Mindwise's Blog

Day 1D Report
Wednesday, July 9th 2008 11:56 am

Hey,

Here is a review of my Day 1d and the trip so far. I mentioned in my previous blog that I was hoping for an easier starting table than last year, which had three pros to my left. I got my wish and the day was pretty straightforward. I had a good player two to my right, a contest winner (via a drawing out of a barrel) to my immediate right, and then some definitely good/solid players as well as some weak players to my left.

The very nice, older gentleman to my right who won the drawing had never played live before and was doing things like folding when it was checked to him. We tried to help him with the rules. He enjoyed himself I think, especially win the Milwaukee Beer girls gave him gear to wear. I didn't get into many pots with him before he busted (on a pretty bad cooler too) but he walked me like 4 times.

There was some strangeness on the table, like 6x preflop raises, but people were mostly playing their cards. I was able to pick up a bunch of pots preflop or with c-bets and ended the first level with 26,600 chips (starting with 20k) with my biggest preflop hands being A10 and 88.

Level two went exactly the same way. I still wasn't getting hands but the table was extremely calm (I think that's the best word for it) and they let you know when they hit a hand. There was very little three betting. My biggest hands that level were JJ and AJ and I lost both of those but still ended up a bit at 29,500.

Level Three had the drawing winner eliminated to be replaced by a strong young player with PokerStars gear and EPT patches (let's call him EPT guy). He was much more aggressive and he changed the table dynamic. But he was to my right and I was able to continue to push up when he let a hand go and got to 33k.

But then I lost a huge pot to EPT guy when my KK got out flopped. Suddenly I was under 20k for the first time in the tournament and was pretty disappointed for a few hands. But I chipped up again the exact same way as before and ended with 26,450 at the dinner break. I was battling more often with the two strong players to my right now. I should add that the solid player to my left kept picking up and getting value from his big hands and he was starting to three bet more.

Rizen stopped by and took me and some poker buddies out to dinner. Except for some questionable driving, we had a good dinner and got back with minutes to spare ... and we had Rizen to answer our questions. Thanks sir!

The next level went great. I hit my first trips of the tournament and got paid off somewhat by EPT guy, although he made an excellent laydown when I tried to get too much value.

The last level had the EPT guy get a bit lower (he'd get knocked down then get most of it back -- over and over again). I picked up KK to his QQ and knocked him out. EPT guy was replaced by Nath Pizzolatto, a PXF subscriber and popular poster on 2+2. He entered the table with a stack around 60k I think and talked about he had just built up to that with a rush before they broke his table. His rush continued and he ran over the table but showed a number of big hands. He did lose QQ to KK for 15k chips to get knocked down a bit. When the last hand of the night came, the table pretty much assumed Nath would take the pot, which he promptly did. But besides the monsters he showed, he picked up plenty of other pots. He's just a natural player and I can see him going very far. I ended with 49,050 chips.

Then I was faced with two full days off. Boo. I mostly worked the last two days. Two nights ago, I had dinner with Fox, Rizen and his lovely wife, UCLABruinz, and online friends Yaaaaaaaaa and DigitalDoc. Then we headed to the PokerStars party where I finally got to meet Apestyles in person and we agreed to a bullet chess death match on ICC (Internet Chess Club). Stay tuned!

Today I got to rail some PXF subs and talked briefly with UCLABruinz on his last break of the night when he was at 70k chips (after being as low as 7k! -- he ended with 55k). I also played some small stakes cash games and ended up a bit.

Since the table assignments for today have been posted, I was able to research my table, which is very interesting. Not sure how much it will really help, but there are at least two players with live tournament wins and almost $300k of winnings plus a strong Internet player. There are a lot of chips at the new table too. Should be fun.

Good luck all!

Scott
mindwise



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rambodave
Wednesday, July 9th 2008 12:30 pm
GL Mindwise!
For the chess, use this, you'll never lose. The analyzer portion.
http://www.chesslab.com/PositionSearch.html