My Main Event

I'm out.

Funny day of poker, for the majority of it i was in complete control and totally comfortable, then the last 2 hours was a total grind.

When i sat down at the table i recognised one face and quickly realised i was sitting opposite Minh Ly, who appeared in high stakes poker. I couldn't remember much about his game, but someting told me he was pretty tight in that game. Of course he could play totally differently in a tournament, but i figured i would be careful when playing pots against him.

Within the first 30mins, it became apparant that the majority of the table were pretty weak. From my left:

• Old guy who bluffed heavily and badly post flop, but played passively preflop

• American in his 30s who mini raised and check/mini raised a lot with marginal hands "to see where he was"
• American in his 30s who appeared pretty solid, but in a passive way
• Young American who was raising junk in every seat and trying to "play poker" but who wasn't willing to fire more than one bullet after he missed, rendering his style useless.
• Minh Ly - played a lot of hands, and played them all very passively, he check folded when he missed every single time.
• American in his 30s who appeared quite solid, then showed down K4 having limped in mid, he then later proved his donkeyness by calling a 3 bet out of position with T5s and getting it all in preflop for 200 bbs with TT.
• Exceptionally corpulent American fellow in his late 20s who called far too many raises in and out of position, and loved a hero call on the river.
• 50 year old American who limped in with a lot of junk, never raised and called down with marginal hands, overvalued massively - inexperienced in live play.

So yeah... i was pretty pleased with my draw.

At the first break i was down to 15k having lost a few chips trying to setmine, then trying to outplay the loose player who had flopped trips - whoops. This didn't concern me too much as the chips were all still at the table and i figured i could get them back easily enough.

At the 2nd break i had chipped up to 24k without a showdown. In this time i did get a few hands, but also managed to make well timed continuation bets on favourable boards for me. Shortly after the 2nd break i raised to 1600 with AA in the sb after two limpers for 300, and the old guy in the bb shoved for 6.5k, i called he sighed and tabled 44, flopped a gutshot draw and got there on the turn.

Down to 20k, i managed to catch some cards, 3bet squeeze pre a few time and grind my way to 34k at the dinner break - good job.

At the break i spoke to quite a few ppl and a lot of them were saying how they were looking to hang on until day 2. This really wasn't my intention, and i have a plethora of reasons for this, the main ones being:

1. Other people will be playing tight to hang in - exploit them
2. As the tournament progresses the dead money will drop away, i want to get the easy chips now before someone better than them gets them.
3. I'm playing to win, and an effective tourny strategy is not to play to cash, then to shoot for the final table.

After dinner it proved to be tough for me, and i found people hitting some hands vs me, and come the next break i was at 29k - far from the end of the world though.

Just before the final level my table broke and i was moved to a truely horrible seat. I had 3 tight, bad english guys to my right and 4 foreign loose aggro guys with chips to my left. So when i opened light they could 3 bet me, and the guys to my right weren't opening light so i couldn't 3 bet them as effectively.

My stack dwindled a little but i found myself on 27k when i saw a spot to pull a move.

The chip leader raised 3x to 1200 @ 200/400/50 in early (position meant nothing to his range), 40 yr old american who had splashed around a bit called, english guy called. I really felt like it was a good spot to pick up some chips, and despite looking down at J2o i bumped it to 5.5k. Oh god... American guy called.

At this point it is tricky, as i have created a 12k pot and I have 22k back, i have total air and I'm out of position - it's just ugly. I thought he could have a mid pair and was just seeing the flop, so i was prepared to fire again.

Flop J 6 8 rainbow. Oh god....

I just flopped top pair, but i know I'm still bluffing.

I led out for 6k and he instantly moved in. I knew, i just knew that he wasn't bluffing. I really thought he had a set, and even if he didn't, i felt his range was 66/88/JJ+,AJ, which I'm absolutely crushed against. The pot was offering me a great price, but that's irrelevant if you're drawing near dead. After 2mins of pulling my hair out i eventually folded asking him if he had a set and he showed KK.

I blinded down a little then picked up KQhh in late position. I had 13k, an m of 13 with the blinds and antes. The chip leader limpe din UTG - he hadn't limped much. It was folded to me. I think i perhaps made an error here, i limped behind. It is tricky, if i had raised i would have made it 1400 from 400 probably, but creates a pot of 3850 going to the flop with me having 11.5k back. If i miss, which i will do most of the time, i surely have to c-bet most boards, and if he plays back that is say another 2k of my stack invested so I'm down to 9.5k, ie losing 1/5 of my stack. But limping creates other problems....

The sb folded and the bb checked.

Flop 2d 6c Kd

BB leads for 1.6k.... utg folds. Ok what's my play??

I called to control the pot and to disguise my hand a little, i'm representing a draw here or maybe a hand like 67s or 77/88.

Turn 8h

He fires 4k - oh oh, can i fold here? I felt i could, i really did, but it was a tough spot. Because of my smooth call on the flop he could fire another bullet here to chase out the draw, or even on the draw himself. I felt he could have dd or KJ/KT as i had underrepped my hand thus far. At that point i felt there was enoguh in the pot, so shoved for just over 6k more.

He thought for 20 seconds, asked how much it was, then called and tabled 22 for the flopped set! I definitely could have folded, but I'm not sure if i should, although his turn bet was very strong.

GG me 15mins before the end of day 1c.

I hastily left the pokerroom, headed back to the Manadalay where i discovered my friends were at the Rio waiting for me... So after a quick turnaround i headed back and drowned my sorrows until 6am.

There's always next year!

Tomorrow Team Pokerroom have organised a golf excursion, which will be a timely break from Vegas and all things poker! (who am i kidding, I'm going golfing with 70 poker players, i wonder what the no. 1 subject of conversation will be?!)

Until next time,

Neil.