Poker: Home Tourney–July 2011

Twelve eager players saw the start of the second half of the season.  With only 10 points separating the top 7,  the league is still wide open.

Turned out I was on the tight table.  During the rebuy period, it took until mid-way through the second level before anyone needed a buy-in, at which point the other table had 18 buy-ins!   Whoever got through to the final table was going to have their work cut out to catch up!!

I was playing a fair number of hands in the early stages, and was a bit up and down.  I grinded away and built my chips up to around 5k, then dropped a couple of thousand to Steve W when we both made a flush with four clubs on the board, my Qc not good enough to beat his Ac (I knew he had it, just couldn’t get away )   Overall, I generally had something I thought was good enough when betting out, although did take a few liberties as well         This set me up nicely for the break, putting me on about average chips

After the break, the cards came for me on the first hand when I raised A-A and Jock re-raised then called my all-in with Q-Q  My Aces held up and Jock was out first.    Simultaneously, alex was busy on the other table and took out Sean and Bill on the same hand.   It wasn’t long before we had our final table, when Derek knocked out Andy…. who was out the door before I had even realised he was out!  

I’m UTG with A-Jh on the first hand of the final table, so make a raise   Simon on the button and Lee in the SB call.   The flop is low and rainbow, but this doesn’t stop me cBetting when Lee checks to me,.. Simon folds, but Lee calls.   The turn is also low but another heart, giving me the nut flush draw, but when Lee checks decide to bet out, only for Lee to re-raise all-in.  I’m pretty sure I’m behind and not getting odds to draw for the flush, so fold.  Lee shows a straight, so had made a poor call on the flop but played the turn well.

Sadly this put’s me under pressure, especially as I can’t play my blinds and am pretty short.   I see A-9h and decide to shove (about 12 BB) Steve W calls me and sure enough am way behind to his A-J.  Lady luck intervenes though, and I manage to spike a 9 and double up, leaving Steve one of the short stacks.

With the blinds going up, I am soon down to about 15 BB again so make a move with A-2c when Lee limps, raising to 4000.  Jon is in the BB with 4'300 chips and shoves all-in, Lee folds so although I’m way behind Jons A-Q I was getting the odds to call.   Luckily for me (again!)  I spike a 2 and manage to dodge Jon’s outs so take Jon out and get an average chip stack.

It doesn’t all go my way, when down to 5 players, I raise A-3o against Simon’s BB only for him to shove all-in.   Despite having put in 1/3 of my stack, I can’t call and he shows A-K to confirm my feeling of being well behind.   Simon goes on a bit of a run himself and starts hitting flops and quickly goes from short stack to joint chip lead.

Down to four players and I’m shoving my 3 BB UTG   Lee umms and ahhhs but takes a chance to try and win my bounty, showing his 7-5 against my Q-7   What goes around, comes around and the first card that hit’s the flop is a 5 which is good enough to take me out in 4th and Lee gets another bounty (he took out Derek as well)   

Derek is down to 1.5 BB but goes on a run and gets it up to about 4 BB before being taken out by Lee, who also takes out Simon the next hand to take a well fought victory and his second cash on two attempts this year!

Well done all, it was a great game and very enjoyable as normal.