So, after a decent night’s sleep and a day of shopping for jeans it was time to hit the tables.  As I said previously, I haven’t played for ages and haven’t had a decent run for a year or so, so I decided to get started fairly gently with the $150 tournament at Caesars at 7pm.  You start with a decent stack of 10k, and 30 minute blinds, so plenty of play.  140 runners meant a pretty good prize-pool as well, first was worth $6,000 and 9th would get $500 – only the top 9 got paid.

Well, early on I settled into my normal steady kind of play and got my stack up to 20k fairly easily.  This was perfect for me, as it meant I could really take my time and play solid, and not be forced into anything risky early on.  I had a few good hands, made some decent lay-downs and generally felt in control.

Later on and we moved around a bit, and I was never in any trouble – my stack varied form pretty good to average, but I was never short.  The field dwindled pretty raplidly, and with 4 or 5 tables left I sensed a chance to go very deep.  My stack then hovered around 15 big blinds for ages, before gaining a pretty good stack with a flurry of good hands, including a straight-flush.  I both won and lost big pots with jacks, so I was involved a lot.  With 2 tables to go it was going to be nip & tuck whether I could make it thru to the final table of 10 and then hopefully a cash, but I squeaked home with about 50k, and blinds at 3000/6000 and an ante of 500.

It was around 1am, and now the fun started.  We did a deal to give 10th place $200, so now I was guaranteed money.  I became somewhat obsessed with not going out 10th tho, and so did everyone else.  There were 2 or 3 short-stacks, including me, but they all kept doubling up.  I stole the blinds with A9 and doubled up with pocket 4’s against A-9 with a load of dead-money in the pot.  Then a guy was all-in in his big blind, and got 6 callers.  Amazingly, and infuriatingly, he won the hand!  I was pretty angry about that to be honest.  Anyway, after nearly 2 hours of play a guy busted in pretty unlucky fashion and we were down to 9.  I only had 1.5 big blinds left, from a stack that at one point was over 90k, and that’s not great play really.  I was also going to be in the big blind after the break, so I decided to go all-in blind whatever happened.  A few players limped, then the small blind raised, which was awesome, because it meant there was a load of dead money in the pot and I only had to beat one player.  He turned up AQ and I turned up 10-7, and obviously I won, because I am deadly when all-in blind   That put me safe again for a while.  Another short stack busted, and now I was guaranteed 8th, and $700. It’s now around 3am.

Then, a bit of magic.  A huge stack busted 2 other pretty sizeable stacks in one hand when he hit 2 pair on the flop, and suddenly I was up to 6th.  I started to play a fair bit at this stage, feeling really awake and in the game, and I managed to keep fairly safe with a stack that was just enough to give me fold equity when I shoved.  Another big stack busted, getting tired I think, so now I was 5th.  Another guy busted, being rivered pretty harshly, and now I have 4th spot.  I grew my stack to about 120k and was doing ok.  Of the 4 of us, me and one other guy had about the same stack, and the other 2 had bigger stacks.  The other guy with my kind of stack was in the small blind to my big blind when I picked up A4.  He moved all-in on me and I decided to call.  I decided to do this because I figured that basically we were racing for 3rd place, and a possible deal.  It was going to come down to one of us going out, I had an ace and I was prepared to gamble.  Sadly for me he had A9, and I didn’t hit, so I finished 4th, at 4.30am.

4th spot was worth $1,300 and I was pretty happy with that.  Not having played for ages, and not having had a deep run for even longer, it’s good to have a decent early cash in the bag, and be $1k+ on the road to a profitable trip.  And my jeans are paid for

Peachy keen.

Now, in the hotel room, it’s about 5am and Korea v Greece is on tv.  I’m thinking of getting breakfast in the room and then getting some kip after the England game in a few hours time…

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