The signs weren’t good that I would have my best ever weekend in poker at around 5pm on Thursday afternoon. I’d lasted approximately three hours in the £560 UKIPT Brighton main event and didn’t quite know what to do with myself. I was a little disappointed as my starting table was really easy but nothing really went my way, even though I felt pretty good about the way I played.
My bustout hand was fairly interesting and I posted about it here - http://www.pkr.com/en/community/forums/tournaments/my-bustout-hand-from-ukipt-brighton-main-event-55998/ - so you can check that out if you like. I’m still fine with my play but I did feel like a moron when he turned over a better hand. It sucks to be knocked out of tournaments where you really want to do well. I’d imagine it’s akin to hearing your opponent’s name read out at the end of a boxing (or MMA, a far superior sport) match that has gone to the judges – only without the violence.
I was also disappointed because a few mates from PKR – WongaMan, BrotherMuzone, Rhymenoceros, MrNiceness – all hail from Brighton (or close by) and it would have been good to make it through the day, have a load of beers and catch up properly. As it was, I sulked off back to London right away and played some of the worst poker of my life for an hour online, dropping $1,000. Friday wasn’t much better either, as I played poker for nearly twelve hours and lost $1,500. It wasn’t boding well.
My bustout hand was fairly interesting and I posted about it here - http://www.pkr.com/en/community/forums/tournaments/my-bustout-hand-from-ukipt-brighton-main-event-55998/ - so you can check that out if you like. I’m still fine with my play but I did feel like a moron when he turned over a better hand. It sucks to be knocked out of tournaments where you really want to do well. I’d imagine it’s akin to hearing your opponent’s name read out at the end of a boxing (or MMA, a far superior sport) match that has gone to the judges – only without the violence.
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| Enjoying myself at UKIPT Brighton. I was KO'd shortly. |
I was also disappointed because a few mates from PKR – WongaMan, BrotherMuzone, Rhymenoceros, MrNiceness – all hail from Brighton (or close by) and it would have been good to make it through the day, have a load of beers and catch up properly. As it was, I sulked off back to London right away and played some of the worst poker of my life for an hour online, dropping $1,000. Friday wasn’t much better either, as I played poker for nearly twelve hours and lost $1,500. It wasn’t boding well.
I was originally supposed to be going to my girlfriend’s 7-year old nephew’s birthday party on Saturday. It would have been quite fun as Louis is cool, he likes playing Pro Evo on my PES3 and we were going to play football in the park and other assorted kiddie things. However, as it was the 16th of the month and I had so far earned exactly -$500 for my monthly salary I decided to put some more hours in online instead and felt a bit guilty about sending Hattie off on her own to the party. With hindsight, it’s pretty good that I let my professional (selfish?) side take over as by the time I went to bed I’d won $7,500 – my best day online ever.
Cash games were a pretty steady upward spiral with some super soft $2/$4 and even a few fishy $5/$10 games running all afternoon. About $3300 in profit came from there after I ran pretty great and played good too. As it was still only about 7pm by this point I decided to register for three tournaments for a bit of a change while I grinded the cash. I crashed out of one early but had accrued pretty big stacks in both the PKR Open ($22 buy-in) and Monte Carlo ($77 buy-in) and made it to both final tables by about midnight. I’ve never been a big tournament grinder at all but making final tables is still the biggest buzz you can get in poker, and I was determined to try and win both of these in one night. It’s not something that happens often and it would be a cool accolade to have. An hour or so later and I was proud to take this screenshot :)
Cash games were a pretty steady upward spiral with some super soft $2/$4 and even a few fishy $5/$10 games running all afternoon. About $3300 in profit came from there after I ran pretty great and played good too. As it was still only about 7pm by this point I decided to register for three tournaments for a bit of a change while I grinded the cash. I crashed out of one early but had accrued pretty big stacks in both the PKR Open ($22 buy-in) and Monte Carlo ($77 buy-in) and made it to both final tables by about midnight. I’ve never been a big tournament grinder at all but making final tables is still the biggest buzz you can get in poker, and I was determined to try and win both of these in one night. It’s not something that happens often and it would be a cool accolade to have. An hour or so later and I was proud to take this screenshot :)
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| For some reason my avatar looks like a hollow man dressed in a gimp suit but rest assured, that IS MrStarch... |
Woohoo!
Sunday started off good with my Sunday Times subscription (surely I can’t be just 26?) and a good lunch with Hattie at High Road House. The main event of the day – just nudging out The Apprentice final, yes Tom! – was PKR’s first-ever ‘PKR 500’, a new monthly high-roller tourney with a $560 buy-in. I bought straight in after my run good the day before and was lucky enough to get a soft starting table full of people I had never heard of. When you consider all the usual PKR big names were also playing this could have been one of the best bits of luck that I had all tournament. I was able to play pretty aggro and get away with some stuff that wouldn’t have worked against better players.
I did have one really tough hand early on though against a player who went on to finish 3rd. I’m still not sure if my fold here is correct or not but I liked my discipline in not giving up even though this put me quite short early on. Annoyingly I don’t have the hand history on my hard drive but I had Ah-9d on a 9c-7s-2d-Ac-Tc board. I cbet flop, he called, turn went check/check, I value bet river and he then jammed on me for all my chips. I just had the feeling he wasn’t good enough to be bluffing and eventually I folded. No idea if I was right or wrong.
It all went really smoothly until we got to the final table bubble and I was out of position against betonme who I felt played brilliantly. He was putting pressure on everyone as a big stack and 3-betting me constantly whenever I tried to steal the blinds. I was pretty much card dead at this point so never had anything to play back at him and the one time I did try - four-betting him with As-9s - he jammed on me and I had to wipe away a small tear as I folded. Still, I made it to the final table despite being in the perilous 15-20BB zone and then found a great spot to double-up, moving all-in for 15BBs with A-J and getting called by K-J. A King on the river and I was out in 6th for $3,600.
It was a great score and now that it’s morning I’m happy but I really would have loved to win the tournament, get the $16,500 (!!!!) for first and complete a weekend mini Triple Crown. Still, I’m incredibly happy with how it all went and I know as much as I played well I needed a lot of luck along the way too. Thanks to all those on PKR who railed me and left me good comments on the forum.
I’m now ranked 241 (from about 3000 odd on Friday…) in the MTT rankings and while cash games will always be my home I’m coming for the MTT Top 10 too…
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