Thanx guys.
Fantastic series of tournies out here. Lots of Scandies and all that that brings and plenty of Pros too.
Won the opening warm-up event for 400 euros but that was just a getting-to-know-you game really where we all had a laugh and a joke during the game, though it was nice to make a call with 8-7 to an all-in shove on an 8-4-4 board against pro player Lee Pope when 3-handed and correctly tell him that it was "The only way you can win the pot".
The Main Event was a series of 4 STT"s over 2 days with 12k chips, 30 min blinds and starting at 100 / 200. With the combination of that structure and 70% of the players being Scandies I was expecting short games with lots of action but that hasn"t been the case at all.
In my first 2 games I targeted a minimum of 5th place but really wanted higher but played well in the opener to get 4th after running 8-8 into A-A and that got me 6 pts for a solid start.
Friday night though turned into a disaster. At level 4 (500 / 1000) it was folded to me on the button and with 9k and an ace I shoved, only to run into AQ which saw me leave in 9th for just 1 point.
So going into day 2 I had just 7pts with the 20th place currently standing at 14. That was the target spot for everyone to aim for as the top 20 all go to the Final and make the cash. I knew that I needed at least 3rd place in the opening game and was delighted to win it to give me a real shot in the last leg. Moving onto the final leg and I had 19pts but when I looked at the pts of the other players, 1 had 26, 1 had 24, 2 others had 19 like me and 2 had 18...that meant that 7 of the 9 players at the table were in with a shot at qualification.
Early on I made a spaeculative set-mine raise with 2-2 and got called by the BB, who wasn"t a contender for qualification. The flop came 10-7-2 and it goes check-check. I then bet the Q turn and he re-raises me. I re-re-raise, he shoves and I call and he shows 10-7, so happy days.
It took an age to lose any more players though, but after calling an all-in with K-Q (after the guy went to shove his chips in, then realised he hadn"t looked at his cards !) I was up to 25k and looking good....until next hand I ran AJ sooted into aces and was back down to 12k !!
Finally though, we got to 3 handed but in a strange situation in that none of us was 100% assured of enough points to go through. Eventually, it was me calling an all-in shove with AQ against his K-8 that got me to guarrantedd 2nd and a place in the top 20 was sewn up.
So today is the final, 20 players 40k starting stacks and 30 min blinds so hopefully a 10-hour session with 30,000 euros at the end of it and the title of European STT Champion.
ONE FECKIN TIME PLEASE !!
