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he Guardian Poker Column |
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Victoria
Coren |
Tues 25 Oct 2011 |
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A 'bad beat' I might never
forget
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Sometimes you
have to be philosophical but it's not always easy
I never remember bad
beats. I hope that reveals a sanguine nature, but here's one I might never
forget.
On Sunday, I was knocked out of the EPT in San Remo. Time to go
home. But the sun shone, the sea twinkled and the schedule offered a soft
1,000 side event. |
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What the hell. At the last minute, I
cancelled the airport taxi and bought into the event. I missed two hands and
arrived just in time to find 88 on the button. A player raised to 150 and got
three callers, including me. The flop came 6 7 8.
The raiser bet 300.
Call, call, and I re-raised to 3,000 (from a 10K starting stack). The raiser
and one of the callers folded. The third guy called. It takes a very strong
hand to cold-call here: did he have a lower set, or had he flopped the
straight? When the turn came a 9 and he checked, I checked behind. The river
was a 10: lucky for me if he'd flopped the straight, unlucky if he had the
lower set. As is standard on a board like this, he shoved all in and I called.
And he showed
10 J!
What murderous luck. He'd called only to hit
the magical middle pin, which came. Then the river guaranteed I had to call.
And I could so easily have been on the way home, or arrived one minute later to
miss the hand! One minute earlier, I could still have caught the plane! That
one minute cost me 1,000, plus a hotel room for the night.
But
here's the lesson about all "bad beats" in tournaments. However unlucky, you
must always take responsibility. I chose to play a game in which, the truth is,
you're never guaranteed more than one hand.
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