We hit the town after my win on Monday, I say hit the town it was all very civilised. We went for dinner and a couple of drinks, the place was dead – apparently unaware of my win. Despite the early night I had a bit of a hangover on the Tuesday, which was fine as we’d decided a day off was in order.

Wednesday and Thursday were both pretty shitty, but we had the Auckland leg of the APPT to look forward to. After we finished playing on Thursday we drove up to Auckland and arrived at a Golf Warehouse at 5.10. It was due to close at 5.30, but at 6.50 there were still two guys attending to us, we did buy two full sets and all the trimmings though.

Dinner and a couple of drinks were followed by an early night. We had planned to watch a film, but after flicking through the choices for half an hour Neil and Dom couldn’t agree and by this point it was 10.30, and we needed to get up in the morning to go to the gym and have breakfast before a noon start.

We didn’t make the gym, but did have breakfast with Joe Hachem. I say have breakfast with him, I should clarify for legal reasons that he was in the same cafe as us, but was not interacting socially with us, nor was he even sat anywhere near us.

We arrived at the cardroom a little early, which gave me a bit of time to introduce myself to the SikTilt guys – two Scottish guys who travel the world video blogging poker. The result of which is available here:

I didn’t really know what to expect poker wise. All I had heard was that the standard was terrible, but seriously, it was a $3k buy in, how bad could it be? BAD! At my table I had all sorts, there was the touring live pro wannabe, who was limping in and splashing around everywhere, chatting during hands and bluffing in the most inappropriate spots, there were the couple of local guys who were looking to take a shot with their 10x preflop/check mini raise the flop style, there were the online qualifiers who were just looking to have some fun. In addition to these guys, there was one local pro, who played quite well, and also Tysen Streib, co-author with Lee Nelson on Kill Everyone. He was a really good guy, played very well and was unlucky to run Jacks into Queens in the blinds.

Here’s a brief report of a few hands I played:

Kqo mid position, one limper to me – splashy, talky wannabe.

I 4x, only he calls.

Flop Q 7 4 two diamonds.

“OK, I’m going to see if you hit that flop, let’s bet 350” he says. This was just under pot.

I call, I have a good hand, and the only draw is the flush, there’s really no point building a big pot here, I have position, let’s see a turn.

Qc

“OK, let’s try again, 350”. OK, good card for me, and he bets the same amount, I really think he is weak at this point, I’m putting him on total air, or the flush draw. If I raise here, I think he folds everything I beat, even the flush draw. If I call, he can’t put me on as strong a hand as KQ and will likely lead again at the river.
2d

“1500”. Oh god, if he was on the flush draw he just got there. My initial reaction was to pull out my earphone and sigh, at this point I saw a little smirk come over his face, which he quickly covered up – this was no false tell. This tell is kind of irrelevant to this hand as after I merely called the flop and turn I have under-repped my hand in his mind massively. I quite simply never fold on any river unless he moves in or I pick up some other huge piece of info.

“I call”.

“Good call” as he mucks his cards.
“What do you have?”

“I’m afraid you’ll never know, you mucked your cards, I don’t have to show mine.” I smugly reply. The rest of the table were mixed between laughing and being confused as the dealer pushed the pot to me and I relinquished my unshown cards.

K9 in the bb.

Terrible guy limps, I check.

6 7 J rainbow.

He checks, I bet just over half pot, perhaps 250. He calls.

Turn A

He checks, I figure this is a good card to bluff, he probably has a 6 or a 7. I bet 500, he thinks and calls. Oh oh…

River 4

He leads for 400. OK, he had done this weak lead on the river before and folded his hand face up to a raise, I felt the pot was there for the taking and made it 1400 figuring him for a weak jack now. He thinks and then throws in a 5k chip. – Great read Puggy…

Obviously the Hollywooding comes out, first I look to see what I’m going to claim I folded, yip A6 is a good shout. Then I looked for the nuts, the river meant 58 made a straight.

“OK, I fold, you’ve got 58”
“Nope, I’ve got A4”
“No you don’t, you’ve got 58, there is no way you have A4.”

He laughs and flips 58 as I nod say “Nice hand, Ace Six”. So I just have to read his hand before I put in the bluff next time…

QQ utg 7 handed.

I raise to 300 (must have been before the K9 hand)

sb local retard calls. There is 700 in the middle and the flop falls T 7 3 all hearts, he immediately throws in 2k.
Oh god, wtf can he have here? After about 30 seconds of thought I decided that either my QQ was the best hand at the moment (ie he had a mid pair and was scared of the draw, or had the Ace of hearts) or my Q of hearts was good. I just couldn’t see him donk leading at the flop with the King hi or Ace hi flush.

So what now? Call? Well I figured there was a lot in the middle, if I call I have 7k back and the pot is 4.7k. I definitely could have called, as long as I’m going with it pretty much no matter what turns, but the reason I decided to shove was that he might make a crying call with a mid pair and a heart (he was that bad). I shoved, he went into the tank and eventually folded, keeping tight lipped on his hand.

33 on the button.

Splashy wannabe opens to 550 in mid, local idiot no. 2 calls, I call, Streib calls in the bb.

Flop: 3 A Q two clubs.

Wannabe bets 1500. He has to have hit that ace if he’s leading at 3 of us right? Local guys thinks and finally folds. I had 12k back, and figured if he had AJ+ he was going nowhere. In addition to this I had clearly rattled him after a previous few hands including the one I called his river bet. I decided to raise and make it 4k. Streib folds and the villain let’s out a big sigh “Catch your set of threes?” – nice read sir. Perhaps I didn’t give him credit for giving me credit on my range. I mean I only ever have 33 or AQ here, perhaps a hand like Kjcc or Jtcc, but I would rarely call a raise for just under 5% of my stack with these hands. But I hoped he wouldn’t be able to compute this. He eventually folded claiming AK flashing an Ace. There’s no way he had AK, and despite AK = AT/AJ in this spot I think he goes broke with AK. Perhaps I should have called representing the draw, but I really thought he had to have something and would go broke.

66 in late.

I make it 550, online qualifier calls in the c/o, the third time in a row he had called a raise of mine.
There’s now 1700 in the middle with blinds and antes, and Streib shoves the button for 4.8k.

It looked like such a squeeze, and as soon as he did it I looked at the online caller and he was clearly disinterested, and not feigning disinterest, just obviously done with the hand.

“Do you teach the squeeze play?” I asked.
“OK, I’m all in”.

He flips Qjs and flops a jack. I actually think it was a nice spot for him, my opening range there was pretty wide as was the caller’s and he could add a third to his stack.

AQ in early.

OK I played this hand badly, but also made another good read after I made the error.

I raised utg, this famous Aussie Jockey, Shane called. He was very tight (and short for that matter).

Flop K Q 3.

Why am I leading into this board? What the hell am I getting value from and he isn’t going to raise me on a bluff. I lead…
He shakes his head and then raises.

(Chuckling) “I’ve seen that one before, you’ve got Kings haven’t you? OK, top set good”

At this point one of the siktilt guys was filming me and the action, but I can’t find it online, because obviously I enjoyed what followed.

“You think I’ve got Kings?”
“I’m fairly sure you do”.
“You wanna see?”
“Sure”.

(He flips Kings).

I should remember amid all the self congratulating that both of the hands that I called in this session I only called after I had donk bet/donk raised. I suck.

JJ in early

Guy shoves 10k UTG I have 11.5k, I reshove. He flips 44.

Flop 5 3 K

Turn 2

River A.

Oh, there’s the wheel.

I picked up Ats the next hand, shoved, bb called as he had to and my ace high was good vs 64o. I then folded a little controversially in the bb after a utg raise and a shove, I had 63o and 600 in blind with about 2k back.

The next hand which was to be the 2nd last of the day, utg raised and I found 22 in the hole in the sb. “Let’s gamble!”. The bb also called, which was not ideal, but it mattered little as the flop contained a deuce.

“Ship the chips” I exclaimed as betting was complete. And there I was, finished day 1 on 8.7k.

Day 2:

M of 4, shoving any two first hand if possible. Oh 88, that’s good. Not as good as the button’s TT though is it?

GG me.

Who cares anyway? Who wants to sit and play poker all day? I mean we had new golf clubs to use.