http://www.spencerlawrence.com Life on the wire Tue, 20 Apr 2010 09:57:49 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Not the best poker-trip ever. 1) 200 euro taxi-ride to San Remo from Nice as the trains were on strike. 2) Checked into our hotel where according to the booking agent EPThotels I was confirmed 12 days ago for a Junior Suite.  We get to the room.  Blatantly not a suite.  Complain ... http://www.spencerlawrence.com/2010/04/20/san-remo-troubles/ £550, I'd been very active early chopping away at some small pots but people playing back hard so was slightly below starting stack. in 3rd level. Folds to me on the button with 85dd.  I make it 375. BB is youngish guy who seems like a midstakes online player.  He makes it ... http://www.spencerlawrence.com/2010/03/22/20th-in-220-turbo-busted-550-early/ So I have almost 1/3 chips at FT.  The payout structure has the same flaw as stars in that it almost forces you to play for 2nd place.  This irritates me somewhat.  I should clearly tighten my oop ranges and just let chips come to me, attack in position, wait ... http://www.spencerlawrence.com/2010/03/20/q5s-and-ajo/ Turned down deals 9-handed, 6-handed and 5-handed the last of which would have given me £8k. But no seat in the champion of champions. Meh. Yes it's a crapshoot at that stage but I have a huge skill edge in crapshoot structures that means dealing in general ... http://www.spencerlawrence.com/2010/03/19/5th-for-3200/ 1st day went fine despite hampering ourselves by traveling same day it started after a long online session. So we'd been up 24 hrs when we took a 3 hr nap after checking in to a london hotel that leaves a lot to be desired. When I finished ... http://www.spencerlawrence.com/2010/03/19/330-gukpt-side/ $11400. Eh. I know turbos well so was relaxed and confident from being chip leader 400 people out.  Some weird spots later on tho.  In 2nd place with 3 tables left I had Whatis7x6 move to my left as chipleader.   Bye-bye free chips from attacking the blinds in position.  It was complicated ... http://www.spencerlawrence.com/2010/03/17/4th-in-mini-ftops-22-turbo/ Sigh.   Keep going very deep in sunday majors with no win.  To quote an older British player, "I've been knocking on the door for so long, I'm starting to think there's no-one home."  3rd in the weekly $215 LHE as well on Saturday, which would feel better if I hadn't had 3/4 ... http://www.spencerlawrence.com/2010/03/15/46th-in-sunday-warmup/ I found one redeeming feature to my semi-enforced stay in Berlin. Curryworst! This curried sausage snack is delicious, and although the hotel version costs 12 euros, its available for 2 euros on every other street corner (think hot dog stand). The good thing about the dead days at the end ... http://www.spencerlawrence.com/2010/03/06/curryworst/ The stars pro from the jacks hands was Florian something. Early hand back from break, he raises CO I flat from SB with KQdd and bb calls. Flop 9d 3h 2h. Interesting. There are a lot of sexy turns here. We check to Florian, he bets 3k, I ... http://www.spencerlawrence.com/2010/03/03/fail/ 44675 at dinner, pretty much exactly where I started after the last break.  Slurping down a coke before going back was probably a bad idea as I spazzed somewhat during the excitement of antes.  I opened K7s from the co got called by He checks to me.  Against a lot of live players ... http://www.spencerlawrence.com/2010/03/03/dinner-break/