StudioGlyphic

Month: July 2006

  • Tesla Roadster

    The electric sports car is finally here, and it looks pretty damn hot:

    Tesla Motors is a brand new car company whose first product is a roadster designed by a Lotus designer, engineered by a bunch of Lotus engineers, and manufactured in the Lotus factory. The configuration is that of a mid-engined, real-wheel drive two-seater with a bunch of batteries in place of where the engine would be. My kind of car.


    The electric motor puts out 248 hp at peak and redlines at 13,500 rpm. Torque is instantly available (of course), so off the line, you’ll smoke the competition (without any of the smoke). Zero to sixty in about four seconds. Neat.

    The range of the car is 250 miles, which doesn’t quite get you from LA to Vegas in one charge. There is a portable charging kit for longer trips, but since recharging the car takes about 3.5 hours, this still doesn’t quite get you to Vegas. As a commuter car, a weekend driver, the mileage range should be more than most people need on a daily or weekly basis. The batteries are estimated to last at least 100,000 miles, and I believe are covered under warranty for that period. Assuming that owners will charge the car overnight, energy costs are estimated at 1 or 2 cents per mile. My 1991 MR2 gets 18 mpg and costs about 10 cents a mile using premium gasoline.

    The $100,000 price tag attached to the Tesla Roadster makes the discussion of efficiency and costs somewhat academic. Little two-seater sports cars appeal to a niche for whom efficiency and cost are secondary to styling and performance. This is a car for the environmentally-conscious affluent performance nut and/or technology geek. Future models from Tesla will include a car for “the rest of us” (fuck that!) that presumably costs less and seats more. The hot flagship roadster will primarily generate publicity for the technology and bring in curious people who might just drive out in a new electric sedan.

    Official Site: Tesla Motors

    Wired: Batteries Included

    LA Times: Look, Ma, no gas — and yet zero to 60 in just four seconds

    YouTube: Tesla Roadster Video

  • All-In Limit Players

    One thing I watch out for at the medium stakes limit tables are the all-in limit players. On the surface, the all-in limit player appears to be a suitably tight aggressive player, but if you observe how he plays his hands, you realize he’s actually playing some form of donkey no limit. He makes a single decision with a hand like AK: play it strongly all the way to the showdown. When confronted with a raise on the flop, he is likely to 3-bet to take back the initiative. When confronted with a raise on the turn, he may give up the initiative, but still goes to showdown for another two big bets. He’s decided this hand is going to cost him 4-5BB, and damn it, he’s gonna pay to see your “garbage” hand. These are the players that make hands like top pair weak kicker or middle pair somewhat profitable. Their raising range makes it relatively easy to put them on hands, and in the absence of any scare cards, you can bet the river for value against his high card hand.

  • The Wall

    In limit hold’em games online, 5/10 seems to be the line that divides the low stakes games from the medium stakes games.

    I was discussing my own experiences playing 5/10 with all-around big brain HDouble several weeks ago, and he referred me back to his archives from a few years back where he lamented the mindlessness of four-tabling 3/6 versus moving up to the tougher 5/10 games. Then he added, “But all the good players must have moved up by now….” The implication there is obvious. Thanks, buddy.

    At this past weekend’s home game, Bill speculated that the 5/10 games were full of lower-limit players taking a shot at a bigger game, which I think implies that they’re adding more variance to the game. Still, I think there’s a noticeable difference between 3/6 and 5/10. The ratio of solid players to weak or loose players seems much higher.

    In my opinion, 5/10 is still a hurdle for many reasonably good players before they launch themselves into the 15/30 and higher games. Let me state the obvious: 15/30 is three times bigger than 5/10. In contrast, the prior two changes in limit have been a fraction of the previous limit: +50% from 2/4 to 3/6, +66% from 3/6 to 5/10, versus +200%. It’s probably safe to assume that decent players lacking the bankroll will not capriciously move up to 15/30, whereas gamblers and affluent players will gladly fling chips with properly bankrolled good players.

    Of course, my experience at the 15/30 tables is only a fraction of that at the 5/10 tables (I’m running well, but half-expecting to get hit by the variance train), and it’s based solely on the games at Party, so I’d be curious to hear from other limit players about their thoughts on the games.

    Is 15/30 an easier game than 5/10?

    Have you run up against the wall in your own game?

    Will you be reading a post from me in a couple weeks about how I was playing way beyond my depth? 🙂

    —

    In other poker news:

    Grubbette showed up at a short-handed home tournament this past weekend and won when she re-raised all-in with JT vs. my K5. She paired the J on the river. Damn. I played poorly when we were down to four, missing out on some opportunities to chip up. As a result, I entered heads-up play at a severe chip disadvantage to Grubbette, who had managed to bust the 3rd through 5th place finishers. Next time, Grubbette, next time.

    Absinthe is off to Vegas for the WSOP, serving as my proxy in Event #37. Send him some mojo. Oh, and I guess he’s also playing in the Main Event, too, but I have no money in that (yet). By the way, if anyone spots any $100 round-trip tickets to Vegas from LAX, let me know. I might pop in this weekend to say “howdy” and collect my money from the bracelet winner.

  • Return of the Home Game

    We hosted a small home game last night, the first since HDouble’s home game ran afoul of the neighbors and got voluntarily shut down. A few of the usual suspects were rounded up to make donkey calls and ill-timed bluffs against each other on the green felt. We started with a single table tournament with starting stacks of 4000 chips, starting blinds of 25-50, and 30 minute levels. Seats were drawn and cards were in the air. The players:

    “Any Two” Lance in the SB.

    Mrs. Absinthe in the BB for her second live tournament ever.

    StudioGlyphic (that’s me) UTG.

    The S.O. UTG+1.

    Bill Rini in EP.

    Shane in MP1 riding high from his second place finish in an FTP $50 MTT.

    Fhwrdh in MP2 and still hatless.

    Absinthe in the HJ, directly across from me.

    Katkin in the CO.

    MySpace George on the button.

    (more…)

  • 284 miles from Vegas

    In my mind, Vegas is always just four hours away. Compared to LA commute time, four hours never seems that bad. That’s like driving to and from Irvine 1.5 – 2 times. Easy, right?

    In reality, everyone in LA and their mother thinks of Vegas in the same way. They might drive up Thursday night, Friday morning, Friday night, or Saturday morning, but they all come back Sunday afternoon.

    When you’re waiting out the traffic and heat in Baker, CA in 110 degree weather, an extra night at the MGM Grand for $60 suddenly looks like the deal of the century.

    When you realize you’ve spent $100 on fuel and 12 hours of your limited free time crossing the Mojave desert (sober!), two round-trip tickets + cab fares for $500 doesn’t really seem that expensive.

    The next time I talk about driving up to Vegas, somebody slap me.