Cursing at the coursing

No rest for the wicked, as they say, and it was a case of straight back into the Irish live tournament poker scene as soon as I got back from Deauville.

I played the Fitz End of Month last week, sporting my snazzy new Bruce shirt with my name on it (when you get to my age, Alzheimer's becomes an issue so it's as well to have your name on your person at all times). A number of people commented on the snazziness, including Scott Gray who said he was going to make an official complaint to Boyle's on their rather lacklustre by comparison ones.

Unfortunately, the shirt was a much bigger hit in the tourney than I was. My performance was one of the dullest you can have: essentially I loitered around starting stack until it got to push/fold. My first push that was called was KQ into AQ and that was that.

Next up was time to fade the line to Clonmel for the coursing festival organised by the CPT and Big Slick. The main event was more or less a rerun of the Fitz EOM except I had to make a few big laydowns early on that I'm still happy with but you never really know for sure. My first ship with 66 was called by 88 and AQ and that was it. The main entertainment came from being at the same table as Andrew Yates, a real livewire at the best of times and someone who's company I always get a kick out of.

I continued my recent trick of being a side event specialist by final tabling the €170 event. The structure was very fast from a long way out which of course was right up my alley given my experience and recent successes in online 3x turbo tourneys. Unfortunately having been in a good position 5 handed I ended up going out in fifth when K9s was no match for J9o (a traitorous king on the river filling a gutshot for the J9 that had me cursing under my breath). Although it's always nice to get a result you're always left with the feeling that it could have been better (unless you win obviously) and particularly on this occasion.

Well done to all involved, especially Liam and Fionn for re-invigorating the CPT and to my friend and IPR comrade Liz Mullally who dealt both the final tables and was never anything less than entertaining.

Next up is this weekend's European Deepstack. Where it all began, in a sense. Before that, it's time to do some online grinding. I've been trying the nightly tourneys on Bruce with some success so far but yet to win my first one.

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