Av'it!
A few weeks of paternity leave appear to have worked wonders on my temperament with two 500NL finals in a week, resulting in a heads-up chop at the Broadway and a four way deal at Walsall.
Both events proved very tiring as Barney's arrival has meant that we have very little free time to ourselves. The few hours between Day 1 and Day 2 at the Broadway were particularly testing; twenty one of us finished the day at 5.30am and it was 6.30am by the time I'd driven back to a frosty Nottingham.
When I got in there was no electricity, it was -3° C outside, Reuben had thrown up in bed, Barney was bawling and Amanda was trying to light a fire, all by candlelight. I eventually got my head down at 8am, but had to set off through the snow at midday to make sure I was back for the 2pm start; not ideal preparation but it's hard to grumble when everything went to plan.
The most memorable hand occurred with fourteen left. With the average stack at about 60k, I was running well with 120k. At 1500/3000 Will Mitchell pushed all-in from first spot for 40k and Paul Jackson followed suit with a short 15k. I found A-K on the button and called. Will flipped up A-A, Paul had A-J and I shipped a third of my stack over.
In hindsight I don't really know if there's a right or a wrong play there. The big all-in looks suspicious and I think it's rare that you are gonna see someone turn over aces there. But on the flipside I didn't have a chip in the pot and perhaps the option of passing and not getting involved should have at least crossed my mind.
At Walsall a few days later the sickest/most amusing hand I played was the following: With a big stack two tables out and Burnley John and Mickey Wernick on my left, I was of course doing my best to keep them both out of trouble when they were in the blinds.
I expected one of them to look me up at some point and sure enough Mickey came along for the ride when I'd raised with a K-5s. We both checked the 10,6,7 flop and I bet 5k into the 13k pot when another blank hit the turn. I wasn't overly surprised when he called and was sure he'd lead out on the river. The seven paired and he led out for 11k, with about 9k behind.
Boy it pains me to leave any chips out there and I was sure this was one of his patented chip garnering plays, it looks strong and pot-committed but I just had a hunch he was on a J-Q or J-10 type hand. I pondered for a short while and called - he tapped the table, preparing to muck.
'Good call, king high', he said, and flipped over another K-5s.
'Aargh!' I lamented, as we chopped the pot,
'I shoulda pushed!'
My arm was twisted last week and as a result I head over to Goa for five short days at the end of the month. There's value of sorts in the million dollar guaranteed pot, but the catch is that the there's a very strong British posse heading over.
The short-term goals then will be to win the event, get a golden tan, eat spicey food for breakfast, lunch and tea and of course, wash it all down with something very chilled and dry.