Live Poker

I've been playing a lot of live poker recently with pretty mediocre results.  I went to London at the end of September to play a couple of  side events for the EPT.  Unfortunately I am not yet balla enough to play the big main events.  I could sell action I suppose but that's not something I'm interested in doing just yet.  I mini-cashed in a £500 event for £1100 which was annoying because I went into the 2nd day with a really good stack but couldn't get much going around the bubble.  It's really frustrating to get four steal attempts in a row 3-bet by very tight players!  I also whiffed a £1000 event which wasn't much fun mostly because the guy next to me had a cold and was coughing and spluttering over me for nine hours before busting me with one of those classic live nitrolls (I shoved A9o for 26bbs otb after a HJ open and he had called in CO.  Blinds folded and he tank called with TT sigh).

I also played some events in Brighton last week when the GUKPT was on.  In £200 one I built up decent stack before running KK into AA.  Kings vs Aces is by no means a standard stack off in live poker but in this situation I was pretty readless on players because I had just been moved to the table and I was the cold 4-bettor in the blinds when we were 60 odd bbs deep so pretty standard imo.  I then played a £500 event at the Rendezvous casino in Brighton marina where I got nothing going really.  The field in that one was ridiculously tough for a £500 event mainly because James Dempsey and Chris Moorman live in Brighton (I think?) and brought a load of their MTT specialist friends along.  I had JP Kelly to my left and James Mitchell also on my table so it really sucked to have two people who are almost certainly better than me at live tournaments at my table for a £500 event.  James Mitchell ended up cripping me when we got allin with QTo vs my T7ss on Q67ss flop.  I think he should have folded but maybe he just wanted to gamble.

I lasted less than two levels in the GUKPT main event when I got in AKhh vs 66 on 67Qhh flop.  I could have played this differently but I give my opponent credit for betting a really awkward amount  into me on the flop when I had squeezed pf so I decided to raise/call.  I think just flatting here vs this particular opponent might have been better but whatever.  If I had hit I wouldn't be thinking much about it obviously.  It's just so hard not to be results orientated in live poker even though the logical side of your brain is telling you that the variance in it, especially in tournaments, is so huge.  You can't help but feel a bit depressed when you don't cash a few tournaments in a row even though this is ridiculously standard.  I must give credit to my mate Mark who final tabled the £200 and £500 events and then ended up bubbling the main event despite having a load of chips throughout the 2nd day.  I wish he hadn't donked off all his chips though because I had 20% of his action!  Luckily I did manage to win in cash games in London and Brighton so that was good.  The highlight of this was playing £1/2 after busting the from main event and managing to win back my buyin back despite running KK into AA twice in the session!

I've still not decided whether I like live poker or not.  Sometimes I really enjoy it and other times it can grind down on your soul.  I definately feel like I'm getting better at it so at least thats something.  I'm back on the online grind now so hopefully I can run good for an extended period of time because been running quite gash for the last few months.