£300 + £30 No Limit Freezeout 10,000 chips, 45 minute clock (2 day event) @ DTD, Nottingham
37th out of 131 after 7 hours of play isn't really satisfying. But honestly, it was the best result that was possible today. The tournament started already in a weired way. In the first hand of the tournament there was some raise and re-raise preflop. More raise and re-raise on the flop and finally an all-in and call. Didn't they know we start with 10K Chips and have 45 min. levels?
As you might have expected it was AA vs. KK. The Aces held up and we had a chipleader with 20K chips. I got some playable hands but never connected strong enough to the flop to make some powerplays. Nevertheless I managed to keep my stack as high as 8,500 or more at all times.
Somehow I had already made it to 12,000 when this hand arrived: There was a raise in front of me and I called with JJ. Flop came 55J ... bingo! He checked and I checked. Turn is a King. He checked again, as do I. River is a 2 and he bet 1,500. I raised to 4,000 he went all-in for just 2,600 more and I called. My Full House Jacks lost against Full House Kings :-(
That was a real turning point in my tournament. Had I won that hand I would have had a comfortable stack of more than 25K (and would have been able to play hands that I wasn't even able to consider as short-stack). Of course I could have bet on the flop here ... but I dought that he would have folded his Kings. And by the way, an opponent with a strong starting hand is what we all wish for in that situation. A guy who thinks he has a good hand but is in fact a 92% underdog on the flop. Playing carefull just because he might hit his two-outer? Not my style!
Down to 6K I went all-in a few hands later with 66 and was up against AK. Hit my set on the Flop and made quads on the River. Back to 12k but almost shortstack. Later succeded with a nice squeeze play and went heads-up against a shortstack. Unfortunately my AK didn't improve and his 44 held up. Somewhat down again. Same Squeeze play with the exact same people again somewhat later. Again I got AK but this time I was up against ... AK. We split the pot and another opportunity was missed.
That was the biggest issue of todays tournament: I didn't had too many good opportunities but besides the quad sixes I wasn't able to take advantage of these rare opportunities at all. For the last hours I was aboslutely card dead. What can you do when your fold equity goes south but your best hands are 63, 47, and of course K-low, Q-low etc. in several variations.
At the end (5 minutes before day 1 ended) I got my opportunity: I had King-Spades, Two of hearts in the Big Blind. There was a call, and another call and I checked. Flop came two spades with 9-5-4. All checked. Turn is a 2 of spades. Hell, what do I wait for I had hit a pair and had a flush-draw. Went all in with 6,700 chips. First guy folded, second one called me with 8-9. River was the 8 of hearts and I had missed another good opportunity ... and was out of the tournament.
With K2s being my best hand for a long time you may imagine who painfull the last two levels had been. But as said before: There wasn't much I could have done better and I stayed as long as possible. It just wasn't meant to be that night.
Today is the £200+20 event which has the same structure as today but you get "only" 7,500 chips. So it's designed as a two-day event too.
Some words about the DuskTillDawn club at the end. It's a very nice poker club! 45 tables on 3 different levels make a great impression. The tables are big enough for 9 people and most dealers are very professionell. But some things are very unusual: Beverage service takes your money when you order your drink, not when it is delivered. They have about 20 public computer terminals there that can be used for surfing or playing online poker. But the best thing: They publish the tournament results on their website while the tournament is still running. During every break the dealers count all chips and they update the chipcount. They know exactly who's located were ... so they can build a complete list of every placement (with the correct names). Truly amazing.
While our tournament was started the £1,000 4-Day-Main-Event was still running. Christiano Blanco and Maria Demetriou were some of the best known players in the field. That event used the exact identical structure of the WSOP main-event and drew 186 participants. Great tournament but unfortunately way above my bankroll!
So hopefully it will run better today ... of course I will update you again on a regular basis (at least during the breaks).
This morning I just strolled around in the city (enjoying the sunny day). The picture on the right is just a random street in the city to give you an impression how Nottingham looks like. Nice city but nothing special (as is my hotel).
As you might have expected it was AA vs. KK. The Aces held up and we had a chipleader with 20K chips. I got some playable hands but never connected strong enough to the flop to make some powerplays. Nevertheless I managed to keep my stack as high as 8,500 or more at all times.
Somehow I had already made it to 12,000 when this hand arrived: There was a raise in front of me and I called with JJ. Flop came 55J ... bingo! He checked and I checked. Turn is a King. He checked again, as do I. River is a 2 and he bet 1,500. I raised to 4,000 he went all-in for just 2,600 more and I called. My Full House Jacks lost against Full House Kings :-(
That was a real turning point in my tournament. Had I won that hand I would have had a comfortable stack of more than 25K (and would have been able to play hands that I wasn't even able to consider as short-stack). Of course I could have bet on the flop here ... but I dought that he would have folded his Kings. And by the way, an opponent with a strong starting hand is what we all wish for in that situation. A guy who thinks he has a good hand but is in fact a 92% underdog on the flop. Playing carefull just because he might hit his two-outer? Not my style!
Down to 6K I went all-in a few hands later with 66 and was up against AK. Hit my set on the Flop and made quads on the River. Back to 12k but almost shortstack. Later succeded with a nice squeeze play and went heads-up against a shortstack. Unfortunately my AK didn't improve and his 44 held up. Somewhat down again. Same Squeeze play with the exact same people again somewhat later. Again I got AK but this time I was up against ... AK. We split the pot and another opportunity was missed.
That was the biggest issue of todays tournament: I didn't had too many good opportunities but besides the quad sixes I wasn't able to take advantage of these rare opportunities at all. For the last hours I was aboslutely card dead. What can you do when your fold equity goes south but your best hands are 63, 47, and of course K-low, Q-low etc. in several variations.
At the end (5 minutes before day 1 ended) I got my opportunity: I had King-Spades, Two of hearts in the Big Blind. There was a call, and another call and I checked. Flop came two spades with 9-5-4. All checked. Turn is a 2 of spades. Hell, what do I wait for I had hit a pair and had a flush-draw. Went all in with 6,700 chips. First guy folded, second one called me with 8-9. River was the 8 of hearts and I had missed another good opportunity ... and was out of the tournament.
With K2s being my best hand for a long time you may imagine who painfull the last two levels had been. But as said before: There wasn't much I could have done better and I stayed as long as possible. It just wasn't meant to be that night.
Today is the £200+20 event which has the same structure as today but you get "only" 7,500 chips. So it's designed as a two-day event too.
Some words about the DuskTillDawn club at the end. It's a very nice poker club! 45 tables on 3 different levels make a great impression. The tables are big enough for 9 people and most dealers are very professionell. But some things are very unusual: Beverage service takes your money when you order your drink, not when it is delivered. They have about 20 public computer terminals there that can be used for surfing or playing online poker. But the best thing: They publish the tournament results on their website while the tournament is still running. During every break the dealers count all chips and they update the chipcount. They know exactly who's located were ... so they can build a complete list of every placement (with the correct names). Truly amazing.
While our tournament was started the £1,000 4-Day-Main-Event was still running. Christiano Blanco and Maria Demetriou were some of the best known players in the field. That event used the exact identical structure of the WSOP main-event and drew 186 participants. Great tournament but unfortunately way above my bankroll!
So hopefully it will run better today ... of course I will update you again on a regular basis (at least during the breaks).This morning I just strolled around in the city (enjoying the sunny day). The picture on the right is just a random street in the city to give you an impression how Nottingham looks like. Nice city but nothing special (as is my hotel).
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