rui cao Archives - Paul Phua Poker

Kim Jong-un’s Finance Minister may have told the Chinese Foreign Ministry that North Korea is still on course for full-scale denuclearisation this week, but that hasn’t stopped the French from dropping a few bombs along the Korean Peninsular.
PokerStars has been as quiet as a jaguar juggling jackfruits in a jungle about their appearance in Korea this week (you won’t even find the results in Hendon Mob). Jeju’s Landing Casino hosted the PokerStars Red Dragon, and outside of the PokerStars blog, you would have missed it altogether, and that would have been a shame because it was the scene of the richest live tournament prize on offer this week.
The Red Dragon Series included a $53,000 buy-in Super High Roller, and 44-entrants created a $2,231,879 prize pool, and you can buy a lot of buttons with that kind of wonga.
And what a final table.
Nobody is rocking the Asian high stakes poker scene as wildly as Ivan Leow these days. The Malaysian star has earned more than $5.4m this year, including five tournament wins, and three seven-figure scores.

Leow won the HKD 500,000 Short Deck event at the Triton Poker Series in Jeju for a million bucks. He then went to partypoker MILLIONS Russia and won the High Roller for $1.1m, and won Leon’s €100,000 High Roller at the World Series of Poker Europe (WSOPE) for $1.4m.
Leow wasn’t the only dragon from Malaysia sticking his claws into the oak surrounding the Landing Casino’s magnificent poker tables. Michael Soyza has earned a career-high $2,142,608 in 2018, picking up a #16 ranking in the Global Poker Index (GPI), and the August GPI Player of the Month award. Soyza won the Asian Pacific Poker Tour (APPT) Main Event in Korea, besting a field of 449-entrants to win the $148,629 first prize in April. During the Vegas grind, Soyza conquered 2,877 entrants to win the $588,429 first prize in a $1,655 buy-in event during the Mid-States Poker Tour (MSPT) at the Venetian. He finished off a beautiful summer by winning a 124-entrant €10,300 High Roller during the PokerStars’ European Poker Tour (EPT), banking €302,500. In October, Soyza was bracelet hunting in Rozvadov and brought home $592,594 after finishing third in Leon’s €100,000 High Roller.
However, it wouldn’t be Malaysia that would hog the headlines in this one. That honour went to the French, and two of the finest proponents of high stakes poker in the business.
Rui Cao v Romain Arnaud.
High Stakes dragon v high stakes dragon.
Compatriot v compatriot.
Friend v friend.
When it comes to multi-table tournaments (MTTs), both players are vastly inexperienced, but the smart money would have gone the way of Cao, after some sterling performances in Triton Poker Series events of late.

Cao has earned $3.1m playing tournaments in 2018, with the entirety of that haul coming in Triton Poker Series High Rollers. The French star finished runner-up to Mikita Badziakouski in the HKD 1,000,000 Main Event at the Triton Poker Series in Montenegro earning $1,683,711, and also finished fifth in the HKD 1,000,000 Short-Deck event at the same venue for $802,412. Cao carried his form into the Triton Poker Series Jeju finishing runner-up to Ivan Leow in the HKD 500,000 Short-Deck event for $672,852.
With the Poker Gods seemingly on the side of Cao, Arnaud made the smart move, and brokered an ICM deal that saw a pocket calculator split the money as the two friends played ‘blind’ poker to determine which of them would have to say ‘cheese.’ Born winners, I think this may have been a rare time when these two private men would have preferred to have been on the losing side.

Arnaud won the flips, and now has the inconvenience of finding a home for his trophy amongst his suitcase full of cash.
Here are the final table results:
ITM Results
1. Romain Arnaud – $668,424*
2. Rui Cao – $620,258*
3. Michael Soyza – $336,453
4. Ivan Leow – $257,948
5. Wai Kin Yong – $201,806
6. Shunu Zang – $156,961
*Signifies an ICM deal
In other Red Dragon news, John Juanda finished 12th in the 95-entrant $10,770 buy-in Red Dragon High Roller. Yin Gui Li won the event for $255,741. James Won Lee won the $66,327 first prize in the Baby Dragon event. The Main Event continues as I type.

In Other High Rolling Tournament News

So who else has been dropping bombs this week?
One of the best non-professional high rollers in the business found himself in an unusual position this week. The UK’s Talal Shakerchi made the final table of the PokerStars Sunday Million finishing 6/5720. That’s a $215 buy-in event, folks, showing you how much ‘raidalot’ loves the game.
Sticking with PokerStars and the GPI World #1, Alex “bigfox86” Foxen earned his third High Roller Club title in under a fortnight. Between Nov 25 – Dec 1, Foxen has cashed 10-times in the PokerStars High Roller Club events, securing 7 top 3 finishes, 3 runner-up spots, and 3 wins including the $530 Daily 500 for $12,376, the $1,050 Sunday Supersonic for $43,058, and the $1,050 Daily Warm-Up for $25,578.
Foxen wasn’t the only high roller making a splash in the High Roller Club this past weekend. Joao “Naza114” Vieira beat 155-players to win the $2,100 Sunday High Roller for $65,069, Ivan “Negriin” Luca won the $1,050 Sunday Supersonic for $51,384, and Romania’s Alex “Steakaddict.” Papazian conquered the field in the $215 Sunday Warm-Up for $36,151.
Outside of the tournament scene and Trickett’s Room on partypoker was bustling this week with Sam Trickett, Rob Yong and Matt Kirk competing in $100/$200 and $200/$400 Pot-Limit Omaha (PLO) cash games. According to reports, Trickett and Yong were the big winners each pulling $300k+ profit off the tables.

**The latest Paul Phua Poker School video interview is with French poker pro Rui Cao. Paul Phua explores the lessons to be learned**

Rui Cao, the subject of this new video profile for the Paul Phua Poker School, is recognised as one of the best poker players in France. I first played against him six years ago, when he came to Macau to play in the high-stakes cash game known in poker circles as “the Big Game”. Rui Cao is an aggressive, risk-taking player, and he loved the excitement of these huge pots. Anyone who can thrive in such a high-pressure situation, where even the most experienced players can be at risk of losing their bankroll, deserves respect.

In his previous video interview for the Paul Phua Poker School, discussing aggression in poker with myself and Wai Kin Yong, Rui Cao admitted that he sometimes plays a little too loose: “It’s an ego problem,” he said. So this time we asked him what he considers the most important attributes for success in poker.
“I think being smart is a good point,” Rui Cao says in the new video interview, “and being able to learn fast is similar, to adjust fast to the game. Other than that, some human factors as well like discipline, patience, the ability to control ourselves, I think mostly.”

How not to go on tilt

I very much agree with him on this last point. In fact, I wrote a blog about this a few months ago. Even if you have total mastery of poker strategy and poker odds, you will still be a losing player if you don’t have the patience and discipline to apply the theory in practice. What is the point of knowing the best starting hands, for instance, if you get bored of folding and start to play everything you are dealt?
Part of not going “on tilt” is developing a philosophical attitude to the game. Yes, you got unlucky this time. But the longer you play, the more luck evens out. You get unlucky sometimes, you get lucky sometimes. If you make the right decisions, over time you will be a winner. So don’t let temporary setbacks affect you.
When asked in this interview how he deals with losing, Rui Cao says, “Quite OK. I just sleep for 15 hours and try to forget!” The swings in poker, he says, “are just part of the game”. The one thing you can do, he adds, is to examine whether any of the hands you lost were the result of bad play rather than bad luck. “I try to improve my game and losing is part of the game, I would say.”

An epic struggle with Isildur1

Rui Cao originally made his name playing Omaha, which can have even greater swings than Texas Hold ’Em. Asked which of his many matches was the most memorable, he recalls one marathon PLO session against Viktor Blom, better known under his online name “Isildur1” as one of the most skilled, aggressive and feared online players of all.
“We were four-tabling,” Rui Cao recalls in the video interview, “and maybe at one point I was down 30 buy-ins or something, and two hours later I was up like 30 buy-ins, and it was a pretty crazy upswing. We were, like, playing crazy, and it was a really, really fun session to play in.”
I like the way Rui Cao considers this game his favourite not because he bested one of the world’s top players, or because he made a lot of money, but because it was “really, really fun”! We poker players talk a lot about strategy, and discipline, and improving our game. Of course that’s important; in fact, it’s fundamental to the Paul Phua Poker School. Without it, we would lose money. And if we lose too much money, we can no longer play.
But let us not lose sight of the reason we all took up poker in the first place: it’s just a really, really fun game to play!
More videos from the poker pros will be going live weekly on the Paul Phua Poker YouTube channel. Subscribe if you don’t want to miss out. It’s free!

Paul Phua introduces the latest in a series of “In Conversation With Paul Phua” videos, in which the thrilling young poker pros Rui Cao and Wai Kin Yong discuss how to improve your game

How long would you play poker for in a single session? Eight hours? Twelve? Fifteen?
Try 40 or 50 hours!
As you will see in this three-way video interview between myself and the brilliant young players Rui Cao and Wai Kin Yong, we often used to play for two days and nights without stopping. We don’t do that so much anymore, but a round-the-clock game is still pretty common. As we say in the video, one skill you definitely need to develop as a player is stamina!
As I think comes across in this video, when you play poker together for such long periods, you develop a kind of bond, a friendship. But you also develop an awareness of each other’s strengths and weaknesses – and, if you are a good player, you will become conscious of your own.

Rui Cao admits in this interview that one of his weaknesses is playing too loose, wanting to show the table who is boss. “I think it’s an ego problem,” he says.
Then again, it’s also what makes Rui Cao one of France’s most exciting players. It’s six years since Rui Cao first came out to Macau to test himself in the high-stakes cash game against some of the world’s top poker pros (poker players call it “The Big Game”), and I could tell he was instantly drawn to the thrill of those huge pots of tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars.
As for Wai Kin Yong, he admits his weakness is probably being too “sticky”: “I always find the hands to call,” he says in the video.
Is that a bad thing? Well, on the one hand it’s exciting to make that “hero call”, where you call down a bluff with just Ace high. But on the other hand, if you don’t learn when to lay down a hand, even a hand as good as two pairs, you will lose a lot of money over time. You must ask yourself: are you calling because you’ve thought through the action on every street, and you really think the other person is bluffing? Or is it because your ego won’t let you back down, or you can’t stand not knowing and must see the other person’s cards? It’s something I think you learn as you get older: the patience and humility to fold, and to wait for a better spot further down the line where you are more certain of making money from the hand.
That said, Wai Kin Yong is an exceptional player for one so young. You could say it runs in the family: his father is my friend, the businessman Richard Yong. But Wai Kin Yong also very much has his own style, and has been doing very well in live tournaments. Last September he won the Triton Charity Tournament in Manila, and then just two months later the Triton Super High Roller Series Main Event as well. This February he finished sixth in the Triton Super High Roller Series Main Event. These three pay-outs were together worth more than $3 million!
So it was a pleasure to be able to sit down with these two excellent players, and talk about poker for this video. I hope you enjoy it, and pick up some tips for improving your own playing style.
It’s your decision whether to play loose or tight, aggressively or by trapping other players into making a mistake. Whatever works for you, whatever suits your personality, style and the dynamics of the table you’re on.
But the one thing I think you can definitely take away from this video interview is that good players are always talking about poker with other good players: comparing notes on hands and playing styles, working out what they can learn from each other and how they can play better in future. If you can do this, the next big tournament winner could be you!
Enjoyed this video? Subscribe to the Paul Phua Poker School YouTube channel so you don’t miss the rest in this series. It’s free!

Do you want to watch poker tips and poker strategy advice from Phil Ivey, Dan Colman, Dan “Jungleman” Cates and many more top Texas Holdem players? Of course you do!

Hi, it’s Paul Phua here with some very exciting news. My new series of “Tips from the pros” and “In Conversation” videos is almost ready for you to watch! Three months ago I released a series of poker videos on my YouTube channel, and I noticed that the two “Paul Phua In Conversation With Tom Dwan” videos were the most watched, with more than 20,000 views.

So when some of the world’s finest poker players joined me in Manila this February at the Triton High Roller Series, I asked my video team to capture some of their best poker tips and strategy advice. Which poker pros will appear in the video series over the next four months? Watch the trailer video on this page, or read on:

Phil Ivey. That’s right, Phil Ivey! Phil is an incredible player, absolutely fearless, brilliant at reading his opponents. He has ten World Series of Poker bracelets and nearly $24 million in live tournament cashes, even though he primarily plays high-stakes cash games.
Dan Colman. Dan Colman ranks above even Phil Ivey in the list of the ten biggest live tournament earners, having defeated Daniel Negreanu heads-up for a massive payout of $15.3 million in the Big One for One Drop at the 2014 World Series of Poker, only a few days after his 24^th birthday. This February he won the 2017 Triton Super High Roller Series Manila HK$ 250,000 6-Max Event, and then, just two weeks later, he won the Aria $25,000 High-Roller as well.
Dan Cates. Also known as Daniel “Jungleman” Cates, after his online poker name, Dan passed the $10 million online cash earnings milestone nearly three years ago. His famously aggressive playing style has made him one of the most formidable heads-up and shorthanded players in the world.
Timofey Kuznetsov. Playing under the name “Trueteller”, Timofey Kuznetsov is another online poker specialist. He hit the headlines in 2015 for a marathon 30-hour high-stakes heads-up session against Phil Ivey on PokerStars during which they played nearly 5,000 hands, and last week he was revealed to be the biggest online winner of the year so far.
Winfred Yu. As President of the Poker King Club, Winfred Yu runs the world’s highest-stakes cash games, in Manila and Macau. He is, of course, a terrific player himself, and has been active on the poker circuit for more than a decade.
Wai Kin Yong. Poker is in Wai Kin Yong’s blood – he is the son of the businessman and high-stakes player Richard Yong. In November 2016 he took down one of the biggest prizes in tournament poker (over $2m) at the Triton Super High Roller Series Main Event in Manila.
Rui Cao. Rui Cao emerged nearly a decade ago as one of France’s strongest players. He built his reputation online as “PepperoniF” before challenging the Macau high-stakes cash games as far back as 2011.
Go subscribe now to the Paul Phua Poker YouTube channel, so as not to miss a thing. It’s free!