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Both these hands occur on day two with the blinds at 500/1000 and antes at 100. The table is weak passive, which is a dream for me, and I have my favourite seat, seat six.
I don't know any of the players at the table except for seat nine, which is being occupied by the great Nicky Power. Nicky has 50k and he tells me that he's in reverse as he was up at nearly 100k. I have read quite a few of Nicky's blogs where he gives tournament reports so I have some idea how he will play from this spot despite having very little table time with him.
It appears that unlike most young guys who lose their head when they go into reverse, Nicky is using his experience to steady things up as he still has an above average stack. I take advantage of this and work my stack up from 60k odd to 80k. Then the following hand occurs.
Hero Call
Seat seven is filled by a middle aged man who starts ranting and raving to Nicky about some sick beat. He is playing around 25k and seems to be tilting. It's folded around to me in the sb where I look down at A9 of spades. I complete and he checks in the big.
I rarely raise out of the small blind as I don't like building pots out of position, there are obviously exceptions but not a whole lot. So we take the flop with 2,900 in the middle. Flop comes qq2 with club flush draw. I check and he bets 1,800. It's quite a large bet and looks as if he wants to take the pot here and now. Given that he's titling I would expect him to raise large cards pre flop. As a result my ace high is pretty big in this spot.
I also do not figure this guy to be the type of guy to start making sick value bets with a two on the turn and river. The turn is a king. I check and he fires out 3,400. I like the king, as I said I don't have him on high cards, also, most non full time players tend to freeze up in this spot and get worried about their opponent holding a q. There is a chance he has a q but I reckon the chances of this are 10%ish.
So given all of this info I call. The river comes an 8, I check, the club flush draw has missed at this point which is good news for me. He fires out a river bet of 5,300 into 13,300. I don't believe he would bet an 8 or a 2 on the end. He would raise a kx pre flop I am pretty sure. QX makes up a small part of his range but I reckon my ace hi is good here a very large % of the time.
Also, another tell is he has left himself with 15k. His river bet was done more by betting whatever excess he had over leaving himself a shoving stack in an effort to get me to fold as opposed to it looking like he was trying to get value from his hand. I call, he mucks and my ace hi is good.
Table Control
I am in control of the table now raising two times the bb and having a lot of success in taking down pots and building a stack that now stands at just over 100k. In an effort to improve every aspect of my live game, table control is an aspect I have been studying. It's certainly an area where competitive advantage can be gained. There are a lot of aspects to table control. You can control your table in different ways through aggression, a big chip stack, through speech play etc.
Being table captain as such, will enable you to pick up chips more easily. Fintan Gavin is an expert at controlling his table through his gab. I watched much of his final table at the EPT Barcelona and it was an exhibition in table control through speech play.
With dinner break approaching I find qq and open to 2,400. All of a sudden, the sleeping giant in seat nine, Nicky Power, reraises me to 8,700. This bet seizing really seems like an AK to me. In general, I have mucked my raises to re raises at this table as I am accumulating chips at a steady pace. I feel my qq plays close to neutral even against Nick's range here. He could have air but I can sense he just wanted to get to dinner break and come back refreshed after the break with an average stack.
I think ak makes up 50% of his range given his bet sizing. It's a pretty minging spot for me, because once I defend Nicky knows I have a decent hand. My general move here would be to shove. However, if I shove and lose the pot I swap places with Nicky, he's now coming back with 100k and me with 50k after the dinner. I will lose control of the table, which is worth maybe 4k a round to me. Even if he has an over pair I have set mining value.
I call with the intention of check raising all in any flop with no A or K on it. Flop comes A hi and I fold. I announce you must have ak, Nicky lets me have a look at one and it's an ace. This keeps Nicky below 60k and me above 90k. I have become a lot more conscious of who I give my chips to in tournaments. I have no doubt if I take the flick as I would have done in the past, it's Nicky and not me who makes the ft. By the time I go to dinner I have 115k without seeing a river.
The week so far
Played a pretty crazy session on Monday night, where in the space of one hour I went from being an $18k winner to being an $18k loser. Probably my biggest swing hour ever, just the old $36k down swing puke, but if your going to play 25/50 heads up I suppose you've got to expect it.
I think I dealt with it pretty well, went to bed, got up on Tuesday did a good work out, cleared the head and was back at it. Picked up $11.5k on Tuesday, most of it in 75/150 limit hi/lo. So doing just under $7k for the week but it's early doors.
Had two losing soccer bets last night. Me and the warrior are on Newcastle and St Mirren tonight if anyone else wants to jump on board.
Gyming going well and got my 8 km time back below 41 minutes, which is decent progress. Went out to IKEA to pick up some stuff for the gaff, got a savage chair for potting; spent €300 on it but worth every penny.
Comments (8)
Thanks John and Paddy, I had a few bob on that double.