GPT report part 1

So off i set for the inaugural GPT event to be hosted in the glamours Bolton equipped with my new laptop and a couple of films i started the 5hr Journey, my plan was to get there in time to check in have a quick rest then get to the casino for the £200+£20 The Claimer had already taken care of registering me so no panic over seats!

I got to the hotel in time although sadly the train was a bit quick so i hadn't quite finished watching Casino Royale (quite enjoyed it) when i arrived i saw Lord Wernick in the Lobby trying to check in, it turns out there had been some miscommunication and he was not due to arrive till the following day! Luckily for Mickey there was another chap named Karl who turned up and had an extra room, problem sorted! Mickey then took the 3 of us over to the casino.

We arrived at the casino to find a rather large field for this £200 event and a lot of them were friendly faces so the wait for the comp went pretty fast, it wasn't long till we were underway. 16 tables in total, and of course myself Mickey and Karl were all on the same table, other players on the table were Burnley John and Stuart Rutter, it was my first time playing the latter and he did the damage to me in a cooler of a hand. I was impressed by his play though.

Sadly for me level 2 was an impossible place to pass and i was one of the first players to bite the dust, thankfully i had 10% of the Claimer to keep me interested, i hung around for the rest of the night chatting to some players i hadn't seen for a while whilst railing The Claimer. He ended up busting in 12th when his KK failed vs KQ for a huge pot. Would have been nice to see him take the 12k for first and get me my buy ins back!

Friday was what it was all about, i met up with Paul King in the hotel and we travelled across to the casino for the main event, i was very excited about this event. I have never played a UK event with a running ante before, this is something that really hurts the nits and helps my game so i was confident going in. When i got there i met up with the usual crowd at these events made up of the on-line qualifiers from blonde poker and the blonde circuit players. I checked out the table draw and say i was playing with Stuart again, other than that the table was completely unknown to me. My first bit of good luck! already. Especially when i looked at some of the table line-ups.

I got of to a good start when i took about 2000 chips of Stuart when my SB A4 connected well on the A84A2 board vs his A7. It became clear pretty quickly that the table standard was very poor, one very old lady on hand 3 open raised to 1k on 25-50 and complained "i never get action with these" as she showed JJ........it appeared to me that the only two decent players on the table were the two on my right, Stuart two to my right and a Bad Beat Trader between us who was very tight. So i really couldn't complain with the table and this showed through the evenings play, we only played 5 levels and after 4 levels i was up to about 20k from taking small pots down, it also helped that i only lost 800 with QQ vs KK, thanks to my opponents shocking play.

Of course i couldn't go and play well all session, i knew i had to make one big mistake........it came when one of the weaker players had started motoring a bit, he had upped his aggression after winning a bit AA cracking pot with a set. I had bet him of a few pots but knew the playback was coming soon. On 150-300 Stuart open limps and i make it 1200 with AJ, mateyboy calls on the button and Stuart passes, the flop comes KQJ, we all check. The turn brings a 9, Stuart checks i think about the bet but check again, the button guy now bets 1500, Stuart passes and i call pretty quickly. The river bring a 2, i think i am ahead but don't really know how to play it, i decide to opt for a check to induce a bluff, he ends up betting 3500, quite a decent bet i end up calling and being show AT for the absolute nuts, i am still not sure about the call. In terms of the actual hand itself its ok i think, Stuart says he calls vs the guy as well, the thing is though the table was weak and there was no need to play big pots with marginal hands OOP. Tournament strategy makes this hand a pass on the turn.

Anyway it was not all a loss i was carrying an average stack into Day 2 and there were far worse situations to be in than that! The first level would also be the first level of ante's and the higher the blinds and ante's get the bigger my edge so onwards and upwards!