...but 0 for 2 on making the second break. I'm working on that, though!

The major interesting hand was, once again, the fifth of the day. With 4K chips and 25/50 blinds, UTG, a middle aged guy with a lot of tattoos on his arms (read: probably a nice guy, probably not very good) makes it 175. A random MP flats, and then the button, a 20-something obvious online pro whom I've seen around and almost has to be good, overcalls. (I later found out the button is Moorman1, who recently won the 5K winner take all freezeout on Stars and is definitely solid.) I look down at AQo in the big blind and make it 4 ways to the flop.

Flop: A Q 8 (I may be confusing the exact card/suits, but definitely two clubs, one heart). I check intending to CR, but it checks around.

Turn: 5. I thought the pot was 650 (actually 700) so I only bet 400 instead of the 500 I should've, but no matter. At any rate, the PFR and the caller fold, but Moorman calls.

River: 2. At this point, I decide that a)Moorman never has a set (no way he checks behind the flop and then just calls the turn with that many draws), b)he can't really have clubs either because he's never going to check behind on the flop only to call the turn, and c)I may as well bet to let him find a call rather than rely on him to bluff when checked to when I've shown this much strength OOP. Additionally, if I underbet, I might get him to bluff shove, and since I can't think of a single hand he has that I possibly lose to, that's a good thing.

So after thinking a few seconds, I bet 700, right around half the pot, intending to probably call a raise. Moorman thinks for 15 seconds, plays with his chips, and right as I'm praying for him to hero call, he...says "all right, I'm a nit" and just calls with 76.

Oops. Yeah, I guess I did just accidentally turn top 2 pair into a bluff, why do you ask? At least my read was kinda right - he didn't have *just* clubs.

After that, I was rather short and very card dead so I essentially hung around for 3 hours until the inevitable busto. Nonetheless, I still feel good about live poker, and with WC doing okay/the 6 max event coming up, tomorrow should be fun.

Grats to cking, BTW - 7th place in the 1500 PL represents the first WC WSOP final table that I know of other than Vivek's limitament. Hopefully, it's the second of many.

So, I broke my own record and bustoed the 1500 pot limit event (that I decided to play at the last minute) on the...fifth hand or so.

The hand: With 3K chips and 25/50 blinds, someone limps in EP and I make it 200 with AK in MP. The big blind, who's an old guy (at least 60) who just got to the table, instantly makes it 350 total chips. If you've ever played poker, you'll know this is a really bad sign, but, obviously, it's impossible to just fold here.

Flop: K63. BB instapots it for 800 or so. When I'm playing my A+ game, I think I can honestly fold here*, but nobody ever actually does. I call, leaving just about a PSB behind both of our stacks.

Turn: spade. Oh well!

Still not feeling bad about it, I just laughed it off and went to grind some sats (which didn't go particularly well, either - but the play was very soft as usual.) I won't be playing tomorrow, but will definitely be putting some time in later this week.

*After thinking about it, I feel like this is a spot where live pros can and do occasionally find folds that the rest of us just don't understand, but aren't actually wrong. Yeah, I do have top top here, but the problem is that live, it's just obvious when somebody has the nuts, and I think making ridiculous folds that are actually good vs. the guy's range (of 1 hand) is a skill that a bunch of us have to get better at.

For the last day or so, the rumor was that day 1 of the $1500 event (Saturday) would be sold out, as every online pro picked it over playing live on Sunday. That turned out not to be true, as I was able to register 90 minutes before the start (props to the Rio - this year, everything seems to be well organized for a change.) Unfortunately, I lasted all of 90 minutes or so in the event, but I actually feel like every bustout should be like this one - very quick, with every hand basically completely standard. I played a couple of pots where I overlimp/called and open raised about 5-6 other hands, but only won 1 total pot the entire time; every hand I played wound up 3 handed to the flop and I simply only ever paired up once.

The bustout hand was the only remotely interesting decision; with about 1700 behind at 50/100, I raised KK in EP and got called by a pretty loose/bad middle aged Asian player on the button. The flop came down AJT; rather than bet out (never folding out an ace in a million years) or check/shoving (eh...nah, he's never folding either) I check/called a pretty standard 2/3 pot bet that basically told me he had some kind of hand, then decided I may as well induce a bluff again and check/called the last 1K all in on an A turn vs. what turned out to be A6. Not getting there on the river kinda sucked, but oh well, standard.

It appears almost everybody else is also busto already (that's what happens when you start with 60 BB/it turns to 15 BB 2 hours in), but Vivek is still in during hand for hand in the 10K pot limit event. Hopefully, he can win this thing and unbusto WC; even if he just manages to FT it, it looks like we're set for a while.

Tomorrow's Sunday, i.e. playing online day; I might also sit out Monday because neither the 1500 PLHE or the 5K mixed NL/limit donkament particularly appeal to me (I may just grind sats), but there's a 1500 6 max on Tuesday that I definitely want to go for. That'll probably be my next event and my next update here, unless, that is, Vivek wins the whole thing.

PS: Vivek's haircut makes my occasional 'too lazy to go one block' 3 month old Jewfro look seem totally hot, imo.

Last week was pretty gruesome, culminating with today, when, in addition to playing my B or C game most of the time, I managed to take my first 3%'er beat of the month and had about 5 sets/overpairs cracked in big pots. To be honest, I didn't even really care and was mostly playing on autopilot - leaving in 3 days has me thinking about other stuff too much. There are 2 videos I want to make for CR before Wednesday, and I still need to get some cash from the bank, check in with my backers, etc. etc. etc. In fact, I haven't even started packing. Yeah, standard.

To psych myself up, I've been looking at other people's blogs. It's surprising how much I can forget about running well until it happens, how bad other people's streaks can be and for how long, and, for that matter, that I'm still playing tourneys. I've said it about a dozen times by now, but this might be it; after the WSOP is over, I want to switch to MSNL full time. It's just not worth it to continually run bad when Cake and other sites still have the kind of games that they do, and on top of that, tourneys often tie me to the computer late at night when cash games, even if I only play them when they're good, basically run 18/7.

Of course, if I win something, that'll probably immediately change. But I do feel like waiting around for bi-yearly scores is just not that much fun compared to booking steady wins and watching the bankroll line go upward relatively steadily day after day. I might not be able to play 20K hands in a day, but I can certainly book longer sessions in cash than tourneys. So what's stopping me? Thus far, basically some laziness + feeling that cash has gotten tougher faster...except, just by checking out the MSNL regs that frequent tourneys, I know I still easily beat those games. Even my lazy ass has gotten to the point where I think I have to switch.

Meh.

After my last entry, I wound up only playing a handful more events - the razzament (made it deep, but to no avail), a few other midstakes NL tourneys, and the ME, which I just busted in an hour or so ago. It wasn't one of the best tourneys I've ever played, but for how card dead I was, clawing as deep ITM as I did (300-something after not seeing a PP for the last 2 hours and restealing every hand I played) seems pretty reasonable/made my FTOPS profitable. I also took fifth in the Cake 75K for 3700 while I was at it [running like the sun to get there], which makes today an actually profitable Sunday, too/includes my second Sunday major FT in a month.

More impressively, congrats to cking on what I'm pretty sure is his first 100K score (6'th in the $2500 FTOPS) and another chip in the WC unbusto fund. They've run so bad at staking for so long that this isn't gonna get them *that* far, but at least it's a good start and a nice lead up to the ME.

Also, P5'er Halfrek won his second FTOPS event and is up 850K...incredibly sick. I don't know the guy, but I've always been impressed by his play and I think I learned a little bit from watching that FT. Nice job.