Ladbrokes Poker Cruise III

Wow, so on friday i checked my email and saw i won a place in the Ladbrokes Poker Cruise freeroll for being one of the top250 in the tournament leaderboards.

I was planning on going out and getting pissed so i took my laptop round to Jays and got pissed there and loaded up the freeroll which was about 45minutes in. I was down to 1200 starting chips from 2000 and the blinds were about the right level to steal at. I got my chips up to a reasonable level and at one point went down to about 800 but stuck in there and again got them back up.

After playing tight for a few hours we were down to about 30 and i thought i might have a good chance as i was above average in chips, then after some time we were down to the last 10 where i was garenteed entry to the $550+$50 Cruise Ticket Weekly Final! Before long players started to get a bit more aggressive, as only 1st place won the actual cruise and we were down to 4.

The chip leader had just knocked out 5th place so had a huge chip stack of around 100,000 and the rest of us had about 25,000 each. We played quite a few hands patiently, a lot of folding and the odd raise from each of us when i was dealt AK on the button. The person under the gun suddenly raised 20,000 of his 25,000 stack and i quickly pushed all-in. He called and showed A6 so i was in pretty good shape......untill the 6 hit on the river and i was sent packing :/

Ohh well atleast i had won my entry to the weekly final.


$550+$50 Cruise Ticket Weekly Final

This was some of the best poker i have ever played, and the most fun. The stacks were deep (3000 chips with 20minute blinds) so there was a lot of play. There wern't many raises at the start like i see in a lot of low buy-in MTT's and i think everybody respected everybody else's game a lot.

I got off to a nice start when i picked up 22 and just limped in, there was only 3 of us in the pot and the flop came 432. The big blind lead out wih a pot sized bet and it was folded round, i just decided to call. The turn came a 5, not the card i wanted to see. He bet out again just under the size of the pot. I was thinking about re-raising here but figured if he pushed i would be forced to fold so just called to see the free card. Now another 3 cam on the river giving me a full house. He bet out for about 1/4 of the pot and i re-raised him to just over 1/2 the pot, he called quickly.

I think my re-raise was pretty pathetic here, chances are he would have called for a lot more but i bet for value and didnt really think too much before doing it but either way i made about 1000chips from the hand. I played pretty solid for the next few hours gradually making more and more, risked going all-in 3 times. All quite risky situations.

The first time i called some'1 bluff/continuation bet down when the flop came 56T, he had raised a decent ammount pre-flop and bet the pot on the flop. I called him and the turn came a 9, he bet out the pot again (about 1,100 chips) i had 1,600 left at this point and was pretty sure he had an overpair but thought ha may have had a flush draw. After over a minute of my timebank used i clicked raised and he typeds 'ffs' in chat which made me feel a hell of a lot better, after a while he called with AQ and the board paired so i took down the pot of about 5600!!

One hand the blinds were pretty high and i was sat under the gun with J9h, i opted to call and the player after me made it 3x to go. The button called him and i felt with the 2 blinds going out i had a nice price to see a flop even if i was out of position. 2 hearts came on the flop and the pre-flop raiser raised enough to put me all-in. I was getting the right price to call so made the call. He showed AA with the ace of hearts, the turn came the Qhearts, phew! just no more! ...and there wasn't so i doubled up and some.

Later on we were down to about 15 and i picked up A9s in late position, there had been a 3x raise from early position so i called. The flop came 729 rainbow and he checked to me, i bet out just over 1/2 the pot which made me pretty much pot commited. He thought for a while and called. The next card came an 8 and he instantly went all-in. It wasnt much for me to call but it was the rest of my chips. I figured if he could beat a 9 kicked then so be it and called. He had 78 for 2 pair but the river bought a 9 and paired me up better. Now i had the chip lead :)

I went on to win the tournament, knocking out 4th place who took home $825 and ending up winning the cruise tickets and $1,700 for travel!!

Really excited now and recon im gonna play that freeroll every week. Should be able to win 1 more set of tickets by the end of the year then a group of us can cruise the carribean!