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In this latest video for the Paul Phua Poker School, Winfred Yu explains how he became one of Asian poker’s prime movers. Paul Phua picks the highlights

I have known Winfred Yu for many years now. Through the Poker King Clubs he runs for SunCity, as well as the poker tournaments he has organised through Kings Consulting, Winfred has become a key figure in the Asian poker industry.


Sadly, that position has its drawbacks! Winfred is a keen poker player with a deep love of the game, who has more than $2 million in live tournament earnings. And yet he has played with enough of the world’s top pros to realise that he would have to invest more time than he currently has in the game to reach their level.

“l think l’m not as concentrated or have the advantage like the pros,” Winfred says in this video interview for the Paul Phua Poker School, “because l still have my marketing team, dictating tournaments, running my own room.”

The Daniel Negreanu connection

How did Winfred Yu end up with a career as one of Asian poker’s prime movers? He explains that he started off simply as a fan of the game.

He emigrated from Hong Kong with his family to Canada at the age of 14, and studied maths and statistics at university. This was a good background for a poker player, and when he encountered his first game, Winfred says he was “hooked on day one”. This was also the day he ran into the Canadian who would become the world’s most successful live tournament player…

“It was the first time in Canada that they introduced poker,” says Winfred. “And the first day that l sit down and play, the guy next to me is Daniel Negreanu! And at that time he actually was a dealer at a poker club. And l guess on the first day l already learned from one of the best!” 

The rise of the Poker King Club

It wasn’t long before Winfred got a job in one or two of the new Canadian poker rooms, where he was talent-spotted by the Asian gaming operator SunCity and brought to Macau to run poker rooms for them.

With Winfred’s guidance, SunCity dared to dream big. Facing the problem that poker was less well known in Asia than in the West, they helped finance a Poker King feature film to popularise the game. Winfred himself had a cameo role in the comedy, which came out in 2009, alongside real-life poker players including the great Johnny Chan.

Clearly, they did something right! Having started in Macau at the StarWorld casino, Winfred then opened his Poker King Club in the huge Macau Venetian. There are now three more in key Asian cities: a Poker King Club at the Solaire casino in Manila; one in Jeju, South Korea; and in early July a new one also opened at the Star Vegas Resort and Club in Poipet, Cambodia.

As if that wasn’t enough, Winfred Yu also organises several major poker tournaments, including the recent Triton Super High Roller Series at the Maestral Resort and Casino in beautiful Montenegro.

When Winfred Yu met Paul Phua

I met Winfred when the ultra-high-stakes cash game known as “the Big Game” was held at the StarWorld in Macau. He is a smart man, and a keen poker player, so we immediately got on well.

In this video for the Paul Phua Poker School, Winfred admits that he did not expect us to become friends, because I was already friendly with his boss. “He’s a good friend of my boss,” explains Winfred, “and he said ‘take care of Paul, he has super-interest in poker’… he’s such a generous guy he didn’t even think, you know, that he’s a friend of my boss… they treated us all like friends.”

Of course! I look forward to many years more of friendship with Winfred Yu. These are exciting times for the Asian poker market, and you can be sure that Winfred will be in the driving seat.

Who is Winfred Yu? Poker player profile

  • Winfred Yu runs the Poker King Clubs in Macau, Manila, Jeju and Poipet
  • Winfred also organises major Asian poker tournaments including the Triton High Roller Series and the Poker King Club Cup
  • He has previously hosted the ultra-high-stakes cash game known in poker circles as “the Big Game”
  • Winfred Yu has more than $2 million in live poker tournament earnings

Paul Phua Poker picks five more terrific quotes about poker, and explains how they can improve your game

Read part one of 10 useful poker sayings

“Texas Hold ’Em: the game that takes five minutes to learn and a lifetime to master”

Perhaps the most famous poker saying of all was coined by Mike Sexton, the former gymnast, US paratrooper and ballroom dancing instructor who became a highly respected poker pro and commentator. Like so many simple sayings, it holds a profound truth. When climbing a mountain, what appears to be the peak above you often turns out to be just the top of a foothill, with a long climb still ahead. In the same way, whenever you think you have perfected poker you always discover there is more to learn.

It is striking how many of the top poker pros interviewed by the Paul Phua Poker School say they are still learning from their peers. For instance, watch Dan Colman’s video interview in which he says: “The guys that are very math based, game theory orientated, I always want to pay attention to what they are doing and try and understand the reasoning behind it.”

“The smarter you play, the luckier you’ll be”

This is a favourite poker saying of Mark Pilarski, the casino industry insider turned lecturer and author. It even adorns his website banner. Really it’s a variant on pro golfer Gary Player’s maxim, “The more I practise, the luckier I get.”

You may suffer some bad beats in poker, but over a long period of time you will get as many lucky breaks as unlucky ones. Pilarski is saying that the players who appear to be lucky, and winning all the time, are the ones playing smarter. Just as a brilliant golfer who practises hard is more likely to hit a seemingly lucky hole-in-one, so too is the smart poker player more likely to end up with the winning hand.

“Money is simply the way of keeping score”

The full saying by the British journalist Anthony Holden, author of the classic poker memoir Big Deal, is as follows: “Poker may be a branch of psychological warfare, an art form or indeed a way of life – but it is also merely a game, in which money is simply the means of keeping score.”

It’s the final part of the quote that resonates. Poker players necessarily have a bizarre relationship with money. Players who would not normally spend money on fancy restaurants or other luxuries do not hesitate to shove hundreds or thousands of dollars into a poker pot. But they must strike the right balance. Players who are entirely contemptuous of money may end up losing it on quixotic bets and long-odds draws. Players who care too much become “scared money”, folding the best hand rather than risking their cash. In the end, the best way to look at money in poker is as chips: a way of keeping score, and the only way to really know if you are a winning or a losing player.

This thought is also eloquently expressed in the classic poker movie The Cincinnati Kid: “To the true gambler, money is never an end in itself, it’s simply a tool, as a language is to thought.”

“Hold ’Em is less a card game played by people, than a game about people that happens to be played with cards”

Phil Hellmuth is unquestionably one of the greatest poker players of all time. He won the World Series of Poker Main Event aged just 24 (read more), and has since amassed a record 14 WSOP bracelets. One of his strengths is a skill at reading people that is so uncanny he calls it “White Magic”.

It’s for this reason that Hellmuth says Texas Hold ’Em is “a game about people”. Most hands, after all, do not even reach showdown: what really dictates who folds and who rakes in the pot is what they think your hand is, and what you think their hand is, based on your respective reads.

“Poker is a hard way to earn an easy living”

This is such a long-established saying that it’s hard to work out who first said it. But again, it contains a profound truth. You look at the poker pros sitting at a card table or computer screen all day, raking in the cash, and it doesn’t exactly seem like hard labour.

But pros will tell you they studied hard, sacrificed social and family time, weathered hard times in which they lost everything and built it all back up again. Though you need some natural talent to become a poker pro, it’s more craft and graft than art. But if you can master it… then, yes, it can be the best living in the world!

There are so many great quotes about poker, and all of them will help you be a better player. Paul Phua Poker picks 10 of the best

“You’ve got to know when to hold ’em and when to fold ’em”

This saying was popularised by the country singer Kenny Rogers in his 1978 version of The Gambler, though the song was written and first recorded by 23-year-old Don Schlitz two years before. It’s one of the simplest and yet most profound lessons in poker.

Too many people hang on to their hand when it’s obvious they are beaten. How many times have you heard a player sigh and say, “I know you’ve got me beat, but I’ll call?” Like many things in poker, it’s a lesson with wide applications in life and love.

“As long as you’ve got ‘a chip and a chair’, there’s still hope”

This means that in tournaments, you should never give up until you’ve lost your very last chip. Many are the times when someone has fought back from near-obliteration to double up, then double up again, then go on to cash or even win the tournament. The saying originated with Jack “Treetop Straus”, and his extraordinary comeback from a single chip to win the WSOP Main Event. Read more

“If you can’t spot the sucker in your first half hour at the table, then you ARE the sucker”

This quote is from Rounders, the greatest of all poker movies. It’s a film that cares so much about authenticity that its climactic hand is copied from Johnny Chan’s famous winning hand at the World Series of Poker Main Event in 1988.

It is famously good advice. When you sit down at a new table, observe the other players. Are they betting too big, too often? Conversely, are they calling stations who don’t raise to protect their hands and allow you cheap draws to a winner? In short, can you spot players worse than you, the “suckers” whose money you will be raking in by the end of the session? If not, move tables if it’s a cash game; and if it’s a tournament, where you can’t move, sit tight and wait for a premium starting hand.

“Don’t tap on the glass”

You know how the bad poker players who are likely to be donating their money to the rest of the table are called “fish”? And you know that in an aquarium you are told not to tap on the glass as it scares the fish? This saying is a kind of code from one poker shark to another.

Let’s say one is berating a fish for sucking out on him with a bad play that got lucky. “Don’t tap on the glass” would be said as a reminder to keep the fish happy instead – at least for long enough to lose the money back again! This saying is also included in the Paul Phua Poker School Dos and Don’ts of Poker Etiquette.

“You call, it’s gonna be all over baby!”

So famous it’s printed on T-shirts, this is what the irrepressible Scotty Nguyen said to Kevin McBride in the final hand of the World Series of Poker in 1998, when he bet out on a board showing 89988.

The taunt was well judged: McBride made the call, saying “I play the board”. Nguyen held a 9 to make a bigger full house, and it was indeed all over baby. Read 10 more memorable events in WSOP history

Look out for five more great quotes in part 2

The world’s top poker pros battled for the coveted Triton SHR Series Main Event title. Paul Phua was in the thick of the action

Paul Phua Sam Trickett

The Triton Super High Roller Series in beautiful Montenegro ended in a heads-up battle between German poker pro Manig Loeser and my good friend, Richard Yong. After an hour of ups and downs, Richard’s stack was crippled when he ran his pocket sevens into Manig’s flopped two pair. The very next hand sealed Richard’s fate: with A-4 against Manig’s J-2, the Jack came on the flop to give Manig the first prize of HK$16,877,600 (US$2.16m).

What a poker tournament this was! The high buy-ins, and the attractions of the recently reopened Maestral Resort and Casino, brought in some of the world’s top poker pros – as you can see from my photograph!

The $100m poker selfie

#pokerselfie

In the top row, left to right, are Andrew Robl, Fedor Holz, Dan “Jungleman” Cates and Wai Kin Yong.

In the middle row, left to right, are Sam Trickett, Steve O’Dwyer, Koray Aldemir, Timofey “Trueteller” Kuznetsov.

In the bottom row, left to right, are Winfred Yu, myself and Richard Yong.

Someone added up the combined live tournament earnings of the players in the picture. They told me it came to about $100 million.

The only pity is that my good friend Tom Dwan came just a few minutes too late to join the group shot!

Tom Dwan, Jungleman and Sam Trickett

I don’t believe you would find such a high concentration of poker pros anywhere in the world as we had at the Triton SHR Series. At one stage Tom Dwan was seated directly across the table from Jungleman, with England’s No 1 poker player, Sam Trickett, in between them!

I myself had the US pro Steve O’Dwyer on my left at the beginning of the tournament; then I had John Juanda, who ended up in fourth place; and then the chip leader at the time, “Shanghai Wang” Qiang. I had to rebuy twice, but still did not manage to make the final table against such stiff competition!

The good thing about poker is that there are always cash games when you bust out of tournament, and those were going strong well into the night.

And there is always another tournament, too! Another Triton SHR Series is being planned for Macau this October, and I know it will not be long before it returns to Montenegro.

Interviews for Paul Phua Poker

Fedor Holz Maestral

I hope you have enjoyed the tournament photos and updates on my Twitter feed, @PaulPhuaPoker. My video crew have also been shooting some fascinating strategy interviews with the poker pros here. Some of them, like Jungleman and Tom Dwan, have featured in previous Paul Phua Poker School videos. Many more will be new to my website, including some very famous players. I can’t wait to share them with you, once the hours of film have been edited.

Maestral casino Montenegro

But for now, this is goodbye from the Maestral Resort and Casino in Montenegro, with its wonderful beaches, glorious sunsets and warm, shimmering sea. Plenty of fish in there – not so many in the Triton SHR Series poker tournaments!

Watch the new video interview for the Paul Phua Poker School, in which Dan Cates reveals how he went from playing poker with scraps of paper at high school to the biggest poker games in the world. Paul Phua picks the highlights

In his previous video interview for the Paul Phua Poker School, Dan “Jungleman” Cates talked about the aggression that has made him one of the world’s best heads-up players – “I just try to win all the pots I can!”. He also talked about how he could apply some of those heads-up tactics to full-ring games.


In this latest video for the Paul Phua Poker School, Jungleman (as we all call him at the poker table) tells us a bit more about how he became the successful poker player he is today. For anyone dreaming of becoming a poker pro, it’s instructive to see how it’s done!

How Jungleman Dan started playing poker

Dan Cates made more than $10 million profit on the Full Tilt poker site, and has more than $5 million in tournament cashes. He also plays cash, including in “the Big Game” that I play in. He’s still just 27 years old, yet he has already been playing poker for 12 years. Jungleman reveals in this new video interview for the Paul Phua Poker School that he started at the age of 15:
“l played with some friends in high school during lunch periods using torn-up little pieces of paper as chips, playing for $10 or whatever.”
How times have changed! But while the stakes may be different, Jungleman’s competitive drive has remained undimmed.

How Dan Cates improved his poker strategy

We asked Jungleman how he improved his poker strategy. It’s striking how, in so many of these interviews for the Paul Phua Poker School, the pros agree on one key poker tip: it is vital to learn from other players, and get a second opinion on problematic hands.
“In the start, it was all me,” says Dan Cates. But, he says, whenever he tried to learn a new game, he would try to find “the specialists that were best in those games”. Poker proved no different. “it’s helped in random different ways,” says Dan Cates, “like other players gave me their opinions or whatever on things, and over time I learned more and more.”
As Dan Colman said in his recent video interview for the Paul Phua Poker School, “a big part [of success] is having friends who are very good players”.

Dan “Jungleman” Cates’s playing style

Over time, each player develops his own playing style. Jungleman’s is aggressive (he talked in the last video about how he likes to 3-bet with 5-6 suited), but it is also highly data-driven and analytical. Asked about his strongest attributes as a poker player, he says:
“I guess one of my strongest attributes would be that l understand the game. l think l understand the game better than most opponents. Just how it works, and all the decision tree points. l have a very good memory for each decision tree point, and also how players play different ones of those. It’s either that, or that l adjust better than they do. It’s one of those two things.”

How Dan Cates got his “Jungleman” nickname

Finally, Dan Cates reveals how he got his unusual nickname, “Jungleman”, which also inspired his screen name, “Jungleman12”.
“l was called ‘Jungleman’ when l played live,” Dan Cates says in the video, “because players… because I was, like, kind of a crazy person, and also because l was, like, pretty hairy, l had a lot of hair. l had longer hair, too. So they called me Jungleman just to, like, sort of mock me, and I thought it was a funny name. And yeah, it stuck, for a long time.”

Who is Daniel “Jungleman” Cates? Poker player profile

  • Dan Cates, 27, from the United States, is one of the world’s leading heads-up poker players.
  • He plays online under the names “Jungleman12” and “w00ki3z”.
  • He has made more than $10 million profit on the Full Tilt poker site.
  • He has nearly $5 million in live tournament cashes.
  • He often plays cash poker for high stakes in “the Big Game” in Macau and Manila.
  • He is known for his aggressive style of play.

Sam Trickett is among the top pros sitting pretty after Day One of the Triton SHR Series Main Event. Others have had to rebuy. The Paul Phua Poker team reports

Day One of the Triton Super High Roller Series Montenegro Main Event has just gone, and what a day it was! Some of the biggest names in poker were among the 47 (including re-entries) so far who have stumped up the HK$1m (US$128k) entry fee, making for some exciting poker tournament action and some very difficult tables.
Paul Phua playing poker in Montenegro
At one point Paul Phua found himself seated in the most unfortunate position of all: with the young internet legend Timofey “Trueteller” Kuznetsov to his left, and veteran five-time WSOP bracelet winner John Juanda to the left of that! Perhaps it’s not surprising that Paul Phua was knocked out twice during the day. Undaunted, he has bought in a third and final time for Day Two!
Triton poker tournament in Montenegro
Top pros who suffered an early knock-out, and then bought in again, include Steve O’Dwyer, Wai Kin Yong and David Peters. Even the recent Triton SHR Series 6-Max Montenegro champion, Fedor Holz, busted out and rebought. And despite the tournament experience born of two bracelets and more than 33 cashes at the WSOP, Dominik Nitsche was forced to buy in three times just as Paul Phua was.

Qiang Wang, the million-chip man

There is just one million-chip man going into Day Two: Qiang Wang. Top pros with significantly bigger stacks than the 250k they began with include Mikita Badziakouski (825k), Sam Trickett (715k) and Steffen Sontheimer (600k). Montenegrin local hero Predrag Lekovic, who came third in the Triton SHR Series 6-Max warm-up event, is sitting in tenth place with 357k. Lekovic busted Timofey “Trueteller” Kuznetsoz out of the tournament on the very last hand of the day!
Paul Phua playing at poker tournament in Montenegro
Registration remains open until the beginning of Day Two. The big question is, will Tom Dwan make a last-minute appearance? Or is he too caught up in the exciting side action of high-stakes cash games at the Maestral Resort and Casino?

Interviews for the Paul Phua Poker School

Once the tournament broke up for the night, the Paul Phua Poker team filmed even more video interviews with the top pros. We’re really excited by the great strategy advice they have given us, as well as their insights into the life of a professional high-stakes poker player. We can’t wait to get all the footage edited so we can share it with you in the Paul Phua Poker School.
Rui Cao being interviewed at Triton Montenegro
In the meantime, follow @PaulPhuaPoker on Twitter for updates on the Triton SHR Series Main Event.
No one can tell the future, least of all in poker. But there is one thing we can say for sure: with some of the world’s top poker pros competing, it’s going to be a thriller.

Fedor Holz, Dan “Jungleman” Cates and Sam Trickett are just some of the poker pros playing in the exclusive Triton Super High Roller Series in Montenegro. The Paul Phua Poker team reports

Is it really just a year and a half since the first Triton Super High Roller Series took place? Already it has become a key fixture in the top poker pros’ calendars, and Day One of the Triton SHR Series in Montenegro shows why.
Triton SHR Series Montenegro, Day One
The Main Event, starting on July 18, is expected to bring out the very brightest stars in poker. We’re now only just on the warm-up tournament: the 6-Max Texas Hold ’Em, with an entry fee of “only” HK$250,000 (US$32,000). And yet some of the world’s finest poker pros are playing already.

The great, late Fedor Holz

Fedor Holz, the likeable German poker prodigy who at 23 has already amassed $23m in live tournament earnings, arrived fashionably late – by three hours! Even so, true to form, he wasted no time in building a commanding stack. He finishes Day One in sixth place, with more than double his starting stack of 50,000.
Fedor Holz at Triton SHR Montenegro
Three places above him, with 129,000, is Steve O’Dwyer. The US high-stakes specialist, who has $18.5m in live tournament earnings, is now poised to notch up another big win. Pity the Canadian pro Lucas Greenwood, who started the day with the fearsome Steve O’Dwyer to his left – and then, having busted out and rebought, drew the legendary Dan “Jungleman” Cates to his left instead!
Greenwood has a comfortable 64,600 as he enters Day Two. He’s not sitting pretty, however. Who’s that two places to his left? It’s Steve O’Dwyer, yet again!
Other huge poker names who have survived to Day Two include John Juanda, Sam Trickett, Richard Yong, Winfred Yu and Mikita Badziakouski.

Paul Phua Poker interviews the poker pros

The Paul Phua Poker team was at the Triton SHR series too, with cameras at the ready, to bring you live action on Facebook and Twitter (follow @PaulPhuaPoker). We also conducted exclusive interviews with Fedor Holz, Dan “Jungleman” Cates and the British No 1 Sam Trickett – we’ll add those videos to the Paul Phua Poker School in due course – and there will be many more to come as the Triton SHR Series unfolds.
Dan "Jungleman" Cates at Triton SHR Montenegro
Wish you were here? You can have the next best thing: tweet your question for the Triton poker pros to #PhuaTriton, and Paul Phua will do his best to get them answered.
Sam Trickett at the Triton SHR Tournament in Montenegro

Maestral, Montenegro, magnificent

Another reason to love this particular Triton SHR Series is the idyllic location. The five-star Maestral Resort and Casino where the tournaments are being held has been comprehensively refurbished over the last few months, and the Montenegrin Prime Minister himself cut the ribbon on its reopening last week. The Maestral now has 183 rooms and 22 suites, all finished to the highest design specifications, with superb cuisine and a Wellness & Spa Centre that already in 2016 had been named Montenegro’s best. It also offers a private beach and an expansive terrace bar overlooking the sea.
Montenegro Maestral Casino and Resort
Montenegro has some of the most beautiful coastline in Europe, with dramatic hills rising above perfect sandy beaches in tranquil coves. But even by Montenegrin standards this particular stretch is prized as one of the best. In the immediate vicinity of the unique island resort of Sveti Stefan, near Budva with its Old Town and modern nightlife, it is well worth visiting – even without Fedor Holz enjoying a post-tournament dinner on the Maestral’s sea-view terrace a few tables to your right!
Maestral Casino and Hotel Montenegro
For more Triton SHR Series action, follow @PaulPhuaPoker on Twitter, like and follow Paul Phua Poker on Facebook, and tweet your questions for the Triton pros to #PhuaTriton

In this latest “In Conversation” video for the Paul Phua Poker School, Wai Kin Yong and Rui Cao share three secrets for poker success, and remember an amazing hero call. Paul Phua picks the video highlights

If the Triton Super High Roller Series has a break-out star, it’s surely Wai Kin Yong. My young friend has had a superb run: in three Triton SHR tournaments between September 2016 and February 2017, he won twice and came sixth once, for a total of more than US$3m.
Watch this new video for the Paul Phua Poker School, in which Wai Kin Yong explores the secrets of his success with me and Rui Cao, one of the most respected of all French players.

  1. Learn from other poker players

In Wai Kin Yong and Rui Cao’s previous Paul Phua Poker School video, they talked about their aggressive playing style. But actually, as you will find in this new video, Wai Kin Yong achieved poker tournament success only when he tempered that style with a little more caution. In poker tournaments your chips are more precious than in cash: you cannot rebuy. It makes sense to take a slightly less aggressive strategy, and to narrow your hand range.
Here, Wai Kin Yong gives credit to his excellent mentor, the pro Mikael Thuritz. “He’s a great teacher,” says Wai Kin Yong. “I mean, he improved my game, like, 500% maybe!”
Rui Cao, too, stresses the importance of learning from others, no matter how high a level you reach at poker. “I used to watch a lot of videos,” says Rui Cao, “talk with a lot of friends, so it’s not a single person, but just a group of people who made me a better player. I like to talk with good players all the time, so little by little I become better, l think.”

  1. Play the poker player, not the cards

Wai Kin Yong and Rui Cao have played poker together many times, but when asked for their most memorable hand, they both immediately think of the same one.
On a board that ended up something like 7-4-J-6-A, Wai Kin Yong held just pocket nines. All the same, when Rui Cao check-raised the flop, bet the turn, then jammed the river, Wai Kin Yong still managed to call him down! It shows how important it is to know your opponent’s playing style: Wai Kin Yong evidently decided Rui Cao was capable of a triple-barrel bluff.
Wai Kin Yong explains: “I was like, ‘Hmm, it’s Rui Cao. I call with nines. Good!’ And he got so mad about it. I called with nines, ha ha!”
That fearlessness, that ability to trust your read no matter how intimidating the bet, is one of the many things that separates the true poker pro from the amateur.

  1. Play for love of the game, not just money

Finally, we discuss what it takes to be good at poker. Rui Cao believes you need to play from the heart as much as the head; for love, not money.
“If you play the game to win money,” says Rui Cao, “you can be a top player, but you won’t be world class. Maybe you are going to be able to win a little bit, but you’re not going to love it. I think loving the game is the most important thing in poker.”
Wai Kin Yong returns to the opening theme of the video when he says: “I think the most important thing for beginners is their willingness to learn, and admit that you’re not good, you know. Whereas l have known people who play poker every day, and they are losing every day, but they just think it’s  bad luck. And l don’t think poker has that much bad luck.
“You have to question yourself, and improve.”

The Paul Phua Poker team will be filming interviews with top pros at the Triton Super High Roller Series in Montenegro on July 16-20. Paul Phua explains how you can be part of the action

Some of the world’s top poker pros will be travelling to Montenegro on July 16-20 for the Triton Super High Roller Series, and Paul Phua Poker will be bringing you tournament news and interviews from this key event.
At the Triton SHR Series Manila in February, the Paul Phua Poker School secured video interviews on poker strategy with Phil Ivey, Dan Colman, Dan Cates, Wai Kin Yong and Rui Cao.
The Paul Phua Poker team will again be filming at the Triton SHR Series Montenegro. And this time, we are giving you the chance to put your own questions to the pros!
Would you ask Phil Ivey about his stone-cold bluffs? Would you ask Tom “Durrrr” Dwan about heads-up strategy? Or have you a general question about poker strategy to ask the experts?

You tell us!

Follow me on Twitter at @PaulPhuaPoker to keep up with the action, and join in with our Twitter chat at #PhuaTriton. To ask questions of the pros, Tweet your question with the hashtag #PhuaTriton. We don’t yet know exactly who will be playing, but availability permitting, I’ll make sure some of the best get answered.

Top pros play the Triton Poker Series

This is one of the pros’ favourite tournaments – mine, too. Whereas the Main Event of the World Series of Poker has become so crowded that some wonder if any top player can win it again, the Triton Series has high buy-ins that give the pros a chance to shine. For instance:

  • Fedor Holz won the Triton SHR Series Cali Cup in 2006 for $3m.
  • Daniel Colman won the Triton SHR Series Paranaque 6-Max Event in 2017 for $3.6m, after a heads-up battle with Erik Seidel.
  • Koray Aldemir won the Triton SHR Series Paranaque Main Event in 2017 for $1.3m, with Dan “Jugleman” Cates coming third.
  • Phil Ivey placed fifth in the Triton SHR Series Paranaque $200k NLH in 2016 for $656,000.
  • Wai Kin Yong has taken down two titles and a sixth place finish in different Triton tournaments for more than $3m.
  • And I myself, Paul Phua, have cashed in three Triton SHR Series tournaments for more than $800,000.

About the Triton Super High Roller Series

The Triton poker series started in January 2016 with the Triton SHR Cali Cup. The Main Event broke WPT records as its highest ever buy-in, with 52 players buying in for £200,000 each.
Ever since, the high buy-ins to the Triton poker series have attracted some of the top pros, as well as high-rolling businessmen who want to measure themselves against the world’s finest. At these high levels of poker, most of the players know each other. The recently revamped Maestral Resort & Casino, on the shores of the Adriatic Sea in Montenegro, will be full of animated conversation and lively cash side-games.
In addition, the Triton SHR Series raises a lot of money for worthy causes. All proceeds from the tournaments, after expenses (many of which are defrayed by sponsors), go to a named charity. Past beneficiaries have included The Red Cross and Project Pink.
We know that most poker players can only dream of affording the buy-in for these tournaments. Joining in with the Twitter chat at #PhuaTriton is the next best thing.

In his second video for the Paul Phua Poker School, Dan “Jungleman” Cates reveals why aggression pays. Paul Phua picks the interview highlights.

If you have been playing poker for as long as I have, you will have noticed that playing styles have become more aggressive over the years. The aggressor is the one able to take initiative, and aggressive raising also gives you “fold equity”, forcing a fold from a stronger hand. These days there are many expert players who 3-bet pre-flop with hands that others might not even call with.
It makes them unpredictable and hard to play against. They might have Ace-King, Ace-Queen or a big pair… but they might also have just suited connectors!


 

Why Dan Cates 3-bets with 5-3 suited

In his previous video interview for the Paul Phua Poker School, Dan “Jungleman” Cates talked about the aggression that has made him one of the world’s best heads-up players – “I just try to win all the pots I can!” In this second “In Conversation With Paul Phua” video for the Paul Phua Poker School, Dan “Jungleman” Cates talks in greater detail about the hands he likes to 3-bet with.
“If we’re playing in our game,” says Jungleman, “the deep game [high-stakes cash], l’d 3-bet the biggest hands, obviously, but also, like, the bluffs that play the best post-flop, the ‘best bluffs’ so to speak. Like 6-5 suited, 5-3 suited, obviously.”
It may not be obvious to less experienced players that one could raise with 5-3 suited! But that’s what makes Jungleman one of the most successful poker pros around. Dan Cates made more than $10 million profit on the Full Tilt poker site before transitioning to live games, and has since racked up more than $5 million in tournament cashes.

Why 3-bets depend on player and position

As with everything in poker strategy, how you 3-bet will depend on who you are playing against. Jungleman explains: “If someone plays either like tight or aggressive or whatever, l would rather not 3-bet something like AJ offsuit. But if they play passive, and like, just call down or don’t have too many moves, l’d rather 3-bet AJ offsuit a lot.”
And of course it also depends on your position. Jungleman continues: “Or maybe some players I might want to 3-bet more than others, like, if l want to play more in position with them or whatever.”

Why size matters in bluffing

One strategy I have noticed some aggressive poker pros adopt is to deliberately bet more with their bluffs to create a bigger pot. By the time the river comes, the pot is so large that many amateur players will not dare to call with anything much less than the nuts.
In this new Paul Phua Poker School video interview, I ask Jungleman about that. “l think it can make sense to do that,” he agrees. “l mean, l think at least in theory things are quite a bit more complicated, for various reasons.
“l mean, you can manipulate pot stack size if you just know, like, how much they’re going to call on the turn and then fold on the river, if someone just always calls and folds on the river or something. But l think that’s kind of a complicated subject.”
What he means is, this is not something you should try unless you genuinely are an expert player!

How often should you bluff?

Jungleman also talks about when and how to bluff: “The one thing l think about more is how many bluffs do l want to turn up with. In pretty much every situation, basically, you can kind of, like, weight the value of various different bluffs in a lot of the spots and, like, how strong ranges players have. l think about stuff like that…”
And then Jungleman shows that, however aggressive the pro players can be, for the most part they still follow the most simple and fundamental poker advice of all: “But mostly l try to play big pots with big hands

Who is Daniel “Jungleman” Cates? Poker player profile

  • Dan Cates, 27, from the United States, is one of the world’s leading heads-up poker players.
  • He plays online under the names “Jungleman12” and “w00ki3z”.
  • He has made more than $10 million profit on the Full Tilt poker site.
  • He has nearly $5 million in live tournament cashes.
  • He often plays cash poker for high stakes in “the Big Game” in Macau and Manila.
  • He is known for his aggressive style of play.