It's About Time!

A week ago my Pokerstars account was on total fumes and I was making plans to get my hands on some cash so I could switch to playing in person for a while. Then I actually ran into some good luck!

On Saturday I won about $700 playing a mix of SNG's and cash games and on Sunday I was planning to watch football all day and play a few low limit multitables. I saw that they just started running these turbo (meaning they have 5 minute limits and go three times as fast as the normal 15 minute limit tournaments) $12 buy in tournaments that start as soon as 180 players sign up.

One of these was going off about every 15 minutes and I thought they would be perfect since they were going to be low stress and require limited if any concentration. I was hoping to win something like $50 or $100. Nothing major, but enough money to pay for a dinner out. Anything would be a bonus since it felt like a day off sitting on the couch.

In the first one I played I dominated from the start (I'm great at beating players who totally suck) and when we made it to the money (with 18 players left) I was in 2nd place. I navigated my way through the rest of the field and found myself with a small chip lead playing three handed. I figured I'd have a good chance to finish it off, but with blinds of 5000/10,000 and only 270,000 chips total in play I knew it would be a bit of a crap shoot.

Before I knew it I lost two hands and I was out! Crap! 3rd place paid $235 which is a ton considering I only had to risk $12 to get it, but 2nd was about $400 and 1st paid $600 so I was still a little disappointed.

But all was not lost. I was in another tournament of the exact same style that I'd started about 45 minutes later. I picked up some good hands and made some strong plays and before I knew it I was in the chip lead with about 30 players left. Once again I made it to the final table and before I knew it I was playing 3 handed again! I thought to myself "I am going to be crazy pissed if I finish in third again!"

At one point I was forced to risk all of my chips on a marginal hand, but I managed to get the cards I needed and survive. Luckily I was up against two weak passive players and I managed to grind them into dust with little difficulty. By the time we were down to 2 players I had a 6 to 1 chip advantage and finished off my last opponent in about 5 hands.

But there's more! I made a third final table finishing in 8th place in my next attempt! If poker was all luck and everyone had an equal chance, the odds of finishing 1st, 3rd (or better) and 8th (or better) in three consecutive 180 player tournaments would be 1 in 243,000. It blows my mind that whenever the courts are called on to determine if poker is a game of luck or a game of skill the judges always listen to the one moron who says it's all luck and ignores the 4 experts who say it's skill. It makes me sick.

I actually managed to cash in 3 other tournaments of different styles including finishing 60th out of 1370 in a $55 tournament. This is all good for my confidence (and my bankroll) as we get closer to the WCOOP which starts on Friday. I know it's been a few weeks since my last post and I've been posting less often, but I'll be putting up plenty of details about my WCOOP results.

Today I kept the good streak rolling picking up at least another $700 (I'm still in a few multitables, but even if I go broke in all of them I'll still be ahead at least that much). Hopefully tomorrow will be another good day.