My plan to do daily updates about the events here took an early hit, but in a good way, as the five of you reading the blog already know.

Sunday (seems like so far away at this point) started off well. There was a 10-Seat GTD Main Event Satellite at 1pm (no 11am game because of the restart for the $125K from Saturday).

There was a decent turnout for the satellite, which was good for the series after the overlays in the three events Saturday). I did reasonably well and picked up a voucher.

That wrapped up in almost exactly four hours, with 18 of the 80 entries getting seats.

The satellite ended just as the $50K GTD tournament was starting. There had been a nearly $20K overlay on Saturday, and I was sort of expecting that Sunday might be more of a bath for Chinook, but by the time registration closed, they’d just met the guarantee.

I busted in the second level, if I remember correctly—things are already getting a bit hazy—and rebought. 99 < AK, even though I’d had pocket aces twice in an orbit. So I needed to make 18th place to break even on the event. It took nearly six hours of play for me to get any traction; I flopped a set of kings against king-queen to double up, which put me over average for the first time.

29 left. I have 10bb. All ins spreading like zombie virus

— Poker Mutant (@pokermutant) September 9, 2019

I cockroached along for three more hours, getting progressively shorter as we approached the bubble. There was a long period there where it seemed like every all-in won, so the other short stacks just slipped down the ladder a little more. A couple of gross situations where king-jack shoved and was called by the table leader with king-queen, with a jack on the flop. Then he had another chunk taken out on the next hand (maybe not as gross as the guy in the $125K who lost with aces twice in short succession to break his big stack).

I finally got back over chip average with queens over jacks at the eight-hour mark, with four players to go before the money. We had a redraw at three tables just a few minutes before the bubble broke, which went by so fast that I completely missed the announcement and had to verify that we were in the money with Matt Moring, who was running the day’s show.

The rest of the event is kind of a blur. Maybe it was the fact I’d been playing more or less constantly for 14 hours, maybe it was the Long Island Iced Tea I allowed myself when we were down to two tables and someone else was buying. I do know that I got incredibly lucky. More than once.

10 players left. Just got AA twice then set of 4s.

— Poker Mutant (@pokermutant) September 9, 2019

We made the final table just after 3am, but it took almost an hour to get from 9 to 7 players. We were down to 5 when I lost a bit of ground calling a short stack who shoved seven-eight with my pair of sevens. The river was both an eight and made him a flush, but I survived.

HU pic.twitter.com/HW4LOdZbCv

— Poker Mutant (@pokermutant) September 9, 2019

Incredibly enough, chopping was never really brought up as we continued on into the early hours. We lost three players in the half-hour between 4:30am and 5am, so it was just me and Olympia’s John Gribben. That was when I proposed a chop.

I’m reasonably confident in my heads-up ranges and strategies, but at 5am,who knows? There were 3.3M chips in play between us, but the blinds were still only 20K/40K, so we had over 80bb between us, so it could have gone on for quite a while and I was really looking forward to playing the 6-Max. Which started in just six hours.

It says Event 2 but this was really Event 5

So John and I chopped. After we’d agreed, I asked for the champion photo, since I was pretty sure I had a slight chip lead. John said he wanted it, because he’d never had one. I hadn’t either, but Matt said he’d take one of both of us, and when John said he wanted to hold seven-deuce as his winning hand, I figured he might not mind if I did the old antenna trick. So congrats to the both of us!

I got back to the motel about 5:30, didn’t manage to get to sleep until after 6. Then daybreak hit and I needed something to drink at 7, and couldn’t get back to sleep despite trying. So it was off to the 6-Max (after a trip to the bank, thank you Chinook Winds for taking debit cards for buyins) where I was a little light-headed from both adrenaline and lack of sleep, but had a very good time as people ribbed me about talking so much about the night before. Or early morning.

Prize pool up for @ChinookWinds @PACWESTclassic $30K NLHE 6-Max pic.twitter.com/4iDQCMNLdh

— Poker Mutant (@pokermutant) September 9, 2019

The 6-Max was going well and I made it down to about 40th place, then played one of those small blind hands because of an ace and a couple of limps that you would have thrown away in any other position. I was about 40bb deep with Nick “Wonka” Getzen on my left, with ace-three and I called behind the limpers. Nick checked and the flop was something like ace-X-five. Nick and I got involved through to the river with a jack and queen coming and—not believing he had an ace at that point—I shoved. He seemed to really consider folding, and I knew I was in real trouble when he was musing about whether I could have somehow caught an ace-jack. He did eventually call with the ace-five, and I went to the showers.

I ran into Toma Barber at the break before the end of entries. I met Toma here at Chinook Winds six years ago before the casino decided it could do a better job than the Deepstacks Poker Tour. He was sitting next to me as a short stack on Day 1 of the first $1K+ buyin tournament I cashed (though it was a min-cash). Toma went on to take sixth.

I asked if he was in the 6-Max and he said he was waiting for the freezeout in the evening, so in a flush of cash and haze of fatigue, I bought him in. As before he made it deeper than me, though not quite to the money. My fifth-ever stacking adventure!

That was it for me on Monday. I got a nice dinner at the casino steakhouse overlooking the beach and headed for some sleep.

Tuesday was back to more losing. I had a great breakfast with Toma at 60’s Cafe & Diner  then went back to my room before walking down the beach back to the casino. I went up to the cash area and got into the 2/4 O8 game. I sat next to the dealer in seat 1, but then the guy in seat 2 moved away from me and I started to wonder if it was the fact that it had been pretty warm out on the beach. I stayed for 90 minutes to donate a hundy, then had to catch a ride back to the hotel to shower and change because there wasn’t enough time before the HORSE tournament to walk. Not the plan but you need to adapt.

Fresh once again, I set my sights to HORSE, but fizzled out on a hand where I had a pretty good draws but the guy on my left had even better draws and a better hand in the end. Disappointing to bust before the payouts were even posted when I’d skipped the Senors tournament in the morning.

Numbers for the HORSE @PACWESTclassic pic.twitter.com/l79AMZuFpK

— Poker Mutant (@pokermutant) September 11, 2019

After that, it was time for another shot at a High Roller satellite. Once again it missed the number of players needed to justify the 4-Seat guarantee. Made it about halfway through but nowhere near the vouchers.

Does that catch us up? Plan for the day is my dad’s arriving in town this morning. 1pm is the Omaha Hi-Lo tournament. 5pm is another High Roller satellite (which I hope to not be in).

And we’re back! At least for a week.

I’ve rarely had the confluence of having time and money to do a full schedule at a series. For most of the time I was playing poker intensely, I was always on the edge of being broke (well, really, I was broke), playing little daily tournaments, building up some money, then blowing it on a shot at something that rarely paid off. Or getting my car servied. Bankroll management is more difficult when your life and poker bankrolls (such as they are) are intertwined.

For instance, a year-and-a-half ago, when I had my largest-ever cash here at Chinook Winds, I used a big chunk of it to pay off my property taxes, paid income taxes on another big chunk, then had to replace a water heater that decided to go out the next week. Stuff starts adding up.

This series, though, I had vacation time from work available, ready cash from (among other things) buying a piece of Molly Mossey’s action at EPT Barcelona and chopping a $10K at Final Table back in July.

So I’ve been anticipating this series maybe a little too much. The last week at the office, I could feel my mind drifting (more than usual) as I counted down the hours. Anyway, I headed out to Lincoln City first thing Saturday morning for the 11am start of Event #1 $125K GTD NLHE, a $290 buyin with a $100 addon and rebuys through the sixth 40-minute level.

Busted my first bullet about 10 minutes into the second level when I got into a raising way with a pair of tens against an aggressive player a couple of seats on my right after a low flop. We both had an over pair to the board all the way to the river, and his was jacks.

They’re announcing that they might be a bit short on registrations for @ChinookWinds @PACWESTclassic #1 $125K GTD NLHE, so

MASSIVE OVERLAY ALERT!

With the number of entries and players left, maybe $25K overlay after addons. Still 50 minutes plus break!

— Poker Mutant (@pokermutant) September 7, 2019

Attendance was a bit light, there was concern that the guarantee might be quite short, but it turned out the $125K wasn’t the real problem for the first day.

Going to dinner w 32K. 20bb when we come back!

— Poker Mutant (@pokermutant) September 8, 2019

A re-entry went a bit better, and I went to the dinner break with an above-average stack, in part due to knocking out First Friend of the Blog Brad Press. That didn’t last that long, however, and I played most of the rest of that tournament in the 10bb zone. Jacks were my bane for the night; I shoved with a pair myself and got called by ace-king, which hit on the flop.

Contrary to expectations, the tournament hit the money on the first day, just short of the scheduled end of play, at 45 players. They broke the bubble, then drew to determine the number of hands before bagging near the end of the 4K/8K level.

45 players bagged Day 1 and are ITM of the $125,000 guarantee. Restart at 11am. @ChinookWinds pic.twitter.com/aS9qSaNrKT

— PACWESTPoker Classic (@PACWESTclassic) September 8, 2019

The place where the overlay was really a concern was in the 5pm $50K GTD NLHE. I registered this one only about 40 minutes before the second break (with registration open through the 30-minute break). There were only about 100 entries, in a $220 buyin tournament that had a $100 addon. You can do the math.

Brad Press, center

This was a hard game for me. Aside from the fact I came in shorter than I like (but the overlay looked so juicy!), I had the longest period of total card-deadness I can remember in quite a long time (Brad has said something to the effect he’s never seen someone get so many pairs of aces in a game.) But it’s a statistical possibility (something I wrote about for PokerNews a few years back), and just something you have to swallow. Jammed king-queen with about 8bb left, and the big blind woke up with ace-queen.

Running at 8pm most of the nights through the week is a $230 buyin satellite for Friday’s High Roller ($2,500 buyin). Again, a late entry didn’t exactly help. I made it down to two tables (sort of, they miscounted the number of players on three tables and consolidated, then had one guy wandering around until someone busted).

So, a long day with nothing—or rather less than nothing—to show for it. Tournament poker at its finest!

Today’s schedule includes a 10-Seat GTD tournament for the Main Event next weekend at 1pm (the first event started at 11 this morning, GL Steve Myers!) I plan to play that then jump into the $50K GTD that’s due to start at 5pm (that should be interesting if yesterday’s is any indication). Then there’s another High Roller satellite at 8 (which I hope to be too busy to play). And I hear there’s cash games!