With a field of a little over 2000 runners in wednesdays event I finished right around the midpoint. My inability to win races continued to haunt me in the tournament. I won 2 of the 7 all in situations that I was in even though I was at least a 2-1 favorite in most of them.
Some highlights of the event. Before the event
Brad Garret came walking through talking to a friend saying 'Do you feel it baby, do you feel it, are you money'. On the tables around me were seated
John Juanda,
Jennifer Harmon,
Huck Seed and
Toby Maguire.
The player sitting to the right of me was an older gentlemen who I recognized as a pro but still have not been able to place his name. We started with two open seats on our table and were off and running. In the first 40 minutes of the tourney I was dealt pocket aces, pocket kings (twice), pocket queens, pocket jacks, and pocket tens. Unfortunately in the first hour of a tournament you get no action so while I won almost all these hands it was for very little money.
After about 30 minutes of play the two missing players sat down at our table. One was
Jason Lester and the other was
Ben Grundy. Great, a table with 3 pro's that I recognize. Jason Lester busted out an hour later with what I though was a very suspect call with AT against pocket kings. Grundy spewed his chips with some rash aggressive play and the gentleman sitting next to me got screwed when his top pair all-in got called by a gutshot straight draw that came on the turn. Yea, I outlasted all the pro's on my table.
Finally, I took out the small stack at our table with pocket 10's versus his KQs. And made a suspect push against the big stack at the table with pocket 9's when the board came KQ3. He thought a little and decided he had to call me with his J9 of diamonds (flush and gutshot straight draw) and I doubled up to about 4500 in chips. Unfortunately this would be the last bit of luck I had. About 5 hands later I was dealt AQ diamonds under the gun and made a raise to about 3 times the BB (about 300 at that time). I got called in one spot and the flop came Qh 7h 3s. About as good a flop as I could want. I bet out at it for about 500 and the other player moved all in for about 2500. There was a small chance he had flopped a set of sevens or threes here but I figured it was more likely he was making a move with a heart draw so I called him figuring I was a 2-1 favorite. I was right but unfortunately the 5 of hearts fell on the river and I got knocked back down to about 1800 in chips.
I stole some blinds after this but remained pretty much card dead for the 3rd hour. Finally with the blinds at 100-200 and me down to 1100 in chips I was dealt 99 in the small blind. The table maniac made a raise from the cutoff to 600 and I raised to all-in knowing I would be called no matter what his two cards were ( he would be getting over 3-1 on his money to call so he would call here even if he was bluffing with 72o) but I needed to gamble to get back into the tournament. He turned over KQo and the flop came down AJ3. Still alive with a turn card of 5. Then the ten of spades came on the river completing his straight and my tournament life was over a little more than 4 hours after it begin.
All in all, I think I played pretty well. No real bad decisions (that I didn't get away with) and I was always ahead in the all in situations.
Well, I got to get back to the tables to try to earn an entry back into another event. This isn't just all fun and games you know.
