introducing myself [26 May 2012|03:11am] My name is Vitaly, I'm 23 years old and I'm very lucky. In russia I'm well known as "hiNt". I play shorthanded turbo sngs mostly and I think I'm ok at it. I played almost 20,000 games and won $330k with rakeback. And now I can buy 660,000 loafs of bread. Also, I've got a very popular poker blog in russia, it's really interesting and funny. All guys who didn't like it are banned already :(. Unfortunately my english sucks and I can't translate my posts to it to keep 'em still being interesting. But one guy agreed to help me and now he translates most of my interesting blog entries. So, as soon as I get new texts from him - you get them here. updates: 27.05.2009 added intervew for rus poker magazine (dated somewhen in 2008) 26.05.2009: added post about a trip to Riga (dated 08.05.2009) 1 comment|post comment

Riga, text report [08 May 2009|03:19am] Hi to everybody! While you are reading this, mile by mile I’m moving away from the capital of Uzbekista…oops, from the capital of Russia. Towards Riga. It so happened that Vampirka, Quentin and Dymka (Vladimir Quentin’s girlfriend) have already arrived to the capital of Latvia (just a couple of hours ago) meanwhile I’m bucking along in train totally alone. There are legends that explain the reason why He has chosen this Way. As He will write Himself 50 years later in his Memoirs, He had to put his Body and Soul together and recover the Power of Mind and Intuition. Nevertheless I can’t complain about my room. I have a duplex compartment which costs 20000 rubles. Judging by the price it is cooler than the sleeper. Judging by what I’ve seen it’s WAY cooler that the sleeper))) By the way, my ticket was paid by the poker-room, where I won the trip. That’s why you can abstain from your comments about my showing off in this post. Leave some for future :D My compartment is almost twice bigger than the ordinary one. There are upper and bottom shelves, arm-chair, a wee table, tv-set, dvd with discs (fuck em’, I’ve downloaded last 10 episodes of „Prozhektorperishilton”, cause missed a lot), sink, bin, sub buffers, the call-button of a whor...stewardess and many other things, as it is usually said when you have nothing else to write about. Today in the morning we got visas in the Embassy of Latvia. And right at the entrance the security guy asked me “when does the tournament get started?” I was taken aback a wee bit and even didn’t lie. “At the Victory’s Day” – after I answered I realized that there was a big Latvian guy in front of me and he might take it in a wrong way :/ In fact, the day before yesterday Vampirka told him that four of us were going to the poker tournament and the dude simply remembered our faces. Or hi’s just reading my blog (by the way, you are nice and kind! If you are reading this). After that I went home to pack my stuff with the help of my sweetheart and the guys stayed there until the flight (about 3-4 hours). The last thing I heard was a Vampirka’s phrase referred to Quentin “Vov, you know that we still need time to get drunk. I WON’T STEP INTO THE PLANE BEING SOBER!” So…what’s next. Sure! Zhenka and I went to ION, I wanted to buy a digital camera. To shoot as much porno in Riga as I can and give a video-response to Max! We have a camera at home, it’s dad’s. It is a digital one too but it records to the tape. When dad digitized the video from my prom, the quality came in worse that Tom & Jerry which I was watching at the age of nine. That’s why I decided to kill two birds with one stone. Went to the Zoo and killed them. In the trade center ION we immediately saw three cameras. Priced 31, 32 and 42 thousand. My first question to the consultant was: “is this a good one? Has the zoom?” And the second one: “32 thousands? Great, I’ll take it” I think that looked very weird for them, because usually if someone comes to choose some expensive equipment they usually ask a million of questions and then just walk away saying something like: “ok, I’ll think about it” or “well, I will work without food for 10 years, will save some money and then I’ll buy it”. But as I’m a total foo-foo in cameras, I just analyzed the situation in a proper way: that the seller will tell me any shit and I’ll believe him. That’s why I picked the nicest camera and bought it. Yeah, haha. Just remembered how this guy checked the workability of a camera in front of us. He was trying to turn it on. He’s been looking for the necessary button for about two minutes. It wouldn’t be so funny if he didn’t have „Tolya. I know how it works” written on his badge. And „I KNOW” was written exactly with big fat letters:)) Well…later…mm..Ah, The Railway station in Riga. The station appeared to be very clean. You can even take a shower there only for 75 rubles (actually, nowhere in Russia I’ve seen something like that, but maybe the shower is also special, like the ordinary tap with cold water which sticks out from the ceiling, I don’t know, I haven’t checked) While we were sitting in the waiting room and were watching some movie on tv (and again, I don’t remember the same luxury facilities in other railway stations) a strong short guy in the uniform of “Saturn” appeared from nowhere, approached the tv-set and saying “I’ll switch to the hockey, ok?” changed the channel to the match “Russia-USA”. By the way his “OK?” was more likely affirmative rather than interrogative. I imagined two pictures at one time: 1) I’m changing the channel saying: “guys, I’ll watch some porno for 5 minutes?” or 2) “Guys, I need to clear the bonus, I’ll play those 20 tables, okay?” By the way, about the bonus. Today I was shocked to find out that in bet-safe (from which one I’m going to Riga) my bonus of $5000 is running out tomorrow and I gained back only 75% of it. Immediately I called android Max Ripper (SNG players know this name and should smile right now) to ask him to help in clearing the bonus. In comparison with Max Ripper I am no fucking multitabler and I play simply at one table. This man is a machine which can play at 25 tables for 9 hours and don’t go mad. At the same time I wrote to the support saying that if it wasn’t about their rigged in riga promo, I would definitely gained back those 15000 points. It hardly sounded as it was true if take in consideration that the last 75% I got within 35 days and just now decided to get back the last quarter in a single day, but it doesn’t hurt to try. Well, let’s go back to the train. The stewardess told me that it is obligatory to declare at the custom amounts of money that exceed $10k. Lol. Today I took only 5000 cash but then realized that took a pack exactly where were 10 thousands. And also about 30 in rubles. Haha, I had to prepare a quest for custom officers named “Find the money”. I put them wherever I could. I’d better not forget where)). What? If something happens, I will explain them that were afraid of thieves, right?)) That’s it. Cause I’m afraid my skylink will lose the network soon and I won’t be able to post this. That’s why I’m not even going to check the Spelling(. And in the end there are some stupid logs with cheap humor and coarse language (Caution!!! I warned you) 08.05.2009 20:37:23, haman15 u will play at FullTiltPoker 08.05.2009 20:37:36, hiNt is this an order? [20:44] <hiNt_poezd> Ilya, are u coming tomorrow? [20:44] <hiNt_poezd> or where I’m supposed to look for you and break some fucking faces :( [20:44] <IljaV> :))) [20:44] <IljaV> I don’t know [20:45] <NeedDoezd> (this is DK) hint and crush fucking faces [20:45] <NeedDoezd> hahaha [20:45] <NeedDoezd> u r fucking awesome promoting yourself abroad [20:45] <NeedDoezd> lol [20:45] <hiNt_poezd> dek, I crush fucking faces of people like you twice a day and one before going to bed [20:45] <hiNt_poezd> just don’t say anything [20:45] <hiNt_poezd> I’m modest [20:45] <NeedDoezd> к [20:45] <NeedDoezd> got started [20:45] <hiNt_poezd> if I had a blog with the videos where I’m crushing people’s faces, Katz would kill himself for losing his popularity [20:45] <hiNt_poezd> fuck, yeah...while I’m typing this with one hand, with the other I’m crushing the face of the train driver [20:45] <hiNt_poezd> cause it’s fucking bucking me along [20:45] <NeedDoezd> have you ever crushed smb’s face with ur face? [20:46] <hiNt_poezd> +)))) P.P.S. [21:18] <luckyfish> write something nice about me Fish has a huge one. BR. P.P.P.S. Interesting, Latvian currency ls equals what?? Cause I’ve ordered a bunch of food (I was told that the payment would be later) and now I’m afraid I won’t have to hide the money at the custom))) post comment

interview for russian poker magazine [27 Dec 2008|06:02pm] Vitaly "Hint" Volov - is a real hero of Russian poker community. He is winning a lot, podcasting on the net, writing humorous tournaments reports and even... singing well. So in general he put people in good spirits. Last time Vitaly have great success in live tournaments and he showed great results in few tournaments in a row. Hurry to hear about it. "Hint" won’t let you get bored. Hello Vitaly! Usually we introduce our interlocutor, but you seem to be well known by all who interested in poker. -I think that I'm really well known only by Web community. Those who play in Moscow pokerclubs rather know me as joyful and steady guy that usually go out on bubble with Aces against Kings, than a professional player (Laughing). So I should be introduced for them. Meet me, my nickname is "Hint" and I'm professional fish killer in single table online tournaments that spend 120 hours monthly to make my playing quote and reach certain revenue result. I have my blog on the internet where I write about my raids on tournaments and talk about all poker relative themes. You have become a cult person for web community in the full sense of this word. Do you realize you responsibility for this? -I give up and confess! But it wasn't my goal itself. When I just started and didn’t know much, I decided to make a blog. I already had pen-pushing before - I was writing articles for "Hacker" magazine. It was not intellectual (as I’m not very intellectual from beginning), but common articles written with good sense of humor. Also I was writing big posts in my LiveJournal blog if I was inspired or intoxicated. And I was very glad to receive comments from people who liked it, though I wasn’t glad less to ban people who dislike it, joke. So I started my poker blog and began to develop myself as a player. I stared from single table tournaments and then join not infamous team of Max Katz where I spent half a year with a great interest and benefit in company with Dmitriy Egorov, Andrey Zaichenko and some more famous russian poker players. Now I'm really well known on the web and not the last place take that I'm one of the few guys who have so big progress in single table tournaments (SnG, Sit-and-go). Most of the regular SnG players don’t win much and play mostly for rakeback (Partly compensation of tournament commission that player had to pay for playing) and suffering from downswings and many other scary unknown words. Don’t you have downswings in your play? -Not at all, I go with upswing through life! I started from 10$ SnG's played on 15' monitor which can only show 4 tables at once. When I won first 1000$(It was in November-December 2006) I was so happy that decided to jump to 22$ SnG's. Now professional SnG players play 15 tables at once on huge 30' monitors. It's really fun to remember how I started, generally all my memories makes me smile. But my developing in SnG was temporarily slowed because of my activity in Max Katz team. Our team was playing multi table tournaments. There was a regular tournament on "Mansion Poker" with a great overlay. I was young, new at this and didn’t understand much but Max was telling that I'm very gifted. We were playing this tournament every day. Someday it had grown into renting 5 rooms flat and tournaments were set on conveyor. Of course I didn’t have time to play SnG's. It was very interesting to develop myself as MTT player, but there was disadvantages because I didn’t care about myself, lose condition and lose about 10 kg of weight. I was thinking to quit. Max noticed it, we had talk about it and I quit in May. I had some money from winnings and gave part of it to my parents for buying car. I wasn't really sure that i can make money myself, but I won about 5000$ in first month and I received some self-reliance to continue. Every month I was getting higher and higher. I didn't stay at one limit for a long time and was growing steady till I get to a new stage. What do you mean? - I started from 10 players SnG. There is a working strategy published on the web for these tournaments. You can play even 20 tables using it and playing just by system. But maximum buy-in for this tournaments in Ongame network was 54$ and 5 players tournaments had 100$ maximum buy-in. What unfairness! I was needed to clear a huge bonus and I decided to try 5-max SnG's. I need to say that it was really hard to play even 4 5-max tables, in spite that I was playing 16 tables at 10-max SnG's. The game is much less formalized, that full table game where you should only know when to bet and post all-in. I was getting really tired first time and spent about few months for understanding these tournaments while just breaking even in it. I didn’t count rakeback of course. One time I get 7000$ and it was enough to go on vacation. So when I returned full of strength I finally found my strategy for this tournaments and started to win a lot in short handed SnG's. This tournament is played in Russia nearly by anyone and there is not much pro-players of it in the world. I think it's because there is no stereotypes and monotony in it and all the time you should think your self. All the money is made in heads-up. The difference in payout (70% for first place and 30% for second) is huge. So all is about playing head's-up. I have played about 13000 of such tournaments for now (upd: 20,000 already). Each tournaments with 300$-500$ buy-in and with rake back give me about 25$. That’s why I can easy plan my play. If I decided to play 2000 tournaments per month I should get some big sum, let’s not say its 50000$(put finger to mouth) [upd: this year it's about 20$/trny :/] We would like to know how you can play these tournaments with such revenue besides rakeback, but seems that it’s your secret you are not going to reveal. - The strategy is easy "Red bull" in the morning and "Red bull" at night. I ask manufacturer of this unhealthy drink to contact me in case of advertisement payments (Laughing) As far as I know you are getting 23 years old in March and you are playing poker for 2 years. Can you tell us if such guy as you was able to work before starting poker and how do you exchange regular work for poker? - Yes, I was able. In general I had many interesting and uncommon revenues ways. No, i was selling myself as slave or sing in subway. In 11-th grade I found interesting site devoted to protection of ICQ UIN's. In few months I managed to buy UIN's for 20$ and resell them for 100$. I have dealer's eye all the time. Besides I was writing articles for "Hacker" Magazine, but last my workplace (written in work record card) was night shifts in "Russian Standard" bank. I and my partner were doing easy but very important work one night in three (Guys if u had your money stolen from credit card - It's not me for sure!). Need to say that this work took only 20% of night shift and all other time we were free whatever we want. I quit this work since i was earning in poker same money as a head of department. (4000$ vs. 600$ that was paid to me) How did you start recording songs? - My mom is a professional singer. She is working for 20 years on weddings and celebrations singing well known songs. As for me I like it, though I don’t have any musical education and I can’t play any instrument except empty "Pringles" can (but I’m really in debt to learn play guitar in near future - it would really correspond with singing thirst). That’s why I made some funny remakes of popular compositions on poker theme. .............. It’s started from letters exchange with one dealer-girl in which appear “fall asleep” sentence. I suddenly remembered rock band “Ariya” in which this sentence was figured in chorus and think up a new chorus “Deal, Ace-King suited, deal” (fall asleep and deal is close by spelling in Russian). I was just woke up in that moment and make a half song while was crawling sleepy to the shot to buy “Red Bull”. When I returned home I found some poor sound record of this song wrote sound on it and post it on CGM.ru. Many people like this song nevertheless of really awful quality and some people even used it as ring tone for cell phones. One time it was even played in “Corona”(Cresting up erect.) From this time I sometimes visited by muse. Each time I try to do it in workmanlike manner as for music quality and as for song itself. But usually run for quality break in my laziness – I made two takes and that’s all. Last song was about wronged by destiny SnG player which is playing to break even and making profit on rakeback. But suddenly rakeback is closed and he doesn’t know what to do. Some people take it like a cry from the heart. Of course its just a joke. If I would get some troubles I would not song about it but will make self-examination and would  learns from my mistakes. Not so long ago you have started very funny article about Ivan Demidov which was taken with great enthusiasm by poker community. -Yeah there is such series of jokes about Chuck Norris... Ivan Demidov is a really good payer of course but I can't miss that he had luck streak which started in right time and place and didn’t let him out. There very first phrase "Ivan Demidov never have flush draw. He has flush" shows his lucky aura. Or "Ivan Demidov pay by notes (Notes on opponent players), it really easy to play by notes when you have flush". There are many funny phrases in this article made by other people already. You are one of the few professional poker players that didn’t quit university. Why? -I'm on the last year now and I need to write degree work... I didn’t quit mostly because of very good company I’m my study group and because of fear of been sent to "Guard homeland". Also it’s really pity to quit because of time you have already spent on it - it’s better to end it. Direct pay for degree is also not interesting for me. I really like to attend lessons (though I really often shirk lessons) and talk with my groupmates. I can’t be without a good company. I inspire people with good mod and get inspired from them. Recently you had great success in live tournaments -Yes the time has come for this after long streak of badbeats, which I meat very calm by the way. Also I raise my skills greatly in last 3 month. Brainwash in expensive head's-up "Full-tilt" helped me a lot with it. I think than head's-up skill is the key skill for tournament poker and this can be easily proven, but i will leave it to our dear readers as homework. The only thing i can't do now is to read players tells and hide my own tells. Maybe I give oneself away from time to time about how good is my cards or how easy I will fold them on raise. As for results - I had really long downstreak. To tell the truth there was about 10 expensive tournaments (1000$-2000$ buy-in) where I was going out on K-K vs. A-Q. I was about to lose 3 times of 10 but lose 8 times of 10! Then I took in case of examination in university, but I come back to world of live poker not long ago and started with much bigger buy-in's. The core was that I have made enough bankroll to play 3000$ buy-in tournaments steady. In my internet blog I started marathon with a goal to make 4 millions of rubles (125000$) in 3 month. I played really much - about 5 hours a day and when I reached my goal in 2 month I decided that time has come. Time to enter arena and win. The first tournament I came to beat all was 7th event of Russian Poker Cup. Unfortunately the tournament gathered only 27 players because many strong players weren't able to take part. I took 2nd place and loose head's-up to Konstantin Puchkov which was very lucky. Anyways I played really good. I wasn't unhappy about 2nd place at all as all tournament I didn’t badbeat anyone and played well, just wasn’t able to overcome unfortune. I was sure that I will take first place very soon... And I made it really soon in EEPT series in "Shangri La" casino. In 1000$ tournament I played really risky and get lost 2 seats before money. Of course my goal was not to reach minimal prizes but take first place so there was nothing bad in it. Next day in tournament with 5000$ buy-in I staked with Mikhail Smirnov with 50/50 odds and lose. And finally in 3000$ tournament I took legitimate 1st place. The fight took two days for 10 hours each. And again I didn't badbeat any, one time won coinflip with A-K vs. J-J (Talking about it because if I win with even little fewer odds it’s hard to imagine what can stop me!). Variance keeps paying me debts but I think it’s still not the top edge. I think to continue my series at next Russian Poker Cup. I really like deep structure of these tournaments.     Tell us more about 3000$ tournament that you won. How was doing this fight? Tournament was going for 2 days and 41 players were in. It was expected that about 70 players will take part, but there was tournament within Poker Awards ceremony on the next day organizers of which invited (read as entice) 30 players. Exactly these players we missed in "Shangri La". When we started to play we was seated by 3 players each table and that was really funny. Dima Stelmak the winner of previous series Cup was at the table with me. We have stole pretty much blinds from "dummies" and raise our stakes. Then another player come to our table (he made third place by the way) and we was playing four together and such play is really in my style. Always button, J-2 off suite, raise and let’s go... This way I doubled my stake, can's say cards was good also. The first interesting hand. Blinds 150-300. There are 9 people at the table. Igor Sharaskin - strong aggressive player limps from second position. I'm sitting next to him with 8-8. I don’t want to make raise with all table next to me so I just call too. Next to us sits Dmitriy frequent customer of "Shangri La", he says "There is too much of you here" and make 1100 raise. Is that ok - two limps with 300 and he bet 1100? Yeah all would fold now, ha-ha. So 5 people come to flop. Flop 4-5-5 without a flush draw. And Igor with first in bet about 4000. I understand that he can't have cards higher then mine because he would made preflop raise if such. Here he may have A-4 and he wants to know how he stands or straight draw 6-7 or 2-3. He wouldn't bet if he has 5 for sure. I think about preflop raiser sitting next to me - who know what he got in mind but my stake let me call and fold on re-raise if occur. So I just call. Dmitriy looked at us, told his friends "I will show you next time" (about his cards) and fold. All others fold. Turn brings another 5. Igor bets 8000 more. One of my often mistakes in live poker tournaments - I don’t think about ongoing hand much. First thought was - wow its really big bet, I will fold. But I can bring myself back to hand and understand that I'm still higher. He might have 5 but this would happen very-very rarely. I call 8000 and decide to call all-in on any river. River brings 10. He checks, I check also because I can't try to get more with such hand. Igor doesn’t show his cads. He got 2-3 suited - open ended straight draw from flop. He said that he would give up in this hand on turn if call was not from me, but he wanted to kick out possible 6-7 from me. Dmitriy folded A-A by the way. Strange chapter of accidents let me beat pair of aces without showdown. If Igor won’t bet flop I would lose 5000 instead of winning 20000. That’s how I got to 40000 chips. After that I finally got a set and it was paid! I made raise to 1100 with pairs of eights. Uncle Volodya (one of two Uncles Volodya playing in "Shangri La") re-raise to 3000. Stake is deep and I can call because I know that he would pay everything on pair of Queens, Kings or Aces. Dealer brings flop and the first card is 8, finally! Flop 8-2-3, he bets 15000 in 6000 pot, I instant re-raise to all-in, so his possible Q-Q won’t get scary on turn by overcards. He easy calls with K-K and once in a blue moon dint beat me with his 2 outs. (Lose with 95% is common for me). I get 80000 with 200-400 blinds. At next i got funny badbeat. I made raise with A-A, girl with name Sasha calls me. I got set of Aces on flop - most weird because hardly anyone would pay on board with ace. Also there is a flush draw on flop. Here Sasha said "I understand that you may have Ace, but I will still post all-in". About 20000 to 2400 pot. I checked pocket cards to be sure that I have a set of Aces and answered "I understand that you have a flush draw but hope you won't hit it". Of course she hit flush. Sasha had 23% to win. There was no such badbeats more this tournament. I came in 2nd day. There were 18 players left. I had second stake after Alexander "Two pairs" Denisov. However he somehow managed to lose his stack very quickly and get busted. Also Igor Sharaskin was on other table and we exchange words with him - "How much you got?", "That much.", "I got more - go ahead". I was thinking that he is my main dangerous opponent. My table was much easier then first where I fought Sharaskin, Dmitriy Vitkind and Alexander Denisov. I kept my stack growing, didn't make mistakes and went to the final table with comparative ease. Dmitriy Vitkind was eliminated on 5th place. Except me and Igor there was Vitaly from my 1st table and Uncle Volodya, but another - with moustache. I with Igor understand that there is no point to play big and complex hands between each other and keep winning from less skilled opponents. We bust Uncle Volodya. Igor had 100000, Vitaly had 200000 and I had 350000 at that moment. Here I started to use my cheepleader stake. In such rare situations when Vitaly attacked my blind I was making re-raise and he folds cause there was short stack in play, which can be outsitted so he can receive 10000$ more. And when I raise from button against Vitaly big blind, Igor re-raise me to all-in, so Vitaly and I folds. Finally Vitaly made 20000 raise leaving 100000 in his stake. I got Q-Q. I decided to post all-in which looks like much weaker then re-raise. He instant calls me with K-Qs and the most amazing was that I won this comparison. Heads-up comes with 450000 vs. 200000 and in fifth hand I got set of fives against pair of aces... Ship it in! Pure first place. Also i received great looking trophy and that was really awesome. By the way one time we meet with Igor in heads-up on NTV TV-channel and he won there so this was kind a revanche. Do you plan to take part in World Series of Poker? -I have such plan but I don’t know for sure. But if I wont go to WSOP, I will visit some tournaments in other countries for sure. I don’t have much to do in my university now - study is over. Also I will take part in Russian Poker Cup, Russian Championship of Poker and big tournaments in Moscow and Saint-Petersburg and of course I will visit Russian Poker Tour. As I know you play on your own money not using backer services. Are you bankroll is good enough to play all this expensive tournaments without worry?        -I don't worry not because of my bankroll but cause I play really good now. I'm very strict about my bankroll. I let myself play tournaments with buy-in bellow 5000$. I just feel that understanding of the game by me grow up highly, that’s why I confident. One time I was able to join Sergey "Gipsy" Rybachenko team. Sergey offer to co-operate and I even played one tournament from him in "Metelitsa" poker-club. But then I decided to raise my bankroll myself. If you are playing and making profit its better to play yourself and also I tired from team. I'm better alone. How much are you corresponded with poker culture? Do you read forums, books, watch videos? -I read CGM forum (Russian poker forum). But not for developing, because I rarely can find there information I need. I don’t mind to learn play cash, but it would take too much time; I need to watch VOD's, work with a trainer. I visit forum mainly for fun. I won’t mind to watch poker video but I'm too lazy for it. All that I watched is Ivan Demidov video from WSOP. But you are not lazy to play shorthanded SnG's 120 hours per month. -Yes, it’s just amazing. Looks like I got clear aim. However my aim is not money but growing in limits. I was playing 100$ SnG's making good profit, then went 200$ keep winning, it’s became interesting to get distance and be sure that I beat this limit. Each month I get new mini-objective and I keep going on this way higher. Now I'm playing 500$ buy-in 6-max SnG's on Full-Tilt. More expensive SnG's gather only accidentally. I play them just to break even now and make profit just from rakeback but I still think that there are players here which I can beat and make profit from. I just need to make distance. Are u planning to record learning videos? - I was asked about it. Last year I started to record video for 10-max SnG's. Shortly Ongame become mostly Russian speaking network and it become hard to beat even 20+2$ limit but all have stayed in this network because of great rakeback. So I decided not to make mistake again and not to record video for 5(6)-max SnG's. Though it won’t help much. In 10-max SnG's I know that if I had 2nd stake on the bubble and goes all-in from 1st stake u cant risk and should fold even A-K. There are no such axioms in 6-max. All depends on exact hand. And of course I don’t want to reveal all my secrets. We don’t need new regular high stakes players.    What players in Russia and World do you respect much? - I don’t know anything about world poker stars. Among Russian players I can admit cash players that I know well - diatty, Denis Sherbakov. He started from 5$ SnG's and grow to 100$ SnG's. Then he moved to cash games. There he started from NL100 and now he's playing NL2000. I’m following his example. He is a real professional that always obey bankroll management, care about self development and grow in limits steady. I don’t want to admit any tournament players. It's not because I fear to hurt someone. Just if you are playing well and win big tournament and everyone know about you - you are cool guy. But If you are not winning, got unlucky you would be just stable profitable player - doesn’t it deserve respect also? I don’t depend on results in MTT.       Do you have someone you don’t want to sit at table with you! - (Angry) No, there are no such people. Quite the contrary I want to play with all people. For example I didn’t play with Sergey Ribachenko at all and it would be interesting to play few hands with him. It’s important to know how to play versus various opponents. Sergey is raising his stack with great success and play very loose on early stage - that’s interesting. I don’t want to face with unknown manner of play in key moment because lose my head, get worry, lose, go home by subway and quit poker! Do you see your future in poker? - I see myself in poker future There's New Year soon. What objectives will you set for yourself next year? -I will find something out. Maybe it would be learning cash games. I will play much live MTT for sure. Many people know me as funny guy but not all know that I can win. Want people to remember me in such case! post comment

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