Poker Roundup, Day 1

I had hoped to blog about the tournament real-time, but since I didn’t have any Internet at my motel I wasn’t able to do that.  But I still wrote down some notes each day; I’ll post them a day at a time.  Enjoy!

I flew into Walla Walla in the late afternoon on Wednesday, got my rental car and drove down to Pendleton to my relatively decent motel room.  (No Internet access, which always drives me up the wall, but that’s another story.)

That evening there was a Super-Satellite playing at the Wildhorse Casino (the Roundup host), so I got there in time to enter it.  Several hundred players put down $115, and the top 20% got paid entries into Saturday’s $500 “Main Event”.  I went out in the first round, when I decided to play Ace/King from late position.  An Ace flopped, I called a big bet from one player (everybody else folded) and by the turn, all of the chips were in the pot.  The river was a Queen, my opponent had Ace/Queen, and I was out.

So I went to the cash games and bought into the $2/$5 no-limit table.  I folded every hand for over an hour.  Then I got pocket Aces.  I raised, got re-raised by one player in late position, so I re-raised him; eventually we were all in pre-flop.  He had pocket Queens.  A third Queen came on the flop, and I was broke.

I re-bought, folded for another hour, then ended up in the Big Blind with King/Deuce of Clubs.  Several limpers came into the pot so I checked.  The flop was perfect – Ace Deuce Deuce, giving me trips with best kicker.  I bet out, got one caller who raised, everybody else folded, I called.  Rags came on the turn and river, and by then all the chips were in.  I showed down my trip deuces with King kicker, and he showed Ace/King, so I doubled up.  Basically, I was back to even for the night (not counting the satellite entry).  I ended up the night net winner a small amount.