Sooooted pocket trips.

ROLLING ON

I go back into my hidey-hole, but Phil is in the precursor to blowup mode. He is playing every 3rd hand, and never seeing showdown, he keeps having to fold. He burns through 300k chips like this.

We get word that we're down to 18. So we bag and tag our ships and redraw seats for 2 tables. When ifind the new tables there seems to be a bit of confusion as the TDs try to figure out which actual tables we will be using. I leave my baggie behind and take the opportunity go take a piss (yes, while smoking). When I get back my bag has been moved the the new table. I take a seat and start unpacking my baggie.

Devin is here. I don't know anyone else at the table. So I start talking. "Hey, I'm Kurt. I'm from California. Where are you from?"

Apparently people had other things on their minds. the guy on my right folds up a piece of paper and puts it back in his pocket. "Three more until a pay jump." he says.

Me: "really? Cool. What are we at now?

Him: "Twenty thousands."

Me: ...

I pick my jaw up off the floor. "Were at WHAT?!?"

He takes the papar back out of his pocket and shows me that we're at $20,000 payout and the next jump is to $25,000. I'm shocked. You see, I haven't checked the payouts since I first joined Jimmy's table about 24 hours ago and I was looking at about $4k.

"Holy sh*** man!" I stammer, "Yesterday my entire bankroll was eight thousand."

Everyone is ready, and the cards go in the air. I resume folding.

I am completly card dead and I don't get anything remotely playable. So I watch. The guy next to me busts out on an AIPF. Devin gets allin and shows a set. The other guy binks a bigger set. That's so ****ing gross. I hope I go out holding set. That's the way to go though; no regrets there.

We get a player from the other table. he sits on my right. I meet Pascal for the first time. Pascal's bag is overflowing with chips. It takes him at least 15 minutes to stack all of them after he sits down. Pascal likes playing poker. He's French Canadian. His friends show up right behind him are start railing. They are all wearing blue v-neck teeshirts and grninking beer out of those 3-foot tall glasses that you only see in vegas. They like it when Pascal wins.

We are all shortstacks to Pascal. He puts one of us in holding KQs, spikes the flop to beat a baby pair and send someone home. The crowd goes wild. He puts someone else in with 99. The other guy puffs his chest and proudly shows JJ. A 9 on the flop sends him packing, and Pascals fortunes grow. The crowd goes wild.

I fall in love with my seat, directly on his left. This guy is playing every 3 hands and has no fear whatsoever. If I can catch some cards the chips will come raining into my lap.

EP player (holding a rum and coke) opens. Tight LP player 3bets. Fold to Pascal. he thinks. And think. Pascal puts out a big 4bet. "One time dealer," Think as I peek at my cards, but my pair is only eights so they get mucked without a second though. EP player snap 5bet-shoves. LP thinks for a few seconds and gets out of the way.

Pascal takes off his sunglasses. "OK. OK I call." EP player turns up ATo. My mind reels. Pascal has 56s. A 6 on the flop sends EP player home. The crowd goes wild, and Pascals fortunes grow.

Guy on my left motions to the gentleman laeving the table and says "WTF was he thinking." I respond with a rare moment of honesty, "I know, right. You had to assume AT was the3rd best hand there."

The rail has grown huge. I spot a familiar face out there. Chandra is here from my homegame. Chandra is the hero of heros at our homegame, as he has a bracelet of his own. I got to touch it one time. "How's it going man, great job!"

I let out a gasp of exasperation. "Thanks."

"How's your stack?"

"Not great, but I've got some time. I like my table."

"Cool man, cool. Two tables now. Its just like the garage. You can do this." He slaps me on the back and I head back to my seat.

I remain card dead and just keep folding. My stack is diminishing. But the busts just keep on coming. Another player from our table busts and Saar joins us. He's got well over a milling chips. Way to go Saar! Pascal is not afraid to tangle with the only other big stack, and takes mountains of chips off him.

There is a loud cheer from the other table. "What happened?" I ask, "Is Helmuth out?" Apparently Hellmuth busted at the other table a while ago, but I was too busy folding to notice. What happened is that we're down to ten playes.

We're combining tables.

We're making the final table.

and den...

writing...........

i don't know the final results yet, but have been busting my own balls over wether to google or not this past 2 days

this is like reading a sex story

This has been an amazing read. Great job, OP.

FT

They give everyone a piece of paper with a survey on it to fill out. I agonize over the questions. I consider filling it in with a bunch of lol funny rediculousness. I end up leaving it mostly blank. The resuts of this survey can be seen here (warning: spoiler).

I bag my chips, get my seat assignment, seat 7, and head over to the final table. Yes, THE final table. The one you see on TV. The rails are immense and kinda hard to get your arms over. There are holecard cams at every seat. We're in our own section apart from the room. There's TV screens above the table so the crowd can watch the action. And there's massive bleachers around it for the crowd.

Heading to seat 7 I notice that Pascal is at seat 6. Sweet! When I get there I notice there's another bag of chips sitting in seat 7. It has "seat 7" written on it. **** no I'm not giving up my jesus seat to whoever this is that can't find their own seat.

I say to the dealer "I'm seat 7 and this bag was in my seat," and I toss the bag in front of him on the table ,and put mine down in its place.

The dealer picks it up and looks at it. "This one says seat 7."

"So does mine." I point. He calls the TD over.

"what's going on?"

Dealer: "We've got two seat sevens."

The TD looks at both bags of chips that both say seat 7. I show the TD my laminated seat card showing seat 7. "What do we do with this one?" he asks the dealer.

The dealer points to an emplty seat at the table.

The TD hand the dealer the bag "Put these there and unbag them before he gets back."

I take my seat and stack my chips. I see Jimmy. "Hey Jimmy!" I see Max. I see Joe. Its like we've got to old gang back together!!

The rail has filled out. I think Pascals entire college is here to rail him. He calls them "Team V-neck." My rail is filled out too. EL Nino and Dabomb are still here. Split has showed up. pfapfap is on diner break from his event and gedanken has busted out and they've both come by. And the grindhouse is out in force. DIPSET, Perfection, and I some other folks are all together in a Kurt section on the rail.

On my way to the table after final cigarette Gary grabs me.

"Hey man," he says, "are you going to try and win this?

I look at him puzzled. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, are you going to try to win this," long pause, "or are you just trying to survive?"

I know exactly what he means. Am I going to put my chips in action, mix it up, and hope to catch some cards and build a stack for a short handed showdown, or am I going to fold like a little bitch and see if anyone busts before I do. I flash him a big smile.

"I'm just going to do my thing."

He laughs and gives me a fist bump, then I pop over to my seat.

We get seated and ready to play. there are 3 shortstacks at the table. I'm the shortest of the shortstacks with 350k. Everyone else has between 500k and 800k chips. And then there's Pascal. Pascal has about 2.8 millioin chips.

The start of the table is really awkward as the TD goes around and introduces everyone to the crowd, but kinda has to get pronunciations off-mic from each player before he announces them. This takes quite a while, but eventually we get under way.


The dealer sits down and shuffles. He says to the table "I've never dealt at one of these tables, so if I make any mistakes please be forgiving."

I shoot back "Well, I've never played at one of these tables, so we're even."

The cards come out. I fold a couple hands, then its folded to me.

I have AQ. I look left. Old habbit that is uselees at final tables. Everyone checks their hand IN TURN, so no one on my left has even seen their cards. 5 players to get through. My M is under 3. ezgame. "I'm all in."

I push my stacks into the middle in one clean motion, then rest my head on my hand and freeze up. Fold fold fold fold. The BB tanks. He's got me out chipped by at least half a million. He's still thinking. His demeanor changes. "I call." He fliips up AJo. I turn up AQo.

The rail can't see the cards until they are brought the the middle of the table and shown on the video screens. As soon as they are, my section goes nuts! I smile.

The dealer runs out the board and I hold. I just doubled up at the final table.

I am now at stack parity with the rest of the table, in the 500k-800k range. Then of course there's Pascal. And 2 remaining short stacks.

Deep breath, and we go on.

The TD gives up an option of when to take dinner, sooner or later. The table talks it over and picks the sooner option. I don't really have an opion, but that's fine by me. I fold for a couple orbits just watching the table. This is a tight table. then its folded to me in the BU. SB is Saar. Saar has some unusual tendencies that I can't quit pin down, but is overall decent and my strategy has been mostly to avoid him. BB is Kevin. Kevin is the tightest player at the table, and is looking kinda flushed. I look at my cards and have some suited connectors. Can't fold forever.

"I'm all in." Push chips, assume pose, freeze. Saar checks his cards, takes a beat, then folds. Kevin checks and fold quickly. The blinds are getting huge. This folding thing is really taking its toll on me.

The TD calls the 60 minute dinner break. 60 minutes again, drat. No time to mess around, I hop up and head for the cafe for another chicken quesadilla hold the chicken. Gedanken tags along. The rest of the rail holds their seats.

First

I have some IRL things I have to do today. I'll be back tonight to try and finish it up.

While you wait, take a look at some of the pictures a friend of mine took on day 3:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/3775378...7624206945218/

ffs this is killing me

Its not easy on me either. I haven't played poker in 2 days because I've just been writing this up. I didn't think it would take so long.

It is concept of the month I hear

If you FT the Main event - it would be longer than War and Peace

I feel like I'm at the strip club and outta ones....

Take your time. We all know this is costing you table time and likely $$.

nooo! keep writing!