Tao of Poker

Run Good 2, Brit Bloggerment, and the Iron Man Freeroll

By Pauly
Atlantic City, NJ

Tropical Steve covered the final table of the Borgata Poker Open event so I could play in a couple of online poker tournaments. I played four on Saturday which is rare for me.

I participated in the second leg of the Run Good Challenge hosted by the gang over at PokerListings. $600 in prize money was rolled over into Week 2. The top three paid out... $960, $480, $160. Not too shabby. I took second place last weekend and wanted another shot at playing Dan from PokerListings heads up.

Michele Lewis could not play because she was evacuating her house and kids from Hurricane Ike. She managed to pop on and say hello and let us know that she was safe.

My Starting Table:
Seat 1: Chops
Seat 2: Spaceman
Seat 3: Your Hero
Seat 4: Poker Shrink
Seat 5: Shamus
Seat 6: Change100

Bad beat of the tournament? Shamus 2-2 vs. Chops Q-Q. Shamus flopped a deuce. Chops = Gigli.

I made the final table.

Seat 1: KidDynamite4 (1520)
Seat 2: Matt from PokerListings (1845)
Seat 3: Dan from PokerListings (4195)
Seat 4: Spaceman (545)
Seat 5: Amy Calistri (1440)
Seat 6: DrPauly (1220)
Seat 7: PokerShrink(1110)
Seat 8: Shamus (3340)
Seat 9: change1OO (2785)

I was bubble boy. Out in 4th place. Change100 busted me.

Dan from PokerListings went onto win consecutive Run GoChange100 came in third place.

Check out Matt's wrap up.

Here are the overall standings through two events...

Dan Skolovy 12 points
Dr. Pauly 8 points
Shamus 8 points
Change100 4 points
Michele Lewis 4 points
Amy Calistri 4 points
Matt Showell 1 point
Spaceman 1 point

I'm second in points which is not too shabby. Thanks again to the gang for PokerListings for the freeroll.

* * * * *
AlCantHang invited me to play in the Brit Bloggerment. I ended up winning it, but it was only a seven person SNG. The players were tough... cloud71, katitude, AlCantHang, BURNLEY FC BB10, OtisDart, and Acornman.

Busted Otis. Bad beat.

Busted Kat. Bad beat.

Busted AlCantHang when he shoved with the hammer.

I eventually got heads up with Acornman. He led 5.9K to 4.5K. It was a lengthy battle, but I eventually won. Most likely on a suckout. But to be honest, the deck hit me in the face.

* * * * *
I qualified for the Iron Man freeroll. $4,500 went to first place. 465 players. I took 46th place.

The field had several decent players. Since it was the highest Iron Man level, the competition was much better than the average freeroll crowd. Not too many people sitting out either which means everyone came to play

Two Russians, a German, and a Brazilian at first my table. Sounds like the beginning to a crude ethnic joke.

Early on, I ran into Aces and got crippled. I was one of the shortstacks and managed to doubled up with A-K.

I found Aces and won a small pot. I got back to starting stack and jumped up to 203rd place out of 351.

I found Aces again and won another small pot.

At the first break, I was 191th out of 329. Only 1/4 of the field gone.

I was moved to a new table that included two Germans, a Dutchie, and a Brit. Pocket tens held up and I won nice pot with A-10. I got up to almost 4K.

Moved to a new table with three people posting and folding. I had an Estonia, a Canadian and a Norwegian at my table.

I won a small pot and pushed my stack to over 5K which was almost average. I was 112/250.

Guess what? Moved again. Another new table. More international players... from France, Finland, Canada, and two Germans. Oh, and RecessRampage was at my table as well. He got to see me issue the bad beat of the day. I snapped of Aces with K-Js. It was ugly. I flopped a King and my opponent instantly moved all in on the flop. I put him on a flush draw so I called. I was wrong and he had Aces. I spiked a King on the river to double up and crack Aces. That was some pissed off German...

I increased my stack to over 11.5K. I was in 31st place out of 182. I whiffed with A-Ks and slipped to 10K. That's where I was at the break. 10K with the average at 11K. I was 49th out of 121. I was in good shape to make the money and all of the dead stacks were out.

Bayne was moved to my table. He busted out near the bubble when his A-Q lost to A-K. I tightened up on the bubble and cashed in the freeroll! As one of my tablemates said, "Def a better value than some stinkin' metals."

As soon as the bubble broke, I went on a stealing binge. I jumped up to 37th out of 75. JW and AlCantHang were birding me. Change100 too all the way from Barcelona.

Then I got crippled when I lost a race... A-9 to 8-8. I was next to last in chips with 51 to go. I doubled up and looked like I was going to make another money jump. However, I lost another coin flip. My J-J was run down by A-Q.

I busted out in 46th place out of 445. I won $120 which is about 1/3 of what I probably spent in rake trying to achieve Iron Man. Heck, at least I got something, not like those poor schmucks at Lehman Brothers.


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