My first live HU donkament...

[Talking Poker]

There is a poker room about 10 minutes from my houses here, but until tonight, I had never played a single hand there. I mean, why would I choose to play 35 hands per hour with tons of rake and dealer tips and a max buy in of $100 for 1/2, 2/5, and even 5/10 NL games, when I could play online instead, right?

Well, driving by yesterday, I noticed they had a HU tourney scheduled for tonight. I plau HU SNGs online all the time, and I intend to play in this summer's $5k HU Event at the WSOP, but I'd like a little live practice first, to make sure I can adjust for the slower pace, seeing my opponent and having him see me, etc. So I decided to play tonight for practice.

We started a bit late, and they really were digging to get a whopping 7 players total. $100+20... gotta love that too.

I got to talking to one guy (Tim) before we started. He's an online player and I could tell he actually knows what he's doing. Sure enough, we draw each other in round 1. He played well, but I felt good and ran well and ended up winning and advancing.

Round 2 was against an older woman, who was better than I expected her to be, but she was easy to read and was exploitable. I beat her too.

So we're down to the final 2 now, and the other guy offers to chop the would be $500/$200 prize money $350 each. I decline, both because I know I have an edge and because I wanted the live HU practice. I suggest we change the payouts to $400/$300 and basically play for $100 and he's cool with it.

I had a pretty huge edge on him and even picked up a couple of very obvious tells (Do people really shake their head in disgust, then pause for a while fiddling through their chips, and then make a huge bet when they river their flush???). I built a nice lead while the blinds were small, but got coolered once to put me a little bit behind when we were in the 4th level. On the final hand, I raised AQ, he 3 bet, and I shoved... he called with KTo, so obv GG me (T on flop). Meh, oh well.

All in all though, I'm REALLY happy about how things went down tonight. I felt like I had no trouble adjusting to the live play pace, and I am sure seeing my opponent was much more of an edge for me than not. I really do enjoy playing live and feel like I'm a better player live than online, but not nearly enough to make up for the hands per hour difference.

In summary: I'm pretty psyched about the HU Event at the WSOP this summer.

[Zybomb]

Yes

[Nikita]

GL at the WSOP HU.

And great job at this tournament. All that work for $300, I bet you're glad you got something out of the "practice".

[Talking Poker]

Minus $120 buy in minus $20 tip minus $3 for a freaking coke (with tip) minus say $2 for gas = $155 profit for almost 4 hours of my time, round trip.

But hey, at least I came out ahead.

[2Tone]

Wow. 20% rake, $100 capped buy-in, and they charge for soft drinks, never mind booze. No wonder you prefer online to live play.

None the less, well done. Glad to hear you'll be playing the WSOP event (Where the hell is the schedule already!), and that makes it especially important to keep your live game sharp.

[Talking Poker]

It's really annoying me that they haven't published the schedule yet. I'd like to figure out when I'm going, what I'll be playing, what action I'm selling, and make my flight/timeshare/etc arrangements ASAP.

Hopefully it will be out soon.

[JDMcNugent7]

When do sattelites to the WSOP start?

[Mogul4]

Now on FT