Author Topic: Aces and Agony - An APAT'ers blog of the highs and lows of poker ( and life!)  (Read 109574 times)

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TGBane

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See what happen"s with old age.
Really looking forward to the team event myself, never played one before so a new experience.
See you friday for the cash?
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Fatcatstu

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Sod boring poker :) Its Jacks birthday drinking session :D
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amcgrath1uk

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See what happen"s with old age.
Really looking forward to the team event myself, never played one before so a new experience.
See you friday for the cash?



Tell me about it :/

It"s my 4th team event, had huge stacks on day 1 in 2 of them, and both I"ve had trips on the flop and lost ( one a 100k pot where I couldn"t put down A9 on an AA4 flop against 2 other people)... It"s enormous fun. I won"t be at the cash ( mainly because I am yet to play cash)


Sod boring poker :) Its Jacks birthday drinking session :D


And I won"t be there for that either :(
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amcgrath1uk

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Re: Aces and Agony - An APAT'ers blog of the highs and lows of poker ( and life!)
« Reply #228 on: February 18, 2014, 19:14:19 PM »
A little update

The team event went badly, both for the team and myself. It happens. next. It was still a fun weekend though.

Found out yesterday I"m off for the entire Newcastle weekend,  and I can"t afford to go :(

As most who were at Stoke will attest to, I"ve damaged the muscles in my neck/shoulder, will find out tomorrow about physio, I hope I can sort it quickly as it is bloody annoying.

My stats in the 180s are as follows:

Total played: 239
ROI : -4% ( including a few mtt"s)
How I"m running: Approx -$120ev
Best hand I"m losing with: 10 10  - 41bbs across all blind levels

6 at a time is going ok, ready to step up to 8 shortly.

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amcgrath1uk

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I need to update this. LOL. Oh well.
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amcgrath1uk

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Suppose I better do a little update on this thing...

Tomorrow's job methinks!
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amcgrath1uk

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Where to start? Difficult to say really, it's been an epic couple of weeks for me.

As people are probably aware, I've not been about much this season before the Worlds, just hitting Portsmouth, as work as kept me exceptionally busy for the last year. However, with the Worlds being in my "home" casino in Manchester, I made sure I had the finances to play and the time booked off work. My schedule was as follows:

8 game, Turbo, HORSE, ROE, Main 1b, PLO, PLO 8 and Crazy Pineapple.

These days I don't have the opportunity to play online often, but when I do it is in the mixed games, and feel comfortable playing any of them.

A midday start for the 8 game on Saturday was the wake up call for the 9 days ahead. It wasn't exactly an easy table to start with

Marcin Rejmak   4   1
Philip Henze   4   2
Asa Mcgrath   4   3
Vincent  Eley   4   4
Rieuwert Fleer   4   5
Andrew Duncan   4   6

The first few hours were fairly unremarkable with the blinds being low in comparison to the starting stack. 50k starting, 51k at the first break, just 33k at the dinner break and when moved to the feature table, I'd gone up to 185k. I'll be honest and say I don't remember any specific hands at this point to get me there, barring one hand, where I re-jammed QJos blind on blind in NLHE and got there on the river vs AK. End of the day I have 370k and sitting comfortably 3/7.

Final table as follows:

Glenn Laming   1   1   173k
Ross Freeman   1   2   173k
Asa Mcgrath   1   3   370k
Michael Perry   1   4   699k
Nerchabouh Tachajian   1   5   301k
Warren Brooks   1   6   574k
Simon A Lawlor   1   7   79k

On day 2 we lose Simon, Glenn and Ross pretty quickly so are on the medal bubble. Pretty quickly Nino is short and I auto call his all in in NLHE with 67, Nino has J3 and holds. Next hand he ships again, this time I have 88 and beat his A7. So we're in the medals in the 1st event, and damn happy. One person I wouldn't choose to play 3 handed with in any game is Michael Perry as he is super aggressive and a damn good player. The other player, Warren, I found out that this was his first ever APAT game, so no doubt also a good player.

In PLO I lose a pretty big pot, betting heavily on the river where all the draws missed, to be called down by Warren's top pair which was good. 3 handed going in to Deuce - Seven triple draw, I had 180k, Michael had 850k and Warren 1.3m. Win the 1st hand against Michael to double up, manage to hold my own through the rest of 2-7, FLHE then manage to win 3/4 of the pot against Michael in Omaha Hi/low with virtually the same hand, my 2 pair just beating Michael's 2 pair, then win another 300k pot against Warren. Michael loses a similar pot against Warren to leave him short stacked.

Michael and myself then get it all in during Razz, end up having 7543A to beat Michael and be Heads up, both of us sitting on approx 1.2m each. We go through a full cycle of rounds not really doing much but swapping chips, but I manage to go on a run of hands to get a good chip lead, a K hi flush in 7 card stud by 5th street won a good few chips, and get Warren down to 700k by betting a board of 42A69 with 3 hearts, missed by straight draw but hit the flush on the river.

Final hand is in PLO, I raise with  ad1 3h 6d 6c and Warren pots it. I call to see a flop of  2d 9s 7d. We get it it on that flop, to see to my amazement, the pair of 6s are ahead with Warren showing  Ah 4c  Qs Kh. Nothing changes on the  2c turn with the river being the right Queen, the  Qd to hit the nut flush and win.

After watching the video, I'm aware that John Murray attempted to draw me out in an interview, it's fair to say I was completely in shock at winning and gave some very non descript answers.

There was a post on the Degens from last years winner of the 8 game, saying he couldn't make this year and wanted a Degen member to win it. I commented " will give it a go". Couldn't resist afterwards saying "gave it a go!".









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Des

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Excellent post to return with, Asa!

:)
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amcgrath1uk

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After the couple of hours of taking it easy, it was turbo time. Another nice, easy table to start with...

   Mustak         Alli                 12         1  
   Gary         Jackson         12         2  
   David         Griffiths         12         3  
   Asa         McGrath         12         4  
   Darren         Sutton                 12         5  
   Brian         Beekers         12         6  
   Ronald         Greenberg         12         7  

I've come across David a number of times and we've had some battles where I usually lose. We're rapidly joined by Mark Lassman and Ben Burnhill as late entry ends. At the first break I'm on 28k from a start of 10k, with pretty much no recollection of how that happened. Literally float along paying no attention to what's going on, then we're down to 12, and I'm sitting on 30k at 800/1600. Manage to win a race to double up, steal a few blinds, and we're on the final table. Get there as the chip leader with 115k, no idea how. Table lined up as:

   Glenn         Laming         57500         1  
   Sebastian   Mikolajczyk         14300         2  
   Steve          Hollinshead         94000         3  
   Christian    Garvin                 23000         4  
   Neville         Betty                 90000         5  
   John         Murray                 30500         6  
   Mark         Lassman         40000         7  
   Norbert      Bobra                 42500         8  
   Asa         McGrath         115000       9  
   John         Hanley                 36000         10  

Glenn's second final table of the day, Steve won the 6 max, Norbert finished 3rd in the Irish, Christian and Neville I knew from the G in Manchester, we all know Mark Lassman and John Murray.

Very quickly, Seb shoves, folded to me in the small blind, not folding  Kd Jd in this situation, Seb has KQ and I flop the J to knock him out. An orbit later, I'm on the small blind again, folded round to me, I shove  Ad 2d just to steal. John calls with K6, and I turn the flush. 4 or 5 hands later Glenn departs, then quickly Mark departs.

Double up Neville, who shoved for roughly 4bbs, any picture card is a call, I have Q6, run into KK to double him up. John Murray soon departs AK v KQ, Q on the river. When down to 5, Norbert shoves on me, I have  Kd Jd again, Norbert 86os and he flops the 8 to double. Christian then busts in a cooler,  A s Kd v 88 all in pre, with a flop  9s 10s Js and somehow doesn't hit to exit 5th. A few double ups for the shorter stacks, then Neville shoves, I'm priced in to call with  10s 7s, he had 55, and I turn and river 2 10s.

So we're playing for medals again, 3 handed with Norbert who finished 3rd in the Irish, Steven who won the 6 max and myself. Distinctly remember looking up at Tom Clark at this point thinking, how the hell has this happened??

Less than 5 mins later, Steve knocks Norbert out, and the 2 of us are HU to win 2 bracelets in a day. Utterly ridiculous.

Heads up was actually more passive and lasted longer than I expected. A whole 20 mins!

We eventually clash.. Steve shoves with  Ks Js I call with  2d 2s

No idea how I held through this...  Ac Qs 5d 6s 7c

After this hand I have 430k v 120k, fold the next small blind which was 72os, Steve shoves the next hand, K 7 is more than good enough to call with the structure, Steve flops the Q but I flopped the K and hold...

So I win 2 bracelets in a day. Gobsmacked is the understatement of the century...

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amcgrath1uk

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Rolling forward to Wednesday, and it was HORSE time. Again, such a simple opening table..

   Asa         McGrath         12         1   
   David         Griffiths         12         2   
   Gary         Jackson         12         3   
   Jacob         Andersen         12         4   
   Stuart         Ward                 12         5   
   Ricky         Hale                 12         6   
   Simon         Brooke                 12         7

What transpired was a good 5 hours of fun, but mainly abuse from David, Simon and Stuart, all good natured of course, but still fun :) Simon effectively steamrollers the table early on, getting to 25k at the first break, and I'm down at 3.5k. Basically have to get lucky a couple of times and grind away, make the 2nd break with 8k, the 3rd break with 12.4k, only 14 left but sitting 13/14. No fairy tales this time as I bust about 10 mins after the break.

ROE I was really looking forward to on the Thursday, table draw:

   Mark         Lassman         11         1   
   Santo         Toscano         11         2   
   Ashley         Whitfield         11         3   
   Simon         Brooke                 11         4   
   Steven         Bradbury         11         5   
   Asa         McGrath         11         6   
   Jonathan    Seal                 11         7   
   Jonathan    Berry                 11         8 

Never got going in this, was out very early on ( before the end of level 2)

Main event on Friday, table draw

   David         Garden         6         1   
   Martin         Gate                 6         2   
   Asa         McGrath         6         3   
   Jason         Mcburnie         6         4   
   Joshua Thomas    Jones         6         5   
   Linda         Iwaniak         6         6   
   Santo         Toscano         6         7     

Again this didn't go too well, I lose about 6k early on, then raise out of my bb with a few limpers, and Linda calls. Flop is 965, I lead, Linda reraises, I shove, she says, I've put too much in to fold, and calls with 67. My KK is looking nice until the 6 turn, then the 7 river just to finish me off.
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amcgrath1uk

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PLO day on Saturday, and was totally looking forward to this one, charity last longer with Stuart Ward, so it was obvious what was coming with the table draw

   Stuart         Ward         12         1   
   Cody         Wagner         12         2   
   Paul         Jackson         12         3   
   Santo         Toscano         12         4   
   Marco         Maas         12         5   
   Asa         Mcgrath         12         6   
   Dawn         Cooke         12         7   
   Linda         Iwaniak         12         8   
   Alvaro         Dossantoscarvalho         12         9

Generally keep myself out of trouble, and at the 500/1k level, have 28k. Play pretty much standard PLO, raising in the right spots, and somehow find myself on the final table bubble with about 180k, exploit this as much as possible, so that when the bubble bursts, I'm on 235k and sitting 4/9 overnight. Final table was:

   McGrath     Asa         1         235,500   
   Payan         Elie         2         327,000   
   Davis         Paul         3         211,500   
   Lao         Cheok         4         341,500   
   Tyler         Dave         5         273,000   
   Porter         Mark         6         108,000   
   Parkhomenko         Stanislav         7         145,500   
   Clerbaut         Tom         8         129,000   
   Wiemker         Christian         9         29,000   

Final table starts quietly, but I lose about 80k in the first 2 orbits before gaining some back. It takes over an hour to bust one player! Another 45 mins to bust 2 more. At this stage, blinds were getting high, and the 3 shorter stacks, of which I was on, was going to be a case of double up or bust. Cheok and Dave between them were running over the table, but quite quietly, Paulie had accumulated a ton of chips. Cheok or Dave are raising every hand by this point, and on my bb, Cheok raises. I look down at JJ65 take a couple of minutes thinking it through, and decide it's well worth it. Cheok has Q1074, so I'm therefore pretty happy. Flop comes down 4 7 10 which gives Cheok 2 pair, and I don't improve. So a 6th place to add to the double 1sts, happy obviously so far.. One event to come, the Crazy Pineapple!
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amcgrath1uk

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The last day, and we're on to Crazy Pineapple. Last event of the week and it was a case of let's have some enjoyment! Have a laugh with the table I'm on, and what happens, happens.

When my first table splits, I have maybe 16k, manage to get a double up or 2, and we're suddenly playing hand for hand.

There's a player all in for less than a bb on my table, Ian and myself check it to the river, where I have to bet in last position having flopped 2 pair and turning the full house.

We get to a final table:

Seat 1: Brian Beekers - 120k
Seat 2: Maike Tigchelaar - 59k
Seat 3: Asa McGrath - 102k
Seat 4: Robert Dove - 37k
Seat 5: Danny Op 't Hof - 126k
Seat 6: Ian Thompson - 48k
Seat 7: Shruti Shete - 41k
Seat 8: Maarten Kok - 165k

With 6 left, I get dealt QQx and are all in pre, with both Ian and Danny. Happy that the flop comes KQ9, especially seeing Danny have AK, and Ian with AJ. Ian get there on the river but I still manage to win a significant pot. Couple of hands later, Danny is all in after I've raised, I auto call. Flop AQQ, sitting with A9 I'm fairly happy until Danny turns over AQ! Danny 3 hands later has the chip lead and raises again, I have JJ5 on my bb and call, flop is J64, he shoves I obviously call, and I beat his AA.

A few hands later, Danny raises all in and again it's an auto call. Flop is  Qc 10c 6c and I pretty much am playing my pocket pair under, which is  2c 2s, Danny has  7s 5c and I hold.

Another medal bubble! Manage to win a good pot slow playing a nut flush, and there's a double up for Ian who was short stacked. About 10 mins later, I raise Ian's bb and he shoves. I take a while but call. Flop is  4h 3c 4c and I take a while, I'm holding Q77 with 2 clubs, decide Ian has probably got an overpair and go with the flush draw. He turns over AJ, and I get there straight away, so into another medal battle!!

3 handed I have 350k with the others having that between them. Brian eventually busts Maarten after a cagey few rounds and HU for another bracelet!

Lose a big hand early on where my K7 on a AK7 board is battered by his A7. Chop a pot all in where I threw my pair to chase a flush, but the board played whichever way I went. Managed to work my way into a chip lead again, when we had another all in. I held K7 on a K78 all hearts, Brian had  Ah Ac and hit the flush on the turn. Managed to double back up with Ace high vs K hi and again take the chip lead. We get it in all in pre again,  Ks 6d 5s flop, Brian holds  Js 10s to my 10 10 and turns the flush again. Down to less than 100k again, all in with the flop A 2 3, I hold K 3, and Brian J 10, board runs out K ( yay) and then Q to give Brian the straight and the win.

Annoying way for the board to run out obviously, but no complaints from me. 2 wins, 2 bracelets, a 2nd and a 6th in the week. Coming into the week, I was hoping for one final table, and maybe even a medal, but what happened was beyond any expectations.

It also meant, that after the online series, I ended up being Player of the Series, gaining a main event and 2 side entries for free to next seasons Worlds.

The whole experience has only started to hit me in the last couple of days. Winning 2 in a day has never been done before. Running as well as I obviously have done also massively helped. I just remember, going into the final table of the 8 game, thinking 2 things. One was I'm going to bloody enjoy myself no matter what happens. The second was thinking back a few years, to when Chris Moormans father, Simon, won the GUKPT in Manchester, where I railed with Chris for the whole final table. I knew that Simon had never played big poker events before, but he looked totally at ease with himself and the situation he found himself in. So I told myself, chill, be yourself and try and portray that image. Seemed to work!
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pables

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Nice read mate and well played 👍👍
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