Two totally different sessions today – day session: w00t, night session: argh!

I guess I shouldn’t have played the night session, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. I started the day with some SnG action. One NL HE which was totally -ev and two PLO8 ones which were totally cha-ching! Finished 8/10 in the NL HE one, 1st (woot) and 2nd in the PLO8 ones. The 2nd place finish was sort of unlucky two. We’re about even in chips and I hold A-Q-J-10, not a particular groovy Omaha H/L hand as there’s no chance to get the low pot, but after all you need to qualify first for it, so let’s see a flop which comes down K-8-10 rainbow…hmm…nothing much so far but a pair of tens, but it seems that there’s going to be no low…so let’s start the action, I fire out the pot-sized bet and he reraises All-In…hmm…whatever…call…(I’ve got him covered by the huge amount of 48T$)…he shows K-8-A-x…fair enough…he’s in the lead, but I’ve got outs (four nines, three tens, two aces…etc)…sure enough turn and river are blank. Too bad, but I can’t complain….one 1st, one 2nd out of 3 SnGs. I leave to go to footie training and once I return I want to continue the run. No joy though as I bust out early in 3 PLO8s…

Evaluation: It helps if you stick to playing solid hands (any combination of a 3 wheel card hand (best including A-2, but sometimes A-3-4 etc will do), but there’s still some situation where you can’t limit your play to that (apart from the fact that you’re in no man’s land when three faces show up). So I’ve seen the joy of losing set over set etc more than once….but hey…it happens.

Note to self: There’s been a quite drastic difference between the day session’s players and the night session’s players (day: loose, night: tight)…a coincidence? Maybe, but I’m sure as hell trying to get back some dough tomorrow morning 😉

I won’t be playing the WWdN (which starts in around 30mins) tonight as I’m just too tired and don’t feel like playing. I did my share of playing for the day already, too…with not much success either (4 SnGs: 1x3rd), busted out rather early out of the Stud and NL HE MTT…so I guess there’s no point in donking off another 11$ 😉

Have fun all and I’m looking forward to read some transcripts/recaps tomorrow…cheers 🙂

Update: Wow, it seems I’ve missed a quite nice showing by Waffles who took down 1st place, w00t!

…or the case of the accidental hammer clash (more about that later).

After running bad the last few days it was time to get back into shape or back in the saddle of the donkey, so that’s what I did. Played some SnGs (NL HE 3$+0.40$) and was ITM in 3 of 4. The total is: 1x1st, 2x2nd, 1x8th (donkey chasing and connecting) – on a side note: I was down roughly 1:3 in all of the heads up finishes. Was able to turn it around once, although I did well in the other heads ups too…I came back to around even and even took the lead for a while, but just couldn’t finish my opponent…

Apart from the SnG action I played some MTTs, too. Nothing spectacular to report from the PL Hold’em tourney, busted out pretty early. Then I played a Fixed Limit one and the funniest thing ever happened. This poker episode is entitled “The accidental hammer clash”: I’m UTG+3 and look down at the hammer (7c-2d), folded to me and I decide to limp in, flop comes down 7d-Jd-7h…BB leads out, I raise, he reraises, I cap…turn is the 10c…back and forth again…river is the Js…full house baby…back and forth again…showdown (see pic below):

The funniest thing: I correctly shout “hammer time, nh!” in the table chat and I can feel that most of the table is thinking “WTF?!”. The BB asks me: “Why did you call with 72o?” I answer “It’s the hammer, you gotta trust it! … (poker blogger insider)”…he smiles…nothing funny after that and I bust out rather quickly again as I just can’t catch anything.

Then I decided to complete the evening with a NL HE MTT (3$+0.30$). I play some good poker and after roughly two hours of play (already ITM) I bust out in 288th place with Ac-Qc vs As-9c when Mr. BigStack calls my All-In and catches his nine…. not a perfect way to end the evening, but at least I had a good rush today!

Sidenotes:

1. I never had so many AA and KKs in a single day…which is nice, as most of them held up too.
2. The whole single table SnG thing with lots of heads up action today was good training…or at least it should be…I better get in shape for DADIII (see below)

Pimpage:

Be there or be square!

Went on a good run of bad luck early on today. It was so bad it was starting to get funny again. Ever had a time where you were in the wrong place at the right time, all the time? That’s what my SnG and MTT play in the first three attempts was like. Played the Turbo NL SnG (3+0.40), sure enough I push with 10-10 on the button, just to be called by J-J…we both don’t improve and I’m cripple…add another bad timing to it and I’m out in 8th of 10 (I push again with 9-9 this time in LP) and get called by BB, he shows 10-10…you know the drill, no help…

After that I was slightly on tilt and questioning the poker gods, so what can you do? Right, make up for the loss and play a 6+0.50 NL HE Turbo…I dub this one the A-x is the new nuts…nothing more to say about it 😉

Then I go ahead and play a nice NL HE MTT (3+0.30) and I don’t get many playable hands…so after the first break I’m still kind of short-stacked, but not really in need to force things. I pick up some small pots and then I look down at A-K sooted, sure enough my push on the 2-2-4 gets a caller and he shows A-A…what did I say about bad timing earlier on?

Just finished playing my last game for the night, another 3+0.30 SnG. This was the total opposite of the first SnGs or the MTT for that matter. Didn’t get many hands, so I stuck to my tight play and waited for the fun to arrive. It did when we were down to six handed. I look down and find Ad-Ac, w00t…I raise preflop and find a 4-5-2 all clubs, the SB bets I call…the turn brings me the nuts…another club hits the board and it’s the 3c..straight flush, baby!

Two hands after that I got bullets again and pick up another nice pot and we’re in the money.

I donk off some chips before we’re down to heads up – and I’m 1:2 in chips. Sure enough I win a big pot early on in heads up and we’re back to even…a few hands later I’m all-in with Kd-9d he shows K-10 which wins with a 10 on the board…so two bullets and one straight flush wasn’t enough to win the thing…tells you that today isn’t my lucky day 😉

Alrighty…enough poker for the day…off to watch the rest of the Superbowl…

No matter what I played today, I sucked at all of the games…or the cards I got sucked…whatever…I played a Stud H/L MTT (busted out early), a Omaha H/L SnG (bubbled), two NL Hold’em MTT (busted out in the first hour in both)…argh!

I guess there’s no point in playing anymore today…better luck tomorrow I guess…or not…we’ll see…

Just played two small SnGs at UB today, nothing news-worthy…1 cash…1 bust.

After coming back from footie training in the freezing cold and having a few at a club, I logged onto Stars to find a lovely 3$ NL HE MTT…and Waffles was playing too…I didn’t check the player ranks, but he was transferred to my table, but I was moved to another table before we even played a hand. So I fire up Yahoo and the nice part of the tourney began, chatting it up and all. We agreed to switch 10%, which in the end amounted to virtually nothing…too bad we couldn’t get closer to the final table…

(No long hand descriptions here, just two noteworthy hands: early on I look down at JJ on the button, EP raises it up to 6xBB, Cutoff reraises to 12xBB…what to do what to do…I put at least one of them (EP) on either AA or KK…so I fold…EP shows KK…Cutoff shows AA…now guess what the board brought onto them….x-x-J-x-x, argh! That would have been a really nice pot, but without knowing the flop it was a correct play IMO. My last hand: I’m desperately short-stacked and look down a 10-10 in the SB…two limpers…I push…1 caller…he shows A-J…board is blank…until I can virtually feel how the final card is peeling itself off the deck….yeah, you guessed it….sigh….)

So I finshed 257th…Waffles busted out shortly after me in 149th….out of 2347…so not a bad showing…

I guess I should come up with better post titles, but it’s 3am, so I blame that fact for it 😉

Played a 7 Stud H/L MTT on PokerStars – the first in quite a while and to my surprise I was right back in the action (after all I was playing 7Stud H/L exclusively for quite a while) and able to scoop quite a bit in the beginning. Just before the bubble I was able to triple up and cruise into the money. Didn’t catch much of anything after that and just survived another level (antes 200, limits 1000/2000)…finished 47th of 456…for a whooping profit of 1.48$ (3$+0.30$ buyin)…Had three hours of poker fun though 😉

After that I played a NL HE SnG and promptly busted out in 8th, those buggers have been totally -ev in recent days, I think I’m going to start playing MTTs again…

I played 13 NL HE SnGs yesterday, yes 13! The results weren’t all that good, although I managed to place ITM in 2 out of the first 3 and even managed to win one later on. The total score was: 4 ITM (1x 1st, 3x 3rd), 9 times busted (3x bubble, rest bubble +x). So I was already down a bit, so I decided to mix up thing by playing a 5+0.5 PL O8 Sng in which I bubbled, too. Argh.

Then there was the WWdN #13 – I thought that I better made the money to get me back to even, but it wasn’t to be. I had a chat with Garth and Waffles during the whole tourney and we all rooted for each other and wanted to make the final table together. Early on it looked like at least Garth and maybe even Waffles could make it (with both of them in the top 10 in chips), but it just didn’t work out that way.

The tourney saw a record crowd of 125 players, so it was the first time that the final two tables payed, although places 18-10 were “only” 15$ each (that’s not all that much considering the 10+1 buy-in) but 15$ = +4 is better than getting nothing 😉 Early on I was literally card dead with “huge” hands like 2-5o, 3-6o, 3-7o etc. So I folding, folding, folding – which in turn gave me a really tight table image, which should necessarily lead to some opportunities to steal some blinds. That didn’t happen though as there were usually multiple raises in front of me, when I was about to make a move. Then I looked down at my first real hand: K-K, I raise the standard 3xBB and it’s folded to me, woot, I get the blinds…some hands later I look down at A-A, I raise (3xBB again) and all fold, again! Argh! Then I’m back in folding mode with some small pots in between.

After 1h of play:

1. Players remaining: 73 of 125
2. Hi: 9265 (garth was second at that point with 8675, Waffles 8th with 4520)
3. Avg: 2568
4. me: 1343 (53 of 73)
5. Hands dealt: 100
6. Showdown: 2 of 2
7. Pots won without showdown 5

I was back in folding mode as I looked down at Q-Q, now I would usually play this hand in a heartbeat, but there was a raise and reraise in front of me, so I was really undecided. I had the feeling that I shouldn’t play the hand and I was right, I would have been up against 6-6 and A-K and sure enough the Ace hit…Just as I was nearing desperation mode I look down at A-A in the SB, some limpers and one raiser in front of me, so I push and get one caller…he shows A-K, yes sir and I double up. In the very next hand I look down at 9-9 on the button, I make it 4xBB to go…early position reraises me…what to do, what to do…I already commited half my stack, so should I fold…I guess, but I thought he might be on a hand like A-10, A-J or similiar…so I call…he showed AKo…the Ace on the flop sealed my fate and I was out in 44th place.

In related news: Waffles managed to run his stack into the ground even before me and busted out in 54th place, Garth was sucked out on a little later on and busted out in 31st – so no final table for any of us. Congrats to Wes for another top finish (2nd place) and all the others who made the money!

After I busted out we started a sidegame (or two to be precise). The first was a 6Max 0.05/0.10 NL HE table and I quickly joined. Who would want to miss a table with both Wil and CJ? Indeed it was great fun as Wil and CJ went at it right away, announcing their monsters and discussing who’s monster was more “monstrous”…lol…CJ quadrupled his 5$ buy-in within three orbits, I doubled my 4$ buyin as I slowroll trip queens…poor SERNE…Soon after that I switched over to the other sidegame, which to place in more “familiar grounds” at a .01/.02NL table. Soon enough I realized though that it has been a long enough day already as the clock was already approaching 5am…so I called it quits and logged off…

On another note: There were different people liveblogging the event this time, so if you want to have a look at their perspective have a look at the recaps of: Wil, RandomSam and CJ

If you’ve got 11$ to spare and want some good No Limit Hold’em action, play in the WWdN #13 tonight. You can find it via Tourney -> Private (#18610753). The password is: monkey

Played only two SnG today. The first one was the usual PL Omaha H/L and I bubbled, out of my own stupidity. We’re down to four players (3 ITM), I’m the SB, shortest stack is BB and almost All-In (40T$ left). The two huge stacks call, I decide to push the BB All-In, bad idea as it put me all in and he wisely folded hoping for me to bust out – which I did. Argh! The correct move would have been to fold and watch him either be pushed all-in by the others post-flop, or see him be all-in in the next hand (after all I would have been the button and he the SB), but no…I decide to do the donkey and bubble… 🙁

After this stupidity move I was steaming inside, nontheless I decided to give it another shot, this time at NL HE though. This really payed off as I won the thing. I didn’t get all that many cards, but if I did I could do (almost) no wrong. The BB special was especially nice…all limpers at the table so I only saw the flop in the BB in the first 3 orbits, and I won all those hands 🙂

Then I went ahead and busted a player out and when we were down to 5 players I busted two players out at the same time, so welcome ITM. The rest is a blur, but I did good and won. Nice. Donkeys 1 – Ingoal 1 🙂