A Good Result

Poker is such a fickle game. Fortunes (and bragging rights!) can be won and lost on the turn of a card. Well, this weekend, the cards turned in my favour and I’m happy. I actually felt I played as well as I could and got the results I deserved – not something that happens especially often in poker games (or at least the ones I’m involved in)!

So, Saturday night saw a new venue for us, with a first visit to my friend’s new house in Knottingley. For the first time ever as well, we managed to muster seven players which was awesome. Such a contrast to the usual fast dynamic of our five player games.

After anticipating this night for so long, it was great to finally get there and get going. We got the cards in the air around 9.30pm and everyone seemed to make a cautious start to the game – not wanting to make too many moves too early. To be fair, the general standard among us, with a couple of exceptions, is reasonably ok, so the careful start was to be expected.

A few hands in though, with the blinds still only at level two, (10, 20 out of a 3k stack) the best, and most aggressive player at the table started making what I thought were a few bold moves. He is well known for playing fast, aggressive, power poker but by the same token, we all know he doesn’t need a hand to do it. So, I decided to play the role of Sheriff for the night and keep him honest. Unfortunately, this didn’t work out so well. To be honest I was a little reckless, re-raising (twice) with air when he actually had a hand. Fortunately, I bailed out once I realised this but had bluffed off half my stack trying to catch him out.

So, from this point on for me, it was a bit of a grind, and then, as the blinds got bigger, a case of pushing in good spots and getting my chips in ahead. Amazingly, I managed to play pretty well (in my opinion) and get myself into a position of being average chipped with two people out. From here, I knew I had to up my game and actively start to accumulate chips and go for the win. So, as the blinds escalated, I played more and more aggressively, even taking down an amazing bluff hand (for a huge pot), pushing top two pair off her hand – brilliant, a real buzz – I showed the bluff too (nasty!)

However, the win was not to be. I was just too far behind and the luck wasn’t with me. I did manage to get heads up, but my 1:2 chip deficit was just too much and I ended up second – a good result considering my start though.

We started the second game around 1.30am with shorter stacks and faster blinds – really fun poker. Play hands or get blinded out – fast! There were a lot of flops, a lot of all ins and a lot of chips changing hands.
Fortunately for me, I got a few hands initially and that meant I could be pretty dominant throughout the second game. I never got my chips in for my tournament life and actively tried to knock people out. This meant a few stack swings, but it paid off in the end with me eventually hitting a one outer heads up to take the game down. This was a bit rough on my friend, but that’s the way poker goes. I’ve had a few inflicted on me in the past and I’m sure it’ll happen again, so I’ll take it when it falls for me.

The poker finally came to an end around 3.30am, bringing to an end a really fun night, made all the better by the fact that I’d bagged the most league points for the night and the bragging rights for the next month.

Roll on the next game in May!

Bragging Rights at Stake

Since completing Heavy Rain earlier this week, I’ve been pretty restrained with the PS3. My focus instead has turned towards the weekend and my monthly poker match with my work buddies.

I really look forward to these nights – starting late & finishing in the not so early hours of the morning, it is like a proper gambling den experience – the chips, the baize, the smoke, but without any money exchanging hands. You see, the friends I play with are all Muslims and so, it’s against their religion to gamble. However, we play for something far less superficial than money – bragging rights. We have a league system and award points for the various finishing positions. To go out first on one of our nights is awful – you just know the next month will be filled with taunts. I’d much rather lose a tenner to be honest!

So anyway, this week I have been practicing hard, getting my head into the poker mindset, tuning my thoughts so (hopefully) I can keep my rash decisions to a minimum. The last couple of nights I’ve played a few matches on PKR. A couple of freerolls, a $1 sit & go and for the first time ever, a Pot Limit Omaha (PLO) freeroll.
We usually play the most commonly televised format of the game, Texas Hold-em in our monthly games, so I tend to concentrate on that form of the game. To be honest, I’m ok at it – not good by any means – but I can hold my own. I’ve turned $20 into $40 over the course of a year just through playing small sit & gos & freerolls. To be honest, I feel too pressured if I play at any of the higher stakes and I just enjoy the game, rather than the winning of money, so if I can play in a 2500 seater tourney for most of the night, but don’t win anything I’m happy. I just love the game.

Anyway, I digress. Last night, after watching Durrrr and Zigmund play some PLO in the Durrrr challenge, I decided to give it a go. There was a PLO freeroll up at 10pm and I thought, hey let see what happens. To be honest, for the first 30 minutes or so, I was pretty confused. There just seem to be so many more potential hands with PLO. I found putting my opponent on a hand really hard. However, after a while, I realised that the fact that there are 4 hole cards is more or less irrelevant, the 5 card poker hand that your opponent ends up with is the most important thing and as long as you are aware of what is potentially beating you on the board (like Texas Hold-em) you really don’t go too far wrong. After I’d realised this, I felt a lot more comfortable and I got reasonably deep – 323rd out of 1500. I was pretty happy.

So, perhaps a few games more over the next couple of days and I’ll be ready for the big event on Saturday night. Let’s hope so. The gloating will be unbearable if not!