GukPT £100 Head Hunter 15th November 2009

So this was the final tournament of the week in the GukPT and it attracted a field of 134 players. There was a £25 cash bounty on the head of each player, no silly discs, or pieces of paper to collect with each head being a £25 casino cash chip there and then! This was also my final opportunity to cash in a GukPT event and whilst many saw it as a bit of fun at the end of a hard week I went with my game head on.
The tournament started really well for me when I tripped up two consecutive pocket pairs (oh for such cards in the Main Event!) getting paid well in chips both times. I then got my first head when another pair tripped before filling me up on the river. Towards the end of level 3 (90 minutes in) came the biggest hand of the night for me, There was an all in from early position from the short stack on the table, this was then called by one of the larger stacks before another short stack pushed all in. The action folded to me in the High Blind and I looked down to find the ‘Hilton Sisters’ Q,Q. I deliberated what to do due to the action before me and came to the conclusion that I would be very unlucky to have run into A,A & K,K from the two pushes. I considered it carefully and came to the conclusion that it was more likely to be A,K / A,Q or medium pairs due to the previous action on the table which had been in the main loose aggressive due to the players involved and the nature of the event. Also any player holding A,A or K,K would want action not just to take the blinds and dead money in the pot hoping to get it all in good after the flop to take the head hunter prizes. Taking all this into consideration I pushed all in as there was in excess of 8,000 chips in the middle of the table trying to force out the other big stack who could still fold and have a very playable stack. The action moved round past the first player who was all in to the other big stack who clearly had a serious decision to make, he dwelt it up for ages and then announced “there is too much in the middle” and called. His dwell up gave me confidence that he was not holding A,A or K,K as he had previously not taken much time over any decision he made. The cards went on their backs and showed the following:
First All-In – 10,10
Large Stack – K,6 off suit!
Second All-In – 10,10
Me - Q,Q
I could not believe it, 10’s drawing dead except to some exotic straight, only the King or running sixes to worry about. I was a massive favorite to win the hand and did so taking two head hunters and leaving the previous large stack wallowing on a chip and a chair. This pushed my chip stack to in excess of 18,000 with the average at 6,500 plus £75 in cash chips. One more head and I’m free rolling. The forth head followed quickly after when a nice medium pair held against the short stack.
Players were falling like flies in this event and the room echoed to the calls of dealers “lost one” and tables were being split on a regular basis. In the space of 4 levels (2 hours play) the field had gone from 134 down to 52. Players continued to fall on a regular basis however to balance this my cards dried up and so my early large stack became only an average one. Opportunities to get chips into pots were limited as players pushed from earlier position thereby making pushing hands for the later positioned players less attractive, I took the stance, as I have recently that a hand worth raising with becomes not even worth calling with to an earlier raise and therefore I was mucking especially from the small and big blinds.
More tables split and I joined a good mate Linton Holling who was well chipped up, the cash bubble was quickly approaching (13 players) and with this players were pushing with any two cards, Linton, as usual went out to a shocking outdraw, he has to be a player who suffers more bad beats than most players I know, if there is a bad beat to be had then Linton is always on the wrong end of it!
I eventually ran out of steam finishing as the final table bubble in 10th place but collected £150 cash. At least I cashed in one event this week which is more than most of the player who attended this very well supported week can say. It would have been nice to final table and take home a bigger prize but it was not to be.