Scraped through to Day 2

The two casinos seems to have shot themselves in the foot by running the competing events. Numbers were down drastically at the Genting on previous tournaments with only 51 players entering the Day 1A event and they,ll probably  get a similar number for Day 1b today.
There will still be in the region of £15,000 up for grabs, but there was basically no point have two day 1,s!

Edinburgh hosts competing main events.

Big weekend for poker players in Edinburgh. The 2 main casinos in Edinburgh, the Maybury and the Genting at Fountain Park are both having competing tournaments for the Easter weekend.The Maybury Scottish Poker Tour started yesterday and had a 117 turnout for day 1A with a £250 buy in.

I,m playing the £110 + £50 add on, 2 day event at the Genting Casino I,m free rolling as won a couple of seats but I made a mistake selling my 2nd seat - should have used it as insurance, if I get busted out today.
 I could have entered day 1B tomo. We,ll see how it goes..

Another decent cash and a boot in the nuts.

I should really be delighted after getting my 3rd cash in the last 3 tournaments:

I finished a respectable fourth from about 75 runners for a decent payout of £350.
I,ve already made nearly all the money I need for this years Vegas trip.
I also won another seat for a promotional £110 game in April.

Not bad right?... but no poker journey is ever complete without the bad beat story, poker does get under your skin a bit, and I left a bit steamed after getting launched out of the tourney at 5am after a weird turn of events .

Good run continues.

I managed another decent result in last nights tournament. I got 3rd place out of about 70 players.

I got a real help about half way through the tournament with 1 big hand where I raised with pocket 4's.
The board came down jj8, I c-bet the flop and got 2 callers. turn card was a 4 so I bet again, one of the guys calls again and the other guy reraises.

 I flat his raise to keep the other guy in and then the last guy shoves all in, as does player 2 and I call as well. one guy turns over AJ and the other KJ!! River bricks and I,ve got a decent stack.

I got to the final table, as one of the short stacks-as usual, and basically ground my way through until we got down to the last 3. The chip leader who I had been picking off quite nicely for most of the night, limped in the SB to me and I picked up AQ. I put a decent raise in up to about 60k blinds were 12000/6000/500 and had about 140k so I was pretty much commiting myself anyway. He calls, the flop comes down 9, 10, j. He checks, I c-bet, he shoves all in and I call the bet.
He turns over 10, 8 of hearts so we,ve both got the same straight draw buts he,s already hit. Turn and river bricks and I,m busto in 3rd.
Its been a good week - I,ve got another £430 towards the Vegas battle fund! Thats about £1400 this week, This is accumulating quicker than I had envisaged! I also picked up another free seat for a promotional £100 game in April so I,ll get to sell one of them as well.

Biggest Win Of Year - Vegas sorted!

I managed my biggest win of the year to date and my 1st outright win. I,ve played 12 live tourneys and cashed in 4 of them.

Structure was:

4k start stack

5k first add on

6k 2nd add on.

There were 70 odd players.

I thought I wouldn,t make it to the 1st break at one stage. I blew my initial stack after running Jacks in to Kings. Got my add on, and dusted that hitting King high flush v Ace high flush. I then raised pre with pocket kings, got 2 callers, I c bet the q high flop and called the all in re-raise bet on the queen high flop - guy had AQ, and no ace came...

From then on in I ground my way along with no real stack until making the final table.

Final table chipcounts were: me on about 55k, one guy had about 35k and the other 7 players had between 150-200k each.

The table was a great laugh, and shortstack 2 was playing pretty unorthodox poker. He would jam all in with K-10, K - J, or K-Q and proudly show them, but muck his rag aces. The guy to my right raised my blind every single time - if someone else hadn,t - and I could be too patient as blinds were 6k/3k. I survived the 1st after jamming with A7 off to his raise - J 10 showed and missed. Jammed again with pocket tens a while later and survived v AJ

With 7 places paid yours truly and shortstack 2 were hoping for a couple of early bust outs to make the cash - and we got them. The two of us then carried on shipped all in as required for about another 2 or 3 hours before the next guy went out - it was a total war of attrition, and the big stacks just could not put us out.

When the next guy finally went we were down to 6 and it went quick after that. I hit a nice patch of cards and I think I knocked pretty much all of them out. I,d  button raised with a suited 8, 5 and turned a flush v 2 pr, 1st one knocked out, called an All in with 10,s v 9,s - they held. Called another jam with AK and it held, Can,t remember the last one, but we ended up heads up with me massive chip leader. We done a bit of a deal with the prize money and I walked with £950. And that was that. Sweet as a nut. Only downer was the 5am finish, as I was up at 7am for work!

Vegas travel fund sorted - might even get a bit of a bank roll together for it.

Poker Home Game

I used to be playing at homegames every month or two, but they,ve dropped in frequency alot over the last couple of years - what with folk having kids and generally life catching up with them I guess.
I hosted a game at my place for the 1st time in maybe 3 years. We got 8 players together and a load of beer and whisky - the way poker was when you first started - spillages galore, disputes about the music, about the rules, etc - great night.
I,m going to try and keep the momentum going and see if it can become a bit more regular.

I got dusted in 4th place after I hit middle pair, he got an open ended flush draw, money went in and turn completed the flush...

LAS VEGAS 2013

One of the guys from last nights game was talking about heading over with me for this years Vegas trip, I also just got a message from my cousin who,s heading back over in September so theres a few options open.

Bad Fold - Sunday Millions

I got a free $11 seat to play on Full Tilt's Sunday Million game.
Its the first time I played on the full tilt site, and its the first time I,ve had to wait half an hour to be seated at an online tournament!! WTF!

Anyway, I busted just short of the money after missing out on this treble up opportunity along the way:

Blinds were  600/300/50.
I raised UTG +2 to 2100, guy on my left jams all in for 14k,  2nd players jams all in as well for about 17k, so I muck my pocket 8,s.
Board runs out as above.

I bust out of tourney not long after.