The following is a slightly edited rewrite of a note I wrote the day after my best ever finish (monetarily) in an online tournament, which occurred on Sunday, December 14th, 2008.

So yesterday (Sunday) I decided to wait to bake cookies and do the dishes until after Ian got up; with all the banging around, I figured it was the least I could do. Plus, this gave me a built in excuse to do something quiet - play internet poker. I figured I would enter my last tournament around the 1 pm kick off of the Redskins game, which would be the earliest Ian would emerge from the bedroom, and take care of the random things I needed or wanted to do after I busted out of the tournament.

The best laid plans often do not go according to plan.

Eight hours later, I finally busted out of the tournament. It is telling of our relationship that this poker marathon didn't irritate Ian one little bit (or if it did, he certainly hid it well). Anyway, there were a couple of hands I felt were key. I almost busted quite early (well before places started getting paid, which started at 810th place) when I ended up all in with pocket 10s vs big slick (Ace/King). I was relatively short stacked, and so opted to push with this hand after a standard 3BB raise from the player UTG, and everyone folded around to the original raiser, who called. When both the flop and the turn produced a king, I figured I was toast, but when I spiked a 10 on the river I realized, after the chips had already been sent my way, that the resulting full house beat his trips. Catching that two outer allowed me to stay in and rebuild my chip stack.

In my next big hand, I ended up with A/Q in the big blind. UTG raised a standard amount, and everyone folded to me, and I called. I opted for the call here rather than a reraise because of the position of the raiser, wanting to play cautiously under what I assumed was a pretty strong hand; the big pairs down to Jacks, possibly A/K through A/J. In retrospect, I might have wanted to attempt to raise him off the hand; A/Q is a strong hand, but can be tricky to play post flop (as was the case here), and if he didn't have a premium pair I might have been able to scare him off. Still, I called, and the flop came Ace, Jack, Ten. I bet (around half the pot, I think), and he raised all-in. A scary decision, as Ace/King, Ace/Jack, Ace/Ten, or Js or Tens would have me beat (as would aces, but the odds of that, with one on the board and one in my hand, seemed minuscule). I had top pair, second best kicker, and a gut shot straight draw, but what could he have? Two pair or trips scared me, but I decided that his most likely holding was pocket Kings, rationalizing that if he (or she) had actually flopped either two pair or a set he'd bet lower to keep me around. I don't like this rationale as much now - while there were no flush draws that I recall, there was certainly a blindingly obvious straight draw, so someone with two pair or a set very well could opt to push to punish a possible draw. Still, I decided I wasn't beat, took a deep breath and clicked the call button, and was elated when he turned over Ace...9. This hand allowed me to start playing with a relatively large stack, which is definitely a good thing.

I ended up with enough chips to survive a long dry spell at one point. Otherwise, the next couple of hours seemed to be a steady progression of waves - I would peak, then lose a bit, then surge back with my next peak being higher than the last. I was helped a couple of times by short stacks that I called (with proper pot odds to do so) who didn't catch what they needed on the board (or I did). I was also helped immensely by a dream hand - small blind, and the antes were such that it was mathematically correct to call with just about any two cards, so I called with 5/3 suited and the big blind didn't raise, allowing me to see the flop cheaply. The flop - 3, 3, 3. Quads, and when I checked-called his flop raise, then check-called his turn raise all-in, I suddenly had a very healthy stack.

It was a pretty weird experience for me at that point. I've won online tournaments before, but only small ones. My best place in a largish tournament to that point was 3rd place in a 180 person tournament. I had never even gotten into the money in one of these giant tourneys before, and had never played with over 1 million in chips. The growing potential to actually win such a large tournament would seem, to me, to confirm that I have at least some vague idea of what I'm doing, poker wise. You do not win a tournament that size on blind luck alone. Alas, it was not to be. Down to two tables, and I'm in third or fourth place overall. The table is pretty tight, with most pots being won preflop or on a bet after the flop. I'm in the big blind with Q/8 offsuit, and the small blind, a pesky guy who has seemed to be catching cards against me since we ended up on this table, just completes the small blind. I decide that Q/8 is good enough to try to push him off, so I raise 3 times the big blind, and he calls. The flop - Q/9/8. Two pair, which is pretty close to a dream flop. My memory is a little fuzzy, but I think the betting sequence went like this - he checked, I bet, he raised, I reraised all in, and he called with...Jack/Ten. This hand didn't bust me, as I had more chips than the other guy, but it did cripple my stack, as I lost around 1.75 million. I managed to hang around until the final table and was the first to bust from that group for 9th place and a payout of just under $200. I outlasted 5,571 other players, making final table when there were 620 tables to start.

A disappointing result, given how close I came to potentially making top three, or even winning, but not if you consider that I could have easily busted out of the money all together. Luck is a factor, and this was the one hand where the luck didn't break in my favor. It had in other hands, or I had missed flops in pots that couldn't cripple me. All in all, I thought I played very solid poker for a relative amateur. I obviously wished I had finished higher, and that I had gotten around to baking those Christmas cookies, but all in all it was a great learning experience if I'm serious about getting good at poker. And I think I am.