Home / Poker News November 2011 / Czech Pro wins Fifty50 Prop Bet
Czech Pro wins Fifty50 Prop Bet
Posted by: Randy Williams - Wed, 2011-11-16 14:18
Playing Fifty50 (double or nothing) SNGs at
PokerStars is one of the best ways to build a bankroll on account of the low variance. In these SNG’s all one needs to do to win is to survive half of the starting field. Basically, in a 10-player double or nothing SNG, 5 players lose their buy-ins while the other 5 double up.
Czech poker pro Martin Balaz started playing poker in 2007. He quickly recognized the profitability of the Fifty50 SNGs at Pokerstars and pretty soon he found himself limited to playing exclusively in such SNGs. This is where a prop bet came into the picture. Poker players are notorious prop bettors, and when he realized how successful he could be at the double or nothing tables, Balaz didn’t shy away from a seemingly insane proposition: to play 24,000 (that’s right, twenty four thousand) Fifty50 SNGs during October and finish with a profit, not counting rakeback of course.
Balaz almost bit off more than he could chew by accepting the bet, but in the end he succeeded. The bet was not his first of this nature though. Back in July, he had undertaken a 12,000 Fifty50 SNG prop bet, and found that turning a profit at that level was a cinch for him.
His 24,000 SNG challenge was supposed to go down at the $20-$200 buy-in tables, but after he found that traffic at the said stakes was lower than expected, he added the $15 tables to the mix too.
As soon as the challenge got rolling, Balaz discovered that he had to let go of his plans to jog in the morning. His days were pretty much entirely dedicated to poker. He woke up at 10 a.m. each day and went about his regular daily chores, before putting in 3-4 sessions of 3-5 hours each. He would go to bed at 4 a.m. each day.
He said that sticking to a proper schedule was key in such undertakings.
Balaz eventually finished with an almost $3k profit, but he made $25k+ in
rakeback.
