The Steven Train Jumps The Tracks

the gravy trains seems to be temporarily over. we played at the tuesday night tournament at the radisson again this week. same structure as last week -- $30 buy-in with a $20 rebuy or add-on. i had about T500 at the break and about T1100 aftering adding-on. my table was pretty crazy with many hands seeing raises, re-raises, and re-re-raises before the flop. many bluffs were flipped over. although it was my intention to be more active than last week i wasn't picking up any hands to do so. i was able to win a handful of pots that always kept around or above the original T400 starting stack.

once again, the key hand for me was when another player flopped trips in the same hand as me. it was a limped pot and i held A6o in the sb. about five players saw the flop with blinds at 30 - 60. i had about T900. the flop is AA10 with two spades. i check. the bb bets about 150 with two callers. i move all-in. he calls and flips up A4o and here comes the split pot. if i had won this whole pot i would have over T2200 in chips. it was not meant to be.

the reason this was such a key hand was because i could not get away from the hand that busted me. i have about T950 with a limper in front of me and the blinds still at 30 - 60, but about to move up. i find two black kings and raise to 250. i get three callers so there is now more than T1000 in the pot. if i end up folding here i will have less than 10 bb's left at the next blind level and simply looking for a hand with which to move all-in. the flop is super scary -- 7/8/9 with two diamonds. one player checks in front of me and i move all-in. the player behind me moves all-in and everyone else folds. he flips up pocket 7s for a set. i was actually more concerned that someone flopped two pair, or a straight, or someone would call with a straight or flush draw or both. if i started the hand with over T2000 i can check there and play more cautiously. the same player would still likely move all-in to protect against the straight and flush and i could easily fold. oh well.

steven accumulated chips early, but could not get the job done this week. he lost several hands with he bigger ace. one hand he held AK and called another player's AJ pre-flop all-in. the flop was QQ10. a K hit on the turn to complete her straight. i guess things cannot always go your way. i played in a $0.50 - $1 no-limit sidegame with a $40 max buy-in for about 45 minutes while steven continued in the tournament. i won $45 so i covered most of my buy-in.

we played for about two and a half hours at the horseshoe on wednesday and it is here that the train actually jumped the tracks. i lost $93 for the session which for me was up and down, but i felt i was playing well and could have easily posted a win had we played for a while longer. steven lost several key big hands - one when he made an incorrect read of someone's all-in move on the flop, two hands when someone hit the winner on the river, and one when someone out drew him on the turn. those hands accounted for almost all of his $400 loss. let's just say that he was less than pleased. we were meeting caroline and william, friends of steven's for dinner back in escazu so that dictated when our session was over.

we had a decent, but unspectacular italian meal. we then went to hang out at this new place, motor psychos, in santa ana. a very cool place which has its grand opening this saturday. we will check it out after playing in a tournament at the horseshoe. we have free entry into the tournament. depending on how many hours logged at the regular games one receives between T1000 and T5000. we should end up somewhere in the middle. other players pay a $500 buy-in for T5000. the last winner won over $3000.

for those of u who don't know the world series of poker (offical site) started this week. for incredible coverage please check out dr. pauly's tao of poker. i discovered this blog near then end of 2005's wsop. he is a an excellent writer firmly in the tradition of hunter s. thompson (official site). check his own description of his blog:

so if you want chip counts, hand histories, or winners photos of the 2006 wsop then the tao of poker will be a major disappointment for you. but if you want to read about my encounters at the hooker bar, or the pros I pissed next to, or the strippers that grubby and I paid $200 to eat a can of dog food, or how many boiled cheeseburgers made of kangaroo intestines that otis ate in a 48 hour period... then this is the place to get those stories.

i'll share it all with you here. for free. you don't have to pay me a dime. and if you don't like my coverage, that's fine too. don't read me. i don't waste my time reading shitty blogs or piss poor wsop coverage that has already been cropping up like an unwanted case of the rickets.

trust me, it is an excellent read. i have checked it out on a fairly regular basis since last year. we will be playing the $100 tournament at the radisson tonight. time to put tomorrow behind us.