A Good Couple of Days on the poker tables

Well, since yesterday was thursday, and St Patricks Day, and a Public Holiday, I elected to also take today off work.

I spent some time back on the cash tables, where I ran Good and made a decent profit, running at a sick 70 BB per 100 Hands at the 5c/10c 6 Max tables. I was clearly running good, as the EV % had me at 41 BB/100 which is still a sick win rate.

I started playing a little tighter, and folded in marginal spots where I was calling beforehand. On Tuesday Night I finished 2nd in the tcb poker forum league for the 2nd week in a row, followed by a 3rd Place in the Paddy Pantsdown Tourney on Wednesday.

Then between yesterday and lunchtime today, I won $30+ playing six-max, followed by winning the Boylepoker lunchtime Turbo for $25. Unfortunately I literally set fire to $15 on the cash tables this afternoon, as I decided to get it in bad against a very aggressive player on the table. At least I realised I was not in the zone, so quickly left the table and stopped playing poker for a bit.

However this evening I played in 4 tournaments, 2 on Boyles and 2 on paddypower.
The boylepokerblog freeroll, where I didn't really get anywhere, and the $5.50 no lose tourney (where you actually lose the rake). This was going very well, and was looking good for the Final table with less than 20 left, but I lost a couple of races and that was that.

On paddy I played the paddy pantsdown weekly final, and again was looking quite good here, until my shove with AK was called by 77 which held. It was a brave call, as I had the 77 player slightly covered. That sent me down from being in 30th place with 130 or so left , down into the bottom rung, and I was out shortly afterwards. Personally , I would have folded the 77 had the shoe been on the other foot. But I suppose on the other hand, if you'e playing for the win, its these types of gambles you need to take. And to be fair, I had been fairly aggressive.

The highlight of the evening was the Irish Open Cheap seats Tourney. I had to make a few rebuys in the early stages. One Guy spent €20 on rebuys before calling it a day, and to be fair, when he got his cards in , he was usually in front.

I on the other hand, just shoved any 2 decent cards, eg Ax s, or 2 connecting cards, and needed a couple of rebuys. With blinds getting big, (it was a turbo tournament), I made the sensible decision to double-rebuy. I then had 2 all-ins in front of me, with the blinds coming around and I had 52 (it might have been suited, I can't remember), but anyway I was up against two far superior hands, but I managed to suck out and almost treble my stack

I then managed to increase my stack, mostly by shove stealing, and occasionally getting called. I was quite well positioned at the add-on break, and considered not taking the add-on, but they were giving you 5000 chips, which was nearly 1/3 of my stack, so it was a no brainer to take this.

I trod reasonably careful, from the end of the break to the final table, again mostly accumulating chips by shoving. With 11 left, I was about to start shoving any 2 , as there was plenty of dead money in the blinds, but the short stack lost a race, when he was ahead, and we were at the final table.

Then pretty soon after that, there was a three way all in on the final table, and the big stack won. He was behind, but sucked out and we were down to 8.

At this stage, blinds were quite big, and with the ante in play, a shove would net you 2000 chips. I think the max stack at this stage was 31K, 2nd was about 26 K and there were 2 of us hovering around the 20K mark, so any shove increased my stack by 10%. The other thing that influenced my decision, was that there was only 1 seat up for grabs. I ended up shoving almost any 2 when I was folded around too. I had also been caught by a short stack when shoving 4-6 suited, but a couple of shoves saw me back up around the 20K Mark. I then shoved K9 off, and the chip leader took his time, before deciding he had to call. It was clear he didn'tlike making the call, vs my stack, as I could do serious damage to his stack, but he had QQ and vs my range, he was likely in front. Unfortunately for him, I hit A K and seriously dented his stack. This put me up to about 45K , which was almost double the next biggest stack. I then won and lost a few chips here, and there, and knocked out a fellow short stack in really ugly fashion. I had 40K+ chips, he had shoved his 4K with something like AJ, and I felt compelled to call with my 52o. He was of course ahead and hit his card on the flop, but I hit a 5 and then in really ugly fashion I hit a 2 on the river. I was running so good, that I had 90K with the next biggest stack at 30K. Suffice it to say, I ran good again, eventually knocking out the previous chip leader (QQ Guy) and ending up heads up. In 2 or 3 hands in , I found myself with 77, induced a shove from the other guy, and made an instant call. He had 22, the 7's held and I won the tourney. The Buy-in to the fortnightly qualify-only grand final is worth €220, so I am obviously well pleased with the result. I did spend €10.20 on buy-in, rebuys and addons.
I am also very pleased with the way I bossed the final table. It was mostly shove, shove, and shove again, but my stack increasing by 3K on every shove that wasn't called, and as result any knocks I took didn't really dent me.

I did suck out a lot, and I probably did win ugly, but I am absolutely thrilled with the win.