I arrived at the casino 15 minutes before the 3000 euro main event was going to start. I catched up with a few friends and saw some finnish celebrities, and the tourney started. My starting table seemed pretty tough, like 4 of the people there knew each other and all seemed to have been playing poker for some time. There wasn’t much happening, but I tried to play as many pots as long as we were deepstacked as I feel I have a big edge at this point of the tournament coming from a cash game background. I just couldn’t hit the flop and had a failed J4s squeeze attempt, but I managed to grind some chips to keep my stack somewhat healthy.
The first bigger hand comes up when I got about 26k in chips (starting stack 20k), blinds were at 150/300 if I remb correctly, I look down at AA under the gun and make it 1000 to go, I have been pretty aggressive so I was expecting to get action, one guy calls before his turn, and luckily for me another guy before him reraises to 3000, the caller then folds leaving 1k extra dead money in the pot, a few people fold to this Swede who raises it up to 8k, it gets folded to me and I have to admit I’m quite happy with the action :D. Now I’m trying to figure out what would be the best move, I think calling just screams aces at this point so I just shove it all-in, the first reraisor folds and its down to the Swede, he is getting pretty good odds and thinks for some time and ends up folding saying he had AK. I show the aces and tell him nice laydown.
After 4 hours of play there is a dinner break, and after that I get moved to another table. Here the cards start to go my way, at the beginning I open tons of hands because of the antes, and because I still have a solid image. Second hand at the table I open A3o from the hijack, everyone folds to Ilari Sahamies in the small blind who calls with only like 15 big blinds behind. The flop comes QTT, he checks, I ask him how much he has behind and realise I can’t really cbet here because of the stacksizes, I check behind. Turn is an ace, he checks, I check. The river is a blank, he checks and I bet 3/4 pot. He goes into the tank, at some point I jokingly say K-high is no good as I have seen some sick hero calls by him at the full tilt highstakes tables :D, he says he has KQ and after some deliberation folds.
I start slowing down after stealing many pots, knowing no-one will give me any credit. This is when I start picking up hands, Teresa Nousiainen, a finnish pro poker player opens, everyone folds to me in the SB and I look down at AK and reraise, she thinks for some time and folds. Just a few hands later she openlimps UTG, everyone folds to me on the button, I look down at JJ and raise, blinds fold. It’s up to her and after a while she reraises 3x my raise which is kind of scary and is like 1/3-1/4 of her whole stack. Limp reraise from UTG usually is a big hand, especially at live 10handed tables, but in this hand I have to take into consideration my the game flow and my crazy table image. I ask her if she has aces and decide to put her all-in. She doesnt instacall which I’m very happy with, Ilari points out “No aces” which I find quite amusing. She ends up folding and my stack keeps growing.
Everything is going really great, and I have the perfect position at the table with two nits on my left. I have opened the 2 last hands and look down at 33, everyone folds to me in middle position and I’m not quite sure if I want to open it or just fold, but I end up opening it to 1100 with the blinds at 200-400, and a generous 50 ante. This woman to my left who I’m not sure has played a single hand reraises my to 2500 with a stack of like 26k. Everyone folds to me and in my opinion its an easy call at least for set value for 1400 more, the board comes down K53 rainbow and I probably have an erection. I check, she bets 3k, I raise to 8k pretty quickly trying to make it look bluffy. She calls pretty fast, and the turn is a 2, I put her all-in, she tanks and asks me how I’m getting so much good hands, and says we probably have the same hand. I just stay quiet knowing she will call, which she finally does and shows AK. I’m like no 4, cmon that would be sick, and the river is a ten.
I also make a pretty big bluff, the blinds at 300-600, a guy who has been opening pretty liberally, opens from middle position to 1.5k with 40k+ behind, everyone folds to me on the button with AdTd which I decide to call with, the blinds fold and the flop comes Qd6d6x. He bets 3k, I call. Turn is Jx, he bets 6k, I call. The river is a Qx and he checks, which brings up the everlasting question to bluff or not to bluff. I decide to do it and slowly count out 17k in chips which is push towards the middle. This guy literally tanks for like 5 minutes, before he finally folds, I turn over my hand and Ilari shouts out “I would have instacalled, cmon you could see it on his face”.
At this point I’m at up to like 70k in chips and am probably one of the chipleaders, I’m very confident in taking down the tournament. Ilari and a guy besides him is talking about a highstakes hand against CTS. Here I found the hand: http://www.pokerhand.org/?2698813 , I join the conversation saying something like “yeah it would have been the biggest pot of online poker had you called”, the other guy adds yeah, but it was a good bluff by him. Ilari says nah, it was a pretty terrible bluff, I can’t believe I didn’t call him, I was tired or something, wasnt playing good. He also adds and says afterwards he tilted and put 130k in preflop with jacks in Pot-limit Omaha, which is pretty funny, I can’t believe a guy playing on that level can make such tilt plays, btw if someone has this hand saved please pm it to me :P.
Anyways this is when everything starts to go *****. With the blinds at something like 400-800, everyone folds to the SB who opens with about a 20k stack behind, I look down at AQs and put him all-in, with my image I know I’m getting called by alot worse, he snapcalls with 99, and manages to win the flip of an over 40k pot. A little bit after this it’s probably the first bigger mistake of the tourney that I make, I look down at AQo from early position and open to 2k with the blinds at 400-800. Teresa reraises to 6k, with like a bit over 20k behind, it gets folded to me. Now I don’t think calling is an option here oop, I either put her all-in or fold. I think I could have gotten away from this as I overestimated my laggy image, I had been pretty quiet for a while now, and knew she wasnt doing this light. Anyway I end up putting her all-in and she calls with AKo which holds up. A few hands later I open 99, a shortstack with like 11k shoves so I kind of have to call, he has TT, and I lose. I cant believe how fast my stack has shrunken down. When the day is over I have 34k, with the average stack being somewhere at 65k, so I’m gonna need to get lucky the next day.
The second day I get a new table. The blinds start at 1200-2400 with a 200 ante, so I’m in push or fold mode now. It’s funny how live poker players do not understand the math behind shorstack pushing. This one hand comes up with everyone folding to me in the SB, I look down at 73o, the BB only has like 5 big blinds behind so with the antes I’m expecting to get called a ton of the time, most players would understand to pretty much call with any two cards from the big blind here, but I have hopes of having at least some folding equity so I think its a +ev shove. I shove and bb says its really close, but ends up folding A6s faceup, I’m like say whaaatt.
Everyone is just giving way to much credit to my shoves and I’m basically shoving any two cards from SB and button, and almost the same from the CO when it’s folded to me. I manage to build up my stack to like 44k before the hand I’m out on. A bit before this guy with glasses gets moved to our table, 2 to the left from me. Everyone folds to me on the button, blinds still at 1200/2400 I look down at KQs, the SB is too short I dont have to worry about him, but the BB who just arrived has me covered. I think about just openshoving but it would be quite an overbet so I end up opening to 6k. SB folds and the BB shoves pretty fast. Here his looks really come into play, he is a young guy with glasses, looks like an online player who I would expect to be restealing really light here. Also I’m getting sick good odds because of the antes so I end up calling, he turns over 88 and I lose the coinflip and am out. I’m pretty dissapointed but I guess you can’t win them all… What still surprises me is how bad some of the live “pros” play, I saw a well known finnish pro, I’m not gonna say his name but he openlimped UTG with like 10bbs, I thought to myself like omg aces, someone raises behind him, everyone folds to him and he folds?? Well stuff like that just gives me confidence the no-limit hold’em games will stay beatable for years to come.
oh and btw found the JJ hand: http://www.pokerhand.org/?2698800