Genting Poker Series Leg 3 - Edinburgh

This is going to be a two parter to my much neglected blog..

First up is my recap of the Genting Poker Series Edinburgh which came to town 31^st May -3^rd June, and secondly a recap of my month overall.

First up in was Event #3 £109 6max, which then became a £109 full ring tournament due to space L, 82 runners and the tournament was really a grind, there was a young kid on my left that called every single one of my opens.. never 3bet me stationed all day long. I could not get any cards to play back and I ended up giving him a big chunk with 89hh on 57Jhh board with two big barrels on turn and river.

Before long I was down to the 10-13bb mode and just got it in as and when  I could which worked out pretty well my allins ran like this A8>KQ, T9dd>AQo KK>AQ which took us up to two tables left.. 10 paid and 18 remaining, we just got 4 new players in the table break.

blinds 800/1600 200. Utg (50k) opens to 3800 brand new just moved after split. Big fish 60k flats. He is super wide like 22+ I jam TT on the button and 27k (17bbs) it's folded to us and we jam.. only original raiser calls with JJ and holds

Sigh , gg etc

Back home to my own bed which is simply wonderful for a festival, to have it on your own front door and woke up rested for the main event.

Day 1B

I took my seat at table 7, seat 7 and didn’t notice anyone at my table really except for Gareth Walker who won a UKIPT or something who between him and his Geordie mate sat beside him decided to flat almost everyone of my opens.. I wasn’t hitting so I would generally open/cbet / give up.

Lost a chunk 4betting AQcc out of the small blind (UTG Lithuanian fish had opened, Gareth Walker 3bet, his mate flatted, I 4bet, only Geordie mate called) I fired a ¾ pot bet on Kc2s7s which he called and then again when a non spade fell on the turn only to get shoved on. Still don’t know exactly what he had.. probs a set but I sigh folded, thought my line looked strong but w/e .

Couple orbits later I get in my first allin.. Old gentleman opens 26k utg to 1100 (200/400) me with a 13k stack 3bet AKdd to 3050 all get out of the way and he flats.

Flop Kd Th 7h and he checks..

I bet 5500 and he jams… I call and he has KQhh .. fade the turn and river and get up to like 27k yay!

Won another decent pot off the same guy flatting AJdd in the button flop Qc 7d 5d, calling his cbet turning the flush and getting two streets of value.

I bust a shortstacked Gareth Walker AQ>KQ.

Up to about 35-40k now and another old guy replaces the first old guy.. he wasn’t to last long..

Lithunaian fish limps UTG, new old guy in the CO raises him to 2500 (30k) (400/800/50) I cold 4bet Aces from the SB to 10k, fish folds and he flats.. Flop comes down Qc 2h 5s and he insta-ships out of turn full pot bet (20k).. im like wtf just happened its me to go but w/e I call and hold vs AK.. (turn is a T obv for the sweat) and im up to 75k and get moved tables.

New table scarily has a stack that can bust me.. 90kish tall irish guy with Sunglasses and headphones think his name was David Caffery, everyone looks a little scared of him and he is opening every pot  the rest are on the 15-30ish stacks so I hope to pick up some chips here, Richard Sinclair is on my right and I make a mental note of how busting two UKIPT champs would be nice..

I first tangle with him opening JTdd 2.5x ing it from UTG, this is one of the hands the tournament blogger caught so I will copy and paste it here:

 (no idea who Jon Milne is.. but it was me that played this hand honestly)

Jon Milne raises UTG plus one to 2200.

David Caffrey flats him in the cut off.

Flop is 6d 5h Qc

Milne bets 3500' Caffrey flat calls. Turn is the Ad, and Jon makes. It another 7k to see the river, which Caffrey calls.

The river is the Kd, to which Jon checks quite quickly.

Caffrey thinks for some time and makes a bet eventually of 8700.

John Milne instantly reraises, throwing five black 5k chips straight across the line.

Caffrey sits upright and whips his headphones off. He asks Milne how much he has behind, and The dealer counts them out. She tells him he has another 37k.

Caffrey sits and thinks for some time, during which John's Reflective shades get too hot so he removes them and keeps looking at Caffrey and his chips, in between shuffling in his chair. He's either got a big hand or he is suffering from St Vitus dance, but eventually Caffrey makes the call, although seemingly reluctantly.

John happily flips over Jd 10d for the second nut flush draw. Caffrey mucks.

I was torn between a shove and a value bet.. if it was a non diamond king maybe I shove.. he mucked so not sure of the strength he had but w/e he had something and now im on 130k woo!

Few hands later make it 2100 to go with QQ (500/1k/100) get a caller and then the BB ships for 23k total.. I overshove and caller gets out of the way.. AJ for the BB and I only have to dodge 3 ou.. oh look theres the Ace meh nevermind.

They call last 4 hands of the night and I get TT, AK, KQ and win all of them.. finish the night with 107k going back to 800/1600 for my first day 2 since the Caesars deepstack almost 2 years to the day. In between I’ve not made day 2’s in 3 UKIPT’s and a Venetian deepstack so it’s nice to finally make one.

Day 2

I get to the casino with like 3 mins to spare as Corstorphine decided to have their gala day and block off the roads and congest them with traffic so I sit down and don’t recognize anyone which is always good. I yo-yo a bit playing some small pots and eventually win a decent one BvB with AK > Ax on a ATT26 board.. didn’t like the T there probably could have gotten paid off a lot more but I wimped out.. I had been quite aggro so a T was definitely in his range.. that took me up to 140k and unfortunately a table break.

My new table was leaning heavily to one side with 3x 500k+ stacks all to my left.. I got 0 cards and any time I opened from LP with legitimate hands KQ/A8 etc I was 3bet and 4bet before it even got round to me. .Definitely frustrating. But I rode it out albeit with a depleted stack to take 56k to the dinner break and a new table to return to when I was back with only 46 remaining and 42 getting paid.

I’ve always bemoaned my luck, whenever I seem to get deep in live tourneys that mean something to me I’ve got a habit of getting it in good and losing huge pots 64 v AA on a 456 board in WPT Bahamas in 05, TT < KQ in the inaugural APAT in 08 which was in essence a $16,000 coin flip but I would finally get a taste of what it was like to be on the other end of this.. a return on some of my Sklansky bucks if you will.

Picture the scene we are on the stone cold bubble and we are desperate , 48k with blinds of 2k/4k and find AJ in the small blind, folds to the button who raises to 10k for the 30^th time in a row (slight exaggeration) and we jam all good so far right? The BB doesn’t fold.. he’s thinking, pained but thinking. So now I have to get through what looks like two players to cash this tourney… he reshoves 100k and the Button tank folds claiming 88. He has AQss and my head and heart just sink to the floor, I stand up and cheekily as for a Jack and get it there right on the flop with two sixes on an all red flop, the turn is an 8 (lol button ul!) and I fade the river 3 outer which is the 9c.. more than doubled up and right behind me everyone rushes to another table where Genting Pro Davia Barauskaite  busts JJ<KK to burst the bubble.

You can never have enough Saltires on your Hendon Mob and mine just went from 2 to 3 (one is next to my name lol).

Get down to 36 and our table is broken, I draw table 1 seat 2 which is the TV table.. or online streaming table if you will. I have the chip leader on my right so realise I’m not going to get a chance to open much.. I’ve got like 150k at this point with 4k/8k/400 blinds. Fold patiently for an orbit then get AK in the SB.. folds to me and having played with the BB a bit I know he is really aggro so think there is a decent chance I’m getting it in here.. I make it 24k, he asks for a count of my stack.. I tell him and he shoves. I snap it off and he has 99 Ace on the flop and I’ve doubled again to over 300k in chips.

Don’t play many other hands at this table, I miss twice with KQ once flatting on the button and folding an AJ4 flop from an EP raiser and next 3betting a medium stack only to get 4bet shoved on.. where again I fold. Break comes round and they rotate us with another table.

I get to witness first hand BobaFett’s huge double up where the then chip leader 6bet shoves on him with QQ into Paul’s KK which holds to rocket him to like 1.8million an out and out chip lead.

I again don’t get to play many hands at this table but eventually find AKo in MP, 21 players left, I’m playing 240k and raise it up to 25k, (5k/10k/1k) folds to the BB who asks for a count he’s playing about 300k and ships on hearing my reply. I call but don’t even get a sweat an eight comes down on the flop, turn card brings me 4 outs to a chop but I fade and the dream is over with 50% of a £755 score in my pocket.

A win there takes me to half a million and a real chance at this one. Big congrats to Paul Mctaggart (Boba Fett) who I’ve known since the days of playing tourneys at Cincinnati’s about 10 years ago.. he abs crushes online but always seemed doomed when it came to liveaments.. he chopped it HU with Paul Jackson then won the extra 2k and the trophy shortly after. Also big congrats to Barry Burns and Rab Gregory, both local regs who were on my right for a big part of day 2 and patiently grinded those 10BB stacks into a big score.

Had such a great time, below is my interview (I won my seat as a bounty) and a few pics.