Weekend off

Was planning to play Blinkers monthly but with sudden and still somewhat mysterious departure of JP have decided to stay away. JP posted a mssage on Boards clearing up matters somewhat: looks like the topups went to the casino to pay for the dealers which is fair enough though it should have been made clearer in advance. I was certainly under the impression that there was no reg fee as such, whereas in actual fact about 35% of the money paid by the players into the prize pool effectively ended up as reg fee (this was of course offset by the Duffy family's very generous donation of 5000 Euros to the pool). With the cash games and the gaming table generating a lot of additional revenue for Blinkers on a night which would otherwise have been very slow, it leaves a bad aftertaste so I don't feel inclined to play there any time soon. Shame because with JP there it had every chance of becoming my regular live poker place.

Instead been playing some online cash and sats. Good night last night: Friday night cash games online as soft as I remember them, and I also played a sat to the GUKPT weekly final on Sunday and scored a ticket, and one for the Irish Winter festival where I finished third with just two tix to the weekly final, but cash prize for third was almost the price of the ticket so happy enough. With 4 left I was chipleader with 20K, other 2 guys had 10Kish, and a shortie had 3K. I assumed the 10K guys would just stay out of my way until the shortie was gone and as chipleader I was quite happy to be the one putting prssure on him, particularly since I was button to his BB so I was autoraising his blind. Assuming other people know or can work out the optimum strategy in these spots can get you into trouble though: I min raised utg with queens, the BB (one of the 10kers) reraised, I shoved to basically let him know I had a hand thinking he couldn't call on the bubble with the other guy so short, but he called with AQ and rivered an ace. To make matters worse, he then went into hunker down mode, so the shortie was robbing his blinds with impunity and at one point got back to level with me and the other 10ker.

On Monday we head for Waherford for a family holiday of sorts, culminating with me playing the IPC thing there next weekend. Fond memories of Waherford from childhood holidays in Tramore and Dungarvan, and the poker there in May. Like JP, Neill Kelly is one of the good guys helping to ensure better structured tournaments here than anywhere else.

On the running front, World 24 Hour team has been confirmed as moi, Eddie Gallen (who was second Irishman home last year and is Mr. Consistency) and the real wild card Thomas Maguire. Thomas is our top 100K runner (national record holder), three time winner of the Connemara ultra, plus he's won ultras at the North Pole and in sub Sahara Africa, so he's got the speed and credentials to mount a serious challenge for the title if he gets the distance. With the champs less than 2 months off, my mind is switching back to running mode more and more, as I want to give a good account of myself again and perhaps achieve the top 20 spot that could have been mine last year but for injury late on. There's a vote next year as to what new sports will come into the Olympic Games with ultra running being one of the most tipped contenders (it's coming into the Commonwealth Games next year for the first time) so fingers crossed it gets in for London. I'd just about be young enough in 2012 to have a real shot at making the Games, but anything after that would almost certainly be too late. It would obviously be a dream come true to represent Ireland at the Games (if something you never imagined possible can even be said to be a dream).

Meanwhile, Irish ultra running legend Tony Mangan (the so called Bono of Irish ultra running) is attempting to break the World 48 hour tradmill record in Longford right now. You can follow his progress at http://www.tonymangan.com/

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