Home Game + FTOPS

My home game was a smaller affair than usual, but a great evening nonetheless. 7 runners attended - myself, Shazbo, Jody, Debs, Professor Jalfont, The Doctor and Deven. Unlike many home games, nobody really won or lost a huge amount - I think Dev was probably the biggest winner, although I am unsure what his final total was. As for myself I lost £100 in the tournaments, but won back £120 in the cash game to register a tiny profit.

One rather worrying aspect was that I found myself frequently frustrated to be only playing one game, since I am now reacclimatised to playing up to 6 tables at a time online. In cash I am generaly a loose player so it doesn’t really matter what I am being dealt, as I can still play many hands, but I found it infuriating in the tournament when I went card dead. Due to frequent raisers to my right, I just couldn’t get myself into the game without putting it all on the line with a marginal holding. I hope this impatience doesn’t wreck my game when I return to live action in a couple of weeks.

There was one interesting hand to blog from the tournament. I have 3.2k in chips, and am probably in last place, with blinds of 150-300. There have been some serial pre-flop raisers so far, and I find JJ UTG. This is pretty tough to play with my stack size. I can either raise as normal, and take it as it comes on the flop. However, this will leave me with 2200 if I get a bad flop, and in real trouble. I decide to be more unconvential and limp with my JJ, which is a hugely dangerous play, but I figure there is a decent chance someone will pop it up to 1200 and I can shove for my last 3k, and make it look like Aces. Some people might argue I am turning JJ into a bluff here, but I think it works well with my stack size.

Anyway…everybody calls. Great - that worked.

Flop arrives 7,9,10

This is not the worst flop in the world, but clearly I am worried about the straight potential out there. With 1500 in the pot, I decide to shove for my last 2900 to take it down, but Jalfont has a set of 7s and I am toast. I think the hand is unavoidable, as if I raise to 900, Geoff probably calls with 77 and I get it all in anyway on the low flop.

Back in the online world, I see there is another FTOPs festival coming up on Full Tilt. I have one more big Saturday and Sunday session lined up this year, as well as my usual midweek schedule, so I have targeted the following events:

Sat 8th: $535 PLO
Sat 8th: $109 NLHE rebuy
Tues 11th: $216 Round of each
Sun 16th: $129 NLHE

Sun 17th: $535 NLHE

I guess the whole lot including the rebuys will cost a little shy of $2k, so it would be great to register one or two decent cashes in these. On the Sunday, I’ve also set aside some bankroll to play the usual big Sunday tournaments as well, so that night will really be a long slog. I’m really looking forward to the Sunday tournaments, as I so rarely get a chance to play them with work comittments.

Congratulations go to Deven, who registered a meaty 4 figure win on a Full Tilt Sunday tournament. On the flip side of the coin, he finished at 5:30am on the Monday, and had neglected to book the day off work so a nightmare start to the week workwise. That age old question - “shall I bother having one hour sleep?”