EPT Baden

I did not survive Day 1 of EPT Baden. My starting table was decent, there were 3 fish and a couple of really predictable old players so I thought I would be able to gradually build my stack playing smallball. However, my stack size began to decrease rather than increase after a couple bluffs were picked off and a couple draws never materialized. I won a few pots back after making some 3bets with nice hands (QQ, AK and AJ) and was back to 8k when the following hand came up:

UTG (superfish Italian, 4.4k stack) minraises to 400 with blinds of 100/200, everyone folds and I am in the SB with 77. I call the extra 300 and see a flop of 8s6s4s. I have the 7s, so I have middle pair + a 1card straight flush draw. I opt to check and see what he throws at me. He immediately bets 1k. To me that looks like a huge bet with an overpair who is now scared to see another spade come off, so I checkraise to 3k, thus committing myself is he shoves his last 1k on top of that. He indeed shoved and I was forced to call. He showed AsQs for the stone cold nuts and I was drawing thin to one out. It did not come and I was crippled.

With blinds of 150/300, I had just under 3k when I posted my BB. The action was folded around to the button, who raised it up to 900. SB folded and I looked down at AA. I obviously shoved, he was forced to call with JTo. The board came down JT972 and I was eliminated.

My flight back to Berlin is on Wednesday, so the plan is to use today and tomorrow as relaxing days. I heard that the hotel offers nice massages, so I'll go check those out with Expekter.

Life is good!