Dec 132013
 

I’m stealing the blog post of fellow Team Online member Roy ‘GodlikeRoy’ Bhasin who tried this early November this year. Read all about his challenge at http://www.godlikeroy.com

I’ve decided to have myself a little poker marathon next week. The details are simple: 100 hours of poker in 7 days. It’s not totally insane and probably lots of people have done this before. I’m not taking bets against me completing it or anything like that – it’s just a little experiment/challenge.

Why am I doing this?

  • December has always been the month in which I played the most poker, often finishing a milestone or SNE. There was always a special feeling when playing in December and by doing this challenge I hope to get back that feeling since this year I haven’t played as much as I would have hoped.
  • I already planned to take a break from work around Christmas and New Year but it felt like a good idea to take an extra week to play some poker, so why not a poker marathon?
  • Part of the December Festival promotion on PokerStars are the $700k Milestone hands. It’s always fun to playing during these Milestone hands and most of the time this also means softer games. The Milestone hands start the same day as I will be starting my marathon so that’s another reason to play a lot of poker.
  • Only for players in the Netherlands there is a VPP Challenge in which I would have loved to compete. Unfortunately I had way to much work to finish before my holiday started but during my Marathon I will try to get myself in the top 20 and earn some extra money this way.
  • For fun. I miss playing lots of poker so I’m definitely doing it for fun as well, if I’m actually winning some money I bet it’s even more fun 😉

milestone-hands-header

Thing I want to do throughout the week

  • Get a minimum of 6 hours sleep a night, but no more than 8 hours.
  • Eating healthy and refrain from overeating. When you put in so many hours it’s easy to eat only snacks and overeat yourself during the small breaks between playing poker.
  • Keep my back healthy. I don’t have a standing desk setup like Roy but if I notice my back suffers too much I will take a break. If my back keeps being an issue I will quit the challenge.
  • Stay focused and limit distractions: Facebook, Twitter and What’s app. Banning it however would be a step to far 😉
  • Play at least 50,000 hands. That’s only 500 an hour and should be relatively easy, I except that during the morning not many tables will run and I will use that as a sort of warm-up. During the evening I expect myself to 10-12 table most of the time, I’m not planning to 20-24 table besides during the end of the Milestone promotion.
  • Hopefully maintain a small winrate pre rake-back although I don’t expect this to be big due to me being out of shape. Winning money post rake-back is obviously the minimum 🙂

What preparations will I make for the week?

  • Make sure there is plenty of food in the house so I won’t need to do any groceries during the week.
  • Minimize distractions. I’ve cleared out my calendar and have almost nothing scheduled for the whole week. Aside from one dentist appointment I can wholly focus on the challenge. Not going out during the weekend will probably be the hardest part 🙂
  • Have my poker setup ready, something which I have already prepared so it seems like I’m ready to go.
  • Ensure that I start off on the right foot. Sleep well the night before and be fully rested.

What else?

  • I’ll be starting my marathon Monday the 16th after breakfast and the clock starts ticking after I’ve played my first hand of poker.
  • You can follow the progress via twitter (@Tzen1)
  • I won’t be posting any blogs about the challenge (I have no time for it) but I did already prepare two blog posts about my 5 years as a poker professional which I will publish during my challenge.
  • I will write a wrap-up on Monday or Tuesday after the challenge and two more blogs about my 5 years as a poker professional so there will be plenty to read at www.tzen1.com over the coming 2 weeks!
 Posted by at 5:07 pm
Nov 042013
 

Late November 2005 we celebrated a big party. My dad turned 55, an age he was always scared about. He had lost his dad at the age of 54 and before that his granddad had also died at the age of 54. Turning 55 was a big thing for him, a very big thing, he had outlived his dad and granddad and we celebrated with roughly 80 of his best friends at our favorite diner place.

In January 2006 I bought my first house at the age of 23, needless to say I felt excited about moving out. It was only 200m away from the place I’ve grown up but it still was a big step. I worked 5 days a week and would play poker any moment I could. I daydreamed a lot about becoming a professional poker player and told my parents I wanted to chase down that dream. I already had a 6year career in IT and was making good money for my age but still poker felt like something I could make a living off. My parents didn’t really like the idea, but since I’m not the reckless kind of type they knew I wouldn’t rush into something if I wasn’t really sure. They let me be and knowing that I just bought a house they were even more sure I wouldn’t do anything stupid.

April 2006 I went to Las Vegas  again. In 2004 and 2005 my dad came along and after two times he said he wanted to skip a year. That year we went with a big group, I had finally convinced all my friends Las Vegas was the place to be. Hearing that, my dad suddenly changed his mind. My friends really liked hanging out with my dad and while I was playing poker with my poker buddy, my dad would show my friends all the casinos in Las Vegas. He was crazy about that city.

LV06-048

In July 2006 I got the keys to my house. The house was in pretty good shape so it wasn’t a huge project besides some small tweaks and the usual paintjobs. I have two left hands so there wasn’t a lot I could do but luckily my dad was a carpenter and combining my ideas with his craftsmanship would create the perfect place for myself. I wasn’t in a rush to move out so we agreed to do things slowly. I remember also that the weather was really great so I spent more time on the beach then doing stuff, also knowing I could do little anyway. My father wasn’t the type who would sit still so despite my mom saying he should come down to the beach and take it easy he would do all kind of things in the house. In July he had the month off but in early August he was back to work again and one day didn’t feel so well in the morning. Going home sick wasn’t like him, so he finished the day but felt really bad when he got home. My mother got worried and took him to the hospital where they told him he had had a small heart attack that morning. I visited him together with my sister that evening in the hospital and he told us that it was nothing to worry about. He talked about how he would go back to work the next day and when they told him he wasn’t allowed to go home he wasn’t happy. He felt fine and didn’t understand why they would keep him in the hospital. He would say that every day and after a couple of days he came home and coming home was a bit different then he expected.

His energy levels had dropped and he felt tired quickly. He wanted to work, he wanted to finish my house but the doctors told him he should rest first. And so he did and after a couple of days the doctors advised him he should join recovery group sessions at the hospital where he would meet other people who were in a similar situation. Of course he didn’t want that at first because he didn’t see it as a big thing but probably with some guidance of my mother he joined the recovery sessions. I remember how he came back from one of his first session. Basically what the sessions was about was to work at his condition so they put him on a bike with a heart rate monitor and he needed to pedal slowly while they would watch his heart rate. He saw people who could barely get on the bike, who were tired after a couple of minutes pedaling on a very low cadence but he jumped on the bike and they told him to slow down all the time because he was pedaling to fast. He was way ahead of most others in his “class”, giving him even more reason not to see it as something big. My birthday came around mid September which was supposed to be the date I would move in. Doing nothing made my dad crazy so he would do small stuff in my house, often at a slow pace and only for an hour or two. It gave him some distraction so it was all good, you could see his energy levels slowly coming back.

When I visited my dad in the hospital in August I wasn’t worried at all. They way he acted gave me the idea he was indeed okay. When he got home I saw how my dad was struggling so that did give me the indication something real had happened but by the time it was October I had no worries at all. Many people survive a heart attack and many people live years after. When you are 8 years old you believe your dad is the strongest man on earth, I still believed that when I was 24.

My sister was a stewardess in that time and had invited my mother to join her on a trip to Isla Margarita. Only a couple of days but my mother was very hesitant because of the situation with my dad. The trip was in early November, and my dad was getting better by the day so my mom decided to go. The morning of November 6 my dad drove my mom and sister to the airport. I headed to work like usual and my dad would do some stuff at my place. Around lunchtime he had a recovery session at the hospital and I finished my day around 5. My reception was always pretty bad in the office back then and when I arrived at the train station I saw that I had a couple of voicemails. I called my voicemail and my grandmother was on the phone, I could barely make out what she was saying thinking something had happened with my granddad only noticing a couple of seconds later it wasn’t my granddad, it was my own dad.

Standing on the railway platform I felt desperate. My mom and sister were still in a plane, I was in the middle of Amsterdam waiting for a train to get home to eat dinner with my dad. During the recovery session my dad was on the bike as usual, after 5 minutes or so he got his 2nd heart attack and fell of his bike. Getting a heart attack in an hospital having a heart rate monitor attached to your chest is probably the “safest” place to get one but that didn’t help in his case. They tried to reanimate him but couldn’t get him back. After he passed away the doctors had tried to call my mom and sister but couldn’t reach both since they were both in a plane. They didn’t had my number and had tried ringing my grandma after a while. While trying to reach my mom and sister they had called up my sisters employers somehow, maybe it was my grandma. My sister had a different flight plan then my mom and had a stopover in Copenhagen where she heard the news. My mom heard the news in the cockpit on her way to Isla Margarita, probably thinking she would get a special tour in the cockpit because my sister worked for that airline.

Wednesday this is 7 year ago. A lot has happened in these 7 years. The last 5 of these 7 years are truly my best years in life so far. Soon after my dad died I started playing online poker, in 2007 I changed my life for the better by losing 41kilo’s. I chased my dream of becoming a professional poker player and after a successful year in 2008 I finally had enough confidence to go pro in January 2009. I’ve enjoyed life to the max knowing that it can be over in a split second. I celebrated my 30th birthday in the place where he celebrated his 55th, knowing he would have loved that. I’ve changed as a person after November 2006, for the better and there are two key reasons for that, my dad and poker.

This year however was different. I’ve still lived life to the max. I’ve probably just closed off my most enjoyable summer ever but I didn’t go to Las Vegas for the first year since 2004 and I haven’t played nearly enough poker to consider myself still a pro. My life is changing again and while I do know I’m probably on the right path, it feels kinda wrong. I can’t get my dad back for sure and letting go of poker probably means more to me then poker alone.

What I do know is that the way I’ve lived my life over the last 5 years would have been the way my father wanted me to live my life. Besides my dad I have many other people to thank for my happiness but this blog it’s only about one person.

Thanks for everything you are still the greatest dad in the world!

Pappa

 Posted by at 2:52 am

Wintertijd

 Poker  Comments Off on Wintertijd
Oct 172013
 

Zoals ik in mijn laatste blog al schreef was de zomer erg goed, te goed waarschijnlijk. 3 keer sporten in de week, niet omdat het moest maar omdat het prachtig weer was voor een potje tennis of een rondje op de fiets. Een groot contrast met het weer van de afgelopen dagen, niets zo Hollands als zeiken over het weer natuurlijk. Het weer is niet de enige verandering, het vroeger donker worden maakt ook alles anders. ‘s avonds niet even op de fiets als het wel droog is, of liever naar het strand natuurlijk!

Dit betekend meestal wel dat het eindelijk tijd is voor andere dingen, ’s avonds wat vaker thuis blijven en TV-Series/films kijken of ouderwets eens gamen. Zo heb ik inmiddels een aardige League of Legends verslaving opgebouwd, helaas is dit spelletje niet alleen leuk om zelf te spelen, maar ook om te kijken. In september heb ik ruim 30 uur aan League of Legends matches gekeken, echt mega vet! Naast al deze ontspanning is het natuurlijk ook wel weer een perfecte tijd voor poker. Ik zou er niet aan moeten denken om bijvoorbeeld in Malta te moeten grinden zoals veel Nederlandse pokerspelers zijn gaan doen. Grinden met mooi weer? Dan weet ik wel wat “beters” te doen, des te meer respect voor alle grinders die het daar wel uithouden!

Zelf was ik ook blij dat de WCOOP weer voor de deur stond! Wat een vette toernooi series zijn dat toch altijd. Natuurlijk zijn er tijdens de WCOOP nooit low buy-ins zoals tijdens de SCOOP, maar er is wel echt voor iedereen wat wils en voor mij zijn dat natuurlijk de Limit Hold’em toernooien. Dit keer was de planning ideaal, de full-ring op donderdag en de 6max de volgende dag op de vrijdag.  De teleurstelling was daarom ook groot toen ik zowel in satellites, de full-ring en de 6max werkelijk waar helemaal niets klaar wist te spelen. Mijn pokermaatje was zelfs zoals we dat vroeger ook deden naar mijn huis gekomen om de 6max te spelen. Heerlijk ouderwets samen klikken, 2/3 van het veld was spelers die ik nog nooit Limit had zien spelen, het kon niet beter leek het op het eerste gezicht. Ook voor mijn pokermaatje viel helemaal niets zijn kant op en zo is het weer wachten op de SCOOP ergens in het voorjaar. Dat blijft toch wel het nadeel van Limit Pro zijn, goeie online Limit toernooien zijn er eigenlijk maar twee keer per jaar. Natuurlijk heb ik ook wel een aantal no-limit toernooien geprobeerd, maar ook daar liep het niet. Toch blijft het vet om bekende te railen, zeker als ze aan de finale tafel zitten van het Main Event en daar 6de worden voor $291,154.50 zoals Shane “shaniac” Schleger deed, een collega Team Online pro die eind oktober ook waarschijnlijk weer een paar dagen naar Nederland komt om hier online te grinden.

Momenteel kijk ik vooral uit naar de Master Classic of Poker in Amsterdam die 9 november begint. Ik speel zelf te weinig live en/of no-limit toernooien om €4.250 naar te leggen voor het main event maar heb me tot nu toe wel al  ingeschreven voor de €880 bounty op vrijdag en €300 speed op zaterdag. Ik twijfel nog over de €1.590 re-entry en €550 speed. Meestal als het slecht gaat ben ik na 2 live toernooien wel klaar, maar als het goed gaat zoals vorig jaar in de afsluitende €300 speed (5de) dan baal je dat je niet meer toernooien hebt gespeeld. Hoe dan ook gaat het weer een gezellig weekje worden met veel bekende. Ik ga waarschijnlijk op zondag wel weer even de PLO railen en misschien doordeweeks ook het main event. Vorig jaar had ik hier en daar wat procenten in vrienden van me die ook speelde en dat maakt het natuurlijk ook leuk om even te komen railen.

Met dit weer hoop ik op vele mooie ouderwetse zondag avondjes grinden! Op naar kerst en oud & nieuw of ben ik daar echt nog een beetje te vroeg mee?

MCOP-Pic2

 

 Posted by at 12:59 pm

Zomerreces

 Poker  Comments Off on Zomerreces
Aug 212013
 

De laatste weken ben ik heerlijk aan het genieten van de zomer. Het is al weken mooi weer en dat heeft een impact op zo’n beetje alles wat ik doe. Ik ga de laatste tijd zoveel mogelijk naar de tennisbaan om in conditie te blijven, fietsen is momenteel even tweede keuze wat helemaal geen ramp is zolang ik in ieder geval maar sport.

Ik ben redelijk vaak richting het strand geweest voor een hapje en een drankje, in deze tijd van het jaar is in Zandvoort wonen nog mooier dan in de winter, ik ga hier voor geen goud weg. In het weekend mag ik nu gelukkig ook weer een biertje na 180 dagen zonder alcohol dus de weekeinden zijn weer als vanouds met een kater op de zaterdag, zondag of natuurlijk beide. Maar door al dat leuks komt er van poker eigenlijk helemaal niets terecht, daar kan ik niet echt trots op zijn maar de motivatie is gewoon ver te zoeken. Ik heb momenteel niet echt doelen in poker en zonder doel is het lastig om de focus en motivatie te vinden om te blijven grinden. Geld is natuurlijk normaal gesproken wel de reden waarom als je full-time pokert je in ieder geval moet blijven spelen maar omdat ik makkelijk rond kom van mijn part-time salaris is die druk er helemaal niet. In vele opzichten is dat natuurlijk juist alleen maar goed, maar in dit geval zorgt het er dus voor dat ik gewoon helemaal even weg blijf van de virtuele tafels.

De zin is niet helemaal verdwenen want ik kijk op zich al uit naar de MCOP en baal eigenlijk best wel dat ik dit jaar waarschijnlijk helemaal niet naar Las Vegas ga. Een maatje twijfelt om Brummelhuis te gaan railen tijdens de WSOP finale maar ik ben niet zo van het railen en ken Brummelhuis verder ook niet. Een excuus om naar Las Vegas te gaan is het wel, dus wie weet boek ik toch nog een ticket. Het is maar te hopen dat een regenachtige herfst vroeg inzet, maar sowieso ben ik weer aanwezig tijdens de WCOOP. Met twee Limit toernooien in de laatste week is wat mij betreft het schema perfect. De eerste weken kan ik dan goed gebruiken om een beetje weer in het ritme te komen zodat ik nu wel een keer zo’n leuk armbandje naar huis kan nemen. De Mixed Hold’em krijgt ook mijn goedkeuring en het is natuurlijk nooit verveld om wat No-Limit toernooien te grinden.

Ik zit ook al weer te kijken wat ik in januari ga doen. Na 3 jaar de Bahama’s is het geen must om weer te gaan maar de laatste keer was misschien wel het leukst dus het is niet alsof de nieuwigheid eraf is. Liefst natuurlijk weer een keer het Main Event spelen ook dus waarschijnlijk dat ik wel wat qualifiers ga proberen. Sowieso wil ik wel naar de zon in het begin van 2014 dus ik ben al een beetje aan het kijken voor iets anders mocht het de Bahama’s niet worden. Mijn oog viel op de Malediven.

screenshot_303Al die foto’s die op het internet staan zijn natuurlijk echt om je vingers bij af te likken. Vliegen via Dubai en daar nog 2 dagen kijken is dan ook een optie maar het zal verder dan wel een vakantie echt niets doen worden. Het eiland rondfietsen is in ieder geval zo gebeurd en heel veel gezellige restaurantjes zijn er niet te vinden als ik zo naar de foto’s kijk.

Momenteel ben ik dus eigenlijk vooral een beetje zoekende wat op zich niet erg is want ik heb het zeker niet slecht. Over een maandje ben ik ook weer jarig en daarna moet ik maar weer eens wat doelen gaan stellen waar ik me dan de rest van het jaar in kan vastbijten. Hoofddoel is toch om fit te blijven wat dit jaar tot nu toe in ieder geval goed gelukt is. Als de poker kriebels weer toe slaan dan hoop ik toch weer gewoon mijn oude vertrouwde Limit spelletje te spelen, de laatste keren dat ik heb gespeeld wist ik aardig te winnen op de Mid Stakes tafels dus daar heeft het niet aan gelegen.

 

 Posted by at 3:45 pm

My SCOOP Main Event

 Poker  Comments Off on My SCOOP Main Event
Jun 202013
 

I figured it might be fun if I’ll do a small review of my SCOOP Main Event, the Limit Hold’em events. Let’s break it down!

SCOOP
The 20th of May was a big day for me. Online there are only 2 tourneys every year in which you can win a reasonable amount of money playing Limit Hold’em, SCOOP and WCOOP. The SCOOP even has 3 tourneys at the same time (low/medium/high) which creates a decent amount of value for experienced Limit players. The level of play in the low buy-in is never that high, the medium always gets a decent amount of runners due to the buy-in still being affordable for a tournament that only runs twice a year and the high buy-in attracts a lot of pro’s who play every SCOOP since they figure they can never be that far behind in a game as simple as Limit Hold’em or possibly they try to make a run for the SCOOP Leaderboard. That does mean that the type of “bad” players is very different between the different buy-ins, but there is value in these tourneys for sure. The variance is even higher in Limit then in No-Limit tourneys so you need a little run good but you need that anyway when you are competing in big tourneys with a relative small sample size of hands you get to play.

Satellites
The 3 main tourneys started at 20:00 and during the day there were a pretty decent amount of satellites scheduled in which I presumed was a pretty decent amount of value. I decided to play as many as I could from 15:00 onwards and I think that in the end I played roughly 90% of the satellites that run towards the medium or high buy-in. The satellites offered were in many different formats, multi table SNG’s, single table SNG’s, Hypers, Turbo’s, Steps, basically anything you can think of. Every format had a different pay-out structure so I really had to pay attention if I was playing the bubble or not, the number of players at the table certainly didn’t provide sufficient information. Some satellites only awarded one ticket which resulted in heads-up play which is always difficult to handle when you are playing 8 different satellites at the same time. I probably missed some value in mixing to many different formats at the same time but there isn’t any other day in the year in which so many Limit Hold’em satellites run so I wasn’t able to practice beforehand to prepare myself a little better.

I was lucky to win 2 tickets to the $700 qualifier to the high buy-in but that satellite wasn’t really deep stacked and after only losing 1 big hand I was already out. Not winning a $700 satellite when most other satellites only award $215 means a heavy impact on your ROI so unfortunately I finished my batch of 50 satellites with a small loss. The level of play got better during the day when more Limit regulars started to play satellites so maybe next time I need to be a bit more selective but on the other hand winning the $700 satellite would have boosted my ROI to a pretty good level so in the end it’s all down to variance.

SCOOP-L
My table draw in the low was decent, 2 good players and 3 bad ones so plenty of value there. In the first hour I managed to run up my stack to 7.000, decent with the low blinds still around. It’s nearly impossible to bust within the first hour and I certainly wasn’t planning to do so. In the 2nd hour I managed to keep a healthy stack despite running into two bad river cards which cost me two decent sized pots. During the 2nd break I had 9.100 points which was above average. Unfortunately during the 3rd hour I couldn’t take down any decent pot and when I got JJ right after the 3rd break I hoped to get a chance to double up.

Poker Stars $24.55+$2.45 Limit Hold’em Tournament – t500/t1000 Limit – 6 players – View hand 2233781
DeucesCracked Poker Videos Hand History Converter
holdi12 (CO): t2380 4.76 BBs
puule (BTN): t18790 37.58 BBs
Mr. Ilves (SB): t7660 15.32 BBs
AAmaggie (BB): t23885 47.77 BBs
Hero (UTG): t6840 13.68 BBs
efeiner (MP): t18863 37.73 BBs

Pre Flop: (1.5 SB) Hero is UTG with J of diamonds J of hearts
Hero raises, efeiner 3-bets, 3 folds, AAmaggie calls, Hero calls

Flop: (9.5 SB) 8 of clubs 2 of diamonds 5 of diamonds (3 players)
AAmaggie checks, Hero checks, efeiner bets, AAmaggie calls, Hero raises, efeiner calls, AAmaggie calls

Turn: (7.75 BB) 5 of spades (3 players)
AAmaggie checks, Hero bets, efeiner calls, AAmaggie folds

River: (9.75 BB) 7 of diamonds (2 players)
Hero bets, efeiner raises, Hero calls

Final Pot: 13.75 BB
Hero mucks J of diamonds J of hearts
efeiner shows K of diamonds A of diamonds (a flush, Ace high)
efeiner wins 13.75 BB

Well that didn’t work out as planned and since I was the Big Blind in the next hand with only 1.340 points left I had to go all-in with 65o. No help on the board so it was the low buy-in which I busted first. Ultimately the winner was Koraseg, a good regular who took down $12.314 in a $27 tournament, pretty decent for a Limit tourney! Well known fellow Dutchie Paul “padjes” Berende took down 4th place winning $4.548.

SCOOP-M
In the 1st hour of the medium not much had happened but in the 2nd hour I could finally get some things going. The most notable however was the fun atmosphere at the table which doesn’t happen a lot online since most people don’t have a lot of time to chat. Since the Limit community is rather small most people know each other and I happened to have a table full of familiar faces. Even people jumped in from the rail and because I was only playing 3 tourneys it was easy to chat along which made it almost feel like a live tourney at some moments. The table wasn’t that easy and those players who weren’t familiar busted first and got replaced by other familiar faces. Luckily I was doing pretty well and after the 3rd hour I was constantly in the top100. With 35.000 points after the 4th hour I was really doing well and a couple of good players already busted at my table so it was time to start running over the table. The poker gods however had another plan and I either got unplayable hands or hands at the bottom of my range with flops which only cost more money. 5 marginal hands later and I busted in 107th place, 84 places got paid. Calvin “Cal42688” Anderson managed to win the tourney, taking home $23.634 which also was a pretty decent amount for a Limit tourney, luckily I was still in the high!

SCOOP-H
This was definitely the highlight of the SCOOP for me. My Main Event! The field wasn’t as tough as last year, as expected many “Pro’s” who played about any SCOOP tourney also played this one. 131 players signed up and I think about 50% of them were Limit regulars, which means it had a pretty decent value for a $2.100 buy-in. The 1st hour was uneventful but during the 2nd hour I was able to almost double my start stack. After 4 hours of play I had over 16.000 points which was pretty decent at that time and I was pretty happy with both my table and my game. This was at the same moment as when I was still doing good in the medium as well so I had a lot of confidence making the money in both of them. As said during the 5th hour I busted the medium but I was still doing good in the high and since I was only playing 1 table now I could fully focus on “the big one”. At the end of the 6th hour when we were pretty close to the money already I played the following hand:

Poker Stars $2000+$100 Limit Hold’em Tournament – t500/t1000 Limit – 6 players – View hand 2233802
DeucesCracked Poker Videos Hand History Converter
john_baird_1 (BTN): t22331 44.66 BBs
blanconegro (SB): t30535 61.07 BBs
SixZeros (BB): t3495 6.99 BBs
Hero (UTG): t23818 47.64 BBs
72bestcard (MP): t26255 52.51 BBs
B00mslang (CO): t24689 49.38 BBs

Pre Flop: (1.5 SB) Hero is UTG with Q of clubs Q of hearts
Hero raises, 3 folds, blanconegro 3-bets, 1 fold, Hero calls

Flop: (7 SB) J of hearts 3 of spades 2 of spades (2 players)
blanconegro bets, Hero calls

Turn: (4.5 BB) 9 of clubs (2 players)
blanconegro bets, Hero raises, blanconegro calls

River: (8.5 BB) 5 of spades (2 players)
blanconegro checks, Hero bets, blanconegro raises, Hero calls

Final Pot: 12.5 BB
blanconegro shows A of spades K of spades (a flush, Ace high)
Hero mucks Q of clubs Q of hearts
blanconegro wins 12.5 BB

As you can see this hand is almost identical as the one in the low with the exception that I was in position in this hand which made me raise the turn instead of check/raising the flop. The hand is pretty standard but winning this one would have given me a really healthy stack meaning I could easily navigate myself to the money. I had work to do again and this worked out pretty good at first despite the fact my new table had 3 High Stakes Limit regulars who I consider better then myself. After going up and down I open 3 times but 3 times I don’t hit anything on the flop and following those 3 hands I’m not able to play a hand post-flop for 9 orbits! This had nothing to do with me playing tight, I just didn’t get a single opportunity to play a hand. Meanwhile we were down to 20 players with 18 paid and the other tables were stalling a bit since the bubble was worth $3.406. 3/4 other players had about the same stacksize as I did and winning 1 big pot would probably be enough but as long as that didn’t happen I had to try and keep my stack at the same level, not bleeding too much chips every round by paying the blinds. I open 76o on the BTN and flop nothing, I defend T9s in the big blind but again nothing and after 10 orbits of not picking up a single good hand my A3s on the cutoff looked really sweet:

Poker Stars $2000+$100 Limit Hold’em Tournament – t800/t1600 Limit – 5 players – View hand 2233808
DeucesCracked Poker Videos Hand History Converter
Shhh00kem (UTG): t46428 58.03 BBs
Hero (CO): t7618 9.52 BBs
GripDsNutz (BTN): t34677 43.35 BBs
facel3ssvoid (SB): t13516 16.89 BBs
Sasuke234 (BB): t54688 68.36 BBs

Pre Flop: (1.5 SB) Hero is CO with A of clubs 3 of clubs
1 fold, Hero raises, GripDsNutz 3-bets, 2 folds, Hero calls

Flop: (7.5 SB) 4 of hearts 2 of diamonds J of spades (2 players)
Hero checks, GripDsNutz bets, Hero raises, GripDsNutz calls

Turn: (5.75 BB) Q of clubs (2 players)
Hero bets, GripDsNutz calls

River: (7.75 BB) A of hearts (2 players)
Hero bets, GripDsNutz raises, Hero calls all in

Final Pot: 10.273 BB
Hero shows A of clubs 3 of clubs (a pair of Aces – lower kicker)
GripDsNutz shows A of spades T of hearts (a pair of Aces)
GripDsNutz wins 10.273 BB

I hoped that my semi-bluf on the flop looked pretty strong since committing so many chips close to the bubble must mean I had something. I almost jumped up hitting the river but instead of hitting the jackpot I had to call with my half a bet left and busted in 20th place just 2 places short of the money. Out, no $68.120 even worse, nothing at all. As a cashgame player I really can’t ever get used to the feeling of busting tourneys this deep. 7 hours of play for nothing and my “Main Event” was over. Looking at the remaining players less than 50% were Limit regulars, I really had hoped for more but those last 10 orbits were really killing. The structure of the tourney was really good, meaning there was a lot of room for post-flop play but you still need to pick up a hand every now and then. After a pretty long heads-up it was Jarcon86 who took it down.

Now I can only wait till the WCOOP since I’m skipping the WSOP this year. I was pretty close to booking a ticket after I busted because I really love playing “big” Limit tourneys. Last WCOOP I finished 11th so I hope to do better this year!

 Posted by at 2:44 pm