One of the secrets of life is to make stepping stones out of stumbling blocks (unknown)

Chess quote: I like the moment when I break a man's ego  (Bobby Fischer)

Backgammon quote:  Hieronymus Bosch’s famous image of hell in his painting "The Garden of Earthly Delights" includes a backgammon board. After many tough games, I understand why it’s there.  (Deahn Kahn)

Poker quote:  "How long does it take to learn poker, Dad?"
"All your life, son."  (Michael Pertwee)

The Coinflip Challenge is coming to an internet or casino near you very soon! I can't wait for it to happen – it feels so cool to give someone the opportunity to be 'The Ultimate Gameplayer!'. You can read all about terms and conditions here

The outline is simple:

A player must face probably the best Pot Limit Omaha player in the world – the superstar and gentleman Ziigmund! And beat him! Not easy...

He will also have to face the 2004 champion of the wooooooooorld in backgammon Peter Hallberg – and defeat him! Not easy either.

He/or she? Will also have to play a chess blitz match against Me and win. That will prove either rather easy or completely impossible! All depending on who the challenger is.

The challengers entry fee is 10K and he will walk away with 100K if he wins – if he loses he still get's a nice weekend paid by betsafe. He will only have a reasonable chance if he is (more than) decent in all three disciplines – this goes especially for chess (but you off-course have to play chess - the king of games - if you want to be 'the ultimate gameplayer'!).

For instance if the three of us should try the challenge Ziigmund and Peter would have virtually zero chance of winning! Because they can never ever beat me in chess Hehehe But I would have roughly 5 percent if I think my chances against the two guys are around 30 percent for each (I think they are bigger – but let's be polite). That would give me something like 0.3 * 0.3 * 0.5 = 0.045 equity. (and hence a bad bet)

So for most people the chess would be a big problem because in poker or backgammon you always have some chance but in chess the variance is almost nonexistent. But that also means that a better (much better) chess player than me would almost have a lock in chess! I don't think I would ever win a blitz match against World Champion Vishy Anand (but he doesn't play poker – I have talked with him about it - so we can probably rule him out as a challenger) . But some other guy with grandmaster level chess skills better than mine will probably have a rather good bet. One example is the Russian Grandmaster Alexander Grischuk. He is number 7 in the world in chess (and will most likely crush me very easily). He is also a very good poker player – there is a Youtube clip where he eliminates Joe Hachem (can't find it right now). I don't know of his backgammon skills but he is probably not bad (he is a very smart guy). I estimate he has around 13-16 percent equity.  

I know some of the good grandmasters are very interested (with TV coming they can probably easily get a sponsor) so I am sure someone will take the bet and have good odds. Actually I think the whole set-up is rather nice for even an amateur with virtually no chance of winning: You get a luxury weekend paid by Betsafe. You get to come on TV! And you get to play poker with a worldclass player, backgammon against a former world champion and chess against a good grandmaster – and it only costs 10K! I have seen some people playing the WSOP who didn't really know the rules... here they get much more value for money!

There have been some complaints that the odds are rather bad but this is obviously not a challenge for every one – only being good at poker, backgammon or chess is not enough to be 'The Ultimate Gameplayer' – you have to have all-round skills to compete :)

I am looking forward to either getting killed (dead in the water against the superGM) or be the big bad stumbling block. It is only if a midrange Grandmaster takes the challenge that my skills actually come in to play (even though I would prepare like hell if I were to play with Carlsen, Grischuk, Kasparov or someone like that).

I am sure it will be a lot of fun.