Michigan Poker Tour Day 2: Holland

There are two poker room in Holland. The Poker Zone and Century Lanes. I've played at the Poker Zone a couple times and had a great time at both visits, so I was pretty excited to get there again. (check out the poker room review - on UMichiganPoker.com under the "Reviews" tab, and on this blog)

Around 5:30pm I pulled into the strip mall where the Poker Zone is located - I could see a full cash game when I parked the truck. As I walked in, Tom greeted me with a smile. People were signing up for the 7pm tournament. There was one seat left at the cash table, so I bought in and sat down.

The plan was to play for about an hour, cash out and drive over to see what's going on at Century. You know what they say about the best laid plans....

Two terrible hands in less than 10 minutes, and I was done at the Poker Zone.

On to Century Lanes...

Century Lanes is, as the name implies - in a bowling alley. The parking lot was packed. The poker room is in the middle of the bowling alley down the hall. There's also an entrance on the north end of the building. Completely non-smoking poker room, tunes in the background, and separate from the bar & bowling alley.

I showed up at 7:10 for the 7pm tournament and was put 2nd on the alternates list. That was great - gave me a chance to meet the crazy room manager, Russ. Within 5 minutes of the tournament start, there were enough alternates so they opened another tournament table. 65 players for the $10 + $10 add-on tournament paid 6 places with a $380 first prize. Add-ons available in the first 4 levels as long as you still had chips.

Before the tournament end, Russ had opened a 7-card stud $3/$6 limit table. Now, I've heard of charity rooms playing 7-card, but this was the first time I had ever seen it in person! Pretty cool. There were also two $1/$2 hold'em cash tables going. With the complete beat-down I took earlier, cash tables were a rail-birding only!!

Two great poker rooms! Can't wait to see what Muskegon has to offer!!!

Nov 19 Michigan Poker Tour : Lansing

What a fun night of poker!

We arrived in Lansing later than we had planned due to traffic, and some other hang-ups. By the time we got dinner and checked in to the hotel, it was getting too late to get into a tournament. It was destined to be a cash game night. I punched the address into the GPS and quickly found myself in front of Club on the River just after 8pm.

Club on the River is not just a charity poker room - they've got pool tables, a video game area on big, flat-screen TV's, a small arcade, and chess. It's a very big venue with lots of room around all the tables. I'll get some photos up later on today.

Luckily, they were putting alternates into the $20 buy-in plus $10 add-on tournament. The tournament players were on break - I bought in and sat right down in seat 1 as break ended. I'm not a big fan of being in seat 1 - can't see the players on the other side of the dealer, and had some bad experiences of dealers mucking my cards when I'm raising a hand - but I was really happy to get into the tournament and thought I'd make the best of it. It only took about two hands to erase my card-mucking paranoia. Jesse is by far, one of the best dealers I've ever seen. Fast, accurate, alert, knows where the action is, and even *asked* me if I folded my cards when he didn't see me push them towards the muck. Impressive!!!

Club on the River had 70 players in the tournament on Thursday night, and one full cash game going the entire time I was there. The tournament was fun and well run. Blinds cranked up pretty good, but necessary to get the tournament finished up by closing time.

I'm also completely star-struck!! I got to meet Dean Hamrick, and managed to *not* spend the whole time with my foot in my mouth. Dean is great - lots of fun, great sense of humor, and runs a fabulous poker room.

More from Holland coming tomorrow - and photos too!

UMP Michigan Poker Tour Nov 20 - 28

UMP is embarking on a poker tour of Michigan! We will be visiting a whole bunch of cities and checking out the local poker scene. Here's our tentative agenda:

11/20 Lansing
11/21 Holland
11/22 Muskegon
11/23 Grand Rapids
11/24 Mt. Pleasant
11/25 West Branch
11/26 Happy Thanksgiving - we will be with family
11/27 Saginaw/ Owosso
11/28 Troy / Auburn Hills

We will be posting trip reports & photos. Meet us at a local poker room during the tour!!