Monday, April 24, 2006

The Carribbean Poker Classic

This was first taste of offline tournament poker , late night poker ace being just a single sixpac.

Held at the marriot resort in St Kitts i knew this would be a very different experience to anything i had done before in my life.

I played stts out there and 2 multis before the main event. I was in profit for the stts and the experience of the multis was invaluable to someone that never plays live. I also played in 2 finals of their designer watch freerolls which were the omaha hi/lo pl and omaha pl. 5/10 in both which i was happy with as started with joint weakest stack in both and went out for pots to go chip leader if they held up. I also played in the team game for Littlewoods and missed a few coinflips after a lot of nice early cards to only finish in 3rd in my sixpac, again valuable experience.

The main event, i had day 1A rocked it for the first 2 hours and found my 6k stack down the 4k. Also found no real decent cards so i decided to up a gear as i knew my table image was a rock. Had a beer at the break and convinced myself i would agress more and gamble a bit. It worked and i got back to the 6k starting stack by the time the next 2 hr break came. I had a very tough table with some high stakes players and i new that so when 1 or 2 other weaker players came i found myself a bit more relaxed. Key pot for me at the table had to be AKc UTG.

Raised to 600 (bb = 200) . Only the big blind called (a high stakes player) and flop 964 with 2 clubs I knew i would get as many chips as possible in if i was raised on the flop and intended to bet big. I bet 1000 into the pot and he flat called, strange i thought as he had about 5k in total and i had 6k ...pot was already big and i expected a raise or fold, i basically put him on a draw but i knew he could have flopped a set. Turn came , almost perfect card the Ks, my experience during the week kicked in and when he checked to me i did a quick weak check as i knew he would bluff me or bet out regardless of river anyway. River was what seemed a horrible card 9h pairing the top pair flop, nbot what i wanted to see. He bet about 2500 and i had a good think always fully intending to call but trying to see how many chips i had left and also whether there was any tell on the guy as to whether he wanted a call. I called and he mucked instantly , i absolutely luved this as i was able to take the pot without showing my AKc so the guys at the table still probably considered me a weak player as they had no real information on me.

Another key hand just before we split was JJ in the big blind, i was still in gambling mood with 7-8k and when utg raised the 400 bb to 1600 i moved all in for my whole stack. He showed the high staker players to his left when mucking and i instantly announced "show one, show all" to see a KQoff but more importantly to get under their skin which amazingly it seems to do. I used this tactic throughout the tournament to try and pick up on as much information as possible.

When i moved to another table my 10k stack at 600bb wasnt ideal but i was very happy to still be in. This doubled on a 679 board with 66 when a same size stack had KK. My stack was 20k ish and the day off while day 1B played ws invaluable as i was very tired having put so much effort into my game.

When the 2nd day began it was being played to the final table with about 70-80 players running. i wasnt in too bad a position but i fully intended not just to make the money but to go as far as possible. I proved this when i put my increased stack of 28k all in preflop with only AQoff when the blinds were still only 1200, i thought the reraiser was at it and was proved right when he called me with AQstd, i almost hit a four card flush board which would have given me a monster stack but i was very happy with the spilt as i had lost AKoff vs AKstd on day 1A for a 9k pot in the last hour.

I was very active around the bubble time with any middle hands, i was surprised how unchallenged i was and so many people blinded out towards the money. When the money did come they dropped like flies as u would expect as there were so many short stacks.

Anyway made it to the last 15 and was probably one of the top 6 stacks before i called an all in overraise with 77 as i put the guy on AK or AQ and had 30k spare left i decided to gamble as i wanted to get the big stack to guarantee the final table of 6. The pot was for the chiplead about 200k pot but he turned over JJ and with no help i was in danger zone short stack territory.

I then lost a pot against a stack i had covered...about 50k pot JJ vs 88 and became even weaker.
Doubled through but then lost another 50k ish pot again where i had the guy covered with KJ vs J10off. Board in order was K7389 , made good tv at the tv table but i was sick after that flop. I went out a few hands later after trebling my tiny stack , K2 vs AQ sealed my fate of 13th.

I was happy with about £10k but i know my 77 call cost me big, i also know i was very unlucky after that but once you are all in preflop u have to take the consequences if u r outdrawn.

No comments: