Aussie Millions Update

So I decided to come down to Melbourne after all. I arrived yesterday afternoon (too late to play the Main Event unfortunately) and last night played some 10/20 (the straddle to 40 was happening about 75% of the time). It was pretty boring and uneventful and I lost 2.7K, 2.2K coming from a hand where I opened the BTN to 125 with TT and got 3-bet by the straddler to 340. I shoved, he called with KK and he held.

Today I decided to play the 1.1K NLHE event on a whim, mostly because I found 10/20 last night so incredibly boring. I’d forgotten how horrible live poker can be when you’re card-dead for hours on end! I got off to a great start and had about 2.5x the starting stack within 30 minutes. My double up came in pretty funny fashion. A player limped in MP and I limped behind with 22. It was five-ways to the flop of Q42cc. The first limper bet 225, I raised to 700, it folded to the big blind who 3-bet to 2500, the limper folded visibly annoyed and I shoved. My opponent tanked before finally calling with 42o (which was pretty lol given his raise was for half his stack). The limper said he had AQ and when the Q came on the turn he said “oh no, don’t do this to me!” Sure enough the river came an Ace so I doubled up while the limper rued what could have been.

It was all downhill from there though and 4 hours later I open-shoved 12bb’s in MP with 99 and ran into KK. C’est la vie.

During the dinner break of the tournament I decided to try out live PLO for the first time. I sat down with 1K at 5/10 PLO and won 305 in about half an hour before having to return to the tournament. After I busted out of the tournament I sat back down with my 1305 and second hand I picked up 8654 with three hearts in MP. The straddle to 20 was on so I opened to 70 and got 4 callers. The flop came down 844ssc and I got it in versus the button. I had 1 out and didn’t hit. Great game, PLO.

Tomorrow I’m just going to grind 10/20 live until dinner when I’m meeting up with two friends from PCA (speaking of which, I’ll do my PCA/NYC trip report when I get back; it was genuinely such an awesome holiday!). On Saturday I’m going to play the $2200 6-Max event and if I bust out of that (which seems inevitable given my MTT history in Melbourne) I’m going to play the $550 Turbo on Sunday. That was another tournament I didn’t initially intend to play but I really want a live title and since that field will probably be about 15 people strong (since it’s on the very last day of the series) I’m liking my chances there!