So our main event game took place on Saturday and I finished in 3rd. In the money? Yes. All the glory? No. I was so close to finishing 2nd at least, but I suffered two bad beats when we were 3-handed and I got knocked out.
Let's quickly recap how the game went: almost perfectly!
I started the game with 60,500 chips. This amounted to a 10,000 chip lead over the second place stack and a 25,000 lead over most of the other stacks. I dominated the two short stacks by 40,000.
At one point I was up to 140k. How did I get there? Two monster pots!
Pot 1
I'm sitting around 65k with A3 of spades on the button (blinds 1,000/2,000). Two other players and myself limp and the BB raises to 6,000. Both others fold and I call. The flop comes rag-rag-rag with two spades. The BB bets out 6,000 and I call. The turn pairs the board (8s). He bets out 3,500 (weird...) and I call. The river is a blank, busting my flush draw. He bets out 6,500. Slowly and calmy I play with my chips and announce a 12,000 raise. He hums and haws a sec then folds. The table starts chirping how I obviously had it and that it was a good fold so I show my busted flush draw bluff. I got a bit of respect after that one.
Pot 2
I'm at around 85k with K-10 of hearts and we get four limpers in a pot (1,500/3,000 blinds). The flop comes rag-rag-rag with two hearts. I'm under the gun, and bet out 6,000. UTG+1 raises to 18,000. Both others fold. I call on the draw. The turn comes a K. I bet out 6,000 again because my outs just got better. The guy raises 6,000 more. Why do these guys bet smaller on the turn? No idea! Obviously, I call. The river comes a heart, making my K-high flush. I check like a sneaky little bugger and he bets out 10,000. I put him all-in and he folds two-pair face up with over 3/4 of his chips in the pot. Yowzers.
So, I maintained my lead until we got 5-handed, playing very few pots unless I was in good position. At that point I took my first big hit. A short-stack shipped it preflop with 77 and I called with 55. Hilariously, someone with 10-10 folded and would have hit quads. She was actually supposed to act before me, which was annoying because I wouldn't have been in that pot if she'd called first. Gutless! That one cost me $25,000.
I maintained a slow and steady pace winning and losing small pots until we got 3-handed. Sadly, I was in 3rd place.
I took down a 35,000 pot with a middle pair all-in semibluff, which put me into second place.
We entered a 3-way family pot. The flop came K-8-5 with two hearts and all of us hit a piece! The short stack bet out 12,000 on the flop and I folded my 8-9 offsuit. The chip leader went all-in with K-2 and found himself up against A-5 offsuit when the short stack called. K-2 was ahead and in great shape until a heart came on the turn... and another came on the river. The short stack hit a runner-runner straight. I gagged almost as loudly as the chip leader who was now bumped down to 3rd place.
Here's where my first of two bad races happened.
I got K-J in the small blind and pushed the short stack all in. He called with K-6 offsuit and hit his own four-card flush. Brutal.
Then I got A-3 in the small blind again and pushed all in against him again. He called with K-4 offsuit and hit a ****ing 4. And with that, I was out of the main event in 3rd place.
Five hours of gruelling poker to have it end like that was a bit disheartening but what can you do? Bad beats happen and I guess that's what makes the game exciting. It was a great season, and at least I can claim back-to-back season champion status.
Our next season starts on Wednesday, so we'll see if I can make it three in a row!
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