Almost Vegas

That was tough ... and weird! I played the $24+2 WSOP tournament at FullTilt.
This tourney had 89 players and first place was a $1.500 buy-in for a WSOP preliminary event and added $500 for expenses. Place 2 to 4 paid some small money.

Somewere during the middle of the tournament I lost a coinflip and was down to 90 chips. Average stack at this time was about 4.000. I was able to hang in, increase my stack and made it to the final table.
At the final table I busted one player and became third in chips. Unfortunatly I couldn't get any good cards from there and others doubled and tripled their stacks.
We were down to 4 players (Me about 20.000 / Shortstack 12.000 / BigStack 61.000 and another stack who wasn't important for the hand with about 40.000) as I was dealt 99.
Some betting and raising between me, shortstack and bigstack. I thought about laying down my hand but already commited to much to the pot. And - despite of the small cash win for plce 2 to 4 it was all about the first prize. With the shortstack winning - I would have been the shortstack, with the bigstack winning he was dominating us all.
So I decided for calling all-in (knowing I was probably second or third here). But I didn't expect what happend now:

Shortstack: JJ
Me: 99
Bigstack: TT

Flop came 49J - great I will lose to the shortstack but will win something from the bigstack's sidepot. Turn was blank ... but the river brought the infamous Ten - Good Bye Vegas...

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Schenefeld again

I had to go to Hamburg again for some business and was able to make it at the right time ;-))

So I went to the €200+10 Single-Table tournament on Tuesday in Schenefeld. Technically it isn't a "Single-Table" anymore. They had 22 people and played it as multi-table tournament (2x11). With 5 places getting paid between €1.400 and €380 I had no objections at all. Looks like they are willing to make it 3-table if the number of sign-ups increases.

It was good organized but started somewhat late due to a computer crash (they use the tournament software for these tournaments too).

The blind structure is tough. 15 min. blinds starting at 20/20 and then 20/40 ... doubling from there. With 1.500 chips the first two levels are "easy going" but should be used to increase your stack as much as possible otherwise you're doomed for "all-in" quite soon.

I didn't get anything except for an A10 that beat a K10 due to the kicker. Nice double-up. But that wasn't enough to stay in the game. I lost most of my stack of 1.900 (at 160/320 blinds) with an all-in against a short-stack. Next all-in a few round later and I doubled my stack to 1.600 with a coinflip that rivered me a straight. Next hand all-in with K9 ... no help against A9 and out on 11th place.

With a slightly above average stack it shoud be quite easy to make it into the money as the short stacks should bust out fast on the final table.

I know this tournament is designed to be over in a short time but with that number of players they should really think about adding some blind levels. For example instead going from 80/160 to 160/320 and 320 / 640 directly they could add a 120/240 and a 240/480 in between. That would be just 30 minutes more in total but should help to make it a much better tournament.

Nevertheless ... I will play it again if I'm in Hamburg again.

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