The 1st Thursday tournament of the year. I wanted to get off to a good start for the year so I played some excellent poker, I bluffed at the right time, stole the blinds at the right time and played my hands correctly to maximise my returns. I chopped the tournament with Isaac again taking home about $1800. Good start to the year.

Played in the $250 Tilt Thursday tournament tonight. Played some pretty good poker and ended up splitting the tournament with Isaac. We took $2000 each. Also I had a cheese sandwich today, It was pretty good!

Tournament Date: 27 November 2006
Buy-In: $2500 + $200 CAD
# of Players: 784
Prize Pool: $2,000,000 CAD

This was my second visit out to The River Rock Casino and the second time playing in this event. Shyam and I flew out on the morning of the event and went straight to the Casino to register. We went to a friends room at the hotel and showered and had a nice breakfast.

We took our seats and as luck would have it for the 2nd time in a row I was seated next to one of my friends. Well, at least I had position on Shyam (he can be an aggressive player so I was glad to be able to get away from his raises in position).

The very first hand I am dealt 77 on the big blind, I flop a set and make a little money. The very next hand I am dealt A9 off in the small blind and I limp, this time I flop trips and I make a little more money. For the first 3 hours I didn't have any problems and I was steadily increasing my stack. I went from the origional 10K stack to about 19K. Then our table was broke and we were all moved.

Another 3 hours passed and my chip stack remained the same, not much movement till I was dealt JJ. Blinds were 300/600 with a 75 ante, I raised 4 times the BB and got one caller. The flop came 10h 6h 2c. I bet out 4K on the flop and he called, the turn came 7s, he checked and I bet out 7K, he called. The river came the Jh. He bet out 4K and even though I knew he was chasing the flush and caught it, I paid him off because there was a lot of money in the pot. I was right, he turned over Ah Qh. Damn, now I was crippled. Half an hour later I made a stand with K J and was called by A K.

Tournament Date: 04 November 2006
Buy-In: $1100 + $100
# of Players: 872
Prize Pool: $933,335

Me, Shyam, Jay & Matt decided to take a trip out to Foxwoods Casino Resort in Conneticut to play some events at the World Poker Finals. We decided to drive and after about 9 hours of doing so, we arrived at our hotel at around 2am, Saturday morning. We checked in, freshened up and went straight to the Casino to check it out. WOW, the cardroom was amazing, huge, it had over 150 tables and they spread most limits of most games. We all decided to play a little 5/5 No Limit for a couple of hours and then back to the hotel to get some rest before the tournament the next day.

On Saturday morning we got up at a reasonable hour and went back to the Casino. We all registered for the tournament and chilled till it started. We all got our seating assignments and as luck would have it I was sat to Jays' right on the same table. We did not get involved in any hands together until our table broke. At this point, I had built my stack up from the origional 5K stack to about 8K.

When we moved tables I was put into seat 10 (I hate seat 10 because you cannot see the whole table). The blinds were going up every 45 mins and by the time we had played 5 hours I only had about 4K in chips and the blinds were 600/1200 with a 100 ante. I pushed with 7c8c in the cut off only to find AA in the big blind.

I stayed on till Tuesday and played some cash games and some 1 Table Sit 'n' Go's. I left the car with Jay & Shyam and flew back to Toronto. They came back the following Friday, with the car, having had no luck either for the rest of their stay.

Tournament Date: 25-29 October 2006
Buy-In: $10,000 CAD
# of Players: 497
Prize Pool: $4,829,332 CAD

My first WPT event. What an experience! I started off the day well, playing some pretty solid tight aggresive poker. Went from the original $20,000 chip stack to 27K within a hour. Then it all went pear shaped! I got my aces chased down to the river by K J on a Jack high flop only for a King to come on the river to crack me. I lost about 7K in that pot.

After the first break I built my stack up a little to about 26K when this hand came up. Level 5, blinds are 300/600. I had just been moved to another table with Alan Goehring (Winner of the WPT Championship 2003). I am in the small blind and Alan is in the big. I have 9 J offsuit and everybody folds around to me. I limp and Alan checks. The flop comes 2 7 9 rainbow. I bet 1200, Alan raises to 2400 and I re-raise to 4500 (I didn't want anybody to think I could be pushed around so I decided to play back at him). He called. The turn comes a J (I make 2 pair) and I bet 4K, he calls. The River comes a 5. I decided to put in a bet of 2700 (there is over 17K in the pot but I want to look like I have a big hand and I want a call). Alan raises me to 9700. This made me think, does he have pocket deuces or sevens? I think he would have raised preflop with 77. Deuces is the only hand that he could possibly have to have played the hand the way he did. I must have thought about it for about 3 minutes before somebody called time on me. I folded my hand face up and said 'nice bet'. Alan looked at my hand and said 'how could you fold that hand? He flipped over his hand and showed me the same hand as I had. A few people said that I should have called in that spot but I figured that I didn't want to get crippled at this stage of the tournament, after all, I still had 15K in chips. If I called and lost i would have had only 8K.

7 hours later I was knocked out of the tournament. I had a bad run and I had about 8K in chips. Blinds were 1200/2400 I found 99 under the gun and limped, there were 2 other callers and the flop came 5 7 8 rainbow. I pushed for my remaining 5600 with an overpair and a gutshot and I ran into KK. Tournament over for me.

All in all it was a great experience and I learn't alot from playing in such a big field with such a high level of play.