CPT Win

Here is a report from the Canadian Poker Tour tournament I won on Saturday. We went down with 25 others from Calgary, from Poker Knights. The people I refer to in this post are from this group.

We start off with 7500 chips and blinds at 25-25, Bunny and BFF are at my table. Early on I don't play many hands and the ones I do I win by bluffing and picking up a few small pots and I build my chips up to about 15K. The blinds in this tournament were aggressive to say the least, the level before the dinner break we were at 300/600 with alot of players at around starting stack.

I decide that I'm going to try and pick up some chips before the break as the blinds are going up to 500/1000 so I raise with 5h6h in late position and get two callers. Not what I wanted but oh well, flop comes KQT it's checked to me and I bet out 3K, and they both call. I decide I'm done with this hand and it's checked to the river only to show that I could have won the hand had I bet out on the turn or the river as one player shows AT and the other A7 (WTF!!).

So now I'm down to around 8K in chips and I'm really feeling the need to chip up we have around 3 mins left before the break so I look down at Tc8c in 3rd position. I raise and it's folded around to Natalie (bunny), she just calls in the bb. The flop comes 743 ranbow, She checks to me and I push, hoping she has over cards. Well she did, two Kings (oops) she played me like a fiddle. I have her covered by 1500 but I'm basically screwed if I lose this hand. Well what happened next was nothing short of a miracle. I needed to hit two running cards to win, two clubs, two 10's two 8's, or running cards for a straight. The turn came a 5 of spades Only card in the deck that can save me is a 6 ---- RIVER 6!!!

We go to the break and I have just over 15K again so much for chipping up. At dinner I find out that I am among the chip leaders for all the people from PK, only Spade has more chips than me. After Dinner I pick up back to back KK's and AJ the very next hand, and quickly chip up to almost 50k within the first few orbits. I really think the T8 hand helped me get action on my KK hands as people couldn't get their money in fast enough against me.

Soon after that I got moved and we were down to 5 tables, I was among the top 5 chip leaders for the tournament at this point, if not the chip leader. I get no cards and try to get a read for my table, when I pick up my friend Corey's favourite hand KT in position. I make a 4xbb raise and 2 people push in behind me. My raise covers one of their stacks the other I have to call just a little more, I have odds and decide to call. We flip the hands over, they are KT (me), AT and QQ. One guy says that he folded a K, so I have two outs. Well lady luck hits me again and I catch a King on the flop to knock out two more players.

I was at around 70K and I went extremely card dead and my steals were getting reraised so I lost almost half my stack when we combined down to the final 3 tables. I had a great seat at my new table, I was to the left of an aggresive player who had been my nemesis at the previous table. I played fairly conservative, I had an avg. stack and I wanted to see what the players were like.

One of my biggest laydowns of the tournament came when a good player who had been playing pretty tight came in for a 3x the bb raise. Now I know what your thinking 3x BB thats not that much, well at this point 3xBB was a huge portion of most peoples stacks. I had this player covered but if I pushed it would be for 60% of my chips, he had just lost a big hand and I had a feeling he may be tilting slightly and might call with hand like AT or AJ. I thought about it and thought about it, and finally decided that I wasn't going to go to war with 9's. I don't know what he had, but I really think that I made the right play, mostly because of what happened soon after.

Another player who was just below avg. stack at the table min. raises UTG and I look down at QQ in 4th position. I think about what kind of hands he could min. raise with, AA or KK are definately possiblities as a min raise could definately garner him some action ( I am always really leary of min. raises or limps UTG). I decide that I just can't lay this hand down, and if I want to make a run for the final table I have to play this hand. I decide to push all in, well I got more action than I wanted as two other shorter stacks decide to call and the original raiser folds his cards. The cards are flipped over they are: KJ, AT, and my QQ. I dodge all the cards and I pretty much double up with the 2 other players chips.

I am once again among the chip leaders in the tournament. I don't even think I had finished stacking my chips when another player UTG decides to push all in, for about 40% of my chips, it's folded to me and I look down at AKd. I really had to think about this one for a long time, and I honestly thought I was up against a pocket pair. I thought with that raise it had to be 8's through J's, his raise just was too suspicious to me, he didn't want a caller. So with AK I thought it was a coin flip. As a lot of people know I play to win and I really thought if I won this hand I would be in a great position to win, so I pushed all in and it folded around to him. We flipped over our hands: Him: JKos Me: AdKd. I couldn't watch, I don't even look, I walk away and face the wall, but as I hear the crowd go nuts (we had a lot of support there) I turn around and all I see is KJ but I look closer and the other card is an Ace. I dodge the other J's and add a huge chunk to my stack.

Now we are approaching the bubble and we have to eliminate about 6 more people to be in the money, there are a lot of short stacks with maybe 2 or 3 times the bb left that are just hoping to fold to the money. There are some others with about double those stacks and one other player at the table with a stack just smaller than mine. I decide that I am raising almost every hand, to put pressure on the medium stacks. This strategy worked great and I added probably between 60-100K to my stack by the time the bubble had hit.

We were playing hand for hand and a couple of players were truly on life support. We had 4 players left from our group of 25 that went down, and unfortunately one them turned out to be the bubble boy. We are in the money now and I am in the BB, unfortunately another PK player (Cowtown) pushes on my BB for not even the same amount as the BB, he has K9 (I think) and I have A8, the flop comes A8X and the turn and the river don't help him and he's out.

I go to the final table as the chip leader with 288k in chips out of 1,080,000 chips, so I have about 28% of the chips, there is another player with 240k, a young internet player that was my nemesis earlier, luckily though I once again get seated to his left. Sharon was the only other PK player that survived to the final table, she had 75K chips. We sit down and they introduce us and even though Sharon and I aren't from Lethbridge we get the biggest applause and cheers from the crowd (helped having 25 people there).

We start the final table and in the first orbit there are 3 pairs of Aces dealt. Two of which are cracked, luckily the ones I got were the ones that weren't. I don't pick up many hands and the kid to my right is raising a lot of hands so I sit back and wait for something to fight back with.

I don't really remember many hands until I am forced to call a guys all in, in my BB with 48os. I was getting 2-1 and it wouldn't have dented my stack. He had AQ and I hit a 8 on the turn to knock him out. We were down to 5 players, blinds at 10k/20K and I raised to 80K with A5 UTG, folded to the chip leader on my right and says "Here's your chance to win this" and pushes all in. I go into the tank, what would he push with, his starting hand requirements weren't exactly the greatest, but I didn't want to put my tournament on the line with A5 I decided to fold and he showed me an ace. He told me later that he had A9.

A couple of hands later I'm in the bb and he raises to 90K in the sb. I look down at KJ and with position I decide to call, the flop comes down AJx, and he pushes all in imediately. I once again go into the tank, I think that I could be ahead, but he has to put me on an Ace, and how could he push if he did. He was a cagey player that liked to trap opponents, and this bet just seemed really weird to me. I finally decided to muck and I showed him my KJ, he showed AK. Phew!!!

The fifth place finisher is knocked out and we are down to 4, the chip leader (kid to my right) just doubled up another player and we are all pretty close to even. Brad comes up to me and says you should offer a chop. So I do, I say "how about we chop this so everyone makes minimum of 4K?" (Original payouts were 4th-$2K, 3rd $3K, 2nd $5K, and first $10K) This would pay everyone $4K with 2nd getting $5K and first getting $7K. Everyone agrees and I truly believe that it helped me and heres why.

A couple of hands later the kid to my right once again raised UTG for about 1/3 of my chips, I looked down at 77. I went into the tank and finally decided once again that I was playing for the win and I had to make a stand against this guy sooner or later and I pushed all in. He called almost imediately with KQ (I think I might have thought that through a little longer) and we were off to the races for a 750K pot. The flop came 863 and I was stil ahead and then the turn brought a beautifull 7 to give me trips. I won the hand and crippled him in the process and I took a commanding chip lead.

He was knocked out in the next couple of hands as was Sharon. She played amazing at the final table coming in with a shorter stack and still finishing 3rd, Great job!!!.

So we were heads up me with around 750K and him with around 300K. The blinds were 20K/40K in the very first hand of heads up I pick up K5os, and raise in the bb to 120K, he calls. Flop comes rags with no K or 5, but I gamble and hope he missed, I bet 200K and he folds.

Great he just put 1/3 of his chips in the pot on the first hand. The next hand I'm on the button with T6 and call, he pushes and I fold. On the 3rd hand of heads up I pick up Jd9d (My friend Joel aka Spade's fav. hand), I say in my head I'm going to win this tournament with this hand. He calls in the sb and I check, The flop comes out 8T4 with 2 spades. I bet what is 75% of his remaining chips and he pushes all in. I call for the few extra chips and flip over my open ended straight draw, he turns over 83 for middle pair. I need to catch a Q, 7, J, or a 9 to win, the turn brings a Q and the crowd goes nuts, I just won the tournament and the 7K that comes with it.

I walked away with about $5600, after paying out the players I swapped %'s with and tipping the dealers.

I'm the current CPT money leader for 2006, that won't last long though as their is a bigger prize pool in a tournament coming up next weekend in Edmonton.