WE DID IT!!!

Maximum result. In the main event, the 7stud tournament we finished 1th and 2nd! The prelimiery afternoon NLHE 18 player 200+10eur two table tournament was won by - KATJA !!! Wow, this was really our weekend. We are still shocked how well this weekend turned out for us and how lucky we got to book these scores.

Now, the whole story: we had a nice saturday, Katja sleeping 'till noon and me getting summ stuff done since 8 a.m. when Katja drove to our horses to do some quick horseback riding and me meanwhile getting a one hour nap where she woke me up when she returned. My son was there putting attention to our beagle, Paula, so we had no worries and went there in a refreshed and motivated matter. The prelimery nolimit holdem tournament was scheduled for 4 p.m. and there were 14 players so it was decided to run two tables and make a combined placement. When 4 more players showed up shortly after the thing started there were allowed to play making for 18 player event with a 200eur buyin and top 5 spots paid (we objected and tried to have only top 4 paid but no chance). There is a nice shopping center in the same building as the casino and the stores were still open (this may sound strange to my american readers) and even upon arriving my thought went to some stuff I could need. In the tourney we got 1,500 in chips and 15 minutes levels. I played the first five hands and was down to about 1k (I layed down a 67 of clubs on 89K-K flop/turn with the 89 in clubs against a very tight player going all-in) when I got AQs in MP and raised to 300, the BB moving in for about my stack size. I called, he showed TT which held up and I was out in 18th spot out of 18. I even jokingly asked about the shopping center before I called so I guess I had different priorities there, lol. I went over to Katja playing the other table and wished her luck, then went out to the mall. I was in the mall for about 90 minutes, browsing and buying things when I returned to the casino and thought to myself "if she is still playing she must be very close to money now". It was already so full in the poker area (all the people for the main event starting at 6 p.m.) that I had trouble seeing who was still seated but to my delight there only four players left, including Katja, and she had a monster stack! I huged her and sat down to watch the tourney coming down. It took another 20 minutes to finish and Katja made not one mistake at all. One player ("Weinschorle" Nack) was whining not getting any money in adjacent hands with JJ and QQ (I would have to). Our two asian pros Minh and Tang got 3rd and 4th and heads up Mr. Nack was no competion for Katja holding 90% of the chips. She won the tournament and I was really happy for her (and me, as we split all and everything which we have).

It was time for the main event. Still all players left, Katja was "short stacked" but had two rebuys left and I had a lot of chips and also two rebuys left. There were two levels before dinner break and nothing much important happened there. The dinner itself was good, asian food and nice dessert and I almost forgot my weightbet. As a sidenote I had a flue for 14 days and could not do any running for 10 days and went out on friday morning for a 6 mile run - since then I am always hungry like a wolf, I did not had this experience in the whole time so far. After dinner we took the rebuys as add-on's, getting 8k chips for each one and I was close to the chiplead there. Now the tournament really started, 36 of 37 players still in the tournament and most of them still holding decent chips. Not to far into play I lost a big hand with pocket kings against pocket aces which were played to passive by the player I identified yesterday as "weak-tight" (and I think I got confirmed) and when we both did not improve it was checked on the river (I had pushed it all the way). Upps. Two or three hand later I had TT in the hole and an open ace and raised it right away. The player to my left called, the ultra-tight asian "Bin Long" (his nickname for terrorizing the game showing down nothing less than trips). All other folded (can you guess why with the maniac 50outs and the super-rock BinLong playing???) and I improved on 5th street to a straight draw. I still led the way but he raised me. I thought for a long time but he had 47J with two diamonds showing and I had him on that big pair (most likely kings) so I called. He led then all the way, showing down full-house 7's with 4's (no pair open) and I improved to trip tens but still lost the hand. I was nearly broke with about 8k in chips left and the limit already 600 ante, 1,200 bring in and limits 2,400 to 8,000 or something. That pot was about 60k and the pot before with the KK against AA was 36k also. I survived my next all-in hand and started to put preassure to everyone, raising the next 8 hands and getting away with it (some may call this tilting but it defintly was not) so I was back around 20k and went back to my normal -still very aggressive- game. Not to long after I won a decent sized pot and was back in good shape. Katja was on move meanwhile, getting moved to each of the remaining four tables twice. And she really hates that. She was swearing and rumbling and getting dealt the high card to be moved each and every time, it was a running joke. When I visited her one time she won a nice pot against our friend Kai (who played that hand very badly) and she keept on moving up. Players were droping now faster and soon it was only 3 tables left. I never looked back until we were down to two tables and I got moved to balance the tables (12 players left, 8 in the money). Katja was there with about 100k in chips, one guy with about 200k, Dirk with about 80k and two others including my friend Peymen "Chappi" with small stacks. Sure enough Chappi doubled up against me hitting a gutshot against my aces up and I was down to 40k. I stealed here and there but being very carefull back to 60k when Chappi hit me again, raising with nothing to steal and getting caught by me but hitting a A on 5th and 6th street so he won again and was over 100k I was agaion down to the felt with about 20k. Katja went unhurt and won one lucky pot holding 77-x against A3-A when she caught a flush to throw out Dirk. I made my way back to 100k with only one showdown when I had aces up in five and getting called all-in by kings-up on 6th. When Minh went out in 9th spot we the final table was set and Katja and I made it! We huges each other, high-fived us and went over to the designated final table which was going right away without any break.

Right the very first hand I got pocket nines and the chip leader raised. I popped it up and when he called we went heads up. I betted out on 4th street when I hit a K (he had a K showing so I got very lucky by catching that card) and he called me. I had not much left which I fired out on 5th and he surly called. 9's were good as he had no pair and no decent draw. He improved to an inside straight draw on 6th along with his 4 over cards but got no help on the river so my unimproved nines were good and I doubled up. The final table went for 90 minutes and there was ainteresting hand that made everybody wonder: I was in the last seat and had to open with the low card I brought it in for a full bet holding A3-3. Katja was on my left sitting in the first seat and she raised all-in about annother bet. Everybody folded to me and I surly had to call (and if only for us not looking like we are "playing together" which we surly do but not in a cheating way). She had 55-J. Everybody made jokes about us throwing out each other and the catched a third 5 to win this hand by far. I wondered why she did that as there were still 3 or 4 players behind her who could easly wake up with a big hand, busting us both. She insists -still- that she thought this well out and figured my stack and hers and everything. Had we been hit in that hand I am sure we would still discuss but it turned out for good so I happily taking it the way it was. Then we were only 3 players left, Katja, Achmed and I. Achmed is the player I have the most respect for as he is fearless, thoughtfull and has patience as the devil. Besides this we consider us very close friends for years and stay out of each others way as often as possible in any game we play together (which is not often the case as he lives in Berlin) and we even kind of softplay each other as if we have a unspoken rule "however really has something, bets, otherswise we just check it down". Anyway, I had the chip lead and Achmed and Katja had about the same but we were very close together and I was not surprised when he said "I really don't like to play that out with you, what about a deal?". We quickly agreed on a even split for the about 24,500eur paid in the first three spots and play just for the honor. I then went on to win the tourney with a pair of aces, Katja was next and Achmed got third. We did as agreed and splitted the money even between us, 8k for each and the rest as tip for the dealers. Nice was very nice!

Overview: there were 4 events this weekend:

We did not play any cashgame this weekend although there was a "dream table" playing pot-limit holdem but we were tired and exhausted (and there was no open seat ;) so we drove home.

Our local two day tournament started yesterday. It is a 7 card stud event with a 500eur buy-in and three rebuys for 200eur each. The levels are 30 minutes, starting chips are 2,000 and first limit is 20-100 (spread limit). The amount of chips you get for a rebuy is depending on the level where you do it; in the very first level you get 3,000 in chips and if you manage to make the rebuy at the very last possible level after about 4 hours playing time you get 6,000. If you manage to last until the end of the rebuy period you get 8k chips for each of these 200eurs. In fact that makes it almost impossible to not take the rebuys.

We arrived there after a peacefull day right on time and were delighted to see that were already over 35 players registered as we had small fears that there would be way less - there is another very good tournament running this week in Bregenz, which is also very nice and a lot of people go there. After some walking around and saying hello the tournament started. But I did not manage to see the first hand - there was a massage chair available which one of the players brought along (he has a coffee/massage shop at the airport) and I naturally used it immedeatly and extensivly. When I sat down I got rubbish the first level and managed to get my 2,000 chips down to about 1,100 by calling way to much until 5th street (I just love that). The limit went up to 200-400 with a 40 ante and I got my first good hand, jacks up on 4th. I lost that being all-in to a straight on the river and was the very first one shouting "rebuy". Nice work, lol. I relaxed, took a deep breath and decided to give these guys a little more action.

I knewed every player on my 7 handed table except one how and I was able to classify him very soon as a weak-tight player with the others being mostly pot-limit players and generally tight. They have problems with an agressive approach where you play your draws strongly and make some fance plays. While I'm the perfect candidat for FPS (fancy-play-syndrome)

Fancy Play Syndrome (FPS), a term coined by Mike Caro, means choosing unusual tactics too frequently when the more obvious choices would do better. FPS often implies that a player goes out of his way to impress opponents by using unexpected strategies that actually cost him profits through overuse.

So say Michael Wiesenberg in Cardplayer who is famous for not winning anything

Katja has about 2k in chips and also took one rebuy. Things did work out for her so good as she lost two big pots each to a rivered kings-up (king coming last...) and one big bluff did not worked out as she controlled by a sheriff holding just one small pair (she hamered herself on the way home "never bluff a dumb player, never bluff a dumb player"). Better luck for her today!

After the tournament there was cash game offered and for the first time single-table no-limit holdem tournaments. Katja and I decided to support this nice move from the casino and joined the action. The players discussed about the actual buy-in amount with all extremes from 100eur up to 1,000eur. Finally 300+15eur was choosen and cards were in the air. Early on I won a nice pot when limping in with JQo for 20 (1,500 start chips) after my friend Kai who limped only also. It was 4 players. Flop comes 9Tx and Kai bet out 200. I had this nut straight draw with two overcards and flat called. The blinds both folded. The turn brought a beautifull king, Kai checked to me and I also checked. River comes a blank and I hold the nuts with position on him. He bets out 200 and I thought what he could have and how much he would be calling for. I finally raised him 500, fearing that he might fold for more and putting me on a steal for this amount. He called, nodding his head to my hand and showing - KK! Little did I know in what danger I had been there on the river. I needled him for this play (not raising with KK pre-flop) but he took it pretty well. The levels were 15 minutes which in live play does not give you to many hands but with my now nice stack I was able to just cruise and play good cards and situations. Katja got in more trouble, surving one time with 77 against two better hands when a 7 turned but finally busting out in an unpleasant 4th place. Left were my friend Frank and Minh, a online 7stud pro (also doing some "business" with Men "The Master" from time to time), both very good players. My conficence broke when in the only passed-to-the-big-blind pot of the day I had kings and got no action. I was just able to outlast Frank somehow but lost to Minh with K high against A high. Anyway, that was a 900eur payout for second place. We choosed right away to play another one!

In this one I got some chips early when I had raised preflop with QQ, got two callers and moved in a K high flop (I know, I know, not a very good idea but I had these reaaaaaaaaads, lol). Anyway, no callers. Frank busted out three players including Katja in 10th getting nice cards and after that Pete continued to bust another three players. I won one hand and had about 2k in chips with 15k on the table, not a very good position. Dirk was in a even more desperate position sitting directly to my left and when Frank and Pete one time folded between our blinds I raised his BB with my "killer hand" 68o. Dirk called! Uhoh. In the end I made a very lucky two pair against his K high with a K in the flop. From there on was no holding back, I got dream cards for 10 hands in a row (7 times a pair including aces and 3 hands containing one ace) and busted both Frank and Pete to win this thing for a nice 1,500eur payout.

We left then, it was already 3 a.m., very tired. Today play will begin at 4 p.m. with another single table tournament and the main event will then continue at 6 p.m.

I feel ready to kill!

I almost did it again. 3rd out of 160!!! On saturday I played another 100$ multi-table tournament, limit holdem. Normaly I play NLHE for obvious reasons but due to my nice win last weekend I thought "what the hell" and played limit again. 160 starters. First thirty minutes, same thing: nearly broke, went even all-in once in the second level. From there on I went on a tear, playing and winning a lot of hands and I was never in any trouble again until we reached the final 20 players where I got two ugly beats in a row to send me well below average. I was severly crippled when only 14 were left but then came back to about average due to sheer agression. On the final table I managed to survive with about average when only 4 were left. I got KK, my first decent starting hands since these beats and got lucky not only to win the hand but to bust the other player also. I had the second most chips with 3 players left when my final hand came up: I got AQo, re-raised in the SB and had the BB calling (more chips than me) and the inital raiser calling. Flop came AQJ, two pair for me. Button checked, I bet, BB raised and button folded, heads up. Turn is irrelevant and I thought deeply. Would he raise here with a made strait (no flush possible)? As far as what I had seen the answer was a clear "no". So I figured him on weak ace or a draw like 9T, maybe a middle pair with a backdraw like KQ. I bet. He raised me in a split-second. I re-popped it and included the same holding than I had AQ into the list for a split pot. River is another J. I bet, got raised and called all-in. Sure enough he opened AJ for a rivered full-house. So much for my strong reads here, lol. I was very disgusted and closed the table and partypoker within a second. It took a few minutes for me to realize that I got third in a big field and although I did not won first place money (nearly 5k) it must have been something. So I logged in again and looked at a nice 1,800$ score.

I played two limit 100$ tournaments more this weekend and got far in both but not touching any more money. In one with 90 starters I was 15th and in another with 130 starters I was 25th (horrible beat here, with AK against A5, an ace in the flop and a 5 on the river)

Besides this the weekend went very well. I won at 15/30 and at 30/60 good money without any big swings (3 and 2-tabeling). In between I played 100$ single table SNG's, 4 at the time, and had exact the same results three times: won one, got 3rd in one and busted early in two. So much for the records.

Sunday late Katja and I were thinking about either going to bed early (4 o'clock leaving to the station ahead) or playing the 250k guaranteed. You guessed it, we played both. Katja had no chance at all and was out after 45 minutes but my story is a little more wired. Wired? How? Well, after an hour I got so tired that I lost any fun and searched for an opportunity to bust out without looking to much like an asshole. I went all-in on small draws and bottom pairs - and made them all the time! With about 900 players left out of nearly 1,600 I was close to the chip lead! Anyway, not even that could motivate me enough to really concentrate and play my A game. I continued to play such relentless and foolishly and finally found a way to dump all these chips. Now, in the bright light of the next day I smash myself for doing such a ridiculous shit like that but it seemed all pretty ok yesterday to me when I finally went to bed and slept within 1 minute. I really have to put up more dicipline there. These online tournaments just don't pump that many extra adrenaline thru mein veins as a live one...

Speaking of live tournaments next weekend there is one. It will be limit seven card stud buyin of 500eur and 3 rebuys of each 200 which more or less must be taken by everyone so the buy in comes to a nice 1,100eur. Hopefully we will get about 30 players so the first price would be over 10k, which I plan to take home (and if not me then Katja, I'll like to get pushed around by her :)

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All this sounds very good. I shall not forget to mention my experience fromthe weekend before when I was four-tabeling 15/30. I lost about 170 (!) big blinds there in about 90 minutes. Upon ongoing self-analysis I realized that I got affected in my playing style by this and finished. When checking out the hand histories I realized that I throwed about 30 big bets out of the window due to this "tilting". This still leaves me with about 130 big bets lost in about no time at all which was quite a not-so-nice experience. I felt like a total scumbag and the worst player in the world. Fortunatly I was able to recover a little from this later that day and on the day after but only thinking about all the beats I took still lets me get in rage. If I were The Hulk my feets would be green now - wait, let's check 'em out - oh no, they are really kinda green! Did I miss the shower over all this playing...?

Don't expect to see me around partypoker to much the next days; I made a nice cashout yesterday and as the next weekend will be mostly live action I don't plan on refill it before the next million guaranted which will be on March 5th.

While I was was waiting for my three 30/60 tables at partypoker after having lunch with Katja I decided to join a tournament. There was a 100$ multi-table limit holdem starting within two minutes so I joined. I prefer to play limit tourneys while playing limit side games as I is easier to switch between these tables. So this one was perfect. 69 other players registered which made up for a nice 7k pricepool. The first 30 minutes nothing went well and I was quickly low on chips. I changed to surving strategy. This worked somehow and managed to acumulate chips. In the meantime my 30/60 tables came up and so I almost forgot about the tournament playing it on autopilot. The cash game action was fast and furious as always and I was quickly to involved in the big action to really care about the tournament.

I woke up when one player in the tournament stated "50, look, we are playing the same 4 tables". Sure enough it was true, it was TheSeed69 who played exactly the same three tables as I. This guy is playing with 10k on each table always so I was throwing in something about the fact that I had at least more chips than he on that tournament table. We both had a good laugh on that. Then I watched how many players were left there and it was only 17! With 10 in the money not to bad at all. Si I started to put some more attention to the tournament and when I reached the final table I even switched the cash games off inbetween to "deal me out". The final table went forever as all the small stacks survived their all-ins. I believe the final table went for about 90 minutes or more which is quite long for these types of events. When we were down to the final 3 players I was lucky to have two opponents that had no really clue about the game and I able to outplay them. There was really not much luck involved as I would have been able to get away from any hand that I played. Most important, I did not get unlucky! So after nearly 5 hours I won this thing which was pretty welcome as you might know my tournament results in the last few weeks are rather thin.

How the cash game went? Well I can not tell yet as I am still playing!

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Yesterday I wrote about my daily read blogs. I forgot one very important which is a stop on my daily tour: Linda's blog, "Table tango". She is great! As a dealer at the Bellagio the sees it all. If you don't know this gem so far go read. Now.

I have three favorite blogs that I check daily. These are Matt's chronicles, Iggy's guinness-fuelled ueber-posts and Daniel Negrenau's poker journal. I read a lot others also but only in a fast manner with with my RSS aggregator or via the bloglines web service. Now two of them, Matt and Iggy seems to have some differences. While Matt is already the "most hated blogger 2004" and claims to be the 3-1 favorite to get this honor again in 2005 Iggy on the other side always looked like that high flying "blogfather" and has no need to bother about the daily in's and out's that affects all us others (well, at least not in his blog). I really like both blogs and I am quite sure I could like both guys also. Within the last week they started to exchange some "arguments" about something that happened in the last blogger tournament (see WPBTOnline for details about the series). It must have to do with some of Matt's "trash talking" other players. I don't know who said what and who "crossed a line" but the whole thing looks pretty amazing from the rail. In one of his last comments Iggy throwed in a line "u r evil. i just buried my best friends wife." If I don't miss anything here (in which case I will apologize) this somehow crossed a line for me. I mean as I followed the discussion it went about how to play special kind of hands depending on your style and image, how to handle other players in general and how to have fun in a blogger tourney. Then it escalated into something about "ego" and "arrogance". Now I read about Iggys sad incidence but throwing that comment in was still suprising me.

With all these comments and stuff I feel the blogger community starts to get a hang of the 2+2 forum guys. Is the poker world (and wasn't there a real world to?) already so empty that we need to blog about each other? In this manner??

Boys, turn on IM, throw yourself a "peace on earth" smiley and forget about it.

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Out world is certainly not empty. On the poker side of things Katja went monday and thusday to the PLHE game again, got no cards at all but still managed to win both nights. Very good. My week here at my workplace went mixed, I played partypoker several times about 30minutes each, won and lost. I was up already 2k and was down about 3k, now I am a little short of breaking even for the working part of my week. From tomorrow on I will be in Hamburg again for the weekend so I have three days with very few business things to do which in turn means partypoker and me will meet intensly.

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If forgot to report about my last try to get us on that PPM IV boat on sunday night where I promised myself to play "aggresive and fast". I sticked to my play but managed to play only 2 hands when my KQ flopped a Kxx and lost again AK. I believe it was a little over a minute that I lasted in the event. So the boat will leave without us on board.

Out next trip leaving europe is getting more accurate anyway. We made our plan to go to the Bellagio event starting April, 4th for minimum of two weeks. Then I will work again 6 weeks and we're leaving for the wsop early june for hopefully 5-6 weeks!

I have no clue how to finance all these (28k each needed for tourney's alone in April), especially if we are going to loose big-time in april but that does not matter. See you there!

Thursday I played a long night again at partypoker. Katja was out to play in the live PLHE 10-20 game (she lost small) and I played several tournaments and the first semi-final for the boat. At about midnight I got so tired to get drawn out that I actually went to bed for two hours and used the alarm clock to get up on time for the semi-final. I also played a 100$ multi in the same time. I did not last long in both and could get back to bed at about 5 in the morning.

Friday after firstly being a little unmotivated I decided to give it a new full try, deposited 5k into my account and putted myself on the list for all three 30/60 tables. While waiting I played four tables of 15/30, got stuck 1500, got ahead 1500 and finished about even when the first two 30/60 tables popped up. I played on these about 5 hours with big swings and finished where I already after 20 minutes: 2k ahead.

After a break and a dinner I decided to play the STEP 1k tournaments for the first time. I bought into two and got my ass handed to me in both as I busted out as the first player IN BOTH. Upps! What happened? In one I lost QQ against AKo when the flop was save with rags but the turn brought a king and the river an ace and in the other I had AKo and my all-in opponent KQo. The flop was nice with a king but turn and river each brought a Q and I was history.

I really thought about quitting there but then decided to give it more chances and bought into three more 1,000 STEPs at the time. This time it worked better for me as I got third in one (with a bad beat) and won the second (the third was 7th) so I invested 5,300 and got out 6,300.

Directly after that I rejoined the 30/60 games and got into a big swing right away again. Fortunatly I was able to quit on the right end of it and booked annother nice win. Now I quitted playing (ok, one last 100$ multi is running) and watch some lord of the rings making-of dvd while waiting for the next PPM IV semi-final. Katja is on the road again to earn us some well deserved cash. I hope she is running good!

Oh well, out of boredom I just joined annother 1k step tourney. Let my report whats happening here: in the second hand we lost the first player. In the fifth hand I got AQo but only limped. Flop came 89J, one opponent bets 30, I call, turn is a 8, we both check. River is the nice T and I have a straight. I bet 70 and he folds. In level 2 and 3 I got not one playable hand. Blinds are now 50-100 and 7 players have about 800. Level 4, I still had no playable hand, three players gone. In level 5 I found AQ on the button, no caller. Right when level 6 started I went all-in with KJo and got called by TT which won, I am out in 5th place. I quickly bought into annother one... not only one but two ;)

Early in one of them I got outplayed and was 8th and in the other I was a bit unlucky to exit 5th. I went to bed and woke up when Katja arrived. She booked a nice win.

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Annother PPM IV qualifier saturday night. Starting with only 1000 in chips against everybody on my table holding 3000 it was a little difficult but I played with patience and guts. I surrvived a very lucky one with AT against AK but otherwise it wal all straightforward. I had about 5000 in chips (average at 6000) when I got AQs. I played 1400 (450 in blinds there) and got one caller. Flop came Q high and I played all-in. He called! I was happy when I saw him calling with QT so I figured he is ddrawing thin to 3 outs. Well, he was. But he got a runner-runner flush and not a T to win the hand and throw me out of the tournament in position 420 of 1200 players. Katja is not here to share my pain as she went working in the live PLHE game again. She woke me up late in the night and told me about very nice score that she did made. Man, I am so proud of her! She is the only woman there and is playing with a lot of persian and turkish guys there that have a lot of gamble and she is beating them up very nice.

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Sunday I started early with 4 tabling 15-30 while waiting for the 30-60 seats. I won a little over 1k there. Then I got my seats and played for 9 hours straight, 3 tables 30/60. I pumped each of these tables with 2k and got busted after man up and downs on two of them. But on the other I made more than good for that winning nearly 6k there so the time got paid well enough. Now Katja left again to play the live game and I try the last semi-final which starts in about 15 minutes. Low on chips again and with a train to catch in about 7 hours I will play very aggressive and fast. Either I could leave Katja a nice stack when I leave for my work-week or I am out and we can catch 2-3 hours of sleep. *gl*