EPT BUDAPEST

After the disappointment of London I was off to Budapest in late October. Seeing as everyone I know works or is broke I had real trouble finding someone to share my room with. Thankfully Eddy "There is such a thing as a free lunch" Eyre was available again to abuse the free Breakfasts of another 5star hotel.

I arrived alone the night before the tournament started, traveling in style via Wizz Air. It had been a while since I'd left England and on my taxi ride from the airport to the Hotel I began to remember how much I enjoyed being abroad in Europe and how exciting it was to travel. I have a real thing for European cities (they make up 97% of the cities i've ever visited so its no wonder) despite their similar characteristics there is something about the Architecture that makes me feel weird inside, like I've gone back in time or am Jason Bourne.....one of the two, i'm not really sure which one it is. It could also have something to do with the amount of alcohol i'd consumed in the airpot/plane (I wont lie, i'm not a big lad, one pint usually does the trick).

The Sofitel in Budapest was probably the nicest hotels I've been in, located on the Danube with a spectacular view of the Parliament on the opposite side of the river but more importantly a Casino inside the building so there is no need to go outside and risk getting mugged. I met up with Eddie, who'd already become accustom to the room and Mini-bar, and we went to check out the Blackjack tables.

We sat and played. I spent more time trying to work out exactly how many froutiers (money) I was betting in £ than I did trying to count the deck and Eddy just chained smoked in the chair next to me until the novelty of smoking in a public place wore off.....it never did.

Next day we got up ate the breakfast which i'd probably rate an 8/10. I think Londons was better quality but I liked the porridge/rice pudding thing they had so I reckon i benefitted more from it. Eddie liked the champagne that you were apparently allowed to take by the bottle and drink around the hotel which he had scummed to by the 3rd day.

We went and hit the town later and looked for somewhere for lunch. We hit some Japenese trendy restaurant and had Sushi that seem to be a 6/10 but that might be because I had eaten it a lot recently. I paid Eddie 20€ to eat the massive one with Orange eggs, he didn't enjoy it so it was worth the money apart from he felt ill and that knocked the wind out of his sails, so we went back and I played some 10/20 PLO (o the god old days) on FTP and chatted to Annette who was apparently in the same hotel and playing DAy 1B also. Eddie managed to perk up later in the day when he entertained himself for 2 hours watching the street hookers from our hotel window. I think I offered him 50€ to go and do the 'Monkey Dance' in front of them but then decided it would be cruel/weird for all parties involved.

Day 1B. I looked forward to the tourney and felt a lot more relaxed. I guess the rate I was winning EPT packages I had guaranteed a seat at every spot on the tour so this had become more of a routine than a yearly highlight.

I was seat 7 on the table on which I had Danny Stern (Ansky) in seat 3 and Luca Pagano in seat 10 as well as a SNG reg on my left whose name SN escapes me momentarily but he's from....some where in Europe. Play was standard for me as I shrunk into my live poker shell and spewed 0% pre but then again won fewer pots then I would have online as a result bluffing 0% and finishing the day on a modest 27k. No dinner break meant we were finished early which I like because eating makes sluggish and I'm used to playing 10 hours of poker+ with no breaks online, usually pissing, shitting, eating and doing whatever else you can think of whilst balancing my laptop in my free hand.

Day 2 was interesting for me as I became more shortstacked and felt comfortable shipping 15-20 BBs as resteals and value 2,3,4 bets etc and was able to soul read a LAG euro donk for a light 3bet from the BB and happily ship AJo for value.

I then probably made my biggest mistake of the tourney even tho I stood by my rationale. A youngish Hungarian opened OTB making it his 3rd consecutive LP open in as many orbits and I decided to cram ATo for around 16BBish over his 3.5x. My reasoning was that although I felt he liked the look of his hand his bet sizing gave away his range. I scrubbed JJ-AA out on a feel basis and that there was no reason for him to make such a large raise against opponents who had shown no tendencies to defend their blinds or splash around generally. I also felt that he would fold AJ alot of the time and that I was value shoving the times he called with AT or worse and with TT unlikely and smaller pairs a flip I felt that this was a +EV shove with AQ+ and some AJ's the only threat. Online this reasoning is factored down to mathematical ranges but in this live setting the feel factor requires an explanation of my thought process. Well he snapped AK so I guess I'm a donk and on an K T x flop my chances were looking very slim indeed. That was until I binked another TEN on the turn, ooops! He was not happy. I told him it was standard. ***stack sizes are a little blurry***

So with my stack I kept snug for the first 3 or 4 hours of the day. My UTG KK open got 3Bet by Tristan Clemencon on the CO. We were both about 30BBs deep and he had just outplayed the previous hand so I figured he must have a big hand. I did contemplating flatting to look as if I was steaming but felt a cram here was my best line as he would be making less mistakes than others post flop. Anyway he tank folded to what he said was QQ and I do believe him cos he did look in agony as he did it. I don't think many online regs would fold there, I know i'd have trouble as I felt I was stinking of AK. Having said that in my attempts to polarize my range to one specific hand I ended up stinking of KK+ AK+ and so folding QQ was not that difficult for him. I had planed to exchange 10% with him because I felt he was playing well but fortunately I didn't because he busted before the money.

I later made an error once I had spewed a little in that I raised QT from the sb with the intention of snapping BBs 10ish BBs. Instead I was faced with roughly double that (if i remember correctly) but thankfully still called and won a flip versus 33.

The bubble then burst and I had made my first EPT cash in 3 attempts which was nice.

EDIT: 22nd Dec/2009

To finish this off:

I ended up busting the tourney in 10th place when I got coolered for the chip lead, raising k8o on the button and bet/calling the BB's shove on Ks 8s 7 flop and losing to 77!

Even though I took 30,000€ in the end I was fortunate to have swapped a piece with Will Fry who took down over 400k. So in the end I made more out of his finish then my own.

EPT LONDON

Its been along time since I have written anything so I can't recall hands as well I would like but here goes.

Day 1B. Very good table draw. Only notables were Timex who is a fairly solid online MTT player aswell as November 9 Finalist Ilan Schwartz  as well as an online friend of mine, Adam York who was weirdly sat on my immediate left and probably the only person I had said "See you there" to prior to event. Play for me was pretty straight forward for the first 6 Levels, I picked up enough small pots to ensure my confidence was high which is a very important factor for me in live poker. I was able to snap of a double barrel bluff by Ilan with 4th pair that gave me a strong enough image to ensure i could play with some comfort on this fairly weak table.

Unfortunately it is now January the 4th and I have forgotten many keys hands but I still want to tie up some lose ends. 

Before I moved to my 2nd of 3 tables for Day 1 I was able to flat a 3bet from a new donk with QQ. Unfortunately I was unable to extract anymore (even with 40BBs+ Eff) on a Qh Xh Xh flop and my bet on the turn ended the hand.  Soon after this I was moved table which really sucked because I was very comfortable. 

Having no reads on my new table proved to be costly. 2nd hand I pick up QQ and open UTG+1 with a 22k stack (300/600). A young online player (who turned out to be Fatal Error) with a similar size stack called in the CO and a tall, slap-head Scandy 3-bet (with a stack of about 27k). This was a spot that you always dread in these big live buyin events, especially since your tourney life is so much more value than your standard daily donkements.  What is sicker is that given first impressions and the way this guys chips were stacked (and the mixed denominations) he seemed like he had been very active and that this was just an obvious squeeze. I felt that he was testing my resolve and knew that his FE pre/post flop was increased given that I was new to the table and wouldn't want to go to war readless and OOP for my tourney life. I did consider just folding, predicting that it was always going to be a nasty spot. I also Considered 4Bet/calling or even just shutting my eyes and shipping but came to the conclusion that seeing a flop with a good intention of CR was the best line. I think mostly i wanted to avoid racing pre v AK.

Anyway the flop was As 3s 3 and it went Chk Chk which i was pretty pleased with. The turn was the Ks and now I picked up the Nut flush draw. I did consider betting and on reflection maybe made a mistake not half potting here but felt like he was calling a lot of the time so this was rarely a semi-bluff and never a value bet and so I just opted to check given that I was never going to fire a second barrel if I missed river. So i check and now he bets something close to 5k which is now nearing 1/3 of my stack. I think I can call here but evaluated that I will be check/folding to any non-spade/Queen river so I left myself open to getting bluffed by air, so as I result I just fold with no money committed post.

Other than that I am fairly card dead and play fairly tight once my momentum goes. Phil Ivey joins the table which I predicted would be -EV on my blind stealing. He stayed for an hour built up his shortstack, got a beat and then horribly limp called 55 from the sb v Fatal errors standard K6 push. It was odd from Phil as I couldn't see the value in slow playing a small pocket pair with 10BBsish.

I was allin and chopped with AJ v AJ on A high flop and then later 3bet shoved 88 from SB v bald Scandy and ran into AA in the BB FFS. Luckily I spiked one of my 14 outs on the river and so I was able to join my final table of the day with an around average stack (tending to be between this and lowish for the remainder of the day).

My new table had Isabelle Mercier, Andre Akkari and Johannes Strassmann (who was impressive). I 3bet-shoved a bit in standard spots to try and gain a good stack for day 2. In the end i was like half average when the lowest nittiest player in tourney raised UTG and by mistake I caught a glimpse of one of his whole cards which i thought was an Ace. Now i'm not a cheat and am the first to tell some when they are flashing cards but given the fact that I had extra info on Villain I decided to call ATC and assume that he has raised AJ+ with the intention of taking the pot away from his. Anyway the flop came Q 8 x and I had A8 so I just decided to CR his half stack Cbet for value rather than a bluff given that AQ was s small enough part of his range. Anyway he tanks and starts cursing and now I'm very comfortable predicting he will fold leaving 3-5BBs lol. So I ask him what he has and he says TENS!! and so now i'm shitting it with only 6 BBs more than him. Anyway to my relief he makes the worst fold ever explaining that I have to have a Queen and I avoid this weird beat even though I deserve to get felted for my sneakiness and unethicalnessness.

I Finish the day 40/150? stack....something like that.

Day 2 was simple. i play nitty i make it to final 90 top 55 paid. I shove 25 BBs pre with KK over Vanessa Roussos open after 3 levels of play. She snaps AKhh and spike Ace on turn after a no heart 7 high flop and i miss the chance to take a stack that would have taken me into the money and maybe beyond.

O well, Michael Martin won it eventually and he is a FIFA fan so I guess thats OK. Now that he has a Million £ I need to play some HU FIFA games against him and not lose. I did offer to play him and Ansky in Budapest Versus me and Eddie (=dreamteam) but it was FIFA 08 on the PS3 which was probs -EV and I was still in the ME.