Kiel + Hamburg

So Sutti and I drove to Kiel on Friday afternoon to make it in time for the €100+5 NL tournament being held at Casino Kiel. We made it to Kiel on time, checked into our hotel, and quickly headed over to the casino. Sutti unfortunately forgot to bring dress shoes, so he was dressed in a suit with white tennis shoes. The lady at the reception was not going to let her in, until we pleaded with her that we drove all the way from Berlin to be there, so she agreed to let it go by this one time.

At around 8pm we finally got into the casino and headed right up to the "Poker Room", basically the whole upstairs area of the casino. We met CoWhi, who was Floorman of the poker area and responsible for overseeing the tournament and cash games afterwards. He had just been to Vienna to play poker, so we had plenty of things to talk about.

At 8:30, all 23 players were crammed onto two tables (one with 12 players, the other with 11). I was assigned to the table with 12 players. Somehow, ALL other 11 players managed to get their seats right away and so I had to squish myself in between two guys, but I could barely reach the table. Terribly uncomfortable, I was not looking to be playing too many pots early. I would stretch my arms to the table, check my cards, hope that they are bad enough to throw away, then quickly retreat to semi comfortable position behind the other players. 1 player busted and so finally I got to have a normal seat at the table.

We were now in Level II (Blinds 40/80, starting chips 1500) and in LP I was dealt 99. I had not played a single hand up to this point, so I thought my raise would perhaps get some respect. It was folded around to me, and I put in a raise of 200. Both the SB and BB called, and so we saw a flop of 8 6 2. The SB bet 160 (into a 600 pot), which kind of threw me off. What kind of cards would justify that? The BB folded and so I thought for a moment. I put him on a weak ace, perhaps A8. I decided to raise it to 500 and see where I stand. He called rather quickly. The turn comes J and he goes all in. God damn it.

I felt pot committed, and at the same time stupid, as I made the crying call. He showed 88 for the set, the river brought something of no significance and I was sent to the rail in 22nd place. Oops.

The cash game (5/10 Limit) was going to start when only 10 players remained in the tournament and one table freed up. Due to the fast blind structure, that took around 90 more minutes. I got my seat and watched the other buy in with €100 (10 BBs). One guy even tried buying in with €50. Wow. I bought in for €200 and immediately had flashbacks from CCC as these players called every bet presented to them.

We started 7 handed and I was dealt some nice cards, including making 4 aces with my A7o. I had soon built up to €350 and it was looking to be a nice night. The table filled up (10 players) and I continued to run hot. I would estimate the seen-flop % at that table to be somewhere been 65-75%. There were a couple pots that ALL 10 players saw the flop! It wasn't uncommon to have 7-8 players in there preflop, absolutely unbelievable. Showdowns became a comedy show, Q2o vs T8o vs KJo vs some guys's cracked AA. I knew that the best strategy would be to stay tight and hope to avoid bad beats.

CoWhi stepped in as dealer for a bit, which was pretty neat. I continued to build my stack against these calling stations. My KK held up and a few hands later I had A3s on the button. 6 players limped in front of me, and so I elected to limp as well. The flop came 245 and I went cruising. Around 1:30am I called it quits, and when I counted down my stack I had exactly €600, €400 more than what I started with.

The Eagles concert in Hamburg the next day was AWESOME, that was really a once-in-a-lifetime experience for me! Now I'm back in Berlin and it's time to take down the Stars Million tonight. Wish me luck!