Heniek in Irish Master.

[heniek31]

As you know, I won package to this tournament on Paddy about 4 months ago. At the time it was exclusive to Paddy, so I must have been one of the first qualifiers. I set off on my journey early Friday morning, only to find out flight is delayed for over an hour. I wasn't in the rush, cause I didn't play till the following day. When I got out In Dublin, I found out, taxi will cost about €50. With me, being a tight ass, I have decided to get to the hotel on the bus. I though, it might be the only chance to see a bit of Dublin (and how right I was). So, €6 and 2hrs later I landed at City West Hotel. And it looked great. After going up and down to 5th floor 3 times and walking 7 corridors, I found my room. The best part of it was...a bath. Chucked my stuff and went to look for weekend battlefield. After passing 3 bars (and double vodka), I got to Conference Hall were its all was going to happened following day. After checking all information's I had a short stop at the bar and headed to my room. Just to mention, since I arrived in Dublin, weather was getting worse by the minute. When I was trying to go to sleep, I felt walls shaking and was expecting the roof to fly away any minute (I was on the top floor). Thank God that did never happened. Day 1 After breakfast, I was just trying to get into the mood of the occasion, but somehow I was just getting more and more nervous. At noon, I attended special Paddys branch. We all received nice, black blouses. Somehow, it wasn't mentioned we have to wear it. Great. It meant I will wear my shirt with PL on my heart :D. We suppose to have some Paddys pro to talk to us, but first of all I wasn't hungry and second, I had other plans. So, I just buggered off to Conference Hall. I found out the evening before, that Andy Black will have some kind of lecture. It was very interesting to listen to the legend about different aspects of poker. He finished 10 minutes before the start of main event. I managed to spot in the crowd Channing, Brindley, Marty Smith, Big C, J. Akenhead, Frazer, P. Parkinson few old geezers from Late Night Poker. Shuffle up and deal. I took my seat and who do I have at my table? Two English wizzkids, two old guys, Swede, skinny dude, French dude and French (lovely) girl, both with Poker770 on their shirts. First hand raise and all fold. Same guy raises in 2nd hand all fold. He raises 3rd time and only gets called by me with 1010. Flop 10xx. I raised him on the turn to take my first pot. From there skinny dude (SD) tries to take control of the table, but makes poor effort. Im taking few pots with flopped sets 3 times and Im few thousands up. The game isn't overly aggressive, nice banter going on and I feel a bit more relaxed. After about 3hrs we have a 1st goner SD. Stacks on our table at that time are pretty close. After few hands they are bringing new player to free seat. The Gold Digger. Yes, he has a special chapter, as he set me off to my glory. The guy with gold chains and 6 gold and diamonds rings on his fingers :loon. Now, he sat down with big stack around 28k. Our biggest stack was around 17k. So he is on BB in 1st hand. There is raise (150/300 to 900), call and he calls from BB. They 3 way bet flop, turn and river and GD catches flush on the river to his....96s. The biggest pot on our table so far. About 17k. After few orbits I rase to 900 with KQo from late position and GD calls from BB. In this hand, I had the hardest decision of the tournament. Flop comes :Ks::Ts::8h:. I bet 1.5k, he calls. Turn is :3d:. I bet 3k and he calls. River is :6h:. Now I really don't know where Im. Im thinking, if I bet I will be all in anyway, as I put half of my stack already in. But if I check, he might check too. If not, I will have to make my decision then. So I check. He bets 5.6k. If I call that and lose, Im left with 2k :unsure. What has he got? If he had trips or two pairs, he would have raised before. I take about 5 minutes to think. The only thing, that's on my mind is hand when he took that pot with 96s. So, I put him on KJ and lower or busted draw and I called. He turns over K4 :nana. He slams his hands on the table shouting what a terrible call and walk away with disgust. I don't care as I got approve of the table, that it was a good call. GD comes back to the table, but I still feel uncomfortable. Not for long though. GD seems to be on tilt and calling everything. After few orbits, he limps UTG. Im in the middle position and looking at KK. I raise to 2.5k (200/400). It comes back to him and he pushes all in for about 20k :eyes. Well, that stinks of AA or some big hand. Well, I took his chips, so he can have it back, but Im not folding that. I called and busted his JJ out :dude. I bumped in to him at the end of day two and we were like two best buddies. He told me, what happened before I busted him out. He said, that on the break, he received two phone calls. One from his father, that his grandpa has 12hrs to live and from his brother, that his mother had a stroke. Jesus Christ :\:sad. So that's why he played like he played. He apologised, I bought him a drink and all was cool. Back to the game and to GDs seat they are bringing....my old friend, I know from Virgin Festival (DTD) :lol. Now, this guy bluffed me 3 times of the pot and in general he was very loose. I thought, revenge is on the cards. And it only took two orbits. We were still on 200/400 when he raised UTG to 1.4k and I reraised to 5.5k with AA. Good banter developed for about 5 minutes as my friend just didn't want to let go. In the end it goes like. Me:"You know what I have, just fold it". "AA?" "You damn right!". And he calls :lol. WTF? Flop comes :Qs::Ts::5h: and he pushes all in for 13k. Not the best flop, but odds there, so an easy call. He shows :7c::6c: :rollin. Jammy git. We all laugh, shake hands and game was on. In the meantime, we lost one of the whizzkids and French dude. So with two seat open they bringing some guy with Blue Square Team Pro on his shirt (BSP) and.......Marty Smith two seats to my left :loon. I immediately steal his blinds from the button :tongue2. Marty came across as a very cool dude and gentleman. Very quiet and smiling all the time. After about one orbit, came the most memorable hand of the tournament. Swede raises from early position, Marty calls and BSP reraises to 7k. Swede, after long deliberation folds, but Marty calls. Flop comes 744 and they both end up all in on that flop. Swede then stands up, pulling his hair out and shouting he folded 77 :lol. Marty shows 1010 and BSP QQ. Suddenly, Im thinking table is collapsing cause turn brings 10 and BSP bangs his fists so hard on the table :loon. He goes ape, only for river to bring Q. Woooooooooooow :loon:loon:loon. Marty is left with just over one blind and I took him out the very next hand with AQ v K10 :cow. Then we lost our lovely, French girl. She raised and was called by BB. On the flop Qxx, they went all in with lady having AQ v Q9. 9 popped on the river :puke. Au revoir. Here comes J Thorsted (Danes) to my right and we are two biggest stacks at the table. The guy was fearless and I loved his style. He was bought in this event (and 8 others) by the guy who won this years (or last) Copenhagen Open. He was raising at least 5 hands in orbit and betting mad. I will definitely going to try that play in bigger MTTs online. Obviously we avoided each other towards the end of the game. There's just one more hand, with about 15 minutes to the end of day one, that Im not sure if I played it right :unsure. I was on small blind and there was all in for 20k and I had AK. In that moment, I thought of Hellmuth, when he said, he played 2 days and never took 50-50. If Id lost that hand, I would ve lost 3rd of my stack. I folded without showing. Other guys turned over JJ. I don't know :unsure. That's the rap. All day on the same table. It was 2am and I finished day on 59k. I was knackered and went right back to my room. Had a scorching, hot bath and jumped to bed. Yet I was to excited and still rolling about at 4am :eyes. Day 2 After breakfast, I run to the Hall, to check a chip count. Im 12th :loon. I sat at the new table. It didn't look taught and I quite liked it. Took blinds ones and then whole table folded to my BB when I turned JJ. And got moved. 2nd table looked much tougher, yet I loved it. 500/1k and 100. There were 3 limpers and I was on BB with :Tc::9c:. Flop :Ks::Qs::Jh:. Good flop, but not the best with 3 limpers. I checked, cause I thought, if there was A10, they will bet on that flop. All checked. I wanted a safe card for me and it was :8h:. Not bad. Now I can fire out and I bet 4k. Guy, who was UTG, raised to 12k and others folded. I know now I got him. Put him on either two pair or flush draw. He had 15k left and I pushed. He called turning over :Qh::Th: (UTG with that hand?). Many outs there, but he misses and I take over 30k :clap. Next time Im on the button, I raise with AQ and got all in from BB for about 20k. Im happy to take a gamble this time and even more happy when he shows KQo. Im up to 130k. We are down to 57ish at dinner break. Oh and that was funny. They split our table. So Im taking my chips and going to my new seat. Hmm, its taken. Comes out, they miscalculated and all seat are taken :lol. I don't complain, as blinds are 1/2k with antes and Im standing there for 10 minutes before seated. To my left I found a very nice girl. There's one problem. She has low cut blouse with lovely, huge bazookas popping out :loon. After 15 minutes, my neck stays strangely to my left all the time. Thank God she is moved and I can play poker again. Or can I? Immediately they bring player to her seat. Oh yes, Its him. Man isn't he noisy? He just cant stop talking and is heard in whole room. So we get to 1st SB v BB fight (1/2k). I call with 98o and he checks. Flop comes 1074. I bet 4k, he calls. Turn Q and we both check. 2 on the river and I overbet and he insta calls with 79. How can you call? You have busted draw. Magic :loon. We have few nice chats and many times he whispers to my ear what other players possibly have :lol. He plays ultra aggressive calling all ins twice for 60k with K10s and K8s. And winning one of em. Sadly, I went card dead for nearly 2hrs :\. When we got to 43 (3 of the money), no one wanted to go out. Then we had classic raise from button and all in from BB, followed by immediate call, to see AA v KK. Ouch. At the same time, one gone on other table. We are hand for hand. It takes 30 minutes for all in and a call AA v Q7 with a board running 3456 :loon. OUUUUCH :puke. But at the same time sea of clapping hands in the air :clap:clap:clap. Some guy comes to me and asking if Im Arthur and what stack I have. Wtf? He say he is from Paddy, writing a blog and there's many people asking about me. You guys :lol. Im taking blinds twice with A10 and QQ and running card dead again. And Im moved again. To the morgue. No one speaks. One raise and all fold over and over again :eyes. We are down to 31 and I see Andy Black standing and leaving. He donked his chips away in two hands and he had over 200k :loon. Im left with about 80k and blinds are already 3/6k and 300. Not much left to play with. After 30 minutes, we have all in and call at last. Short stack with KK v 44 and cowboys are done with 4 on the flop :eyes. Few hands later, there's a raise over 20k and I look at KK. I pushed (for about 43k and it was easy call for raiser. His A10 kicks my ass when flop comes AAx:cry. Disappointed or upset? Not really. I f I had a huge stack then I maybe would be. Im out in 27th for €2540. It was about 15 minutes to play for the day and they got to 22. Went to the bar, had few double vodkas, checked PL and went to bed. Relieved, very excited and extremely happy. I left on Sunday just before 3rd day started and when got home at midnight, there were still 3 left on the final table. Thank you again to all of you guys. I hope to make PL proud again soon. I will definitely try to mix with big guys again. It was a great experience, which has opened my eyes on few more aspects of poker. Any questions, fire away. Im sorry for all mistakes writing this. Outside. J Thew at cash table.

[Mad Duke]

Re: Heniek in Irish Master. Quality write up hen and congrats again m8 :clap