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Victor Ramdin has a genie, but he looks nothing the lovely Jeannie from your TV set (or, for that matter, a semi-popular slot machine here in town).

“It’s my lucky genie,” he told his table. “I’m very superstitious.”

How lucky? Midway through the first level of the day he saw a raise and an all-in re-raise before he looked down at two black kings in his small blind.

“Call,” he said, his genie hanging just over his shoulder.

The first raiser smelled something funny and mucked his hand, leaving the re-stealing all-in player to sheepishly turn up Js7s. He was drawing dead by the turn.

“Sure, people just hand you their chips,” said a brash player a couple of seats to Ramdin’s left.

Ramdin pointed to his genie. “It’s the massage,” he said.

Ramdin is more focused than I’ve seen him in recent years. He’s alternately grinding and playing huge pots. What’s more, he’s kept the same massage therapist-- a big, muscular man--near his back at nearly all times. The therapist is not quite Tiger Woods’ caddy, but at times it seems like it.

Even when the genie is away, Ramdin is winning. On a board of 4d5hAh-Qc-Qd, Ramdin checked and watched his opponent throw out 65,000 in chips. Ramdin tanked while the ever-present ESPN cameras swarmed. He finally threw in his call and watched his opponent muck without showing. Forced to show his own hand, Ramdin turned up A2.

He stacked his chips without a word--laser focus that only makes way for some fun table chit-chat between hands. ESPN seems to love him. The producers have made Ramdin their feature table player twice, and had cameras at the ready any time he is in a hand.

Last night, as he sat on the side feature table, he leaned back to shake my hand. In just a few short minutes, without really trying, he cemented my impression of him.

“My son starts school tomorrow,” he said.

Not even August yet, I wondered why. Ramdin explained his son has some exceptional talent in a wide variety of disciplines, including boxing and chess. Ramdin found a summer program for gifted kids, and in went his son. While Ramdin toils in Las Vegas, he’s making sure his family is well taken care of.

That’s Ramdin. He’s a strategist, he’s a provider, he’s a fighter.

“Why don’t you have a woman masseuse?” someone wondered aloud.

Ramdin said the females are fine, but they sometimes don’t have the strength to get to the deep tissue.

“You’re a fruitcake,” said the mouthy player from before.

Ramdin’s lips drew into a line, but he didn’t say a word. Instead, his genie spoke for him.

“Have you seen his wife?”

Later, Ramdin remembered the guy in not-too-fond terms.

“The guy called me a fruit,” he said.

From nowhere appeared the genie. “That guy was uneducated,” he said.

“Wish he’d said it to be outside,” Ramdin mused. Then he looked to his therapist-caddy-genie and said, “We’re going to have a session at the dinner break.”

***

Ramdin looks to go into that break with more than 600,000 in chips.

Here’s a video blog recorded earlier today when Ramdin was having a rougher time of it.

Watch WSOP 08: Victor Ramdin Day 4 Catch Up on PokerStars.tv

Editor's note: After publishing this article, we were made aware Ramdin actually has two genies in the field. Rob Marriott is the one featured in the article. Morgan Hildreth is the other. Both seem to be good luck for Ramdin and are a credit to the growing number of male therapists in the room.

This may have been the first time all week I haven’t seen Team PokerStars Pro Victor Ramdin getting a massage. On Victor’s day one, it seems he required a constant pummelling to ease himself back into contention, and before that in the $1,500 HORSE the situation was the same. It must have worked though – Victor made the final of that event, finishing sixth.

But perhaps Victor is not as tense right now, and who can blame him? Sat as he is with 250,000 he owns the table. Besides, the massage therapy wouldn’t have been able to penetrate his leather jacket.
The board reads 8-A-5-5.

Team PokerStars Pro Victor Ramdin

The baby-faced seat two player had been getting busy with some pre-flop raises for the few hands I’d been watching. The two of them danced their way to the river on an ace-high board...

“I got an ace.”

This made Victor pause a second; he did too but didn’t want to show his hand first. Ace-nine against ace-nine - a split pot.

Curiously when Victor is in control it’s as the hands taking place are irrelevant to the actual process of gaining chips. It’s around day two or three that you start to get a better understanding of how things are shaping up, a clearer vantage point from which to judge who’s doing well, who’s trying to do well and who is hanging on as best they can.

It’s no surprise that the leaders on day one, like Kellen Hunter, soon start pulling away, increasing their stacks even more. If you wait for cards you’re doomed, your advantage comes from knowing more than the other guy.

This is where Victor comes in. A quarter of a million in chips, not really playing hands, more just working the table, picking up what he can when he can. Coffee arrives.

Another hand, Victor in the cut off, it’s folded to him and he raises. The blinds fold and Victor picks up a grand or two. He gets his headphones out.

A flop of 8sTdAd, checked by two players, one of them Victor. The fourth street jack sees Victor raise 5,600 which prompts his opponent to take off his shades and re-raise. This time Victor mucks. He does the same after a pre-flop raise on the next hand, forced out by a re-raise.

Betting all the way to the turn on the next hand, an Ad4d7s2d board. The seat seven player made it 7,500 – he’d tangled with Victor before. Victor called and checked the king on the river, then another bet of 12K.

Now Victor pulled his headphones off, like you would if you suspected the table were talking about you, and with a slight shake of his head he reluctantly counted out the call. Holding the chips high and at arm’s length, grimacing all the way, he dropped in the call.

At that moment his opponent mucked. Victor didn’t even have to show his hand. With a sigh to suggest he’d been put through a trauma for no reason he started stacking his chips. Not to worry, Victor up to over 260K.

Meanwhile the PokerStars video blog team caught up with PokerStars qualifier Adam York...

Watch WSOP 08: Adam York on PokerStars.tv

I’ve seen various characters in the crowded Amazon Room and beyond this afternoon. Men walking the halls chomping on foot long Churchill cigars; I’ve seen the spitting image of Stan Laurel complete with bowler; several players sporting Mohicans, a young player in bee glasses, a crazy guy crashing symbols, a UFC fighter with face bulging black and blue (he apparently won last night) and a man playing whilst keeping a stuffed toy penguin on his knee. I think everyone will need a rest after Day 1D.

But whilst this is the fourth day of the main event, as far as this new wave of players are concerned – and it’s by far the biggest of the four opening days – it all starts today. What happened yesterday, the day before, and the day before that, is none of their concern. This is the day of their gunfight in the desert - high noon Sunday.

Except if you’re Team PokerStars Pro Victor Ramdin - in which case it starts at half-past high noon.

A dealer with a good arm will cost you a few rounds of blinds in half an hour, but nothing to seriously hamper your chances. In fact ten minutes after arriving any deficit Victor started with was promptly overturned to the tune of five thousand. Late? No, that 30 minutes was intentional.

A few years ago at the World Series I talked to Victor about his WPT win at Foxwoods. We were talking about his background, his life in the Bronx and the shops he owns in New York City. Thinking I might catch him out I asked him how much he charged for a half gallon of milk. He knew immediately (whilst I forgot). I figured then he was the kind of man who was always on top of his own affairs.

Whether it’s a poker game, how much he sells milk for or how much money it takes Guyana Watch, the charity he supports, to fly a child from his home country to hospital for a life saving heart operation.

This latter point came to many people’s attention after he won the WPT in Foxwoods back in 2006. He decided then to give the organization a large chunk of his winnings, effectively helping to save the lives of several children.

Whether or not the players knew who was due to fill in the empty seat at their table they should by now know he’s a player to be wary of.

After Foxwoods he ran good at the WPT Championship a few weeks later, picking up an additional $146,460 for 11th place. Then three World Series cashes in 2006, one in 2007 and three more this year, not to mention 12 other WPT and EPT cashes in between. I checked all this online. Victor cashes a lot.

So yes, the half hour was intentional. He immediately got stuck into a massage, nodding hello at me (probably unable to speak) rocking to and fro as a massage therapist worked without mercy on his external abdominal obliques. A good position to be in at the start.

Half an hour late, five grand up. This is the last of the day ones. It’s incredible what a break can do.

The $50K HORSE obviously made greater headlines that the $1500 version, but one other thing it did was to spark interest in the HORSE method itself – the five disciplines of poker that offer something new to the casual spectator used to the dominance of Texas hold’em on TV screens everywhere. What was this Omaha 8-or-better thing? And is Razz really a case of the worst hand wins?

All that was on display again today and the record field serves as a demonstration of just how popular HORSE has become. 803 started and now, after two and a bit long days, the last eight has been reached.

It happened as afternoon became evening and evening edged towards dinner. When just nine players remained tournament organisers sat seated the last nine around one table, intending to use community cards for Stud rounds if they found it necessarily. But just ten minutes later, with another bust out, the final eight was reached. Play stopped. Players took a break, and the preparations for the final, which currently involves a biographical questionnaire, were administered.

Well, we’re pleased to report that Team PokerStars Pro Victor Ramdin is among that last few. His stack may not be the greatest, resting as it does on 78K (seventh in order of size) but few doubt Victor’s ability and motivation – he intends to put claim to his first World Series bracelet tonight.

The line up:

Seat 1 - James Schaaf - 392,000
Seat 2 - Matt Grapenthien - 46,000
Seat 3 - Sam Silverman - 310,000
Seat 4 - Phil Hellmuth - 400,000
Seat 5 - Jason Dollinger - 346,000
Seat 6 - Tommy Hang - 680,000
Seat 7 - Victor Ramdin - 78,000
Seat 8 - Esther Rossi - 166,000

As we discovered earlier this week in the larger HORSE event these things can take time so we’ll have an update on Victor’s progress later this evening. It’s sure to be as tense as any other final we’ve witnessed, and be a precursor to yet another surge in this popular form of the game.

One player who knows full well how it is to compete at the highest levels of HORSE competition is Team PokerStars Pro Katja Thater, who caught up with the PokerStars video bloggers today to talk about the Vegas experience and being able to talk poker with her man.

Watch WSOP 08: Katja Thater Interview on PokerStars.tv

Team PokerStars Pro Victor Ramdin could really use a good finish today.

See, for a lot of the people coming in town for the Main Event, being able to claim one World Series cash in 2008 would be enough. Victor Ramdin already has two cashes this year, but he's not the least bit happy about them. Why? Well, he's stuck.

"Stuck fifty dimes," he said yesterday. "I need to work really hard and I'm hoping I go far."

It's one of those things that happens in a long Series. One tournament turns into another tournament which turns into a cash game. Before long, you're shooting pool with a crazy Scotsman and hoping for the best. Or at least, that's what Ramdin is doing.

He could get it all back with interest today. Ramdin is one of the leaders in the final 21 players of the $1,500 HORSE event. Ramdin has already watched former Team PokerStars Pros Joe Hachem and Chad Brown cash in the event for $6,686. He played late into last night and will come back late today to shoot for his first World Series bracelet. To get unstuck for the Series, he will have to make the final table. If he wins, it will make for a decent summer and $256,000 first prize.

Ramdin and the other 20 players left in his event will come back at 3pm today and play all the way down to a bracelet. That is something that could take no small amount of time. We'll be keeping an eye on him and let you know how it turns out.

Good luck today, Victor.

Tuesday was one of those days on Walll Street that makes everybody happy. The markets rallied and just about everybody ended the day on a high note. When the closing bell rang on the NASDAQ, one Montel Williams did the ringing. Just behind him stood Team PokerStars Pro Victor Ramdin.

As you might remember, Williams had a banner day at the 2007 World Series of Poker. For a period of time during Day 1, Williams held the chip lead and the attention of everybody in the Rio Amazon Ballroom. During the Ante Up For Africa charity tournament, Wiilliams ended up chatting with Ramdin. After a brief Chat, Williams busted Ramdin out of the event. While the game was over, their friendship remained. It took them all the way to Wall Street.

Williams and Ramdin met on Wall Street yesteday to close the NASDAQ and promote the Montel Williams MS Foundation's Gala and Pro Celebrity Poker Challenge on Thursday, March 13th at 5:30pm ET. Ramdin and Williams will both be playing in the event in an effort to raise money for the study of Multiple Sclerosis. For more information on the event, visit the MS Foundation website.