Imperial Poker 101 Tournament

Played last week in the Imperial 101 Poker Tournament at the Imperial Palace in Las Vegas.

Despite the fact that I finished just outside the money, I played some of my best poker ever.

The structure of this tournament was very good and there were some tough players. Approximatley 353 actual players when nearly 500 were expected. My table and seat assignment were excellent in that the table I was at on the first dau was the last table to break.

For the most part, I spent most of the first day just staying out of the way of the Big stacks and the calling stations. In the last hour of the first day I caught the right cards and managed to double up twice. At the end of the first day, I was 17th out of about 120 players remainining.

Day 2 began fairly uneventful and I continued to build my stack. About 3 hours in I caught pocket Kings and bet them up and got all of my money in to lose to a set of Jacks. Out in 31st place. The ironic thing is had I of pondered my hand another 15 to 30 seconds, I would have finished in the money as almost immediately after I went out three others were out from another table.

My nature is to constantly play to win, so I sometimes forget that getting my money back is a win of sorts as well, which is what I would have done if I had waited. I felt I had the best hand and I played it out and lost. This was a race of sorts and this time I lost. My hand was the best hand up until the river.

Congratulations to Allen Kessler winning first place of $51,619.00.