Oskar Silow

I hope you haven’t missed that I have written an article about my WSOPE adventure in the latest issue of FirstPoker.  Only in the paper version tho….

The chance of success have never been better.  I slept really well last night, woke up with plenty of time to register and get ready before the event and had a great breakfast.

The tournement itself was well organized and started at 12.30 which is a very good time I think.  Only 88 players started day 1A and you heard players talk about a very small and easy field compared to the tough fields filled with pros that usually show up for the EPTs.  Only 7 levels was going to be played during day 1 which meant that there was plenty of time for dinner after the tournament.  There were plenty of bathrooms, water at the tables, a great structure with plenty of chips.  Everything felt good and spoke to my advantage :D  So what happend?

We started with 30k chips and blinds 50-100.  The only name players I saw was Peter Eastgate and Luca Pagano and not even them belong to the top tier of pros.  I start out playing a few small pots and won them and built my stack to 31900 during the first level.

During the 2nd level with blinds 75/150 it gets interesting.    One player limp and I make it 550 with AK and he calls.  The flop T33 feels good to continuation bet and I bet 775 - call.  Turn 5 and I feel that I can take it down with another bullet of 1725 - call again.  River 7 and I decide to give up since I feel there is no chance he will let go.  He check and so do I and he take down the pot with his 66.  If th epot would have happend a little later I would not have bothered to try to steal the pot since this Italian hadn’t found the fold button… 

A few hands later a very interesting pot takes place.  I raise to 425 UTG with AA and get 2 callers which both have a little history with each other.  The flop is K74 with a heartdraw (I got Ah).  I decide to play it a little sneaky and check.  The first player bets 1100 and the french guy who I’m determined don’t want to get bluffed by that guy again immediately makes it 2725.  Usually I would just fold with this kind of action since my hand is no longer the powerhouse it was before the flop, but first I must analyze the situation.  Considering their history I belive that the french guy will re-raise very light and that the first player could just be trying to pick up th epot when I checked.  After thinking about it I make it 7925.  The first player don’t think long before he announces all in.  Not the result I was hoping for and unless he has balls the size of baskeballs he has a set here.  The french guy folds after a while and tells the table he had AK after I folded as well and the all in guy flips a set of 7s.  What is really interesting here is that the pot would have been way different if I would have decided to limp casue then the french guy would most likely have raised and I could have isolated him with a 3-bet preflop and won a nice pot from him.  The same thing would have happend if he would have 3-bet with his AK before the flop cause then I would have 4-bet.  Instead I lost 1/3 of my stack.  Sucks, but no catastrophy since the structure is good and I still have plenty of chips to work with.  I finish level 2 with 18575. 

During level 3 and 4 not much happens besides me getting 3X in every hand and get grinded down to 13350 during these two levels. 

During level 5 the french guy raise preflop and get two callers so I call as well with T7spades from the BB.  The flop is T94 with two hearts and 1 spade.  The french guy bets and the other two players fold and I call determined to go all in on any turn call that improves my hand or adds outs.  Turn is Aspades which gives me a flushdraw as well.  I get ready to move all in, but chicken out and check and the frenchy moves all in immediately.  I consider calling for a loooong time but fold eventually after someone called time on me.  I got good odds to call haivng to put in 9,3k to win a 28k pot, but decided my chips was worth more than the very likely 30/70 gamble.  The hand directly after I call a raise with KJ and move in over his continuationbet of 1k and he instant-folds.  The hand directly after that one the guy on the CO raise and I 3-bet from the button with AQ.  After the blinds fold the CO-player moves all in and considering my recent activity and our positions I have to call only to see him flip AK.  I had good odds for a coinflip and just the right odds for a 30/70 siuation.  Unfortunately odds isn’t everything and I bust when the board doesn’t help my hand.  Not happy, very dissapointed.  Everything looked perfect for a good result, but made a few plays I’m not satisfied with having analyzed them again.  I have to look over the hands again and decide on a new strategy for Amsterdam in two weeks.
 

Played some online tournaments and cash games tonight and managed to bubble the final table in an event that could’ve give me a nice cash to forget the live results of today, but unfortunatley my AQ lost to another AQ all in preflop and that was the end of that, not thebest day ever….

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I’m finally in Warsaw after a long busride (6h!) through Polands countryside.  Was supposed to be a quick direct flight, but was forced down, God knows where, when there was too much fog to land in Warsaw.  Think that put me on tilt?!   I’m  going to play day 1A (tomorrow) for once, I usually play day 1B.  Of course I’m representing  PokerTime as usual=)

Tonight I will chill and grind a bit in the hotel room before I conquer the field of the EPT tomorrow ;)

In yesterdays edition of Aftonbladet  I was once again quoted.  This time it was one of Swedens most respected poker players and poker author Dan Glimne who used my quote: “To make a living playing poker is the best job in the world when running good and the worst when running bad“.  I think all poker players agree on this.  Beeing quoted by Dan feels extra special considering that he indeed is an author and that to quote me he must actually have read my blog =)