A perfect day

6. March 2006 | Category: 50outs

Saph
All of us have some perceptions how life is (or would be) being a poker pro. While Katja and me are only “1,5” pros as I still have a job in the IT-world from Monday-Thursday we are kind of close to it (how close we will see in the near future…). In this blog I posted ranted already alot about the not-so-nice days – now let me share 24 hours of a perfect day in our live with you, not to produce any envy but for motivational reasons 😉

The day in question was last Saturday, March 4th. It started out early for me, waking up about 8:30 a.m., quite early although we have been out the night before. I stole myself quietly out of the bed to leave Katja sleeping and found myself behind the computer and in two 5/10 6max games only minutes later, still half-sleeping. I was due for some sports that day (4 days a week ~10km runs) but needed some more time to wake up. I promised myself that I won’t lose more than my buyin of $250 on each table and stop when I doubled on each table before leaving to the cold-outside and take my run. Well, about 6 minutes later I had to press myself to close down partypoker and stick to my own promises, being up $545. I took our dog and did my duty, running around our wonderfull Außenalster.

On my way home I bought fresh bread and breakfast stuff, catched the newspaper and returned home. Katja was finally awake and we chilled over some breakfast about two hours. Katja then drove to the horses, doing her sports and horse-training stuff (that was actually my stuff for long years too but not so much anymore now). When she returned she picked me up and we drove to my daughter Patricia; she is now 16 years old, living with her mother, has a wild party-life and since shortly a fixed boyfriend. Very exciting time for her but someone/something broke her computer and who-you-gonna-call? Daddy. I was able to fix it within an hour and we dropped the dog there as Katja had to fly to Munich Monday early for some poker-related stuff and I had to go to Stuttgart, for my usual boring work. On our way back home we bought some nice food which we planned to cook later. Arriving home we went two wonderfull hours into the bedroom, sleeping and enjoying each other.

Then it was cooking time and we did that together, having a very tasty and wonderfull dinner. Not so much “cusine” but more things we both like very much. It got late while preparing and processing all that food so after finishing we rushed out of the house to get to the local casino, which was hosting it’s usual saturday evenings €200+10 no-limit-holdem tournament. We got there in time (which is a success both in making it and not getting arrested for the way I drove) and soon started the tournament with a total of 26 players. I was able to double-up early when I had KJs vs QQ (I raised small preflop, he called only, board was K-rag-rag, I bet, he called, turn rag, bet-call, river T, no straight/no flush on board, I check, he moves in, I call). When watching over to Katja I saw that she had a big stack also already. We met at the “final table” where new seats and the button were drawn. Katja had a huge pot with about 7 players left when she moved in with ATs and got called by KK but flopped a T and rivered an A. She gave something back with AQs vs T4o, river T. I lost almost all my chips in a SB vs. BB battle when I moved in with A9s and got called by AQ. I still got 4th place for 700€ with the few remaining chips when my QQ in the BB lost to SB’s 93o. Katja went on to win the thing, no deal this time, for a 1700€ 1st price. Very nice, she is incredible successfull over the last few months since she took on 1/2/3-table events.

Once the tournament was over they started a 500€ minimum buyin pot-limit holdem game on that table were we both took a seat. Katja was smooth sailing to a 1300€ win while I got stuck by 1800€ over 4 hours until I finally catched a lucky one: limping with 77 I was up vs. SB and BB, the ultra-tight “Vafa” in the SB and the ultra-loose “Hassan” in the BB. Flop came 236 with two hearts. SB checked, BB made a pot sized and I shoved my whole stack of 480 into the pot. SB raised his rest, omg, I was 100% beat there. BB called. Turn wonderfull 7 and river 3 which gave me the top boat which was good for a 1600€ main pot. BB showed 34 of spades for trips and SB threy away disgusted, not showing his hand – he was supposed to show first as he had the last action but dodged it and Hassan was very quick to show his rivered trips. I call this ‘angle shooting’ already (from the SB) but wont go into arguments with my dear customers… I picked up some more small pots and finished with a nice 300€ win shortly after – not much for this game but after being stuck almost 2k together with Katja’s win and our tournament wins we left the Casino at about 3 o’clock with a very nice score. While leaving we picked up two guys from www.pokerstrategy.de, waiting for a cab. One of them, JJacky, a coach as I understand it, played for some time to my left in the potlimit game. He got unlucky a few times and lost about 1k. We dropped them in the city and talked a bit about pot-limit, the regular players in that specific game and how to approach it. I gave away the maximum advice I am willing to offer any opponnent there which reads “be carefull in that game and be aware of the huge swings this game holds in store for anybody” along with “there have been a lot of takers over the years – only a few survived”.

What I meant is that this game is definitily much harder to beat than it looks from the outside when you just see the sometimes crazy action. Most of the guys (and Katja) have a very good idea what they are doing and you got to have good live poker skills and reading abilities to survive there. Not for nothing comes that almost all regulars in that game have success in worldwide tournaments including WSOP-bracelets and cash games – they are experienced, don’t fear big bets/big moves/big money, are used to the swings and have a good feeling for “weaknesses” may it be in the actual holding/hand or just money-wise because someone’s overplaying his bankroll.

Anyway, we stopped at McDonalds for a 3:30 a.m. burger, dropped the guys and went home. While cooling down there another $500 went into my partypoker-account “steaming down” myself. Finally at about 5:30 am we went into the bedroom…

The day was just-so-good not only because we were winning; in fact we have good days also when losing (but not when playing bad). The whole mood was just so perfect, Katja and I existed in such a harmony and understanding, the food was good, the table chat was nice, the cards came our way and no bad news reached us the whole day, ahhh, just perfect. Because days like this are a seldom gem we try to recognice’em and honor them. While our living standards are quite high already and we have a *very* good life already I would estimate that we have such good days only about 50/365. Somethings always there, you know the deal, trouble with kids or pets, business problems, tax, payments, invoices, wrong invoices, playing good and losing, busting near the money or with a 93% hand, not reaching your personal performance goal, feeling old/ugly/ill/bad, having arguments, not being at home, spending time with people you don’t like and all this stuff takes away something from us day-in-day-out.

My advice here: value and honor your good times. Stop thinking “more/faster/better” at least sometimes for a few hours (very guilty myself here) and just take the good things you get.

Wow, I might get philosopical – once I can’t hold or read cards anymore 🙂

Back to more/faster/better: This weekend is the three-day three-event tournament in Casino Schenefeld and I hear it’s already sold out to the fact that anybody not paying his entry fee in advance might get thrown out of the list! I figure that this will get a big weekend in terms of tournament and sideaction. See us there!


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