Feb 26th - £50+£5 NL Hold'Em - LCI Club (Brighton)

Back in the winners circle tonight as I scraped into 8th place (out of 35) and I do mean scrape.

With this being a multi-rebuy tournament I came prepared to spend £200 although I didn't quite realise just how quickly things can go wrong if the cards don't co-operate.

My first rebut came about whilst holding A-9 on the button. No raises so an easy call. Three of us (both blinds & me) saw a flop of 3-6-9. A great flop for me so I wasn't going to give it up likely. I bet out to 300 (blinds were 50/100) but immediately got re-raised all-in from the SB for all my chips.

To be honest the raiser had been punting for the best part of the game upto that point and was happy to rebuy if beaten. I assumed he had a 9 with a lower kicker. I called and he flipped 4-5 for a straight draw!! An ugly 7 appeared on the turn and it was rebuy time!

A short while late I held A-Q in LP and raised to 400. I get two callers. The flop is 9-10-Q and I bet 500. Again I get two callers. Its all-in time as another 9 fell on the turn and again both players call me with more chips. I'm against J-J and A-K. A King falls on the river and the J-J player makes a straight. Rebuy!

My 3rd, & final rebuy, occurs when I'm holding 3-4 on the BB. The flop is 5s-5d-6s and its checked around. The 2s falls on the turn, giving me a straight and suddenly there's fireworks.

I bet 500, Mr 'punter' bets 1k and gets a call from across the table and I go all-in for what is left of my stack. Call. Call. Its checked on the river as the 10h falls. Mr 'punter' shows 5-7 for trips whils Mr 'caller' shows As-Qs for the flush! Doh!!

Ok..my final buy-in and at the break I have 2900 points (the rebuys get you 2500).

Three hands after the break I get the Kd-5d and decide to launch. So did two others though so there's over 10k in my side pot as we flip'em.

I'm up against A-10 and J-J. The flop is 8-9-K-4-9 and I'm back in the game!

With only 35 runners players drop quicklt and we're soon down to two tables. I'm down to 8k in chips so decide to go all-in with Ad-3d. Mt 'chipleader' calls with A-9 but a scraggy 3 on the river doubles me up and I get to the final table with 13k in chips!

The thing about the Brighton tournaments is that they have 25 minute levels and with blinds only just at 1k-2k and the average stack at around 30k I had to sit around and wait for an opportunity to double up.

I get 8s-9s in the SB and as its passed around I attempt to nick the blinds by going all-in. The BB holds A-J and calls. I hit an 8 and I'm now upto 24k in chips.

Blinds get to 2k-4k and we lose a player. I'm down to 14k again after being anted away so decide that A-3 is a good hand to launch with (when will I learn?) The player to my immediate left holds A-K and this time I don't get so lucky.

I'm out in 8th place with £150 in prize money for a loss of £55 on the night!

Ah well...it could have been worse!

Entries -> 35 - Place -> 8th - Loss -> £55 ($96) Profit/Loss for 2006 -> +$1640