Multi-day Tournament

On Sunday I finished the extremely fun and highly rewarding (although somewhat exhausting) experience of a multi-day tournament.

750 starters, who qualified for this $20,000 tournament by being the best at their respective venues consistently over a period of three months. We started out with 2,500 in chips and 25/50 blinds.

The first day (which I wrote about here) went by quite slowly, because of the low blinds, which ended up on 200 /400 in the end of the day.

On Sunday, around 300 people came back to play as long as needed in order to get to the $15,000 first prize.

The play was very challanging as there was no weak players around. These are two interesting hands I can remember:

I was on the small blind and everyone folded to the button which raised about three times the blind. I looked down at A9 off-suit, so I re-raised to almost the current pot. Big blind obviously folded but the button called, which made me realize he wasn't stealing. A nine high rag flop came up (giving me top pair, top kicker). The button checked, I bet out and the button called. At this point I might have thought he had an pocket over-pair, but I felt that he was holding AK or AQ. It was confirmed when the king turned and the button bet out, I folded and he did turn over AK.

Everyone folded to me on the button and I looked down on a 7,3 of spades. As the blinds were already 400 / 800 I decided to try a steal, intending to let it go if any of the blinds called. I bet out 3.5 blinds and the big blind actually called. The flop was 7,5,10 with two spades. Second pair and a flush draw was enough for me to bet out again, since he might give up the pot right there but if he actually hit the ten or had an over-pair, it was still a coin flip with me actually in front with my 15 outs. It turns out the big blind did have something, since he went all-in, which I called. He turned over the A10 and we went on a race. A blank on the turn was bad news but the 3 came on the river to give me two pair and double me up (to around 90k).

Around six hours into the game we were down to about 30 people, with the money payed out to the final 9. With the money coming close, everyone tightened up, which queued me to steal some of the blinds, which were getting ridiculously high (since it toke so long to get through the field) and were now at 10k and 20k with the average stack at around 200k.

When we got down to the final two tables, we had a massive crowd on the rails and the tournament director pulled out the mic to commentate on the important hands. We stayed on the bubble for almost twenty minutes as no one was making moves and me card dead (I wasn't going to steal with 9,2 off-suit). In the end it was me who toke out the bubble. I raised to 60k with a K,Q of clubs from middle position and the short stacked button went all in with A,10 off-suit. I called and the king on the turn sealed the final table.

Next post: The final table (along with some photos).

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For the curious and impatient, I'll write how I faired in the comments.