Played the monthly £100 freeze at The Rendezvous in Brighton tonight. Again, looking for discipline early and then build from level 3 onwards. Managed once more to get caught up early and lose chips. Here’s a particular hand where I was caught in 2 minds.

There are a few limpers, I have As2s late on and I call. The blinds call. The flop is AhJc9c. The BB bets out. Now I decided fairly quickly that she didn’t have an ace – I did think about it, but something told me that wasn’t what she had, I couldn’t tell you what that something was tho. I also didn’t put her on the flush draw, I had a feeling she had either the Jack or the 9. Anyway, I called, with the intention of betting if the turn was not a club. It wasn’t, it was the 6h. Surprisingly to me she bet out again. I still didn’t give the ace, and she wouldn’t be betting the flush draw now, so in my opinion it was still the Jack or the 9 and she was probably putting me on the flush draw.   I didn’t fancy a raise tho, which is at odds with my analysis. I called.  The river was the 2s, so no change. She bet big. Now is where I’m stuck, coz I still have her on the Jack or the 9, but I don’t figure her to be strong enough to be betting out for the 3rd time without being ahead of me. I decide to call, and she does indeed have the 9, but she also has an offsuit 6 which hit the turn, for 2-pair, and I’m beat. Quite why I’m getting involved in a big pot with a tiny ace is beyond me, it’s what I’ve been trying to avoid doing.

How’s this for a weird one, which didn’t involve me…
There are 3 limpers at 100/200 blinds. The BB raises 300. Yes, 300. Clearly no-one is going to fold to that, and everyone calls it. I now have the BB pegged for aces, coz it’s such a small raise. It’s a terrible raise tho, coz no-one can fold and surely you don;t want to play aces against 3 players. The raise pretty much screams aces tho. So anyway, the flop is 3-4-x, no suits. The BB checks, one of the limpers bets 500 and only the BB calls. The turn is a Queen. The limper goes all-in for about 6000. At this point I believe he must know full well the BB has aces, and so he must have a set. I put him on a set of 4’s. The BB calls. They turn over their cards. The BB does indeed have aces (no surprise there), but the limper shows AQ! Good grief, you couldn’t make it up. He clearly didn’t even think what her pre-flop raise meant.

Down to 6.5k at one point, I made it back to about my starting stack by the 1st break and felt alright, and back in control.

Pocket 10’s
After the break with the blinds at 100-200 I got dealt two black 10’s. The guy UTG shoved all-in blind for 1800. He was pretty frustrated, and with reason – at one point he’s raised 400 (at 50-100 blinds), and got called, and lost on a showdown when his opponent showed J6-offsuit for a flopped full-house! So anyway, I re-raised so no-one else would join in, and he flipped over K3-off. First card – King. One down.

Pocket 10’s Strikes Again
Next hand, the same two black 10’s. This time I raise to 550, and the guy who just beat my last 10’s flat calls. He only has 3000 behind, (having doubled thru me on the previous hand). The flop was A-K-4 with two diamonds and he insta-shoves. Now, it did smell of a stop-&-go to me, but he told me what a great flop it was and I actually thought he was sincere, plus I didn’t like the Ace AND King on the flop. I folded face-up and he showed K8d of 2nd pair and the nut-flush draw. Consecutive losses with 10’s and back down to 6.5k again.

Return of the Son of Pocket 10’s
A new table, and managed to make a couple of thousand back with a set of 3’s. Then, back to 7k again having had to fold a couple of flop’s after being re-raised, and I got dealt 10s, again, this time on the button. Blinds were now 300/600 with 50 ante, it folded round and I raised to 2000, leaving 5000 behind. The BB shoved for 10k and obviously I called. She flipped over AA and I had to force myself to even watch the cards come down.

Pocket 10’s were not my friends tonight.

So, another tournament where I just haven’t been able to build any kind of stack to put myself in any kind of decent position. Next week’s Black Belt Poker Academy might be very well timed, I welcome this opportunity to check my game out. I used to do consistently well in these kind of events, I could almost guarantee that I’m be in there or thereabouts when it down to the business end of it, but in the last 6-month’s I don’t ever seem to managed to get over my initial starting stack size, and it’s a bit of a concern. Let’s see what happens next week, and there’s a £50 freeze at the Vic after the Academy, so we’ll see how that goes too.

I have signed up to a poker ‘bootcamp’ Looking forward to it, I have a feeling that it might be a good time for me to examine my game a bit and to have such good mentors on hand to discuss things with will be wicked. They do a much more in-depth 2-day event in May and I might do that too, the timing would be great with Vegas just around the corner in June…

I’ll do a full write-up of course. I haven’t signed up for BlackBeltPoker online because really I just don’t play online, but if anyone out there is learning then it looks like a great place to do it.

Yep, the dates are in for the Hog Roast trip to Vegas for the 2010 WSOP – I’ll be there from June 10-21, so a slightly shorter trip than usual due to arrangements to watch the World Cup. I will be in the States for the England v USA game tho, which should prove to be a most entertaining day

Anyway, the shorter trip does mean no WSOP KCL (NL 2-7 single-draw), which is a bit of a shame. And the England game clashes with a $1000 NLH too, but there is a $1500 NLH during the trip and I’ll be playing that.

Other than that I’ll be looking to play in a few Mega-Stack events at Caesars as usual and the odd Deepstack at The Venetian. I’m hoping that the Golden Nugget have another really good schedule for their Grand Series of Poker events, which last year included a TDL event which was great fun.

I’ll acually be in Vegas in mid-March for work, but I doubt I’ll get to play much then. Well, maybe one or two…

This one is from my friend Bearded Mike, (see Blogroll).  His ’signature hand’ is 74, tho I can’t remember the suits.  Anyway, this is how to make a million bucks by playing it, courtesy of Tom Dwan…

The Rendezvous Casino at Brighton Marina has a very good new weekly schedule of events.  I lost interest in the weekly schedule becuase I really hate self-dealing at tournaments, but the really good news here is that The Rendezvous tournaments will all be dealer-dealt, even the £10-rebuys.  That’s good news indeed, and I’ll be looking to get down then and play my schedule allows, the more play I get, the more zoned-in I will be when Vegas comes around.

Here it is:
Monday: £30-£30-£40 / 2000 stack / 3000 for £30 rebuy, 5000 for £40 add-on
Tuesday: £20-rebuys / 1500 stack / 4000 for £40 add-on
Thursday: £50-single-rebuy / 5000 stack
Friday: £10-rebuys / 1000 stack / 3000 for £20 add-on
Sunday: £20-rebuys, £5 bounty / 1500 stack / 4000 for £40 add-on
First Saturday of each month: £100 freeze / 10k stack

My only criticism is the small starting stacks, particularly in the small rebuys.  However, I do like the £100 freezeout and the Thursday event, and I’ll try to play when I can.

Well done to the Rendezvous for getting dealers.

Played the £200 freezeout in the January Sales Festival at The Rendezvous in Brighton on Friday.  I was determined to be disciplined and focussed, and pretty much stick to my usual gameplan.  This deserted me before Xmas, where I got sucked into the low-blind limping mentality, which is not me at all.

Anyway, I was certainly tight and disciplined, but to be honest, anyone would have been with the cards I had – I wasn’t card-dead, I was card-extinct!  No complaints tho, that’s how it goes.

Anyway, the structure had us starting with 6000 chips, with 30 minute blinds and ante’s from level 5.  In level 1 I had KK and JJ and won small pots, reaching a height of 7.5k and those were the only hands I played in the first 3 levels. At the break I had 5.5k, the next level being 150-300, and I was happy that “the play would start now”.  I hadn’t donked off a load of chips, I had a good image, and I was ready to go.

Sadly, I couldn’t play a hand in level 4.  I had a succession of 6-9, Q-2 etc.  The ’standard’ bet to open a pot on this table was 4-5x, which also meant I had no real fold-equity to bluff with, but even then, generally a raise was followed by a re-raise, so basically I had no cards and no position.

In level 5, with 3600 chips and blinds at 150-300-25, I got AQ and KQ and again, took the blinds with no action, and after that the only decision I had to make was when to shove.  Obviously when I did shove, I lost

So, basically a bit of a non-event in as much as all my plays were auto-plays, I had no decisions to make and nothing I could get involved with once the tournament reached the stage where play was very much required.

Still, for what it’s worth, I felt focussed and confident, and am looking forward to getting another opportunity to play.

Yep, tonight was a disappointing as poker gets, aside from going out on the bubble.

Here’s the stats:  I played for just over 3 hours, (I tweeted 4, but it was actually 3).  In those 4 hours I didn’t get a single pocket pair.  Not one.  Not deuces, treys, nothing.  I did get AQ 4 times – each time I opened the pot for about 3 big blinds and took it down with no action.  I took the blinds with K5 (the Hog Roast!) on the button once, again with no action.
Those were the 5 hands I won all night.

I limped from the small blind twice, when there were a few limpers.  Each time I had to throw it away on the flop, apart from on one occasion when I bet out into a rag flop, hoping my ultra-tight image, and that they’d miss the flop, would make the other 2 fold.  One of them raised big, and I had to fold.

And those were the only hands I played in the 3 hours – 3 flops, of which I hit none and folded all.

Until I went out of course, and this is how it happened.  I had just over 4000 left, with blinds at 150/300 with a 25 ante.  Given that I was getting no hands, but had a very tight image, (I hadn’t shown a single hand and had only raised 4 times in 3 hours),  I was looking for someone to raise, so I could bang it all-in over the top and have them fold.  I needed someone to raise who wouldn’t be committed, and who could I felt fold.  I must admit that I failed to pull the trigger a coupe of times when I felt such an opportunity presented itself – however much you know it’s the right play it can be tough to act with garbage.  I’ll be stronger here next time.

Anyway, I got K10.  They looked pretty and they gave me the courage to do what was necessary.  Actually K10 is worse than garbage to do this with, because if someone calls they could really have you dominated – something like low-suited connectors or something would be better.  However, a guy in early-ish position made it 1k, and I banged in the 4k, hoping he’d fold.

He thought it about for a while, before saying “I know I’m behind” and calling, with AJs.  I didn’t hit, and went out.

Now I have to say, with no sour grapes, that I think AJ is a terrible call here.  A truly abysmal call.  Here’s my thinking – if I am NOT bluffing, (which I am), then he really must be behind, and he is probably dominated with me holding something like AK or AQ.  If I don’t have a big ace then I must have a pair there, so he is losing either way.  When you look at this way, AJ is only ever beating a stone-cold bluff there.  It’s half his stack, he can’t afford to be making this kind of call.

I was bluffing tho.  Was it a good call?  Did he read me for the bluff?  Not a chance.  He had no info to read me for a bluff, I’d played so few hands.  When he said “I must be behind” he meant every word of it – he was just incapable of laying down AJs, and that’s why the call is a bad one…

..in my opinion.

So really I hardly played poker at all tonight.  It’s the most card-dead I’ve been since the 3 days I was card-dead for at Caesars Palace a couple of years ago.
However, next poker for me will be the Main Event on Saturday afternoon which I qualified for on Tuesday.  Looking forward to that – hopefully I will find either the cards or the positions to enable me to play a bit, that I didn’t have today.

We started this afternoon’s satellite for the main event with 16 runners, each with 1500 chips.  We estimated there would be 3 seats up for grabs, with a £50 double add-on at the break.

Last year when I played this I played very tight, didn’t get too involved and really only started to play after the break.  At that point blinds are 100-200, so if you have 1000 of your original stack left over and you add-on, you now have 4000 to play with, which is not exactly life-support.

Not this time tho, the table was very tricky and limpy, everyone wanting to play flops and re-raise with middle-pair etc.  I got involved a bit early and didn’t really know where I was, which wasn’t great, and I was forced to re-buy.  However, from there things went my way…

I’d played my second 1500 up to around 2500, when I picked up jacks.  There was a small raise, and a call, and I could either shove the lot, or see a flop.  I didn’t want to be one of those who re-buy, shove, re-buy, shove etc, and I figured I could build a stack form where I was, so I decided to see the flop and bang it in if there were no pictures.  Well, there weren’t any pictures.  The first guy shoved all-in, the second player folded, and I obviously called.  Sadly, the first guy had kings.  Happily, the turn was a jack   I now had around 7000 and was pretty comfortable.  The KK guy actually had aces, kings and jacks beaten at this first table.

So, from there I was picking and choosing, no need to get involved in the endless shove-rebuy-shovefest that the end of the rebuy period becomes, but there were still some opportunities and I grew the stack to 10k by the break, so 13k with the double add-on.  Given that I’d have been alright with 4k-6k, I was now really thinking that all I needed to do was nurse the stack thru to the final table and one of the final 3 spots, no risk-taking required.

One guy actually re-bought often enough that he’d invested £250 to try to win a £500 seat, not the greatest economics.

We got to a final table fairly quickly, and I had about 17k, having taken no risks and picked spots to pick up cheap chips.  I did bust one or two, but not in any particularly spectacular ways.  On the final table I had the big stack by a fair distance.  Our table had been aggressive, and there had been a lot of rebuys, but the other table was more passive, so the stacks were smaller.  I would say that the next guy behind me had about 12k.

We were 10-handed at the final table.  I didn’t need to win, or move up the money ladder, I just needed to finish in the top 3, therefore it’s a very different strategy to a ‘normal’ final table.  It’s all about avoiding risk, surviving etc.  I raised early with a couple of nig hands, including aces, and no-one wanted to clash with me.  It whittled down fairly quickly – I busted 2 guys.  First, a guy raised my big-blind from the cut-off, and I flat-called with AK.  I did this because I have no need to get into a coin-flip and lose a big chunk of my stack, when I can comfortably coast thru, so I’d rather know I am ahead when the money goes in, if it has to.  I missed the flop, and checked, preparing to throw it away if he bet.  However, he checked behind and the turn card was an ace.  I now believed I should be ahead, and that he would bet big if I checked – he didn’t have a huge stack and couldn’t really afford to check-it down all the way and lose.  He moved all-in and I called.  The ace had left him with middle pair and a flush draw, so I had to avoid any more hearts or 9’s, with 1 card to come.  No help for him, and he departed, with my stack now well in the 20k’s.

The second bust-out was odd.  The small-blind, who had around 5k, flat called my 1600 big-blind from the small-blind.  I had 10-6off, and I decided to check, so that if he was trapping with a big hand I wouldn’t lose much.  The flop came 10-high.  He pushed all-in, now I have to call, and he showed 10-3.  He was unlucky enough that the river was a low card so no split-pot, but what a weird way to play the hand.  With 10-3 in the small-blind, short-stacked against the big stack, you surely either fold it or shove all-in on the steal?  10-3 cannot be a hand to see a flop with…

Then we messed around for a while until eventually we got down to 3, with no drama on my part.  My plan from the moment I turned the jack to beat the guy’s kings was to nurse that stack thru to the final 3 with no risk and no drama, and I was pleased that this is exactly how it turned out.

The Main Event is on Saturday afternoon, concluding on Sunday.  Next for me is the £150 freezeout tomorrow night, with a £25 bounty.  That’ll be it for me before the Main, due to work, so here’s hoping I can turn this successful table time into a good result there.  It’s nothing major yet, but it’s a start after a while away from the tables…

The Christmas Cracker Festival at the Rendezvous Casino, Brighton Marina, is a festival I’ve had some success at in the past.   Last year I qualified via satellite for the £500 Main Event, and cashed for a couple of thousand or so in the £200 freezeout.  This year I haven’t got the whole week off, but at the same time my goal is still to qualify for the Main and play at least one other event.  Now I haven’t had a lot of poker in the run-up to this one – I busted pretty early in a £25 freezeout at The Grosvenor in Brighton when my nut-flush ran into a flopped full-house, and a few sessions online, (which I don’t particularly like and am not that good at), have gone ok but nothing to write home about.

But the satellites make for a good way to get back into it all again.  I think I have a decent understanding of how to play satts, and so am fairly confident going in.

So, some final thoughts on the 2009 World Series pilgrimage to Vegas.  For nights out I’d say it was right up there, more of us than ever, and great to hook up with Bearded Mike again.  Crazy to think we met in the first place because we were sat at the same table in the Triple Draw event at the 2008 WSOP, with 400 other people playing.

However, the main thing is the poker, that’s why we’re here and if the poker was somewhere other than Vegas then I would be as well.  It’s pretty obvious that it went pretty poorly on the tables for me, and I ran pretty badly.  Does that bother me?  Not particularly – poker is a game of swings and you have to expect some good and bad bits of running.  It’s sad for me that I ran badly during my one huge poker period of the year, but whatever.  I lost what I budgeted to lose, even tho I had hoped not to lose it.

On the other hand, my game has improved again.  I adopted more of a “don’t risk the stack” approach, particularly in the WSOP, and having played that way for a few days there I really got something out of it and felt I was reading the game better.  Of course, I pack in more poker in 2 weeks in Vegas than in the rest of the year combined, and each year I think I take another big step forwards.

Next year I would like to play in the KCL and Triple Draw events, as well as more than just the one NLH event.  We’ll have to see tho, it’s a World Cup year and there might be a trip to South Africa during the WSOP.

Watch this space…