So I travelled down to Southampton last Saturday, it's a 3-4 hour trip by train from Stafford and gets rather crammed. I've already discovered from Flushy that the Casino is NOT open on the Saturday night, yup you heard it right folks, the night before a main event and it's not even open. So instead, I've decided to take the laptop down to play on-line for a bit at the hotel Ibis where I'm staying. The hotel is very close to the station which is lucky, less lucky is the fact I have to cross the scariest traffic junction ever which has no pedestrian crossing areas and I'm stuck feeling like Frogger. The hotel itself is fine, all the staff are from across Europe and speak way better English than I ever could. I get to my room and set-up the lappy for a evening of
losing to runner-runner internet fish destruction. Stupidly however, I've managed to forget to bring the right credit card to pay for my wi-fi connection. Curses. No poker for me tonight then, instead I end up playing Space Cadet Pinball which, although I manage a new record high score, isn't the same.
I struggled sleeping at the hotel, don't know why, but I struggle to ever sleep in a bed that's not my own, I can drop comatose on buses, trains or occasionally in baths at a best friend's house when drunk, but a foreign bed isn't the same. Fortunately, the first remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers was on, (the gory Donald Sutherland one, not the Jennifer Tilly one where peeps do a lot of that pointing and screaming thing) and after watching that I eventually get some sleep.
Sunday morning and I'm already deciding upon my strategy, not for poker, but lunch instead. The meals at the Ibis were around £10 just for a snack! I bite the bullet and get a Macdonalds, the first in about three years, but I stilll feel as though I'm going to Hell for it.
I eventually get to the Casino which is very close to the hotel and meet up with Flushy, Ginger and AlrightJack. Flushy tells me he won the $15k for the third time in a week the night before. He is a
great player lucky mug. We find out there are only 36 runners and I wonder if this means they might even roll back the clock to 1hr 30 minutes or even stick in a 75/150 or 150/300 level. Flushy gets seat 7 on table 4.....Oooooooh spooky. Jen and Snoopy arrive, and despite looking slightly drained, getting cracking and we begin.... That is until I notice the clock only says 45 minutes, I look at the structure and they've decided to make the first four levels 45 minutes long before introducing the hour clock. Odd way to be wanting to save one hour eh?
I play solidly at first, I decide to keep any pots I'm in small unless I have a big hand, I take down a pot with TT early on, but then I lose another pot back with KQ vs A2 after we both make two pair. I get AA and hit a dream flop when it comes 555, but my opponent doesn't want to play, I later get KK but no action. One guy manages to get his whole stack in with QQ vs AA preflop with the blinds only in the second level. He flops the queen but there's an ace on the turn. I guess even if he flat-calls the re-raise, it's unlikely the AA folds on the Q-high flop. The guy opposite me is making lots of small raises, and after seeing his
beat
on the river in a small skirmish I decide I'll re-raise him with any decent cards if I have good position. (I later find out from Snoopy that this is The Camel, and I'm slightly relieved when he gets moved to another table.
) I did manage to pickup one good pot against him, I re-raised him on the button with
and he checked the
to me. As me and Flushy later discussed, I don't mind being in a pot with The Camel as long as I have position and top two pair, it gives me a chance! Incidentally, Flushy's exit was a shocking call in my opinion by his opponent and he was very unlucky, we can only hope and pray that all those 15k wins soften the blow...
During the breaks I would go and
chat amicably pester the crap out of Snoopy, Jen and Jon. I read a few of the updates and couldn't believe when I saw that Red had me as one of his top three picks. (I am very sorry I let him down
) Wow, that felt like a real vote of confidence. The cards went dead for me during the 100/200 and 200/400 levels, and I stole a few blinds here and there but my chip stack-size didn't really change much. The two guys to my right were getting gradually more aggressive and the 93, 62 hands I were getting weren't helping. Eventually I picked up 78 on the button against one of the raisers, the flop came J65 and he checked, I bet and eventually he passed. A couple of hands later, the very pleasant but obviously aggressive scandieboy to right raised from the cut-off and I re-raised him with TT and got him to pass which pushed my stack up towards the 22k mark. As a sidethought, at no point during the first day did I knock out anyone or was ever all-in, which seems rather bizarre. I had AK vs AK which was chopped, but I can't remember doubling anyone up at this time either so during the first half of the night, it was pretty smooth sailing. Until I made my only major mistake of the tournament...
To be continued...
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