Palm Beach Big Game

Having played the EPT Ladies Event the day before and having had no luck there (after busting early with a flopped set of queens against a flopped set of Kings) , my hopes to make some cash (or to be precise some shopping money for my upcoming holiday) lay on the Palm Beach Big Game.

With the EPT £1k side event starting at 6pm on the same day, I didn’t expect there was going to be many runners at the PBBG, but I always enjoy this game and less quality players makes for a better field!

I arrived at the casino a little bit earlier and took in the new look. There have been some major changes done to the lobby area and I have to admit it looks stunning now!

It reminds me somewhat of the interior at the Sanderson Hotel.

I got a glass of wine and I stumbled across Joe Beevers & Ross Boatman (whilst re-thinking my hopes for a soft field). It was nice to catch up with them and as part of team Genting we were ready to go.

In the end, it was a mini tournament, with 19 players which was far below average of 60-90 players. The standard of play was pretty high and with a few poker veterans and a couple of solid familiar faces, to cash was going to take some decent play on my behalf.

I didn’t get the best start and 20 min or so into a game I lost a third of my stack when folding QQ on a connected low board, when my opponent clearly had a straight or set.

I didn’t feel that losing my first big pot had any negative influence on my game to follow and I continued observing fellow players and plotting my strategy against them.

I was getting some playable cards and hitting some flops, and managed to increase my 10k starting stack to 16k by the end of level 4.

Right after the break, I increased my stack even further when flat calling a raise on the button with AQ and letting the short stack on the BB make the expected squeeze play.

I felt I was playing well, and as always required to do well in a tournament I was winning some flips. Unfortunately this was not the case for Ross Boatman, who kept on being coolered before busting out with AQ v 10s all in pre-flop.

It wasn’t long before we were moved to the final table, I was sitting on average stack at the time and was feeling pretty confident.

I managed to win a couple of decent pots without going to showdown and then received AQ just in time to bust out a shortie- who shipped his remaining stack with A7.

The toughest part for me was 5 handed. There were still 2 short stacks on the table, who just kept on coming back whilst Joe Beevers was running nicely and coupled with his obvious skill, it made for a tough period of the game.

I bided my time somewhat, as I felt if I could get three-handed I could still be a threat.

Fortunately for me, Joe ended up taking both of the shorties after one shoved and got called-when finding AA on the big blind:) Nice!

My strategy 3 handed was to shove my short stack every unopened pot and hopefully double up as Joe at this point was in a massive lead.

This didn’t last very long and I was out in 3rd when my Q3 was no good against Joe’s A8. He went on to win heads up, so congrats in order and not a bad night for the Genting Pro’s.

A small field meant an earlier night than usual when cashing at Palm Beach and a taxi ride home plotting Spa treatments and Outlet Mall shopping for my upcoming holiday.

Relaxing next for me in St Lucia, before a week in Vegas, which only means one thing….