Vegas & The Aftermath - Diary

[boldie]

Talking of handling incoming mail & texts, Chili had 117 incoming Texts on Sunday, whilst she was doing her GUKPT thing, not to mention scores of Facebook messages, e-Mails, PM's, etc.

She is incredibly popular on blonde, witness the amazing & genuine warmth towards her during the GUKPT.

She did the 'phone-in to Sky last night, & then later, she was televised playing the Final - Final! - of Late Night Poker. She had a cooler, & ran QQ into KK. She plays KK v AA & AA much better.....

I still can't figure her exit hand at the GUKPT. Ketul makes it 60k (600k behind, blinds still small), she shoves all-in for 300k with A-T suited, & he insta-calls with 8-6. Can anyone help me understand that 8-6 play? I just can't figure it out at all.

nope no sense to me either just another case of bad play rewarded. the poker gods can be so cruel sometimes!

yep that's all it is...

[tikay]

Just before I move on, & I know I've been eulogising Maria a bit, but she deserves it I think.

She has amazing game, & it's improved by leaps & bounds this last 12 months. I think she's Cashed in 6 of 8 TV Tourneys, some record that.

Her biggest weakness was Bankroll Management, the desire to play the Big Comps all the time, (we've all been there) but she overcame that, & pretty much settled down into grinding it out playing Cash at DTD, & small to mid-price Live Comps. She's also improved her Online Tourney game immensely, & has had some decent cashes lately, though some say she has poor Online Game. How wrong they are.

So if she's improved her BM, how come she played the Big-Buck GUKPT? That's a long story, & it ain't for me to tell that, but it was just a weird  - & very nice - set of circumstances which arose. But now she's had that score, I sense she's gonna nail that money to the table even firmer now. Until you've been at the bottom of a bad bankroll swing, it's hard to grasp, but she's been there, done that, & she's on the BM train now, big time.

As I've had 4 or 5 "you run so good" PM's, I guess it's common knowledge I had a decent slice of Maria last week - so I gotta say, out loud, "thank you Maria", it was a pretty decent cash for me, my best of the year, I think. (And for A N Other, but it's not for me to reveal who that was, but "ty him", too, because it would not have happened without him, & once again, that same guy has been great for me). How it all came about was a bit weird, but I somehow luckboxed my way into a nice cash. 

I don't "back" players as such, but I do try & ease the burden for some very special, close, friends. Not for money, (though that's a nice bonus), it's just nice to lend a hand to someone on the hilly road, but it's just worked out stunningly well for me. In fact, thereby hangs a tale......

[tikay]

...So, Thewy, myself, & a guy called Ian Oldershaw ("The Belly") used to travel the circuit together when we started out. We all began at Gala Notts, murdered the Tourneys there for a while, & then set off to find poker stardom together on "The Circuit". Thewy looked afer me early doors, he'd started just before me, & after Slo-Mo introduced me to Poker, Thewy guided me, & looked after me in a Final Table Chop at Gala in the first ever £100-er I'd ever played, & we soon added Belly to the trio. All three of us originally swapped 10%, & if we Finalled together, we'd up the swap %. We never had a single row or dispute about money. After a while, Belly asked to come off the 10% swap, leaving just Thewy & me swapping.

So the three of us ventured across to Amsterdam in '03 for the MasterClassics, & we all take a shot at Super-Satting into the Main Event. Thewy wins a seat, Belly & me miss out. Even then, I was scared of paying big sums to enter Comps, so that was that, count me out of the biggie.

But Belly was determined to play. At midnight on the eve of the €3,000 Main Event (Lido), Belly approaches Thewy & me in the Holland Casino, "I wanna play, you got any money on you?". So we sit at a side table in that Cafe there to try & ante up his buy-in. Well, we were all skint pretty much, but I had a few bob left, I'd cashed in the Limit Event (Limit!). We all stick all our remaining cash on the Cafe Table, & between us, we just about scrape together the cash Belly needed for his Buy-In

I had no idea how much I threw in, but Belly was the Team Accountant, & we trusted him to sort it out. He produced reams of indecipherable numbers, & after a few hours, came up with the Deal - it turned out that I owned (I think) about 20% of him, & Thewy a little less I think.

We retire to the room at "The Owl" Hotel we were sharing - the three of us in a tinsy winsy room, on the top floor, served by the world's smallest lift. Rumit & Steve Jelenik were in the same Hotel, as were The Hendon Mob Updaters, (Poker Verdict, or Wire, I forget), who had to do the Update from their Hotel Room, running back & forth to the Casino!

Belly works out the numbers, took him hours, he was a typical Accountant really, & it turns out I own 19.xxx%, & Thewy has whatever.

I decide to go home before the Main Event, I was still working, & I had some stuff to sort out at work, so I went home, left Thewy & Belly there, & that was that,

I immersed myself in the problems of replacing checkouts & Tills in Sainsbury Stores, & worrying about the cows on John Kirklands Estate - they were leaning on his new, £80,000 dry-stone wall I'd just had built for him, & he thought that was bang out of order - "they have no right to lean on my wall Tony, I want it stopped". (I put up a sign informing the cows, in Cow-Speak - "moo moo, moo-moo-moo, moo, burger").

And 4 days later, I get a 'phone call from Thewy. "Belly got 2nd, & scooped €121,770".

Wow. It took a time to sink in. I'd kopped for about £19k Sterling, I think.

Some Comp it was, too. Robin Keston was 15th, Mick Cook 14th, Robert Mizrachi 13th, John Kabbaj 11th, John "C T" Law 7th, Adam "square7" Lee in 6th, (who, tragically, died a year or two later from a brain tumour, well short of his 22nd birthday), Marcel Luske in 4th, Devilfiish in 3rd, (Belly so owned him that day), & Johan Storakers won it. Belly then turned Pro, but retired - winnings still intact - after a year or so, though he still plays little comps in Sheffield even now.

Belly had 17 cashes on the Fessie Circuit, & I had no % with him in most of them. His biggest cash, The 'Dam apart, was £7,000. I had almost 20% of him only once - ever - & he scooped €122,000 that time......

Go figure how well I run.

Then there's Thewy.....

[Rookie (Rodney)]

68s is the nuts, seriously. My favourite hand, i insta call here too, especially if it's Chili aswell!

[Shogun112]

Those bad weather pics reminded me of these pics....

[Colchester Kev]

WOW ... where were they taken ??

[Tonji]

a few gallons of de-icer needed. Impressive photos those.

[Shogun112]

WOW ... where were they taken ??

I honestly dont know..!!  Iceland..?? 

[Pelham Boy]

I see the gritters haven't been out again.

[boldie]

WOW ... where were they taken ??

Aberdeen in the summer?

[hans47]

That looks like quebec canada when they got freezing rain

[technolog]

I think it was somewhere on the east coast of Americky.

[The_duke]

I think it was somewhere on the east coast of Americky.

Nah it's Rhyl

[Woody502]

Did he utter the immortal words after he called..........they are suited!

68s is the nuts, seriously. My favourite hand, i insta call here too, especially if it's Chili aswell!

[Chili]

I still can't figure her exit hand at the GUKPT. Ketul makes it 60k (600k behind, blinds still small), she shoves all-in for 300k with A-T suited, & he insta-calls with 8-6. Can anyone help me understand that 8-6 play? I just can't figure it out at all.

Just a slight correction, he made it 65k and I had 260k total - as I said slight correction.  Actually 86s was one of his better "call a reraise" hands lol.  I have to give the guy credit, he was abs feerless and these days where more people by the day adopt a LAG style of play, he played it correctly.  At least he could pretty much guess he had 2 live cards and the chips to gamble to get 4 handed.

It is somewhat satisfying though that on Day2, I was battling with my starting stack (95k) for a good 3 or 4 hours without any progress (It certainly didn't help having Tony Phillips the CL 2 to my right!!).  Then Ketul arrived at the table directly on my left.  I was probably the filling them two were more than pleased with but I had other idea's.  I tagged Ketul's game straight away.  Plenty of 2.5x raises with not much to fight with, I checked him out for a little while then owned him lolol.

He sat down with around 300k and I managed to "take" 200k from him in the space of an hour without even showing a hand.  He did amazingly well to come back and showed he has gears.  Well done to him, I cannot fault his win.  He is an exciting player that you want on your table and know 100% that if he has chips they are by no means "locked up!"