MiniFTOPS..

Well MiniFTOPS has begun and I've played 8 of the 10 events so far, and managed one cash. Its been somewhat of a crazy experience. The fields have been huge with 4 of the 10 events having over 10,000 people. And with huge fields come huge prize pools. 6 of the 10 events have had a 1st place prize of over $20k which is just insane since the buyins havent been more than $50. I hadn't played in many large field holdem tourneys, and I gotta tell you these things are a grind. Event 1 was a $22 nlhe tourney and was going pretty well, but somewhere around the 3-4 hour mark, I decided to bluff away over half my chips and blew my shots of cashing and making a deep run. My buddy, "shipshape715", made a semi deep run going out in 275th place which isnt bad for a tourney with over 16k+ people. I decided to skip classes on thursday and play Event 2 which was a $33 6-max shootout. For those that don't know what a shootout is, a shootout is a tourney where each table plays down until there is one winner and then the winners of each table combine to form another table and that repeats until there is a final table. I ended up going out on the first table. It was quite disappointing considering the fact that I was chipleader when we got down to 3 handed but the cards were not on my side and I ran pair into bigger pair twice to go out. Event 3 was a $22 limit omaha/8 tourney and it was a donk fest. Unfortunately for me my internet disconnected twice during big hands and I got timed out losing over 3/4th of my chips in the process. Needless to say I was not happy. Event 4 was a $22 1rebuy 1add-on nlhe tourney. I decided to not use my rebuy at the beginning and keep it as a safety net and good thing I did because I ran JJ into KK early. Unfortunately, the rebuy didnt go as well either. I had AT and called a raise from the button. Flop came Txx, and the raiser put me in. I called and he showed AQ. Of course a J hit the turn followed by a K on the river and he runner runnerd a straight and I was out before the add-on period. Event 5 was a stud hi tourney that I didnt play. Event 6 was the $55 plo 6-max, the event I had been looking forward to. Things started out great, and I was about 100 people away from making the money when the cards took a turn for the worse. I had double suited aces go down in flames and then Karina Jett ended up donking me out 60 spots from the money. I was soo pissed and while this was going on I was in event 7 which was a $10 nlhe rebuy tourney. I really didnt feel like playing anymore and was trying to bluff myself out the event but the two bluffs actually worked and I had build a decent stack. Then a few hands later I stack a player with AA and I had an above average stack. So I decided to take the tourney serious and ended up getting my first cash of the series. Going into the 6th hour of the tourney I had a top 20 stack with around 200 people left and was feeling good about making a possible final table run. But after the break, the fatigue from playing 8 hours straight caught up to me and I lost my focus and patience and ended up going out in 122nd place. I still considered it a big victory because it gave me confidence in my NLHE game and if I get back to that position I'll know how to handle it. Event 8 & 10 today were both NLHE tourneys. Event 8 was a $26 6-max knockout tourney, where I bluffed off half my stack and then ran AJ into AK blind v blind. Event 10 was a $33 tourney and I actually was playing pretty well in it. But in the 3rd hour my JJ couldnt hold against A5s and that was all she wrote. Overall the series hasnt gone quite as well I was hoping for but with seven more events left that I plan to play there is still time to get my final table. I also have a team competing in a pocketfives.com MiniFtops contest. My team consist of my friend Will, "b4nkrollin247", and his friend "Stiltz". There are 28 teams competing and the top 3 teams will get paid. The scoring is based on what place you finish in each tourney with the top 10 scores from each person being counted and right now its too early to tell who will win but since I'm the only person to cash on my team, we definitely have some ground to make up if we plan on making top 3. Tomorrows event is a $22 HA (round of pot limit holdem and round of pot limit omaha) event which is always a fun event and definitely and event I could go deep in so wish me luck. Shipshape.

August recap & September fun

Last month turned out to be a very good month. I ended up with a 167% ROI throughout all my tourneys played. Not too shabby of an ROI. I've never really been a big volume player as I believe I play much better with no more than four tourneys running. That being said, I do need to stop losing focus and keep up with my tourney schedule on the days that I would normally play. When I last posted, I was up around 2k and was poised to have a really good month. Unfortunately, the last half of the month I didn't play as many tourneys due to lack of focus and ended up with just a decent month. Its little bad habits like these I need to break. Another bad habit, I really need to break is giving up in tourneys after I suffer a bad beat that cripples me. Everybody knows the old saying, "all you need is a chip and a chair" (well unless you're not a poker player then you may have never heard this), but it is oh so true. Just last nite, I was in a $5 limit o8 donkament and got down to my last 70 chips. Stakes were at 80/160 which meant blinds were 40/80 and I didn't even have enough chips to cover the bb. I ended up sticking my last 70 in and quintupled up. Next thing I know few double up and triple ups later I am upto 8k and never looked back. Ended up making it to the final table but I bowed out in 6th when this guy horribly 3 outered me on the river chip leader vs 2nd in chips for huuuge stack. Still to comeback from 70 chips to final table felt good. Today however, instead of learning that you're never out until you're out. I got donked in my 6mx plo8 tourney and not only did I decide to donk the rest of my chips off in that tourney, I decided to just donk myself out of all my tourneys I was playing. This time around, my tilting actually got me really fortunate. In the $5 plo rebuy, as I was tilting, I made some crazy play with double suited cards and this guy ends up flopping middle set unfortunately for him I had a gut draw and everyone knows gut draws get there 80% of the time online and wouldnt you know it. I hit it on the turn to double up. Once that happened my brain kicked back in and was ready to work now that I had a huge stack. The guy was not too happy bout my play and let me hear it. I jus typed a smiley face and moved on. Its funny how one move like that can change everything because I eventually went on to ship the tourney. Entering heads up I was down 77k to 500k but played great, got lucky a couple times and BAM. SHIP IT. As I have said before, it feels great to ship a tourney and this was no different.

The month of September has just started and I've already final tabled two tourneys and shipped one. With WCOOP and MiniFTOPS right around the corner, this month promises to be a very good one. Be sure to check back as I will be giving recaps on the 12+ events I'll be playing in MiniFTOPS starting Sept 9th. Shipshape.