I would like to thank Katie, who was the heart of the team and helped us with all our problems.

I didn’t get a chance to play as much poker as before since my daughter was born in July, but I did make a come back in December and cashed on my first tournament in the Budapest Poker Open. Since I couldn’t play in the WSOP last year, I will still play that tournament as a member of the Live The Dream Team in 2011. I am looking forward to it.

I am happy that I got to know some of the great Everest Poker players, I am proud that I could be part of the team. I wish good luck to all of them and I hope to meet you all soon at one of the big live events again!

I busted after putting my very healthy stack in with an 85% advantage. The same guy busted me who knocked me out last year on the second level after a preflop all-in - my AA vs his AK. 93%…

I felt I played quite well – I was happy to realize that poker is like cycling: once you learn how to play, you can’t forget it. I made some mistakes but funny enough they all turned out pretty well. It is important to make the wrong play at the right time BTW in the two whole days of play (12-14 hours per day) I haven’t had any QQ-AA. Zero!

I came 25th out of 305 players.

Then I played in the Ladies Event where I had AA once – and I had to check-fold it on the QT8 flop Again – I played pretty well but I made a mistake at the end when I got knocked out. I rarely make this mistake but I this time I wasn’t careful enough. When I made a move based on a tell against the player on the button I didn’t look to my left to see how eager the big blind is to put her stack in…

Then I played the 3LT final in Vienna. I like Vienna very much, but this time I played quite badly unfortunately. Somehow nothing worked out and I was out in the second hour.

My baby took it very well, she fed from the bottle happily and she went to bed like an angel for her naps and the night. I am happy that I could concentrate on my poker and didn’t have to worry about her. She is a very good baby )) I am confident that I can play all I want next year and she will be ok.

Everest Poker will run a bounty freeroll on 28th December to celebrate my come-back and my success on the Budapest Poker Open. Come and hunt me!

I really enjoy being with my baby but I miss the excitement of the poker world a little bit. It is going to be hard though as Norah is exclusively breastfed so I will need to get some bottles ready for her while I play. Luckily her daddy will be with us so hopefully it will all go smoothly.

I am not getting much sleep lately, Norah decided that she likes to feed every hour during the night. I hope this growth spurt will not last long otherwise I will collapse from exhaustion.

I managed to play a little bit of online poker here and there, but only cash games as I can get out of those anytime.

Well, I am excited that I will be back in a month or so and I think I will even try to play some satellite tournaments on Everest Poker for the Montesino tournament in Vienna.

I should have called the floor, but I didn’t. As the lady was quite loose with her calls and I thought she didn’t want to raise (I was probably wrong), I thought I could make her fold by re-raising. I was wrong, she had a monster and pushed all-in at which point I was getting 3:1 odds on my call, so as long as her range is not only QQ-AA (which it is not), I can’t fold. My Q7o didn’t draw out on her KK.

So this was disappointing but I think I finished a good season. (I think a tournament season should be from August to July, until the end of the WSOP) This was my first season when I played a lot of big tournaments thanks to my Everest Poker sponsorship and satellite tournaments before that.

I made 4 final tables (WPT, NAPT side event, Unibet Open and Budapest Poker Open Ladies Event) and won the NAPT side event. I hope some truly big results will follow next season which is very well possible if I keep playing so consistently and improve my game as much as I can. I also think the WSOP 13th place was a great success, I qualified for the $1500 event on Everest Poker from $100.

Now I will have close to two months for online poker and then no poker for quite some time. I started to work on my 7 card stud game again, I played an hour or two yesterday for small stakes ($0.50/$1) and made $30. I felt pretty good about my game so I will try $1/$2 for next. I have played on $2/$4 before, just a couple of times but I haven’t played in a while and I am just starting to learn this game so I wanted to take it easy.

I would like to be able to play the small 8-game tournaments on the WSOP by 2012. I think in 2011 I will play the 2-7 triple draw and 7 card stud, and possibly some more stud games like Razz or 8 or better. I hope it will be a big surprise when I show up in 2011 as a very mature 2-7 player who they have never seen before By that time I will have been playing for 2 years and hopefully get to some decent stakes online. I wouldn’t mind playing as high as $500/$1000 later if I can beat the game (and not necessarily by that time).  Same for stud and other games, perhaps the 8-mix too.

So from July, no poker for months and months… only baby I am very excited about it, I can’t wait. I will be back in December playing some tournaments and then I guess the continuation depends on Everest Poker for the most part.

I am flying back to Toronto tomorrow.

I made a stupid lay-down which I still don’t understand. I went into the hand with a plan exactly to get into the situation in which I got and then through it away… arrrrrghhhhh… no idea why, I had no reason to do so except that I would have had to put another 100 big blinds in the pot. But that is what I wanted to begin with…

Anyway, I was really angry about that, but luckily it was the last hand before the dinner break so I had no time to tilt. I had a tough table on the second day. Some of my moves worked out well except a light cold 4bet, where the 3bettor went all-in so I had to fold. One more hand I could have played differently, but I think even if I did, the end result would have been the same or close to it because I couldn’t have avoided the last two hands.

Then I played my first 2-7 triple draw session on the $30/$60 tables, two-tabling and it went really well. I had a lot of good starting hands and I hit a decent amount of time, so I made over $2200. I guess now I can say I am a $30/$60 player in 2-7 TD. It is a milestone, I think this is where it starts to become serious money (at least for me). I don’t think I will play at this stake against the regulars, but this time there were several weaker players at the tables and that is why I decided to play. I will keep avoiding the tough tables for a while until I feel more confident at this stake.

Yesterday we had a touristy day with Everest Poker’s Jerome, a nice kid from the London office. It was funny walking around with my huge belly – I guess most of the people thought the 23-year-old kid was the father, LOL. We were laughing about this a lot ))

Today I will play the Ladies Event.  I would like a nice finish for the season. Then no poker for 7 months… OMG – at least not live. I guess I will need to convert this to a baby-blog for a while It will only be about feeding and pooping and burping and no poker DD

I just don’t think it is normal… 6 hours of play… No pairs, no AK-AQ-AT or anything remotely playable. I got my chips from a hobby player who pushed all-in against me with bottom pair and I had a relatively easy call with top pair.

The hand went like this: I had 20bb, found A5o on the small blind. I am not willing to raise-call with this, but I am absolutely happy to limp-reraise all-in with it. So I just call, the big blind checks. Flop comes AT7, all clubs. I don’t want to build a big pot, especially he is never folding a reasonable club here and I am pretty certain I have the best hand right now. I am willing to call 3 streets of betting.

The blind was 600, he bets 1k, I quickly call. Turn is the 2 of diamonds, check-check. River is the 4 of spades. I bet 1k just to get some value for my ace. I suppose I could have bet 2k and still get called by any pair. However he raised me all-in.

I had been playing with this guy for 4 hours by this time and my first reaction is to insta-call. However, I was really happy with my play that first I thought it through. Is there anything he could have hit with the 4? (Not really.) From what I saw from him, would he be trying to get value and raise smaller if he hit two pair? (Yes.) Does he think that big bets are the way to bluff? (Definitely.) So I call .

He shows K4 for bottom pair – funny play. Anyway, I was happy with the way I played, it is just not possible to make in such a fast structure if you never have a hand. Finally I pushed KTo from the cut-off for 12 BB and the dealer found QQ (same guy). He had several (3 or so) AAs during the tournament and tons of other good hands

Whyyyyyyyy….. I hate to feel unlucky.

What is more surprising is that some big online and live tourney pros are also staying here Young guys like EPT Dortmund champion and EPT Deauville runner-up,  Mike “Timex” McDonald; EPT Berlin chamion Kevin MacPhee; Turbo Takedown winner Matt “Ch0ppy” Kay and some of their friends (also very good players).

I like to hang out with them, because I can pick up useful information about tournament situations and sometimes they also discuss hands which is useful to listen to. I can even get some useful advice, like not to play the €5k event in Monte Carlo but to play the €2k instead – I will take the advice and drop the €5k from my schedule I think

Joe (3rd in WPT Bucharest) and Kevin also confirmed that there is no way I should have folded the AK in Bucharest on the final table. I still think that it was a good call and it was nice to hear that these guys would have done the same.

I will play the Monte Carlo Main Event satellite tonight, wish me good luck

I still can’t complain about my luck. On the second day I had the AK and beat KK pre-flop all-in as I wrote in my previous post. Then on the 3rd day I was completely card dead and had no opportunity to push my short stack, so when I finally had a chance to push K6o from the cut-off with 8BB left, I got called by the big blind’s AT and spiked the K. Then I doubled up again with my AQ vs AT.

It just feels really bad that exactly when I could have got back in the game and have a shot for the real money. I also feel I played really well for the last two days, but I had no cards ever. I had two KKs and both times the A flopped I haven’t seen any other pairs higher than 88 for the last two days, except one JJ on the button when they folded to my raise. I had two AAs the first day in 9 hours of play, but also nothing else for the whole day.

Anyway, I am not unhappy. This was my first EPT cash and I don’t think it would have been possible to get any further the way I was running – you just can’t win a tournament without cards or at least hitting some flops (without somebody hitting it harder). I was on the top of my game for most of the tournament (except the first couple of hours) and that is what matters for now. I am sure my day will come when it is all combined with being on the good side of confrontations.

I am not sure if I want to play the €1k event tomorrow, probably not. I will definitely play 2 live satellites for the Monte Carlo Main Event.

I am still in, but short stacked. The day was like a rollercoster. First I went up to 145k. I never ever had a hand, I only played stacks, people and situations but I never got caught. My image was very good at the table. Any pot I entered for the first 3-4 levels, I won. All of them without a showdown (I had nothing to show down anyway ).

Then the most important hand of the day came up. I raised from UTG with 77, got 2 callers and the flop was a brilliant AA7. I bet and got called only by Nick Schulman (WSOP bracelet, WPT bracelets). The turn was a Q which didn’t make me very happy since AQ is exactly one of the hands he plays this way. However there is no way I am folding a full house so I bet out and got raised. Not very happy. I still put my stack in which luckily was more than his. Of course he showed AQ and I lost the 230k pot.

I was left there with appr. 36-40k with the blinds being 1200/2400. I found AQ in the cutoff and decided to raise-call since the small blind previously pushed several times his re-steal stack on top of other people’s raises. As expected, the small blind re-raised all-in, but unexpectedly the big blind also went all-in. Now I was stuck with my great plan. I ended up folding which I think is the right play at this point despite the original plan. The small blind showed AQ and the big blind had JJ which held up.

So I was left with 11-12 big blinds when I found AK UTG and pushed all-in. I hoped for a call from a weaker ace but I ended being called by KK. I was not happy until the flop where I got lucky and scored my ace for a double-up.

Now I had 60k and felt that I could get back in the game soon. At this point I got my one and only big (99+) pair of the day. UTG raised a small amount and I just called from UTG+1 with KK hoping that someone will try to steal the pot with a re-raise. There were several agressive guys around the table and a re-steal stack on the big blind as well who previously showed willingness to put his stack in when the right situation came up.

Unfortunately nobody re-raised and the flop came with an A. Check-check. Turn is a 4. UTG bets very small, I just called. River is a 4. UTG bets what screems of a value bet amount. I put him on AJ-AT. It really hurt to fold but I was obviously beaten. He showed 44 for quads.

Now I was down to 35k again thanks to my greed (I hoped to double my 60k with my KK). I managed to double up when Nick Shulman re-raised a middle position raise from late position and I shoved with my AJ. Many times he didn’t check the stacks behind him and still 3bet very light. I knew I was way ahead of his range and took my chance. He had AT and my hand held up.

Then our table break and I basically only managed to keep myself alive with sometimes stealing the blinds and sometimes re-stealing with a push. I didn’t have any reasonable hands again. I finished the day with 88k which is going to be 17 big blinds tomorrow. Not very good, but chip and chair…

I think I will be happy if I just make the money tomorrow, I haven’t had any EPT cashes before. Of course I am not going to fold in situations where I should obviously call just because of the bubble, but I will try not to make silly moves on the bubble either.

Then, anything can happen I can double up once or twice and be back in the game.

Then we drove to San Remo for the EPT. I played day 1A and went through with 79,400 chips. The starting stack was 30,000. I don’t think I played well, but I didn’t play badly either. However I could do much better and hopefully will show that in the upcoming days.

First I dropped down to 9,000 thanks to a player who called even on the turn with AK, no pair and hit her K on the river, plus another guy who limped with K2 from EP, called my raise, hit his K and never released the hand, even when I raised his river blocking bet. For the first 6 hours I also never saw a pair better than 88. Anyway, 9k was still 30 big blinds and then I managed to double up when I finally hit a set with my 22. Soon after I saw the flop come T7T for my 77 which meant another 10k or so for my stack (could have been more, I left the opponent 6k which he would have been willing to put in with his T).

Not long after that I doubled up again when a guy with QQ ran into my slowplayed AA. So I was sitting there with over 60k at this point, above average stack. And I finally had a stack big enough to make some moves My image was also great, I only showed down really strong hands. So after they announced the end of the day in a couple of hands I made a move that turned out to be the wrong move at the right time. An Italian player, who raised each and every hand from MP and later if nobody else entered, raised again, so I decided to re-raise with Q7o. I was not happy when he called and the flop came J66 so we both checked. The turn brought the a very nice Q so I even got paid in this appr. 40k pot.

Tomorrow, on the second day, the structure is going to be even slower so there is no need to do anything silly, I will just try to play my A-game and slowly increase my stack. Probably day 3 and the bubble are going to be one of the most important points in the tournament, so first I just need to make sure I make it there to be able to use it to my advantage.