Earlier this year I opened up an on-line betting account so as to subsidise on-going Fantasy Football struggles by putting my money where my mouth was.

   After mixed successes, I branched out into betting on other sports and live events too; I won "a fair amount" with a near clean sweep at the Oscars - whilst I managed to pick the correct result for Best Film, Director, Actor, Actress, Supporting Actor and Supporting Actress, I plumped for one of the worst films I have seen in some time to win Best Documentary and (on one level) was pleased when I got that one wrong. That said, had I plumped for an outsider in that category, my "fair amount" would have been easily upgraded to "small fortune."

   Sadly, I am a nerd.

   So, rather than simply enjoy my winnings, I invested them all in betting on the results of Wrestlemania (which is perhaps the even geekier version on betting on Eastenders storylines). My luck of the Irish was nowhere to be found and, thanks to Brock Lesnar and John Cena, I found myself out of pocket and vowing to downgrade my betting on areas I have no control over.

   I cannot, however, say my experiences have put me off of betting in general however. Although I find myself lacking in the key skills necessary to play it, often approaching the game with the puppy-eyed enthusiasm of an eight year old playing chess with less than zero tactics, I've found myself drawn towards the world of poker. Whilst occasionally I  will treat myself to the odd low-key flutter, I aim to improve my skills by watching the pros in action - something I found oddly gripping in ways I had not anticipated. Whilst I've lost the odd figure here or there, I've come nowhere close to finding myself at risk of winning or losing a hand worth $2m.

   Below are videos taken from the PokerStars  live tournament taken from the 2013 tournament to ascertain who has the best brain in the game. Tom Dwan, Antonio Esfandiari, ElkY, Dan Shak, Steve O'Dwyer, Vivek Rajkumar and JC Alvarado make the feature table line-up.




* This post is sponsored by Spreaditfast