Last week I was in Madrid playing the EPT event there. This trip was much more business-focused than any of my previous poker trips, as since Black Friday I had only played a couple sessions on Cake (and subsequently traded the balance of my account for a bank transfer at a discount) and otherwise hadn't been able to play poker at all. The Madrid series had some good tournaments on the schedule and the potential for good cash games too and would be a good tuneup for the WSOP, so I decided to go. My trip was so business-focused that I stayed at a cheap hotel 5-10 minutes away from the casino instead of at the Westin or other hotel downtown that Pokerstars was putting players up in, which were about 30-40 minutes away. It helped that I had been to Madrid a few weeks earlier with my girlfriend and her mom and already had a chance to explore the city some (beautiful city btw, I'd love to go back).

I arrived in town on Friday, May 6 and registered for Day 1A, which was the following day. On the first night I had dinner by myself in the casino restaurant (which was excellent....I ate there 6 times during the week I think heh) and then went across the casino to the room where cash games were being spread. Lo and behold, there was a 20/50 game with an open seat. I jumped in and played for 3 hours or so and after digging myself into a small hole earlier ended up winning about 15k euros, nice start to the trip!

Going into the main event, I was focused on staying patient and on trying harder to observe my opponents, two areas in which I have plenty of room to improve on. I actually think I may have overdone the first and missed some profitable spots to mix it up, although as a 22 year-old guy wearing FTP and Cardrunners patches, getting out of line rarely seems to work for me in live games (I've certainly overdone it at times too). Regardless, I had 75k going to the last level of day 1 with avg ~60k and blinds 500/1k, then played a hand where MP (UTG+3) raised, I decided to 3bet with KJo in the CO (2500->6500), and he called. I was going to play defense when making a pair pretty often, but the flop came J82 two-toned and I thought it was too good to check, so I bet 7k. He called, turn T, check-check. River 5, he bets 8k, I call pretty quick getting 5-1 or so and get shown QQ. Pretty happy with my line there as I hadn't been getting out of line much and my 3bet was credible, but the hand left me ending the day with 45k and under 40bb to start day 2.

On day 2, I played 3 pots in level 1, one in which I raised and got 3bet and had to fold, another in which I 3bet and got cold 4bet and had to fold, and then finally I took one down preflop with a button raise. My fortune turned for a bit in level 2 though, as I shoved over a CO jam for slightly more chips with AJs and despite running into KK I flopped an ace and doubled to 55k or so. Soon after, I raised ThTx UTG (minraise to 4k) and only the BB came along. Flop QJ8hhh, check-check. Turn low blank, he bets 5k I call. River another low blank, he overbets 25k into about 20. I tank and decide to call because a) I've defined my hand as being pretty weak, b) my TT blocks a straight and my heart makes a flush slightly less likely so I think I win more often than if I have KJcc or even KQcc, and c) opponent was a young guy with a lot more chips than me who seemed capable of making a move. Unfortunately, he had T9 for the straight, and soon after I shoved my stack in with AQ and ran into AA.

I played a 5k NL event later in the day and busted level 1 so not much to report there. The day before (day 1B of main and off-day for me), I grinded cash games for quite a while but unfortunately it didn't go nearly as well as the first day and I basically gave back all my day 1 winnings (15k euros or so). I also played a 1k + 1k bounty turbo tourney (awesome), got one bounty but then went really carddead and shoved A4 into AA nowhere near the money. The bounties were paid out in purple euros on the spot though (500 euro notes), so I still felt like I won. After busting the 5k I decided to play again and put in a really long session. Again, I got stuck some early (about 10k), then I went on a huge heater and booked a 23k win. The biggest pot went like this - I limp A3hhT9o in EP at 20/50 and end up calling a raise to 250, 5 players see a flop of 8h7d4d, which checks around. Turn Jh, BB leads pot of 1250, I raise to 5k, he ships it in (I had 19k to start the hand, he covered) and he calls with T9hh and two other cards that don't matter. He has 2 cards to win the hand, I have 5, and the river is the 3h, one of my money cards. Certainly a bit lucky there, I think I played quite well this session though.

The next day I played the 5k heads up tourney, which was one that I was looking forward to as I think my HU NL game is much stronger than my full ring game, especially live since I don't have to battle impatience/boredom in HU. The structure in this thing was awesome, best-of-3 in every round til the finals, which was best-of-5. The blinds went up every 15 minutes so it didn't take too long, it felt just right. My first opponent was a young guy who said he was a 25/50 HU reg online pre-Black Friday, and he played pretty well imo. He beat me in match 1 but I rallied to win the last 2 and advance. In round 2 I played Galen Hall and sucked out on him pretty badly to win match 1 with all the money (~240bb) going in on a 765 flop with me holding 76 vs his 43; I turned a 7. Action went check-bet-raise-3bet-4bet-shove-I call, which I think was too much, although from my limited knowledge of him I thought he could get pretty solidly out of line. Anyway, I won pretty quickly more legitimately in match 2 to move on to round 3. There, I played a German guy named Moritz. We split matches 1 and 2 and then got to 300/600 blinds in match 3 (12k starting stacks). I was down to my last 1500 chips before a poker TV show-esque run where I won a few 50/50 / 60/40-type hands, lost some back, and then ended up winning it. With that I was in the final 4 and had my first ever live tournament cash (seriously, I'm like 1-for-22 or so now).

I got some sleep and came back at noon the next day. My first opponent was James Akenhead. He played much more aggressively than I expected and I returned the favor. In match 1 I 3bet J6cc, bet a 954 (1 club) flop, a 5c turn, and shoved for his stack on a 7c river. He called and showed A hi and I was up 1-0. In match 2, I 3bet A8ss to 700 (50/100 blinds, he raised to 200), he 4bet to 1750, and I called. Flop 842cc, I c/r allin, he calls with K8cc, and I hold. It was on to the finals, where I faced off against Andrew Lichtenberger aka luckychewy. Andrew was the one player in the field whom I really didn't want to face, as he has way more HUNL experience than me especially in the recent past. He beat me up pretty good in match 1, but I returned the favor in match 2. Match 3 went back and forth for a while before he took control and won it, and in match 4 I got grinded down before getting my last 4500 or so in with 99 vs AQ and losing. Andrew outplayed me and deserved to win, although he was the real fish because the next day he was supposed to go to El Bulli but slept in and missed his flight and couldn't get there. What a beat! Anyway, I was very happy with my second place finish.

I decided to play some PLO cash games after the final and dinner with Andrew at the restaurant as it was still only 9:30 or so. Unfortunately, the session was a disaster and I lost back about 27k, leaving me in the red for cash games on the trip. I just couldn't win a hand, starting with me getting it in with the nut flush vs top set on the turn for a 5500 euro pot and losing, and the biggest hits coming from a hand where I called a turn c/r to 5250 with KJT7sshh on a 6543sshh board and blanked and a straddled pot where I potted to 700 with AQ96cchh from the straddle, got 3 callers, and bet-called a Q62dd flop and ran into the good ol' QQo94ss from a guy who played about 10% VPIP, which was quite frustrating. Obviously, my sample size even playing the game for 4 nights and 15 hours or so comes out to only a few hundred hands, but it's still frustrating to lose anything in games that I feel like I have a big edge in. Still, I think I let impatience get the better of me at times and got into trouble with speculative hands that I should be folding preflop or playing slower, such as the AQ96 hand above, in which I should probably just check and see a flop. I'll probably dabble in the PLO games at the Rio some this summer, so despite my loss I'm glad I got some experience in the live, full-ring setting.

My cash game losses were mitigated some by a prop bet I made. In the PLO game one night I was chatting with a Finnish guy named Christian (sorry if I'm misspelling) and he asked me what percentage of stacks I thought needed to go in preflop to making shoving AA** on any flop profitable for the guy with AA. I said I thought it was around 20-25% or so, he thought lower, and after some negotiating we ended up with a game - 100 hands, each player starts each hand with 5 bets, he gets dealt random AA** and I get ****, with the stipulation that I can decide to pass and get a new hand if dealt A*** or a pair in my hand. After I get a playing hand, each player puts 1 bet in preflop, and AA** is obligated to pot any flop for 2 bets and shove any turn for another 2. I can decide to call, raise, or fold flop and call or fold turn with my hand (although raising flop is never the correct play). We started out playing for 100 euros per bet. I got stuck 24 bets early and he asked if I'd like to raise the stakes to 200 euros per bet. I thought I had a comfortable edge and agreed to bump up the stakes, so I halved the total on the scoresheet to 12 bets (now worth double). I got down as far as -45 bets at one point, but then went on a big heater where I won 16 out of 20 hands (and every one of my wins was the full 5 bet stack, whereas I could fold early) and ended up +46 bets when all was said and done. Some friends and I did some math on it after the fact and estimated that my edge is greater than 1 bet per hand, which seems like a lot but I think is feasible. I'd be curious to see where the breakeven point is and will probably work it out sometime soon when I have some free time, as it has real implications toward optimum play of AA** in PLO games.

With the prop bet win and the score in the HU tourney (46k euros), my trip ended up being quite profitable despite the loss in PLO cash. My next play will be at the WSOP; I'm planning on heading out in early June and playing most of the 10k events and trying to win a bracelet and some cash. As for other post-Black Friday plans, basically I'm just not rushing into anything yet. My girlfriend is doing a college program in NYC this fall and it's still my intent to live there, although I'm less sure about how I'll be spending my time. I'm considering making some trips down to Atlantic City to play some live poker, any advice on the state of the games down there would be awesome. Also if anyone knows any NYC private games that are looking for some fresh blood, hit me up :)

Brian