City championships, day one

27. May 2006 | Category: 50outs

Yesterday was “day 1” of the Hamburger Meisterschaften hosted by Spielbank Hamburg. This was is a NLHE event with a buyin of €500+25, two rebuys each €100 and one addon for €200. You get 1,500 start chips, for each rebuy again 1,500 chips and then depending on the level between 3,000 and 6,000 in chips for the addon. The “preparation” was good, the day before Katja and I played a small €300+15 tournament, cashed, played small 5/10 PLHE, won both, slept well and long and had a good day. Right before the tournament we went to dinner with Klaus “Bandit” and Roy von der Locht which was nice and chatfull. When we arrived there we got into some strategy discussion right away with Korn, Timmy, Phil and Sebastian. We all agreed that being an better-than-average player it makes a lot of sense to take both rebuys right away to punish the worse players. Oh well, destiny sealed for me. All said and done, the tournament started with ~60 players!

Now, those are the stone cold facts:

I took both rebuys right away as 6 others on my table also did
I lost 20% of my stack in the very first hand
I lost all of my stack in about the 10th hand
I took the addon as the very first player of the tournament
I managed to survive “level 1” (10/20 blinds), being the first one busted level 2
I was almost never the favorite when my money went into the pot

After busting out I went home, being in a really bad mood, realizing I made crucial mistakes. I left Katja in good shape (tournament- and life-wise). Later she called me and said she has an above average stack going into day 2 and then she continued playing potlimit cashgame until early morning.

I think I totally misplayed all of the few hands I had. My table #3 was not an easy one with two danish semi-pros, Korn, Timmy, Phil, two loose unpredicatables and some rocks. Let me share some of the embarrassing details:

Hand #1
Q9o in BB, two callers, no raise. Flop comes Q9x with two diamonds. I bet out 100 into an 70 pot and get one caller (Nadja, I thought I have a very good read/feel on her lol). Turn is diamond, I check, she bets 200, I call, River brings a offsuit ten which makes an gutshot straight possible if the holds an 8. I check, she bets 500 and I think dream she is on KQ with one diamond. I call and she shows me 86d for the straight and the flush… oh yes, mr. good-read again! (The night before I tried a big bluff holding A6 on a KJ6 board – the other had KK). So I lost 820 in the very first hand.

Hand #2
KK in EP, I raise to 60, it gets re-raised to 300, Phil calls. I think about the possible hands – I was sure Phil has no aces there but had no information on the other guy, a lebanon-danish player who had taken both rebuys also. I decided to move all-in which I did. Folding kings early in a tournament is not (yet?) in my book and call would have totally wrong (or so I think). The split second calling of the danish player made my heart sink, Phil folded. Surly he had aces, no miracle on board, I was out of chips. Addon time! Phil said he had 99 and would have trippled up with an 9 in the flop.

Hand #3
Right before he break I get QQ, raise and bet the flop and get a small pot uncontested.

Hand #4
Timmy raised in EP to 120, one caller, I call with 66 and one more caller. Flop comes AA6, all check. Turn J and I bet, all fold. Wow!

Hand #5
Ready to outplay anybody (lol) I limped with A9o and saw a flop 479 with two diamonds. Nadja again with position on me in the hand. I made a big bet to prevent her from drawing to a flush again but she called. I wished for a black 2 and got a black 3, wow no flush, my hand must be good, right? I made a large bet of 1200 and Nadja moved all-in on me! I called without even re-thinking the hand (very bad!) feeling pot-commited or just plain good old TILT. I even asked her if she was holding trips before she showed me 56o and left me drawing dead. I had 200 chips left. I think there no way to play a hand worse than I did here and I am really embarrassed to write about 🙁

Hand #6
I throwed my remaing chips in with A5o in EP and get called by Phil with AK who flopped a straight. End of tournament story for me.

As I went home I jumped into a 4 handed 30/60 limit game on stars with Erik123. I must have been doing something better there as I made a nice score.

I hope Katja can accomplish something today and get me out of the dirt, as usual.