Slithering into the money....

First of all, thanks to Jen and Brad for making some kind of updates possible. It was a long day of poker, and now I am through to the final day (and in the money), but unfortunately, I went really card dead the last three hours of play, and consider myself lucky that I didn’t get called on a couple of my all ins down the stretch. Plus, there was one guy who was pitifully short, and although I am loathe to just wait my way into the money, in this specific situation, I think it made sense.

So, here I sit, 23rd out of 24 players in chip count. First prize is $550,000, but I have a lottery-esque chance of getting there. The nice thing about where I sit is I have zero expectation past where I’m at now….so, I’ll either double up twice in the first 30 minutes, and give myself a chance, or take my 4,000 Pound ($7,100), and go have a nice day.

Here is what I remember.

I was very pleased to see only one name I recognized at my starting table (Luca Pagano), and he was to my right. The table was a very tight, timid table, and while that may not bode well to get yourself a monster stack, it is good to build chips. I was clipped down to 5,000 chips (we started with 10,000) almost right away, after I tried to trap a guy by limping from the small blind, and after I made two pair on the river, he had made a wheel.

From there I got it back up pretty quickly. I had AA once, and it held up. I decided to flip for all my money with QQ (the guy who re-raised me was the only guy at the table shifting a lot of chips), and the first card off was a Q. Now at about 25,000, I took the aforementioned Mr Pagano out with AK, after I put him on a move from the cutoff. He was on a move with A 4, and I didn’t get unlucky, and off I went. One hand that came up was crucial. There was this wild Czech kid who sat down at our table pretty short stacked…maybe 6,000. He was moving in every third hand. On this one hand Jac Arama (aka Schmulka’s hero) raised it to 3,000, and the kid moved all in for about 10,000 (Jac had about 20,000 left). I looked down at AK suited, knew the kid was on a move, and hoped Jac didn’t have a monster. I moved my stack in, which had Jac pretty much covered. Jac debated for along time, and finally folded. It was a good thing he did fold, because a river King (the kid had 8 10, and caught an 8 on the flop) would have made Jac a flush, but was also the card I needed to knock the Czech out. That put me at about 45,000, and I was the clear chip leader at the table. Just when I was able to take advantage of having the big stack at the table, they moved a guy with a mountain onto our table (of course to my left). I got it up to about 55,000 with about 30 people left (118 started, twelve made the money)….and then proceeded to go on a Caldwell-esque dead card run the likes of which haven’t been seen in the Vic for a long time (OK, I exaggerate, but it really sucked) I saw ONE pair, and zero big Aces the last three hours of the tournament. I actually feel kind of lucky to be where I am at. I was making “creative” moves down the stretch with hands like 8 10 suited (of course!), and just got lucky that I never ran into a hand.

So, I wish I could write for hours about this day, but I slept so late that I actually have to hustle to make my 2:30 pm start time right now. Thanks to everyone for their support, and wish me luck….I’ll need a lot of it early.

Out…