Cheering for Martin Weber

The second day of the IPO started about an hour late at the Jackpot Club. The Jackpot Club is an awful choice for a final day of an event like that. The Club is located in a small street south of the city center. It's very small and crampy. So they had to split the field and one half of the players had to play at the Colossus Club next door. Not much room for the spectators in both rooms and after some time they didn't allow any spectators at all till the last two tables. Hopefully they get sorted these problems for next year as this was beside, some minor things, a really great event in general. If they do it again I will be back for sure!

Martin Weber, the last standing from the german poker players, was in very good condition. Beside a small downswing in the beginning his stack went up and up till 1 Million chips. He finally reached the final table and busted one player immediately there. But with over 2 Million chips and six players left he ran into a real bad beat as his AQ lost against K5 with a five on the river which bought him back down to 1.2 Million chips.

A little later the remaining six decided for a deal und split the money according to the chipcount. They were quite equal in chips so they all received something between 10K and 15K Euros. They played out the winner title and €1,200 separately after the deal. Therefore Martin got a little over €10.000,- in prize money due to his chipcount. Big Payday and congratulations. That was a long day for all of them (over 14 hours of play) but at the end you saw a lot of tired but happy faces. Great Job from Stephen McLean and his team! Although I didn't make it to day two I can say that this was one the best tournaments I've ever played in. Ireland has shown Europe how a huge but affordable poker tournament can be offered without taking the skill out of the game of poker.

Back row:
second from the left - Martin Weber
second from the right - Colin King (Winner)

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My IPO lasted only 6 hours

I woke up well refreshed and felt very good in the morning. A nice breakfast and a 15 minute walk to the bus in the fresh but sunny air was a good preparation for the upcoming tournament. I was there early to take some pictures and enjoyed the atmosphere as the people arrived. With all the empty tables (and later full tables) in the hall it was some kind of WSOP feeling here.

Stephen McLean and his crew did a great job to make this a wonderful tournament with a €134,000 prize-pool. But as expected several people showed up asking if they can still get in paying cash. But Stephen was very clear in the past that only online registered people will play. So he turned them all down. It was amazing how "prepared" several people had been for this. There was a french guy at my table (he's part of some hands below) who didn't have a place to stay for tonight. And he wasn't willing to pay more than €30-40 per night. Good luck! And there was a guy from Portugal that came here without having a confirmation that he was signed in. Very brave guy. But in general there were a lot of happy faces when the tournament started about 20 minutes past noon.

I had a decent start and was able to get my stack from the 10,000 starting chips to 13,000 during the first levels. I didn't play a lot of hands but those I played paid at least something. The most remarkable hand was a limped 78s that made two pair on the flop and improved to a full house on the river. But two pair would have been enough anyway to take that one down.

Somewhat later I got my first beat. I just checked AJ in the big blind and the flop came J-J-5 with two diamonds. To get out a possible flushdraw I decided to bet here. Everybody folded except a french player who raised to double my bet. I called. Turn was a 4, no diamond. I bet half the pot and he called. River was a Ten, again no diamond. No flush and no straight possible. I bet out again and he called ... showing TT for a rivered full house vs. my set of Jacks. Down to 8,000 chips. But still enough chips for decent play. Somewhat later I limped with T9 of spades and the flop came 8 of spades, Jack of spades and a Ten of diamonds. What a flop. I had Top pair crappy kicker and an open ended straight flush draw. And again I was in a betting war with the french guy. Fortunately I had the better end this time. No, I didn't made the flush or the straight but a ten on the river made me a set. Although he folded to my river bet I was back to 12,000 chips.

After our table broke I took down a nice pot with 99 vs. 88 when a 9 showed up on the flop. At the dinner break I was up to 15,900.

After the dinner break I didn't get much to play. With blinds 300/600 in level 7 I raised AQs to 1,800 from UTG. It was folded to the BB who went all in for about 15,000. No way I could call this. Down to 13,600. In the very next hand I received KK in the big blind. MP raised to 1,800 and the same guy from the hand before went all-in from the SB with about 16,000. I had seen the middle position guy raise several types of hands this way so this just meant that he had some kind of hand. And I had him covered (he had only about 6,000 chips left). As I was sure that the all-in raiser didn't have Aces here the only possible action was to call his all-in. There was no way I would fold my Kings here (although I didn't liked the fact that I had to risk my tournament life here). The original raiser went into the tank and finally folded JJ face up. The all-in guy said "bad time for a move" and showed TT. Well, it was the right time ... for him. A Ten on the flop ended a wonderful tournament and I was out in 792nd position of 1072 players after around 6 hours.

This is definately one of the worst ways a tournament like that can end. I will go back later for some cash game and to get more informations about the action as I will write a german report which can be found her at IntelliPoker.

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Dublin and the IPO - the day before

My trip to Ireland was somewhat rough but I finally made it. First thing was that the trains in Germany are on strike this Friday. Therefore the schedule was reduced to one train every hour (instead of every 20 minutes) and I had to go to the airport much earlier than planned. Good thing: there's a Starbucks that just recently opened at the Munich airport. So I got breakfast there. I told you before that I'm a Starbucks addict!

Du to the fact that I was flying on Delta freemiles I had to fly with Air France via Paris. The original connecting time was 85 minutes. But our flight was late due to heavy traffic and the timeframe was reduced to 55 minutes. Connecting in Paris is awful but with less than an hour it's a nightmare. To make things worse the police stopped our bus from the plane to the gate because they were looking for somebody. So we had to present our passports before they let us go. Still enough time ... until you reach security. The security people in Paris are definately the slowest working people I've ever seen in my life. A turtle is "road runner" compared to those people.

But finally I made it to my flight at the latest possible time and had a good flight to Dublin. Before we landed in Dublin we flew over the city and thanks to a window seat I had a wonderful view upon the city center and the highlands in the back. The weather is very nice. Sunny and about 17 degrees celsius. My hotel room is wonderful. It's a nice old building with high ceilings and a good quality standard. And the Jackpot Club is just around the corner. I really hope I make it to day 2 to play there!

Before I met with some of the other german and austrian players I made a short tour through the city center and some of the older streets (e.g. Fleet Street where a lot of traditional pubs are located). Finally we met at Cassidy's and had a nice evening and some good poker stories to tell. Some of the guys decided to check out the €50 deep-stack tournament at the Jackpot Club but I decided to go back to the hotel writing my blog entry and going to bed early.

Tournament starts at noon but I try to be there early to get some of the action and shoot some pictures when 1,100 people arrive for the biggest tournament that ever happend in Europe.

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Vienna - No Happy End

Today was the last day of my trip to Austria and it got as worse as it could be. You like to hear some examples? AK pairs the King on the turn but is up against AA. Pocket KK loses due to an Ace on the Flop. Making a move ... up against QQ. This list could be continued forever. I was on the wrong end every time a hand was important. And to add insult to injury I got the best starting hands since the last seven days. But this cost me a lot of chips in the 10+5 rebuy tournament and resultet in an early exit at the end of the rebuy time. And it was very expensive in the cashgame. There was nothing I could do. This day was definately jinxed.

I know that this is normal variance ... but hey, who said that negative variance has to happen on the last day of a great week of Poker?

Anyway, tormorrow I will be back home and sort out some things before I start to the IPO in Dublin. So far they have 843 participants (9 from Germany, 2 from Austria and 5 from Switzerland) and the record for the biggest european tournament will be broken when the tournament starts.

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A Tale of Justice

Our dance competition in Stockerau was much fun but our own results could have been better. The german team in general had a quite good night as we got two couples to the finals placing 2nd and 6th.

I'm still in Austria because I extended my stay and played another €20+5 tournament at the Poker Royale. I lost a big pot in the beginning when I missed a huge draw and was down from 8,000 to about 6,500 after just a few hands. I wasn't able to play a single hand till level 4. With blinds 250/500 I found AKs in LP. It was raised to 1,000 with another caller. I went all with my remaining 5,000 and was called by both players. And finally my AK nemesis became a winner. I flopped the nut flush against JJ and KQ and more than trippled up to 17,000 chips.

After the break I raised TT in MP and got called from Mr. Crazy (He had just busted a player before the break when he went all-in with 68 vs. AQ and caught 6's on flop and turn). The flop came T67. I checked my set, expecting him to bet but he just checked. Turn was an 8. I bet 2,000 into a 4,000 pot and he raised it to 4,000. I made it 8,000 and he called. River was a 4 and I put him all-in for just a few more chips. He called and a set wasn't good enough here as he had called my initial raise with 45 off-suit.

Down to less then 7,000 my stack was reduced more and more by the blinds and I finally went all-in with Q6 for just 4,000 and got called by AJ. No help and out on 86th of 136 after around two hours.

Justice - Part I

I wasn't involved in that but liked it nevertheless. Shortly before I busted there was a hand between Mr. Crazy-Chipleader and another big stack. Guess what? ... Mr. Crazy flopped a set of 3's but had to pay off his opponent who went all-in on the river after he rivered a straight with 46. Back to medium-stack for Mr. Crazy. That must have hurt ... I know for sure that this hurts ;-)

Justice - Part II

This time I was involved. I was playing at the €1/1 cashgame for a few minutes as to my delight Mr. Crazy (who just had busted from the tournament too) joined the game. The funny part of the following two hours was that he made money from the others by playing crazy and being a luckbox but transfered a good chunck of his winnings to me. I can't go into details for obvious reasons but I was controlling him from the beginning and obviously he never understood completely what happend to him. Unfortunately he left after about two hours and the table eventually broke. As I had already trippled my buy-in I called it a night.

I ran the TT hand from the tournament through my head several times and decided that I was somewhat unlucky here. There's always risk involved if you slowplay a hand. But slowplaying a set of Tens isn't a huge mistake on that kind of a flop. Should I have expected that my opponent was holding 45 (or maybe T9) on a 678 board? I knew that this guy had a wide range of hands but calling a pre-flop raise with that hand was nothing I expected even from that guy. Well, at least until that moment.

In general it was a good night. I made a nice win and played way better at the cashgames than two nights before. I was able to control a crazy player and take advantage of him at the right time without getting into risk & gamble mode. Looks like I feel more and more comfortable with the cashgames (at least live).

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