After my 3 day break from poker I jumped back in to the action on Monday night. It started well enough, min-cashing my first 45 man tournament but things got ugly as I then failed to cash 13 tournaments in a row before again min-cashing a 90 man tournament to end the night. I don't think I was playing badly as I made it down to the final 2 tables on 9 of those 13 tournaments but couldn't win hands at the right time to get me on to final tables and in the money.
Tuesday went a lot better. After the disappointment the night before I was focussed and crushed early, cashing 3 of the first 4 tournaments including a win a 3rd and a 5th (all 45 man tournaments). I trailed off a bit but still had another 2nd a 5th (45 mans) and a min cash in a 90 man. So the results from Tuesday (6 cashes from 18 games) made up for the losses of the night before.
Last night I planned to play a little in the afternoon and then watch some DVD's (Seven Pounds and Role Models) later in the night. I forgot that poker is on OneHD on a Wednesday night so the DVD's would have to wait. Unfortunately, the poker turned out to be a replay of the PCA that I had seen a few weeks earlier ... but I of course still watched it.
The night started well with a 5th in a 45 man before a stretch of 6 non-cashes. After some dinner I cranked it up a level tho and cashed 5 of the last 8 tournaments including a win in a 90 man and three 4ths. I was pleased that I had two good finishes in the 90 man tournaments because it had been a week or so since I had a top 3 finish in those so to finish with a win was nice.
The win was a hard-fought one. I was struggling for chips with about 30 to go and would have been close to the bottom of the chip-count. I pushed all-in twice with pocket 3's, once out-running ace queen and another time getting called by a big blind short-stack with 3 8 suited. After getting to a comfortable stack I then started to actually get hands and come final table was well placed.
Final table started a bit rocky when my ace jack couldn't hold up against a short-stack all-in of ace 2 suited and another caller with queen jack off. A 2 hit the flop and it was good enough to win. The same short-stack later pushed all-in from the button 5 handed, the small blind big stack then re-raised strongly and I loved it because I had aces! As I was re-raising my wireless internet connection dropped out so I was frantically trying to reconnect. Thankfully I managed to, button turns over king ten off, small blind has kings and my aces held up to take down a massive pot.
3 handed I raised solidly from the button with pocket queens, I get re-raised all-in by a shorter-stack who has ace 9 off ... 9 on the flop, ace on the turn ... groan. I exacted some revenge shortly after taking him out and getting to heads up with a slight lead. The other person took down a few early pots but the turning point would be when they min-raised from the small blind and I called with king 2 off. Flop comes king 9 9 with two spades which I didn't really think much of. First to act I checked, assuming my king was good, he bets, I re-raise strongly and he calls all-in. He turns over 5 6 of spades so I'm sweating no more spades and thankfully I take it down. He's almost out so I re-raise with ace 3 suited, he turns over ace queen but I flop a flush and its over.
I thought the king ten button, kings small blind, aces big blind seemed cold short-handed on the final table but I just across this from the World Series:
Solid lay-down from the pocket jacks. You'd be pretty unhappy if you were the guy with the aces ... "but I have trips!!"
Bankroll now just under US$400 and I'm already just one win short of my goal of 4 tournament wins for the month.
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