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Posted Thu Apr 28, 2005 11:59 am GMT by Geno
One of the largest UK poker tournaments kicks off on May 8th at Oxford University and yours truly has managed to get himself a seat! The event will seat 200 players and has a fairly low buy-in as officially it is a student based event. There is the usual unlimited first hour rebuys and an add-on so the prize pool should be about $20,000 with about $7,500 to the winner. The top student also gets $2,000 because the event will house quite a few pros:
Confirmed guests include:
‘The Fossilman’ Greg Raymer, Jac Arama, Al Alvarez, Dave Colclough, Malcolm ‘The Rock’ Harwood, Catman, Anthony Holden, Jon Shoreman, Ashley Hames, Bruce ‘Elvis Senior’ Atkinson, Debbie Berlin, Dave Welch, Ed Giddens, Sir Clive Sinclair and Matthew Stevens!
Unconfirmed:
Devilfish, Marcel Luske, Tony ‘The Hitman’ Hakki, Simon ‘Aces’ Trumper, Marty Wilson, Jesse May, Paul Alterman and Roy ‘The Boy’ Brindley!
Obviously Raymer being there is pretty cool so now I'm just praying for Devilfish and Luske to turn up. I'll try and get pictures of the more famous guys and post them on the forum but hopefully I'll be too busy winning the top prize to do that 
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Posted Mon May 09, 2005 9:13 am GMT by Geno
Trip report time :D
First of all : Sunday 9th May 2005 - first time I ever got out of bed on a Sunday before lunch. That's never happening again 
So I drive the 80 miles to Oxford and after taking a wrong turn and a 20 mile detour somewhere around Newbury I arrive at the hotel 15mins before my pre-registered seat is thrown open to all comers. Luckily I make it, pay my £20 entry ($38) and go park the car. A MILE AWAY. God damn, there is nowhere to park a car in the tourist trap that is Oxford town! So many Jap tourists with cameras are flying around in sightseeing groups, I am hard pushed not to commit a vehicular homicide a number of times as they flagrantly ignore the traffic light colours (does a red man mean blindly walk forwards in Japan or something?!)
After parking and nearly falling over at the cost of 8hrs parking (£8 - $15!) I walk the mile back into town and have 2hrs to kill as the tourney does not start until 3pm. At 2.15 I can take no more of the tourist throng in Oxford and head to the hotel to wait inside. It's already pretty busy and I spot a few pros including Al Alvarez, Jac Arama, Dave Colclough and Mad Marty. They let us into the main room at 2.45 and start telling us what is what.
The main room has 20 tables and a side room 5 additional tables as the field is 244 players. I am in the side room but am required to sit thru the 30 min pre-amble as they explain the rules and introduce all the pros and celebs in great detail. About 3.15pm I head to the side room and take my seat.
Well, my first table is ALL chumps except one oriental lady who clearly knows what she is doing (reminded me a lot of Connie in Vegas but this time I was wise to her ways!). Levels begin at 30 mins and start at 25/25 with 1000 chips. There are unlimited rebuys if under 500 chips for the first 60 mins and an add-on thereafter.
I fold the whole of level one. Every single hand. I think I see one Ace in this time and a pair of 2s which is raised UTG prompting me to fold. The table is rattling me badly and mentally I am all over the place. We have mis-deals, mis-shuffles (this tourney is self-dealt), general slowness and I have a German to my left who will not shut the f*ck up and keeps wittering in my ear. My Caesar's Palace silver dollar card protector keeps him quiet for a few moments as I let him hold onto it but once the amusement wears off, he starts yapping again........
Level two is similar to level one but I at least steal a few blinds this time instead of folding them all. Cards are colder than an eskimos freezer and I wonder what the hell I have done to deserve this. We hit 60 mins and I take the add-on to put me on 1775 chips with 50/100 blinds up next after a break. The tourney can really start now.
Half way thru level three I pick up KK in MP with 1100 chips and raise it up. Random chump re-raises me all in and I call. He shows QTo and I double up which is a relief. At the end of level 3 we are moved into the main room but remain as a table. Some of level 4 is wasted with them changing our chips up because the side room chips are different to the main room ones. This rattles me a bit but I get past it and pick up KK again shortly afterwards. I double up against the only player other than the oriental lady that I rate and he busts on the next hand. I feel bad for about 5 seconds and then get back to it. Almost immediately our table splits and I am moved to a new table.
I sit down with my new cohorts and the chinese guy opposite me has a name tag of 'Geno'. I laugh for too long to myself when I notice this and everyone immediately brands me as unhinged in their heads I can tell. This table is crazy, we have 3 people aged 50+ who can't play for shit and I start rubbing my hands together because they are all minted. I quickly double up off one with TT after she overplays a shoddy hand against a benign flop of all undercards for me. I stay at this table for a while longer until I get moved as BB to a new table. We are about 4hrs in at this point.
New table again and I sit to a table of mostly even stacks who all play pretty solid poker. We play cat and mouse for the next hour with no-one really making any headway and very few people busting out. The tourney has about 100 players left and the blinds are 500/1000 with my ~12000 stack starting to feel the pinch. I decide it is time for some affirmative action and start stealing like a madman. It pays off and I double up my stack before the blinds hit 600/1200 and decide to calm down again. 6hrs in and we are down to about 60 players and I am about at the average chip count.
Final break is over and the blinds hit 1500/3000. People begin to drop at an increased rate but with our tight table, the chips just get shoved from player to player really with little movement overall. The blinds start to go up and up and at about 10pm (7hrs in) I start to really feel the pinch. We hit the 6000/12000 soon after and I have only about 30000 chips. We pass the 40 players mark and are told that the top 18 will be paid. I sit tight and play smart, stealing with position raises and generally staying out of trouble. People are now dropping quickly and soon we are down to 3 tables.
With blinds about to jump to 7500/15000 to my 45000 stack, things are looking sketchy and I just continue to play smart. The bubble comes and goes and we hit 2 tables and suddenly I have Mad Marty to my left. He is a cool guy and breathes some life back into the stressed table but he fairly quickly busts out giving one guy a massive chip lead. The chip leader luckily is moved to the other table soon aftewards when 2 players bust out on one hand and we are down to 14 players.
I'm desperate now, I've got only 25000 chips and I am in the BB knowing I am calling with anything. I pick up Ac7c and feel pretty good when a guy outside the blinds declares all in. Obviously I call without hesitation but the final guy to act who has less chips than me ALSO goes all-in. Crap, now I am worried as hell. All-in guy flips Kc6c, I flip my Ac7c and the other flips Ah8d. Disaster surely?! Flop brings an Ace and A8 takes the pot but my A7 holds up against the K6 and I win the side pot which is a measly 10500 chips. Still, I live to fight another day and after another all-in in the small blind with Ax I have 28000 chips. One guy quickly goes out from each table leaving us with 12 players followed by another from ours shortly after leaving us 11. The final table will be 9 players as we will have the tournament director as dealer.
Eleven players left and I badly want to make the final table. I call a short stack all-in with AJs and he sucks out on me with QTo. It takes my legs out and I cannot cover the big blind when it arrives shortly afterwards. Of course, we are down to 10 now and I am about to miss the final table surely? The blind sets me all-in and a guy out of the blinds goes all-in leaving my incomplete BB, his bet and the SB which is not a bad stack if I win. I flip 57o to his Ax and make a straight out of nowhere. He barely feels the dent but I live on and make the final table!
11.30pm - FINAL TABLE
We take a short break while they cash the 100 chips for 1000s and 5000s and I sit with about 40,000 chips (average ~75000). The blinds are reduced to 3000/6000 to avoid a crapshoot and a running ante of 300 starts. There are two stacks slightly lower than me, one huge stack and the rest are all middling.
First hand I pick up MP is AA - the first time I have seen it all day - and I raise 3xBB. Everyone looks, everyone folds. Doh. I go on to take 5 of the first 9 hands and give myself a pretty good table image from the start. We don't see a flop for the first 20 hands at least as people fold to most raises and a few all-ins are made. Eventually, one is called and 9th place busts out for £120 ($226). 8th follows soon after (£240 - $452) and the blinds go up to 4500/9000 with a 500 ante.
7th place busts out after a while for £360 ($678) but I have had to let a few blinds go after some all-in raises with rag cards and with six players left and I am about 5th in chips. I steal when I can but don't make much headway and after 6th busts out for £480 ($903) and the blinds go up to 6000/12000 I am in dire straits. I get rag after rag until the BB hits me and I go all-in with A4o. I am called by the chip leader with K6o who flops a 6 and turns a K leaving me drawing dead. I finish at 12:30am after 9hrs of play in 5th place for £720 ($1,355).
I am happy with 5th in a 244 player field but last night was kinda bummed at going so close to getting my name on the trophy and the £4,200 ($7,905) for 1st place but missing. I stayed to watch the rest and the chip leader who busted me came 4th after taking a horrible beat for 75% his stack and some random guys I hadn't really been aware of contest the last 3. They were all solid players, just nothing worth shouting about unlike the 4th place guy who I think was probably a less famous pro who covertly entered the tourney. I was presented with the prize and had my picture taken for god knows which website (I'll find out). I get home just after 3am with no-one to tell my story to and am supposed to be on study today but decided I couldn't face getting up at 6:30am after going to bed at 3:30am so I'm having the day off! I hope my boss doesn't read this........
8)
Posted Mon May 09, 2005 9:24 am GMT by Dave B
Nice work Geno!
I am stoked for my live tourney next week. I think Jonnyboy is playing too.
$125+$25, 500 people, 5 groups of 100, top 20 advance to final day. $50k in prize money and a WSOP seat.
Final table should be a nice payout. Jonnyboy is hot off his 4th place finish in the PP freeroll, nothing will stop him now (unless I do).
Posted Mon May 09, 2005 9:31 am GMT by Skribbles
Congrats!
Posted Mon May 09, 2005 9:40 am GMT by ScanX
hey very nice andy :)
so no luske ? no devilfish ? no raymer ?
Posted Mon May 09, 2005 9:58 am GMT by ballbp
Nice work. Good to hear you made it that far with that type of field.
Posted Mon May 09, 2005 10:31 am GMT by Geno
| ScanX wrote: | hey very nice andy 
so no luske ? no devilfish ? no raymer ? |
Unfortunately the pro turnout was way down on what they expected. Raymer missed it because he qualified for the semi-final of some London tourney which he played instead and the other two were only possibilities anyway 
Posted Mon May 09, 2005 11:06 am GMT by Jernej Zorec
Very nice finish Geno
Posted Mon May 09, 2005 12:20 pm GMT by Dias
Geno, excellent work!
Nice way to stay tough and get in that final table.
Posted Mon May 09, 2005 12:24 pm GMT by Tulip
WOOOTTT!!!! great story and very nice finish. Now I can go off to clean my stupid kitchen and smile..thanks for the link.
Posted Tue May 10, 2005 12:24 pm GMT by Geno
It's official
http://www.universitypokerleague.com/id-16/area-5_99.html
Also some pics from the official site of the day :D
Receiving my prize from Joe Barnard the Poker Society president.
Final table action.
Final table action.....deep in thought for some reason despite having no cards
Posted Tue May 10, 2005 12:31 pm GMT by Always_Bored
you can smoke inside?! damn i miss those days.
Posted Tue May 10, 2005 12:38 pm GMT by age_of_sages
I was noticing that too, except I was thinking "like hell you'll ever catch me playing there"
Posted Tue May 10, 2005 1:05 pm GMT by Geno
I passively smoked about 100 cigarettes that day. The guy who was to my right for at least an hour and a half literally chained his way thru at least 20 cigarettes on his own while half the table smoked too. I got used to it after a while.......Tulip woulda loved it 
Posted Tue May 10, 2005 1:37 pm GMT by zeroswarm
Very well played, Geno.
Lucky I wasn't there else u would have passively smoked an extra 40 cigarettes. If my chips lasted that long of course!
Nice 1!
Posted Tue May 10, 2005 1:52 pm GMT by golddog
Well done, Geno!
Posted Tue May 10, 2005 2:10 pm GMT by Tulip
ugh no cant be around smokers for a bit...I am hanging in by a thread. Mind you I did manage to make it through a huge fight with andy last night WITHOUT a smoke...
go me
Posted Wed May 11, 2005 12:13 pm GMT by AAceman
very nice story geno!
thanks for taking the time to write it.
Made the living hell i work in a bit easier to bear for a while.
Working at a bank is very boring.
....
Well keep up the good work,
too bad those Aces didnt triple u up
Greets from Holland
Posted Wed May 11, 2005 12:29 pm GMT by wEbMaStEr
mmmmmmmmmm smokinggggggg 
Well done Andy! Was a superb effort! and a pretty good story to boot 
Posted Wed May 11, 2005 2:26 pm GMT by BeerWench13
Well done, Geno! Of course I was expecting the climax to be that you won the thing, but I always expect too much out of everyone.
Good story too. I love how you convert pounds to dollars for us stupid Americans.
I'm torn on the smoking thing, though. I'm glad that you can't smoke in the Trop. I think I'd go through about 3 packs per session if I could. I usually end up "passively smoking" about a 1/2 pack during the 4-5 hours that I play in our weekly game. Put that figure in my average of 14 hours per session in the casino and I'm a chimney.
Posted Wed May 11, 2005 2:40 pm GMT by Always_Bored
im for and against smoking. I like it when im there and want a cigarette but afterwards my lungs thank me for not smoking :D
Posted Thu Mar 30, 2006 6:18 pm GMT by Geno
Thread resurrection time.
Oxford Cup V is on April 30th this year and I have once again bagged a seat (it's 90% sure) so expect a trip report in a few weeks which will probably read:
Went to Oxford, busted out first hand after the add-on. F*ck.
Posted Fri Mar 31, 2006 8:36 am GMT by BeerWench13
You're such a glass-is-half-full kind of guy.
We'll be rooting for you.
Posted Sat Apr 29, 2006 3:13 pm GMT by Geno
Tomorrow is the day and I'm a little nervous which is very gay of me. Report here in 24hrs or less 
Posted Sun Apr 30, 2006 4:36 pm GMT by Geno
Oxford Cup V - 30th April 2006
Trip report time, strap in tight for the wild ride that is my once yearly big UK tourney attempt. Last year 5th/244, this year................
I get up at 7am ( ) and head off at 7.45am to be in Oxford by 10.15 to confirm my seat. Play is set to begin at 11 with players seated by 10.30. Oxford, as even you yanks know, is famous for its University and old buildings so the city council in their infinite wisdom have decreed that basically you cannot park within about half a mile of anywhere useful. They have also decreed that your wallet will be raped when parking for even the shortest amount of time. How dare you use a car there!
I pull into the car park at 9am and head to the parking tariffs board to see what the damage is in 2006 and find out that it is £17.30 to park for 8+ hours which is what I will no doubt be doing unless I bust out early. To put that in perspective for those of you that work in dollars, that is $31.56 at today's exchange rate. Obscene or what? Anyhow, I head to the venue and register fine. 10.30 comes and goes and lots of people are still arriving and registering so looks like it's gonna be delayed. 11.30 arrives and we are told it's gonna start soon with 335 players. Great, glad I got up early.........
Play kicks off at noon with 90mins of rebuys to follow and an add-on. Blinds are 25/50 in level one with a 2,000 starting stack and 30min levels all day. I am drawn on table 31 which is not in the main room which can only accommodate about 28 tables so just like last year, I am in a side room of 8 tables to start. The game begins and as usual I want to cry as this is a self-dealt student tourney and there are some seriously green players here. Misdeals are again rife and generally I'm getting annoyed pretty quick.
Tables are 10 handed but 3 of our table are absent. Add to that the fact that 3 of the players here are over 40, blatantly ringers and ALL know one another and it's not the best of places to start. They soft play each other to the point where it is getting ridiculous and chips really don't move about much. We lose a player after 30mins who arrived with £20 in his pocket (why come to a £20 rebuy with £20 total?!) and I go grab the tourney director begging for him to break our table or bring us 3 players. He obliges with 3 new players and we finally have a table going.
After the first 30mins, I've done very little really. I get myself all-in with ATo on a T high flop and double up on some guy calling with a gutshot so I have a few chips early on but I'm sitting on them to avoid the donks. Nearing the hour mark, this smug Cambridge University guy who was one of the 3 new guys gets crippled by the old lady ringer after making a donk play and then goes all-in for about 1/2 my stack. I look down at see Aces in MP and go over the top trying to exhibit a weak hand that I am protecting. No-one is buying it except Cambridge guy who proudly flips over his Queens and says "I'm ahead" before seeing my bullets. F*ck you Mr Clever
The third level is 75/150 and passes without much action from me. I top up at the break for 2000 and sit with about 5500 after the rebuys end. That is better than last year and I consider myself to be in pretty good shape given that our table did not rebuy very much. Best of all, I'm only in for the buy-in + add-on so it's a cheap day if it all goes wrong on the next hand.
I kill the 30min break wandering about Oxford (it's boring being at a tourney and knowing no-one) and then we hit the freezeout period. Fairly early on we lose a player and a new guy arrives who plays tight as a duck's arse from the off. Half way thru level 4 I pick up AQo in MP and raise it up pre-flop. Tight new guy calls and the maniac old lady ringer calls. I have the tight guy on AK here and the old lady on any two cards so my plan is to bet any flop and fold to any raise. The flop obliging comes with an ugly KT5 giving me nothing but Ace high and a gutshot. I am first to act and fire out 5xBB. The tight guy f*cks up a min raise effort and can only call to avoid string betting while the loose old lady just calls. I KNOW he has AK now and I just pray for the Jack on the turn. Turn is a 4 so of course I check. Tight guy checks and the old lady checks and the river is a lovely Jack giving me the nuts. I shove all-in after some acting and the tight guy makes the crying call for all his chips after much thought. The old lady folds and he does indeed show AK. Two lessons learnt there - how to never string bet again, and how to not get smart and slow play AK to try and get chips off me. I felt bad when I hit the J and busted him but the more I thought about it, it was his fault
Level 5 comes and half way thru our table is broken and I head into the main room. I sit with some much higher quality players now but knock out a guy with about 3/5 my stack when he calls my Aces with KT. It makes my stack quite nice which is just as well as I feel outclassed by a couple of the guys at this new table. Crazy shit happens in the next 10mins and suddenly our table is at 6 players and gets broken so I'm off again. This time I sit at a very mixed table with Alan Rutter 3 to my left. He is the pro guy who came 4th last year and busted me in 5th. I seek revenge................
I sit at this table for quite some time thru level 6 and then level 7 after another break. During level 7 a shorty goes all-in and I call with QJs in the BB for about 1/5 my stack. He shows 67o and bows out giving me a few more chips to play with. I'm hovering around the average or just above now.
At the end of level 7, I do a very stupid thing indeed. With 14,000 in chips, I am in the BB (1000) with 34o. UTG goes all-in for 3,300, a player with less in MP goes all-in and the SB calls. I make the call of course and there is about 4,000 in the side pot. The board shows 3678T so I muck knowing I am beaten. As it transpires, my 3 was good for the side pot but because I mucked prior to seeing anyone's cards, I cannot play it. 4,000 chips go another way instead of to me. What a donk. I regroup, ignore it and move along.
EDIT - the more I think about this I must be recalling it wrong. I only remember calling the UTG bet but somehow the girl in the SB to my right ended up with a side pot which should have gone to the UTG guy who showed a 9. I think they stitched him up and made me think I'd mucked a winning hand to her AQo. Either way it doesn't matter
Side note - Alan Rutter busted a few hands after my donkage when he called the table chip leader with 77 and lost to A5. Granted he took a beat but he made a really shitty move calling for no reason there and that was that.
Level 8 is 700/1500 and I have about 10,000 in chips so it's not looking too wonderful. I make a few small moves and our table is broken AGAIN. I head off to my 4th table, play 3 hands and it is broken also. At my 5th table, I hit some really big stacks and some seemingly good players. We get about 15mins of play in before a 30min break and with 13,500 chips, I'm in trouble as the blinds in level 9 will be 1000/2000. I head out for a break basically deciding that shoving is the way forward and the first decent hand is going in. I'm at a great table for it given that there are some huge stacks if the cards can just hold up............
30mins passes and we head back in. I am the 2,000 BB on hand #1 after the break and a player with about 15,000 shoves in MP. It folds round to me and I look down at AKo. I make the call figuring at worst it's a race and at best I have him dominated. He flips over AQo and I am looking good for the double thru to put me in a nice chip position going forward. The flop comes blank, blank, Queen and I get no more love. AK loses to AQ and I am out in about 85th place. God damnit
I head out on my trek to the car and an 'amusing' incident tops off my day nicely. Allow me to regale it:
I'm walking down the street when right in front of me, there is a tramp being given some change by two girls. As I walk past him (he is on foot) he starts begging to me. I'm pretty pissed at this point and in the middle of writing a text message so I tell him NO in no uncertain terms twice as I walk past at a faster pace. He quickens his pace to catch up with me and says "Street crime". I turn to him and say "What the f*ck did you just say to me?" to which he replies "It's what I have to resort to sometimes". As you can imagine, this is red rag to a bull so I tell him to go f*ck himself and get the hell away from me. He starts on about how I am mean so I turn to him and say (am I a genius or what?) "Get the f*ck away from me you disease ridden little c*nt" and walk off. I guess I'm lucky he didn't stab me at this point or take a swing but he was this ratty little bastard that even I could have taken on and frankly, he deserved what he got from me. Needless to say this did not lighten my mood from the AK incident and with paying £17.30 to get my car out the car park, I left Oxford in the sourest of places mentally. Here's to next year.............
Posted Sun Apr 30, 2006 6:32 pm GMT by NickHow
| Geno wrote: | | I kill the 30min break wandering about Oxford (it's boring being at a tourney and knowing no-one) and then we hit the freezeout period. |
I probably should have got back to you before you left really. Still I intend to make the effort next year.
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