Shark Pit

From my lack of blogging since the Blackpool GUKPT main event in November, you may have construed that either
1. I shipped it, promptly celebrating my £67,000 win with an indulgent spending spree and round-the-world trip (neglecting to update my faithful online fans); or
2. I busted at the end of day one and went home with my tail between my legs.

Unfortunately it was the ‘tail’ option. The tournament was very tough, and there was nothing too shameful about my exit on level 9, coolered A-J v A-K by the resident card rack. Said villain, who I nicknamed ‘Mr Chips’ on account of his seemingly ever-growing stack, enjoyed a quite incredible run of hands, spiking big pairs, sets, straights, and even busting a guy with a backdoored royal flush against a full house!

Queens of the Damned

I felt some of my play was good, some not-so-good. I found myself in an extremely difficult spot on level 6 with Q-Q, out of position in the SB, with a tricky stack size of about 70bb, against an early position 3-bet. With hindsight – having sought a second and third opinion on the hand – my Queens were probably best mucked pre-flop, although it was a non-obvious fold. Regrettably I made the call (not a dire play in itself) and spewed some chips post-flop (less good). I reckon he had Aces or a set of Kings.

Pointing up the difficulty of playing out of position, Mr Chips even named my hand after I folded the river. OWNED!

Testament however to the high-variance nature of no limit hold’em, Mr Chips, despite being chip leader at the end of day one, went on to bubble the event. :(

I was dealt Aces twice, but failed to win a big pot.

Namedropsville

It was a tough field, with lots of well-known British pros (familiar faces from watching poker on telly) and a strong player inconveniently situated on my left who, as I later found out, has notched up over $1m in live tournament winnings.

I eliminated a Scouse guy called Ian Nelson who I remember seeing on TV, on a GUKPT final table, a few years ago.

There were a few hands I would play differently if I had my time again, and in general I would play a tad tighter on account of the standard of opposition, but the day was a great experience. There were as few as 2—3 players on my table I felt were worse than me, and playing against so many strong pros has made me feel more motivated to step up my own game so that I can compete in future.

As a side note, I cheekily invited myself to sit with a Liam Flood in the canteen area and had a nice chat with him and David Colclough over dinner (there was a buffet for players). I also saw (namedrop alert) Roberto Romanello, Neil Channing, Mickey Wernick, Jake Cody, Marc Goodwin, Stuart Rutter, John Tabatabai...

Online Ace

In other news, I have failed to achieve much in the way of turning around the losing streak I suffered in October. I’m in the red for the last twelve weeks or so.

Lots to be positive about though. I haven’t put in vast volume online of late, but I think I’ve been playing well 97% of the time. Reached a biggish final table on Wednesday ($4k FTW) but sickeningly busted in ninth, Aces cracked (all-in on flop / two-outered on river / sigh gg). Had various other deep runs, but no cigar.

My biggest near-miss was an 18th place finish in Party’s $250K Gtd Sunday, which drew in 1,254 entrants. Obviously a highly anticlimactic experience, but (rather uncharacteristically in a big game) I believe I got my chips in ahead for the whole tournament, until the very last hand, a fairly standard SB v BB encounter where my A-6s failed to outdraw 9-9. The SB – the eventual runner-up of the tourney, chopping for a cool $40k – was super-aggressive, so I have no regrets about shoving over his predictable open-raise.