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JULY 2010 UK £1,00
THE MAGIC FORMULA WORLD CHAMPS GET READY FOR THE BATTLE OF BRITAIN
LET THE GAMES BEGIN
SUN, SEA AND...POKER
SW4 TICKET GIVEAWAY
The WSOP Bracelet Race
Poker Summer Holidays
Fatboy Slim & Armin van Buuren
GX JULY 2010
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First Up 08 Editorial 12 News
Sports Betting 20 Golf: A New Decade of Optimism Brits Ready for Open Success
26 Sharkey’s Spreads 30 Darts: The Immortal Man Who Can’t Last Forever World Matchplay in Blackpool
34 888 Sporting ‘Edline 36 Formula 1: Cove r The Magic Feature Formula British Grand Prix 2010
44 Psychology: Why Chase Your Losses? The Inside Man
The Magic Formula
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46 Motorsport: I Believe I Can Fly The Red Bull Air Race
Financial Spread Betting 50 Tyson Knows Best The Summer Sell Off
54 The Ezee Traders Betting On Trends
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Golf: British Open
Darts: World Matchplay
CONTENTS GX
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Poker 58 How To Spot A Poker Face The Tells They Never Taught In Poker School
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Bracelet Watch The World Series of Poker Part 1
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From A to Zimbler and Back Again To go or not to go, Vegas is the question?
World Series of Poker
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Archie Shark The Ramblings of A Hapless Gambler
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Sun, Sea and...Poker The Perfect Poker Summer Holiday
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GUKPT Season Four The Story So Far
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Poker Strategy The Saffari School of Omaha: Part 2 Basic Post-Flop Strategy
Sun, Sea and...Poker
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Lifestyle Big Brother 2010 Betting Like No Other
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Let The Music Play
SW4 Tickets!
Summer Festival Lowdown Part 2
102 Driving in the Fast Lane The Porsche 918 Spyder
104 What’s On This Month July’s top UK Events
SW4 Ticket Giveaway
106 The Fox’s Den Lads On Tour
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GX SPORTS BETTING
eyesight or fitness struggles, and perhaps even more importantly, there’s not a hint of withering desire. Taylor has eaten his Shreddies but he’s hungry for further success. His UK Open victory was his 67th major title, an achievement which asides from looking like it will never be matched, will surely continue to rise with the magical target of 100 major titles firmly within his lethal sights. To compare this to any achievements reached in other sports is pretty much impossible; Roger Federer has won 16 Grand Slam Titles while Tiger Woods has won 14 Majors. Taylor has won more than twice as many as both of these men put together, there are no comparisons. Yet what fans may not fully appreciate is that the darts they have been witness to in recent His form in recent months has been nothing short of remarkable. The power cut on the night of the Premier League darts final back in May meant instead of a Sunday night showdown with defending champ James ‘The Machine’ Wade in front of a packed house creating a raucous atmosphere, the final was postponed until the following night. With a smaller crowd on Monday, it would have been easy for Taylor to cruise to victory, make his thank you’s and trundle off home with another trophy and cheque. Yet what we were witness to was a thrilling final in which Taylor made history by not only becoming the first player to hit a nine-darter in a televised final, but by scoring two ninedarters in an astonishing display; the first of which came in only the second leg of the match. The fact he was booed in jest by the crowd when he missed his eighth dart whilst going for a third nine-darter in the very next leg after hitting his second is testament to the man’s ability. James Wade played his part in the match too, with Taylor only running out a 10-8 winner in spite of his ruthlessness. Yet Wade will know all too well that he’s nowhere near ready to dominate the sport like his rival should Taylor move aside.
Darting Immortality The sporting equivalent of a nine-darter is perhaps comparable to scoring a hole in one, making a 147 or taking a hat-trick on the cricket field. Yet although plenty of players have managed this feat, how many of those have managed it twice in the same match?
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And if that wasn’t enough, Taylor followed up his Premier League victory with the UK Open title in June in which he smashed his own world record when he scored a three-dart average of 118.66 in his 9-0 demolition job of Kevin ‘The Artist’ Painter; the highest ever recorded in a televised match. This meant Mervyn ‘The King’ King’s own nine-darter in his fifth round match with eventual runner-up, Gary Anderson, was overshadowed before it had even happened. Taylor has reached a level of immortality in the game and what is ominous for his opponents is that at 50 years of age, he is still showing no signs of deteriorating
years, and especially in recent months, will not last forever. We now expect nine-darters and demand record-breaking averages alongside impeccable finishes rather than hoping for them. And demanding anything in sport is a precarious situation to be in as we’re only setting ourselves up for disappointment. The moment we expect something to happen could be the very moment it vanishes. Taylor is a rare breed amongst sportsman. He possesses a gift which is impossible to pin down. In some sports it may come once every ten years, in others it may only come once in a generation. Darts like this though, may never come again.
GX SPORTS BETTING
the crown; and Button, the smooth steering gem who, after finally being handed the keys to the kind of car that does his driving ability the service it has long since deserved, racked up six Grand Prix wins en route to the Drivers’ Championship. Formula 1 fans, and in particular English Formula 1 fans, have been well and truly spoiled in recent years. And after the exhilarating performances from Button and Hamilton, who have secured back-to-back British Drivers’ Championships for the first time since Graham Hill and Jackie Stewart did so in 1968 and 1969, those fans could hardly
complain if the 2010 season failed to match the standards previously set. Yet after the first eight races of the season (the European Grand Prix took place whilst GX was at the printers), which have seen five different drivers crack open the winner’s bottle of champagne and five different drivers perched at the top of the standings at some stage or other, 2010 has already confounded all expectations to become one of the most exciting seasons in recent memory. And come July 11th, it will hopefully continue.
Live by the Rules, Drive by. the Rules. What has been instrumental in the start of an ever so enthralling Formula 1 season has been the rule changes. Not as radical an overhaul as the 2009 changes, the 2010 updates have further fuelled competition and indeed, drawn more supporters to F1 from other sports, neither of which were expected prior to the season nor indeed, after the opening race of the season in Bahrain. The several changes, which have included the introduction of narrower front tyres, increased
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minimum car weight, the removal of wheel fairings, more teams and minor changes to testing, have all played their part. Yet the two changes which have done the most to spice up proceedings have been the points changes and the refuelling ban.
Pointing in the Right Direction. The new points system has been a huge success with a far greater reward now going to the winning driver. With 10 points awarded to first and 8 points to second in 2009, 2 points hardly seemed to really differentiate between a driver rushing past the chequered flag and another cruising in behind on his coat tails.
GX SPORTS BETTING
the majority of people in a situation of loss will become risk seeking. That is, that most of us when we are losing money will ‘naturally’ be willing to take even more risk (such as ‘doubling up’ in the coin toss example) to recover that loss. This is pretty significant and may in part account for why so many people struggle to win over time in the financial markets, on the betting exchanges and on the poker tables (both live and online).
The Inside Man Double or Quits? Or Why We Love To Chase Our Losses Leading sports psychologist and betting performance coach Steve Ward tackles the illogical habits of traders and sports betters to chase losses, and suggest ways to kick the habit.
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magine we toss a coin for a bet. You call. The coin lands. You are wrong and lose. Who is most likely to say ‘double or quits’? You or me? In the majority of cases it will be the person who has just lost. In this case you.
However, this innate psychological bias alone is not the only reason why we love to chase our losses. Do you like to lose? Very few people do, especially when losing occurs not just at a competitive level, but also at a financial level and at an egotistical level. Our ego functions around the central objectives of looking good and being right. Losing is easily interpreted as being wrong and provides ego with a bit of a bashing. To get back into the good books it appears necessary to play again to recover those losses, to win, to be right, to look good. Sound familiar?
Think back on your own performances. Can you think of times when you chased your losses? Can you remember asking yourself afterwards what on earth you were thinking? You know not to chase losses, you know it is reckless, you have lost money in the past doing it, yet you still did it...why?
Our key challenge in excelling in financial, risk induced environments, is to be able to not just understand at a conceptual level all of the key playing principles but to actually be able to implement them in real time, with the pressure of facing losing your own hard earned cash. This is not easy. The standard learning process involves getting it wrong a lot of times until enough money has been lost and enough pain endured to create a change in behaviour – providing of course, that your ability to endure such losses and pain is greater than your bank account. For those with less of a penchant for pain and loss, the key is mental conditioning. Committing to the discipline of taking losses, building a winning mentality around loss management, seeing yourself with those winning behaviours and practising them and practising them until they become ingrained.
Research done in the field of behavioural finance – financial decision making – suggests that the majority of people in a situation of gain (winning money) will become risk averse (take less risk), whilst
Ed Seykota, a highly successful financial trader and Market Wizard, famously said: “The three elements of successful trading are cutting losses, cutting losses and cutting losses.” And if you speak to any
One of the most interesting and common characteristics I have noticed in traders, betters and gamblers is their propensity to chase losses and in many cases in doing so, utilising techniques and strategies that defy all logic and rationality. It is amazing how many ways you can justify such behaviour to yourself isn’t it? Chasing losses is a very expensive habit, and is the downfall of many a promising trader, better or poker player.
FINANCIAL SPREAD BETTING GX
be looking at a daily trend and looking to buy and hold for several days or weeks, or you could be looking at a 30 minute or even a 5 minute chart and be looking to hold for a matter of minutes or hours.
How do you go about buying?. We can then simply see if; 1) the average line is in a nice upwards slant; 2) that price is trading above the line. Now we have information about how to identify a nice upwards trend, we can look at how best we can take advantage of it.
At what point do we enter. a spread bet trade?. As we discussed in last month’s article, spread betting offers tax free advantages for traders. Financial spread bet companies offer a wide variety of tools to anyone who has an account with them including free charting software which is essential to a new trader. There are some big differences between providers when it comes to charging so it’s worthwhile taking your time to see which company best suits your needs. If you don’t know, we will discuss this topic at the webinar on the 8th July. So you have identified a stock or market that is trending well. Remember, you could
There are many different tools at a trader’s disposal for knowing when to buy but let’s keep it simple here. Some traders like to trade once price has confirmed it is pushing higher again. They do this by waiting for price to break above the most recent high and then buy. Their thought process is that price is continuing its push higher within the trend and thus they want to ride its coat tails. Another set of traders like to buy on pullbacks in price. They feel they get a better price in buying after price has pulled back within the trend and can therefore make more money once price breaks higher. These sets of traders will therefore be placing trades around or shortly after price has retraced to the horizontal lines in Figure 1.
Which is best?. They both work but it depends on you and your style of trading. Breakout traders are
waiting for more confirmation that price is moving higher but they make less money on the move. Pullback traders get a cheaper entry price, but what happens if price doesn’t push to new highs?
How do we protect our capital?. The most important aspect of trading is to protect your capital. This comes in many guises but from an individual trade perspective, we need to say, “at what point do I no longer want to be in this trade if it goes against me?” In trading, we know we are playing a game of probabilities. We know in advance that not every trade will be successful and for that reason we need a level where a losing trade will be cut loose. At the point of buying, we can set a price at which we would want to automatically be released from our trade if it turns against us too far. This is called our stop loss order. So in advance of taking our trade, we know the maximum amount we could lose. For example, if we were going to buy the pound versus the U.S dollar at 1.4620 and had a stop loss in place at 1.4570, we know the maximum loss is 50 points. Figure 3 shows this scenario with the buy point plus the stop loss cut off level (note,
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GX POKER woman he admires how her boyfriend is with feigned interest when actually hoping he has tragically passed away in a bear fight. So don’t apologise for getting lucky, celebrate instead. It’s sure to wind up your opponents and put them on tilt. And you’re not there to make friends, you’re there to make money. Of course the one thing you need to be able to do if you’re going to go down this route is remain oblivious to the way people will behave when they luck out
as he’ll see your raises as a come-on, or he’ll be desperate to bully you out of pots after you’ve threatened his masculinity and big spending ability, making him even more determined to bully you off pots from which you won’t budge. Either way, he won’t be able to afford too many more £20 soft drinks once you’ve worked your magic.
messages whilst also calling him on withheld number and not saying a thing. By this point he’ll be so focused on his phone that his poker will start to rapidly deteriorate; leaving you the spoils. The other trick is to pretend he’s calling you every time he makes a call as this will wind him up beyond belief.
The Apologiser Mr Telephone It’s highly unlikely there’ll be many players at the table who don’t have a mobile phone. But there’ll almost certainly be one who’s calling, texting, or playing with it so often that you’d be forgiven for thinking the poker was an irritating distraction preventing him from getting down to some serious telephone business. His phone will also undoubtedly be the latest model of iphone which probably hasn’t even been released yet. Fortunately though, two can play at that game. And there’ll only be one winner. If you’re involved in any pots with Mr Telephone, make sure you’re busy texting whenever it’s your turn to act. The dealer will be the first one to prompt you into playing but Mr Telephone will start chipping in too once you’ve done it several times. You should also try and get his number, either by asking directly or by getting one of the waitresses to get it for you for a small fee. You can then proceed to bombard him with a barrage of
It may be considered good form to apologise when you hit a one-outer on the river, just like it is in tennis when you clip the net and it falls agonisingly short of your opponent on the
The Fixers The fixers are an online phenomenon who cry foul at every available opportunity. If their Aces get cracked, it’s a fix; if they lose to a gut shot straight, it’s a fix, if their four of a kind loses to five of a kind, it’s a fix. They’re constantly typing into the chat box how the cards are fixed and how it’s a f**king joke. They also say the particular site you are playing on, whichever it may be, is fixed and how it always happens on that site. Yet in spite of your suggestions for them to play on a different site which they don’t believe is fixed, they never will because they almost want to lose so they can cry fix.
other side. But you know, and he knows, that you’re not really sorry. In fact, you’re delighted, and you might as well run towards the crowd sliding on your knees shouting goooaaalll whilst pumping your fists in the air with tears streaming down your face. And if you react in any other way, especially by apologising, everyone watching will know you’re a conman - the kind who asks a
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on you. As an actor once said to a bishop who was a part time chef, if you can’t take it then don’t dish it out.
Well asides from these players having their cards ‘fixed’ by the site, they also mysteriously happen to be the worst players in the game who were doing a good job of losing money anyway before their cards were fixed. So the beauty about these players is that you don’t have to do a thing to beat them. You can stir it up a little though, by making a few cries of fix yourself, possibly telling them about a hand you played the previous day that was definitely fixed whilst also throwing in a few
GX POKER
Michael Mizrachi celebrates with all the family after his win. His brother Robert looks absolutely delighted (far right).
.EVENT #1.
.EVENT #3.
Man on a Mission
“A Please Carol”
Hoai Pham from an American town called Mission Viejo won the opening event of the 2010 World Series of Poker, the Casino Employees No Limit Hold’em event. With the series staged in the US there were understandably a deluge of American players who cashed in the opening event, yet that didn’t prevent David Tighe from Birmingham finishing 232rd for $2,908.
Canadian poker player Aadam Daya, the man whose name is 56% made up of the letter A, won the No-limit Hold’em event and took home $625,872 for his troubles. Daya was up against eight Americans on the final table of the $1,000 event. But after finishing above 4344 other players, Daya claimed the first bracelet of the summer for his native Canada.
Brit Bags Bracel et
.EVENT #4. .EVENT #2.
Chow Down
Brothers in Arms
Honolulu resident Michael Chow won $237,463 by winning the Omaha Hi-low Split-8 or Better event after beating Dan Heimiller at the heads-up stage. It also happened to be Chow’s birthday by the time the event finished at 4.30am, giving Chow all the more reason to celebrate his 33rd year of life. Andy Black meanwhile, the former monastic resident, claimed 77th for another WSOP cash.
The Mizrachi brothers, Michael and Robert, both reached the final table of the $50,000 buy-in Poker Players Championship event, meaning there was a familial feel about the table for these two. It was the infamous ‘Grinder’ Michael who won the battle of the brothers though, knocking out his older brother Robert and going on to win his first WSOP bracelet. John Juanda and Daniel Alaei were the other bracelet winners who made the final table, but the limelight belonged to the Mizrachi’s who became the highest finishing brothers in the history of the WSOP. Michael got paid out $1,559,046 to boot.
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.EVENT #5.
Banzi Bags A Bracelet Hit Squader Praz Bansi won his second World Series of Poker bracelet and the first for Britain after taking down the 2,092-man
$1,500 No Limit Hold’em event in the opening week of the 2010 series. The London man has reached new heights after winning almost $1,000,000 last year thanks in part to his 3rd place finish at the World Series of Poker Europe and a handful of
GX POKER
FORGET JACK BAUER this is 24 Hour Poker
E
ver thought of experiencing the thrill of participating in a live poker tournament, winning the 1st prize and quitting your day job? One would think that the sole purpose of participating in a live poker tournament is that of winning the final prize. On the contrary, many online average players simply want to experience the adrenaline rush of playing in a live tournament, whilst going on a virtually free-holiday and enjoying being treated like a VIP.
Better known as EMOP™, the European Masters of Poker™ is one of the biggest and most popular, live poker tournament series, taking place in various parts of Europe. The scope of EMOP™ is to give the recreational player the opportunity to play in big
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international poker tournaments with affordable buy-ins. EMOP™ chooses to cooperate with some of the best casinos in Europe to give the participants an unforgettable experience. This year, EMOP™ is extending its European tournament series to the US, via the much awaited EMOP™ Master Cruise, which will leave Los Angeles for a 7-night cruise along the Mexican Riviera. As one of the EMOP™ Premium Partners, 24hPoker offers continuous satellites, races and tournaments in which an all-inclusive package to one of the EMOP™ live tournaments can be won. The total value of a single EMOP™ package is €2,000. 24hPoker also goes a step further and offers a Bubble Guarantee (x2), Ticket Guarantee and Exclusive VIP Parties for its players.
POKEr GX
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n the first article we looked at the basic workings of PLO with a focus on some pre-flop strategy. In this article I want to take a look at some post-flop concepts that are the fundamental difference between PLO and Hold'em. I want to focus on the importance of judging flop textures and hand analysis as well as some critical emphasis on protecting your made hands.
In the pre-flop article last month we looked at why hand selection was key in different situations. We identified that you can play a larger percentage of hands in PLO than No Limit Hold’em. Like Hold'em, a lot of our reasoning is going to be position dependent, opponent dependent as well as dependent on the betting action we are facing in front of us. As we get deeper into this series I will look at some more of these considerations as we look at both pre and post-flop play together in more of an advanced formula. For the time being, while you are still new to the game, implementing a tighter pre-flop range is best as you still get used to hand equities and post-flop play. Playing a wider range is going to require you to make more bluffs and take more aggressive lines as you aren't always going to have enough equity.
VALUE BETTING HANDS AND READING FLOP TEXTURES
distinctions is very important and remains a tricky phase in the learning curve. Being Hold'em players, there are going to be a lot of hands that we are just not use to folding or even slow-playing for pot control. I will use some examples to best describe these two situations. Folding big Hold'em hands Say we are in a 3-way pot and the flop is Jr Tr 6 and we are facing a bet and a call. Even though we have position, this is a spot where we should almost always be folding a hand such as A-T-7-6. This may seem like a big lay-down but it is very standard to PLO players for a few reasons. The first is that our hand just can't improve in a significant way unless we hit a T or a 6 for a full house. If this was to happen on the turn then we would either gain no value when our opponents check to us or face action from better full houses. This is an example of drawing to a non-nut hand in PLO. Not only are we unsure of whether we should be calling the bets we are facing now that we've made our boat, but also there is really no way that raising for value is going to be a good idea because all worse hands should fold. It seems therefore that we only make more money when our opponent tries to bluff us, which he is very unlikely to do on two streets, or if he decides to check/call a big draw which
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We can't just stack off on bad turn cards and put it down as a 'cooler'. We need to be thinking about what turn cards are going to be bad for us and avoid getting into nasty positions”
Learning what hands are going to be good enough to showdown is the first real learning phase for PLO newbies. It’s going to take a few thousand hands before you really get a good feel. Some of you will be losing money by showing down too light and others will be cautious of this and will therefore be losing value on hands. At 6-max you are going to be seeing flops 3-4 handed as much as you are heads-up which is vastly different from 6-max Hold'em games. At lower stakes you shouldn't be surprised to see 5-6 way pots. The number of people are in the pot is going to affect what hands you will bet, raise and call. So there are going to be times, heads-up say, where drawing to a non-nut flush draw is going to be profitable, and others, like a 4-way pot out of position, where it is going to have a negative effect long-term. The ability to make these
Slow-playing safe flop for Kings and then protecting our equity on turn with two flush draws out.
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GX LIFESTYLE
Big Brother, Betting Like No Other
The show that gave us Jade Goody, Nasty Nick Bateman and the bloke with the Geordie accent may well be about to take its final bow, but for the Big Brother better, it can still give some serious money before its curtain comes down one last time.
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Billed by the broadsheets as a 21st century freak show, stuffed full of vegetarians, political activists, unemployed dolemongers, racists, heterosexuals, homosexuals, bisexuals and people of a sexuality yet to be discovered by the majority of the human race, Big Brother, the show we love to hate but secretly love, is back for one final blowout in its eleventh and final series.
can cause a contestant to move out from 20/1 to a 100/1 outsider over the course of an afternoon. In fact, there aren’t any; any apart from Big Brother that is. And any market which moves like that means it’s ripe for the taking. So regardless of whether the show takes your fancy or not, if you know what to look for, Big Brother could soon become your wallet’s best friend.
the markets It may no longer lay claim to groundbreaking viewing figures with its heyday long since over. And despite being responsible for inspiring a whole decade of reality television, Big Brother itself has become an ageing format which has finally run its course. Still, there aren’t many occasions when an argument over an onion
There are several markets a Big Brother better can dabble in, with both high street firms and the online exchanges offering a wide range of markets including outright winner, gender of winner, top male, top female, next eviction and many more. So the first question you need to ask is, ‘which market should I bet on?’
GX LIFESTYLE
Star Event SOUTH WEST FOUR WEEKENDER WHERE? Clapham Common, London WHEN? 28th-29th WHO? Armin Van Buren, Fatboy Slim, Zane Lowe, Pete Tong, Uffie and more. TELL ME MORE Making a big move this year by including two days (previously it’s just been one) SW4 is starting to compete with the big players of the dance world. The festival makes itself dangerously convenient for Londoners with its easy location, and an early finishing time means you can get the tube home or continue your after party elsewhere. With a line-up crammed with the very best in dance music, some of the most hotly anticipated newcomers, festival exclusives and a whole bunch of great acts, SW4 is the only place to be the last weekend of August. Highlights include a headlining performance from Armin Van Buren, a man who has been voted the most popular DJ on the planet for the past three years and who has one of the
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most popular radio programmes in the world. He is set to showcase his long awaited new album at SW4, so if you are a fan of all things trance, you would be foolish to miss out on what is sure to be a sensational performance. If the likes of Van Buren are not to your taste the festival also boasts an exclusive performance from hip hop legends Salt ‘N’ Pepa as they make their UK festival debut and give their first London performance in fifteen years. They are the biggest selling female rap group of all time and easily one of the most influential hop hip hop groups ever, and will be performing a career spanning set that is sure to be talked about for days after. The highlight of the festival for non trance fans however, is without a doubt Sunday’s headlining act; a man who embodies everything that is dance, with tracks that have topped the charts and found their way onto many best songs of all time lists.
Norman Cook aka Fatboy Slim will be bringing his full live show to SW4 on the Sunday with what is set to be his only London performance of the year. Having famously performed to 250,000 people on Brighton Beach at a gig now considered the stuff of legends, his performances are not only packed with hits but are highly revered for his energetic performance and exciting visuals. Fatboy Slim is truly in a league of his own. Those acts alone more than justify the price tag but add to those performances from Paul Oakenfold, Boyz Noise, a rare performance from French electro genius Uffie, as well as sets from Zane Lowe, Pete Tong and many more, and you can see why SW4 is set to eclipse all other UK dance fests this year. CAPACITY 20,000 HOW MUCH? Day tickets: £40, weekend: £75 www.southwestfour.com
GX LIFESTYLE
SPYDER CAR WILL SAVE THE WORLD PORSCHE 918 SPYDER HYBRID CONCEPT
Can the new Porsche hybrid concept car throw off the shackles previously associated with such machines? Jamie Mallon finds out.
T
he word hybrid, in a vehicular sense at least, is somewhat divisive. For some it inspires imagery of a cleaner, greener world; a brighter more environmentally sustainable future. For others it means poorly performing cars with overly smug drivers, advertising their green credentials and basking in the fury created by their Prius sitting in the fast lane of the M1 at 55mph.
This could all be set to change should the Porsche 918 Spyder concept reach the production line. This piece of hybrid machinery is a million miles away from the drab looks and asthmatic performance of a
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majority of hybrids currently on the market, it looks like the creator of the universe (I’m not starting a God vs Evolution debate here!) and some highly advanced extraterrestrials borrowed a Carrera GT and teamed up in creating this masterpiece. It might be fair to expect the 918 Spyder to weigh more than Rik Waller at a cake eating convention given the monumental weight of many electric cars, but it weighs in at a fairly dainty 1,490kg and has a combined output of over 700 bhp from the combustion and
electric motors. The process of getting from 0-62 is demolished in just 3.2 seconds with a top end speed a shade off 200mph. For anybody wondering if a hybrid can really perform in the real world, the stats paint a very clear picture: the 918 has lapped the Nurburgring in 7:30 minutes, a full 22 seconds quicker than a Mclaren SLR and quicker than the Carrera GT. EXTERIOR Porsche have really achieved something astonishing in maintaining the lines and features that define the brand and maintain the legacy of Porsche’s design whilst also creating something entirely new, entirely different and entirely jaw-to-the-floor gorgeous. Whilst there are distinct similarities to the Carrera GT, the 918 Spyder’s front end is much more angular with less aggressive more shapely intakes. It’s much the same story along the lines of the doors with larger more curved intakes feeding the power-plant
GX LIFESTYLE
What's on this month? GX rounds up the very best sporting, musical, cultural and lifestyle events taking place in the UK throughout July.
best athletes in the world in what may be an early precursor to the 2012 London Olympics. Traditionally the event has been one of the premier athletics events held annually in the UK, a reputation which was cemented in 2006 when Jamaican sprinter Asafa Powell equalled the then world record of 9.77s for the 100m at the event.
Sport CRICKET
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FORMULA ONE
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British Grand Prix July 11th
England vs. Bangladesh, ODI’s July 8th, 10th and 12th
England will look to build on a convincing test series victory over Bangladesh at the beginning of the summer with further strong performances in the One Day series in July. Bangladesh did manage to compete with England for periods of the two test series and may provide a sterner test for the hosts in the shorter form of the game. England, however, still basking in the glory of winning the Twenty20 World Championship earlier this year, are a much improved one day side and will not want to slip up at home to much weaker opposition. The first ODI takes place on 8th July at Trent Bridge, with the second and third ODI’s being held at the County Ground, Bristol and Edgbaston on the 10th and 12th July respectively.
ATHLETICS
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Aviva British Grand Prix July 10th
Athletes from across the globe will converge in Gateshead on July 10th for the Aviva British Grand Prix Athletics. An event on the IAAF Diamond League circuit, the British Grand Prix gives British Athletics an opportunity to showcase its up and coming talent against the
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Formula 1 makes its annual return to the UK as the tenth round of the Formula 1 season heads to Silverstone on the weekend of July 9th – 11th for the British Grand Prix. With British drivers Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button up at the business end of the Formula 1 standings, hopes will be high that McClaren will be able to continue their strong start to the season and build a lead in the Constructor’s championship by mustering a victory for either driver in front of their home fans. McClaren’s main title contenders though, Red Bull, will fancy their chances of repeating their result in 2009 after Sebastien Vettel won the team’s first ever British Grand Prix this time last year. The first and second practice rounds will be on Friday July 9th with qualifying taking place the following day and the Grand Prix itself being held on Sunday July 11th.
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Woods who has won the last two Open Championships held on this year’s course. Woods will certainly be looking to bounce back from a disappointing 12 months both on and off the golf course. Injury and personal problems have resulted in Woods going two years without winning a major Championship, his last victory coming in the US Open in 2008, and so a return to the course where he has never failed to win could not have come sooner for the world no. 1. Lee Westwood will carry the expectations of the home crowd, who will be hoping to see a first British winner of the event since Paul Lawrie’s victory at Carnoustie in 1999.
MOTOR SPORT
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World Superbike Championship July 30th - August 1st
The FIM Superbike World Championship returns to the UK for the final weekend of the month as round ten of the Championship is held at Silverstone. Two
GOLF The Open Championship July 15th - 18th
Golf returns to its spiritual home as The 2010 British Open Championship makes its fiveyearly pilgrimage to St Andrews, with the 139th Open Championship being held in mid July on the illustrious Old Course on the East coast of Scotland. All eyes will be on Tiger
races across the weekend will give all drivers the opportunity to add to their points total in an attempt to be crowned the 2010 Superbike World Champion, the Championship having been won by American Ben Spies in 2009. Max Biaggi led the standings after seven rounds of