Roll up for poker roulette!

A last minute change of plan led to us going to play in the Fitzwilliam in central Dublin, instead of playing the main event qualifier. The format was 20 euro rebuy and was dealer dealt, so plenty of play in it.

However, the players seemed to have some interesting thoughts on hand values - anything with paint on is massive for these guys, and if you have KQ, KJ or JQ you have the nuts pre-flop. The game was hard to play, because the players would re-raise pre-flop with KJ, so it was tough to know where you stood.

Two interesting incidents. Firstly a guy next to me raises to 800 and the big blind goes all in for 2800. He says “I know this is a bad call, but I call” showing pocket 5s. The guy shows QJ and the guy with pocket 5s says “I knew it was a bad call”. I say “surely you’d call if you knew his hole cards?” and he replies “I don’t think so” :)

The second incident involves Shazbo pushing with pocket 9s for 3000 chips, and the guy next to act calls with KQ. He is devastated when he misses the flop and bemoans the bad luck that his monster has been cracked!

Predictably I get into a huge pot before getting unlucky. Action is as follows: Blinds are 200-400. Early position raises to 1200. Mid position min-raises to 2400. I push for 8000 chips with AK, because in this game that is good here 90% of the time. Early raiser installs, and the min re-raiser is having none of this, and puts all his chips in the middle so quickly I can barely see his hands move (it’s for his tournament life).

My hand: AK
Early raiser: KQ
Min re-raiser: K9

K9 is clearly good, and I am busted missing out on a 22k pot ;) K9 man utters the legendary words “Come on I can’t pass there, they were suited” :)

This afternoon, I thought I’d pop down to the conference centre, where Day 1A of the Main Event is underway, for a quick cash game. I bump into Lauren, a former dealer at the Loose Cannon, who I get on well with. He tells me he has a seat for me and I go and take my seat. I notice that the stack sizes are a little bigger than normal, and immediately realise that I have been popped down in the 2/5 Omaha game. Cheers Lauren, always looking out for me ;) Clearly, to save face I fish 500 Euro out of my pocket and enter the game.

It becomes quickly apparent that these people are total lunatics. Several are deep stacked, and they are pure gamblers - it’s a game that has disaster written all over it for my solid cautious Omaha game, as they will put me all in and if I miss it’s 500 Euro down the drain.

In this game, a hand like 8, 10, 2, 3 is worth a pot sized re-raise of an early position raiser. I have to put Aces down twice after huge action on the flop, but the flip side is they will pay you off when you hit a flush, straight or house. The art is getting into the positon of having a big hand without investing too much of your stack.

I see one 1200 Euro pot, where the initial better on the flop has mid pair and puts in 400 Euro. The caller has bottom pair and a Queen high flush draw. This is enough for him to call. Madness! I have a feeling Sonny O is going to make a lot of money this weekend, but this game is not for me - a game of Omaha can be full of thought and strategy, but this game is just coin tossing.

The final hand sums it up. I call a 10 Euro raise with JcJs3d3s but the big blind pot raises to 60 Euro. I don’t like this situation already, but given that all the other 5 players call, I have to call to try and hit a set.

Flop 2, 6, 8

Someone puts in 150 Euro and someone pushes for 350. In any sensible game, the overpair of Jacks is no good, so I pass. The initial raiser calls with a pair of 6s and a low flush draw. The re-raiser has the lone 8 with a gutshot straight draw. He eventually makes 2 pair on the river to win another huge pot. I was ahead on the flop and actually would have hit a set of 3s on the turn. I was ahead on every street. Unreal.

I escape from the game after 2 hours 120 Euro in profit and, more importantly, with my sanity intact.

Main Event starts for me tomorrow…