Durr you've aged dude

Well, day 2 of my first bracelet event didn't exactly go to plan. It started with me sitting down in the wrong seat. Not really all that surprising for a man so near to dotage as I am. What was surprising was that everyone at the table seemed instantly aware that I was an impostor. A quick look at the name on the bag in front of me explained why: Tom Dwan. I scuttled one seat to the left, and about a minute later the real Durr showed up.



I managed to do about 30% of my stack on an openender that never closed, and then folded a variety of eight rag and seven rag hands for an hour or so till we were about 20 from the bubble. Down to 12k aka 15 big blinds, Durr raised the button, I found queens in the SB and shipped in. He snapped with KJo and hit his king on the turn. By the time I walked back to the Gold Coast and logged on, the bubble had burst and my conqueror had joined me on the rail.

I was obviously more than a little disappointed not to have gone further but happy enough with my performance and also happy it never even entered my mind to fold queens that close to the bubble to a Durr button raise as some suggested to me since that I should have.



My second event was a much briefer affair. The table was mixed, three very good internet players (two LAGs and one TAG), a bunch of American recreational players ranging from poor to decent, a really poor Hungarian Borat impersonator, and me. The TAG took an early dogging which more or less reduced him to push/fold. Meanwhile, the two LAGs plus me all moved up to 7-10K pretty effortlessly, staying out of each other's way for the most part apart from the occasional three bet just to spice things up. I'd advanced to 8500 when the TAG shipped in for 9 bigs. I overshipped jacks and to my horror the LAG in the BB, the only guy who covered me, tank called and flipped over queens.

My third event was just one of those dull tourneys where you never really get going. I ended up getting it in with 55 on a 234 flop and getting snapped off by 33. I hit the 5 on the turn but couldn't dodge the case 3. If anything, this was the most disappointing as it was by far the softest table I had, and I felt that given the kind of start I got in either the other two events I'd have a great chance of building a stack.

Other than that I've mostly been grinding the daily and nightly tourneys in the Rio, and some live stts. I've notched up two cashes including one win in the mtts (the nightly $100 which got 130 runners), and broken even on the stts while running really bad (in my opinion at least).

I'm feeling very good about my poker at the moment though and I'm enjoying the process if not the results as yet much more than on previous trips. I'm trying to keep all other distractions to a minimum and focus purely on playing the best poker I can. This trip is mostly about the main event for me but it would be nice to get a result in a bracelet event before then.

After a slow enough start, the Irish campaign seems to be gathering pace with a couple of final tables. Well done to Denis and Nick on that front. I don't think I've played with Denis but have played with Nick in the Fitz a few times and it's no surprise to me he's currently doing so well. It's good to see Paddy Power supporting the local scene and taking him on as their new sponsored pro: I think he's a great signing who will do well for them both in terms of results and being an ambassador.

The latter stages of the PLH/PLO also featured a number of the top players in the country: Dermot Blaine, John O'Shea and Andy Black all cashed. This seems to be the biggest Irish contingent ever and hopefully there will be a few more results to blog home about. Hopefully I can finally break my own WSOP duck and report on a result of my own too before this campaign is over.

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