You wait ages for a tournament, and then three come along at once.

Two London casinos in the Stanley group have apparently been running occasional BJ and Roulette tournaments. I only found out about them by word of mouth, so it would be worth UK members checking with their local Stanley casinos to see if they offer them too. (There's nothing mentioned on the web sites.)

There are two BJ tournaments coming up in quick succession, on the 4th and 8th of December. The first is at the Palm Beach, and the second at the Cromwell Mint.

I've only checked out the Mint so far; I'm told the formats will be identical, but I will try to confirm that, and also check whether the entry fee and prize pool is the same. (I believe the Palm Beach is an altogether more upmarket place, with a dress code, and possibly more geared towards 'high rollers'.)

As ever, the details are a bit sketchy, but here is what I was able to glean about the format -

• Limited to 50 players.
• Entry fee £100.
• One rebuy available for £100.
• Prize pool is all the entry fees and rebuys, plus (I think) £3000 added.
• Top three paid.
• Elimination format, only one advances from each table.
• 21 hands.
• Secret bet.
• Min 25, Max 1000, Initial BR 1000.

The number per table will depend on the number of entrants and rebuys. If they get the full complement of 50 entrants (unlikely), then first round will consist of 10 tables of 5. The maximum at any table should be 7.

With the monthly Gala tournament on Sunday the 7th, that's three BJ tournaments in the space of five days. (Plus the roulette on the sixth.) Tournament overload!

 

Stanley BJ Tournaments

Colin,

I telephoned 10 other Stanley casinos regarding BJ tournaments and came back with nothing.

Nobody I spoke to knew anything about BJ tournaments but kept giving me telephone numbers for other casinos in the group where they thought that they may be held.

All the staff that I spoke to tried to be helpful but appeared unaware of any BJ tournaments being promoted by their organisation.

Andy

 

Sorry to hear that Andy; didn't mean to send you on a wild-goose chase. You must have cast your net pretty wide, to come up with ten that you consider to be 'local'!

It was just the fact that there seemed to be some coordination between the two London casinos, in terms of adopting the same format, that made me hope this might be a group-wide initiative.

I don't suppose you phoned the Cromwell Mint and the Palm Beach themselves? (as a sanity check that the people answering the phones at these places know what they are talking about.)

Are you considering extending your London trip to incorporate a second tournament?

 

I started my telephone calls at Bolton and went via Birmingham to Coventry and Derby then back up to the Manchester region.

The Palm Beach casino looks a bit too Hollywood Dave style for me so I will see you at the Gala on the Sunday.

Andy

 

I'm planning an advance visit, to check they will actually let me into the place!

But that tournament is on the preceding thursday; it's the Mint tournament that is the day after the Gala one. Having already visited, I can confrm that it is not an especially grand establishment. And, unfortunately, there was no sign of this young lady ....

 

I came, I saw, I came third

The Palm Beach tournament turned out to offer very good value. It was £200 to enter, with a guaranteed prize pool -

1st: £10K + £3K in gaming vouchers
2nd: £3K + £1K
3rd: £2K + £1K

It was indeed the same structure as was described at the Mint. There were about 26 entries, plus a lot of rebuys (including me). Each table was 6 or 7 players, with just the winner advancing. After the rebuy round, there were 7 qualified, so it was straight to the final table.

I had a max bet out on the final hand, which could have won it for me, but it was not to be. It looked like I'd be coming away with nothing at one point, so I was both relieved and disappointed at the same time.

The vouchers were in £1K denominations, and only valid for tonight. They were the sort you don't get back if you win. I teamed up with the 2nd-place guy to play red and black on the roulette table. Zero thankfully did not make an appearance.

So I came away with £2,500, and a net profit of £2,100. Glad I decided to go; I nearly stayed away.

 

Well done Colin,
Congratulations!

PS
I hope you had fifty pounds on the zero.
Also you could have gone to a baccarat table and bet the voucher on one side and 500 on the other side.

 

Thanks.

I'm embarrassed to say that we didn't. It seems I'm becoming a reckless gambler!

Actually, that raises an interesting point. I ought to have found out how the 'la partage' rule is interpreted when betting with these vouchers. Without thinking it through, I just assumed that we were gambling between a likely £500 each, and a less likely £250 each. But that doesn't really make any sense. Presumably the rule either would not be applied at all, meaning we win nothing, or just possibly we would both get back half our stakes as normal, and the net result would then be £500 each, whatever happens!

I'm not really familiar with baccarat, but my confederate did suggest Punto Banco (a variation, I think) as an alternative to our roulette scheme. I think he said it would mean paying a 5% commission, after betting both sides of an even money proposition.

If there's a next time, I will try and be more careful. My excuse, on this occasion, is that I was tired and just wanted to get the transaction over with, so I could head for home. (Not much of an excuse, really.)

 

Thanks a lot

In truth, I was BR2 going into the last hand. It was only the way the round unfolded that meant I might have won it in the end.

My memory of the details is a bit hazy. I think it went like this.

• BR4 won it with a BJ which I could still have beat if I had won my max bet. (That much I do remember with great clarity:flame
• BR3 overtook me with a push (but might have had the low on me anyway, I don't recall his bet.)
• BR1 was, I think, ahead by 300, but only bet 675, meaning I could win with a max bet. She was the craziest player at the table, and didn't really have any tournament strategy. I think she may have split and doubled. Certainly, she gave me the low, but I would have thought I'd remember if I had only scraped through by 50, which must have been the case if she had just doubled her bet (assuming I've got the numbers right). Maybe I did, though!

At any rate, I was very relieved to come away with something in the end.

 

MInt tournament

Colin,

The casinos flyer for the tourny is interesting. I would hate to have to count that guys chips to determine my bet.

 

Very true.

 

Mint Condition

I won my first-round table. That might have taken me straight to the final, as at the Palm Beach, but they had elected to change it to two-advance. There were 30 entrants, 5 tables of 6. I think the reason they upped it to two-advance was to ensure there would be a semi-final round, even if they didn't get many rebuys.

In the semi, I got left behind by three big-betting big winners. I was over a max bet behind all three when the button passed me for the last time. My BR was exactly the 1000 which I had started with. And then it became zero.