Aussie Millions visit

I didn't end up getting to Crown for the start of the Aussie Millions Main Event as planned. We had a big night out the night before and spent Sunday drinking at the Riverland Cafe. After a game of buzz at my friend's place we had dinner and figured a quiet night in was the way to go.

So Monday I dropped in to check out the action. As I was heading down to the poker room I passed by Lee Nelson and Jeff Lisandro. I then ran in to some friends in the poker room and they gave me the lay of the land and told me stories about the players they had met and the games they had been in. Cat had her shirt by virtually every big name player at the event, I was just happy to see a few of them.

After wandering around in the main room for a little while I headed up to Studio 3 which was where the final table of the high rollers event was taking place as well as some feature tables from the Main Event. On the final table was of course the great Phil Ivey as well as Tony G and a few other name pros. On the outer tables were Chris "Jesus" Ferguson, Annette Obrestad and the rather hot Leo Margets. Apparently I didn't notice Shane Warne, Dani Stern and Lucky Chewy on the outer tables.

Downstairs I eventually found Tony "Bond18" Dunst, Jay Rosenkrantz (2M2MM) as well as Jeff Fenech and Amanda De Cesare, winner of The Poker Star.

Here are some of the photos I took (excuse the quality, they are off my iphone and I didn't want to make it too obvious I was taking players pics):

Jay Rosenkrantz in the middle, Jeff Fenech front right corner

Tony "Bond18" Dunst in the jacket of course, surprisingly no tie

Lee Nelson

Jeff Lisandro and his trademark hat

The Poker Star

Well, not too much to report from the PokerStars $50K, or at least nothing exciting for me anyway. I didn't realise but the tournament I had qualified was in fact a rebuy tournament and my first time in it the $10 rebuy didn't interest me too much when I had satellited in using FPP points.

I played fairly tight early, took down some small pots and avoided some of the rebuy madness that was going on at the table. I virtually tripled up at one point with top pair king kicker on the flop managed to outrun top pair midkicker and flush draw in a raised pot. So I survived through until the end of the rebuy and add-on period and got to see that there was a first prize of over $10K up for grabs. Shortly after tho I had ace ten in the big blind and in a multiway unraised pot the flop came 10, 10, 6 ... hello!! It checked around to the button who bet smallish so I called and figured I'd lead out on the turn which I did, I got re-raised and hoped I was up against a worse ten, flush draw or bottom pair. Unfortunately the button had pocket 6's and I was needing help on the river but it didn't come and I was gone midfield.

Other than that tournament tho, my early morning good form continued as I got a 3rd in a $3 45 man, min-cashed a 180 and then won a $3 45 man, all in my first couple of games. From there tho I failed to cash in the next 11 games, bubbling 3 (frustratingly). Happy with the way I played tho and a profitable day overall.

As I mentioned, I missed Joe Hachem's The Poker Star last night but you have to love YouTube for having it on there already. I've just finished watching it and its great to see that the episodes are an hour long, unlike 2M2MM which is just 30 minutes and is drawing heat in the forums for being too short. The city of Melbourne and Crown Casino make a great back-drop for the show and its good to see Lee Nelson involved as well. Week 1 was very much a getting to know the contestants episode so we'll see how the show develops from here.