35/949 - Placed in the $$$

So I've finally taken a big step in the large poker tourneys, and placed well within the money.

The event was a $200,000 prize pool $200+15 entry fee, no limit hold-em tourney. At the end of the registration process 949 others had entered. This was by far the biggest tourney at this level of play, that I have been a part of. Top 100 finishers took home the cash. The range in payouts was from 100th paying $300, all the way to 1st which paid out a very nice $45,000 US!

Just to recap, I won my entry by winning a smaller satellite tourney which I paid $21 to play in. Some might say that I should just take the $215 that I won from that tourney and run, but I still have not given up my ambitions to place high in one of these large tourneys.

The game started well and at the first break I had managed to double up. I was quite pleased with my process. I also managed to hit pocket rockets (AA) 3 times in that hour! The second hour was not my friend. My chip stack dwindled and only 2 very successful all ins saved my butt to keep me a contender at the end of that second hour. I had a close call with AA later in the game when I was all in and my opponent was all in as well. He had TT and a 10 hit on the flop! Then the turn card hit and it was thankfully an Ace! Narrowly avoided death on that hit. My next hand was JJ and I took down another decent sized pot. Now I was sitting pretty to coast into the final 100 and at least guarantee myself a $300 pay out. Well I managed to steal a few blinds here and there and outbet some opponents to keep me alive into top 50! Things were looking good as the payouts were now in the $700 range. I was only going to be playing premium hands and play them strong. And that's what happened when my fateful last hand came up. I had AQs and pushed after a weaker opponent limped with what turned out to be JJ. No Ace or Queen came to save my bacon. It was all over, and 35th place was mine.

I'm not too upset. I probably could have coasted into the next payout range, but was happy with my play overall. A couple of stupid moves earlier in the game, but some better ones to also help me get as far as I did.

In the end the money breakdown was as follows:

Buy in fee: $ 21
35th place payout: $900
Profit: $879

Beating out all the pros who were also in this tourney... priceless. :)

Oh, and I forgot to mention that I'm also entered into a free invite only tourney as a result of my participation in this event. It's for a shot at winning a seat into the World Series of Poker. I believe that's on Wednesday, so who knows... I could be off to Vegas! :)