Another One Bites the Dust...

Dinner and poker... that's what I did tonight and everything came out all right. Now, I am not one to be stuffing my mouth when playing poker. Even at home games when everyone orders pizza, I am sitting there with my glass of water concentrating on what's before me. A pro once said, "Championships are won on starvation", and I believe this to be true. I forget where I read it, but there was a scientific study that proved eating while doing any sort of mind game (like poker) will affect your judgment and you will not play optimally. So what does all this mean? Well, besides the fact that scientist have way too much time on their hands to figure this stuff out, I went against them (and myself) and played some poker while eating a nice meal... that I cooked in between hands. The results? They say pictures say a thousand words, so here ya go...



The game was pretty average for me early on, keeping myself slightly ahead of the average chip stack and waiting for blinds to go up so I could play "poker". I was able to build up a rather healthy chip stack when the blind reached 100 / 200 then lost a bunch of chips when I called a guy's all in and lost. Later in the game we were down to 11 players left and my table was short handed. I had 11,000 in chips, and the next in like had 26,000. I ended up shoving my chips in on the button with Kd Td and was called by the BB with Ah Kh. The Flop gave hope, X X T, but a A on the Turn made me drop my fork. As I settled with the thought I was placing 11th, a miracle T hit the river and I doubled up. Two hands later I took him out and we went to the final table. (Sorry guy...)

Entering the final table I was 2nd in command and ended up the table captain in 4 hands. I was in the BB and it folded around to the chip leader in the SB. He made a huge raise and I had QQ, I reraised all in, facing the bubble.... and he let go. He didn't attempt to steal my blinds for a long time after, so this play not only gained me chips up front, but saved money for future rounds. Few hands later I took out a player and the bubble position was over. After that, I just kept myself under control. I called all in bets based on pot odds and what my remaining stack would be. I ended up doubling up a total of 3 players, but I knocked out just as many. When we got into 3-way action I had a dominating chip lead over the other two opponents. They sat around 15k each, and I with around 40k. The players just folded to me every hand, no one wanted to play with me. I just kept stealing and they ended up knocking each other out. When I went into heads up I have over 60k in chips and my opponent was crippled. He ended up doubling up through me once, but finally I took him down a few hands later.

Over all I am happy with the win. I did get lucky not to finish 11th, but I'll take it. I made the correct move and it paid off, even though I sucked out for it to happen. My only regret on taking this down is WPX hand histories make it nearly impossible for me to go back and retrieve key moments in the tournament. I guess need to start taking games down on FTP again. Maybe I'll play in this week's Mookie.....