back with us next week. Items on this weeks agenda will have to be covered next week as time was over running and some of the people there had flights to catch back to Ireland with one lad driving back to Durham. Neil was flying out to Monte Carlo for the EPT, all of a sudden I remembered what I was doing here, "I want to play these EPT's" I tell myself - the workshop had been so much fun and learning, it was easy to forget the reasons for being there.

Wednesday I didn't get in from Walsall till 6am, grabbed a couple of hours sleep, I do a dinner time stint hoping to catch the fish and the frogs but get outdrawn so many times having a -£16 session. I then have the afternoon from hell on the cash tables where I drop another -£120 this one guy has me completely owned and I ask him if he wants me to set a direct debit up for him. The evening session wasn't looking to good either with me dropping over £100 at one point but clawing it back to just a -£3 for 4 hours work and a days loss of £138.

Thursday I have such a migraine today must be all the hours online and the fact that I'm concentrating harder now. Two sessions today for 6.5 hrs and a slight improvement on other days with a loss of just -£33 today, things are looking up.

Friday I do a three-hour midnight session by candlelight and a glass of rose, HU's resulting in 21 wins from 33 games to give me a net profit of £50. Grab a few hours sleep and returning around 2.30 in the afternoon to bash the frogs - 17 wins from 30 starts to give a net profit of £34 and a daily net of +84. We also been given a list of everyone taking part in this grading session along with their usernames so now I can see if any of these mothers have been owning me - nope, I don't recognise any of these names, now that's a blessing.

Saturday Playing in the DTD £300 event so I need to get some hours in during the day as I'm hoping to make it back to Nottingham for the final table tomorrow. I bash out a three-hour session here for an even session. BBP are looking for 6 hours per day but with live events happening this will have to be broken up with me effectively working on my day off, did I just say "day off" ffs, wp and nh. Played 3 hours for a break-even session. I get back from DTD around 4am making the last 100 from 311 starters, I'm short stacked with just 17k

Sunday I get an hour in at the tables before I set off to Nottingham, difficult to concentrate really as my minds on DTD and my plan of attack, played some HU £12+ for the hour. I return from DTD around 7pm having bust out 10 from the money, I get my final two hours in for the week playing a mixture of STT and HU this session ends with an -£18 downswing. This brings my running total at the end of week one to -£190 and 38 hrs at the tables. New levels for the STT and HU start tomorrow.

Summary

With the website going live and also the meetings down at the Loose Cannon you really do feel part of a group, even though we are in competition with each other you are still willing everyone on to do well.

I had so many well-wishers coming up to me at DTD cause they had either read about it on the BBP site or on my blog. People were asking me how they could become part of the community and join the site and also how they could take part in future grading.

It feels great to be part of the first intake of students and I felt very proud wearing the Black Belt Poker logo. It's been a very hard and long week with a very long three weeks ahead of us now. The objective for next week is to get into the black and make some profit.

Nik has posted on the BBP wall that the 50 are now 40 ......that carrot has just got that little bit closer!

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