Game of two halves

After crashing out of the staff-punters challenge on Wednesday night, I was faced with the usual question: Should I stay or should I go ?

I generally take the train to London now. I drive occasionally, and about one time in 10 is enough to remind me why I don't do it. Traffic, parking, congestion charge and the cost are all against the car option. It also takes longer to drive. What's more, I can sleep on the train and 45minutes sleep on the return journey is pretty much all I get on a poker night!

The one key advantage of driving is that I can always get home whenever I finish playing. The fact is that I am rarely finished in time for the last train.

This leaves me with only one option: play through the night until the trains start again. As the main downside to the public transport route, it's not the worst thing ever !

On Wednesday, I could have made it to the last train if I'd left straight away. However, I wanted to see how the teams would get on and I also wanted to take another crack at the Omaha game.

I thought maybe I'd play for 45mins or so, then get the very last train home. Well, I remember that being in my mind but it's hard to see how that was ever likely.

If I started off well then I would want to "play the rush", plus I wouldn't want to hit'n'run. If I did badly, then I wouldn't want to leave straight away either.

It didn't start all that well !

After initially taking down some smallish pots, I proceeded to get into two large confrontations where I had the best of it. As is typical in Omaha, when a lot of money goes in on the flop, the made hand and the draw generally both have a lot of equity.

I could easily have won both of these, but they were hardly bad beats. I didn't think I had played badly - both times I got my money in first and got it in as slight favourite. However, maybe I should have tried to play smaller pots until I could get my chips in as the clear frontrunner.

It is typical of my style that I tend to get into rapidly escalating pots. This does make for a very exciting game, of course, especially when others take the same approach.

So, £700 down in fairly quick order. I pulled up another £500 and determined to wait for the right spot.

The first time this happened, I raised the straddle with KK66-double suited and this was re-raised to £60 and called in one spot before me. I flat called on the button. The flop was T84 with 2 clubs. It was checked to me so with the over pair, 2nd nut flush draw and position, I bet £150.

The pre-flop re-raiser folded, so that felt good. The other player called with 7543 - bottom pair with a back-door flush and gusthot straight draw. A brave call on the flop, perhaps putting me on a draw only or an outright button steal. Nice £60 call pre-flop as well !

Anyway, the straight hit right away, and the 7-high flush came in on the river just to rub it in.

OK ...

Kings-double suited not good enough ? So the next time, I re-raised to £62 on the button with AAQQ-with hearts.

The flop came out Q63rainbow. I check-raised all in with top set, over-pair and the backdoor nut flush draw.

My opponent called with 7542, and his low wrap hit straightaway. The board didn't pair, so that was another £500 gone.

It was an awkward time now. I had missed my chance to get the last train, and I'd also lost as much as I wanted to in one session. On the other hand, as you can tell, it was a very good game.

I am relatively good at not just chasing and chasing when I'm losing, but I found £100 left in my wallet and elected to fire one more bullet. I won a little, and then almost immediately I lost half my chips when a pretty well-judged (I thought) bluff on the river was called by sixes-up. That'll teach me to try to bluff Mo.

£60 left. The blinds are £1-2 with a near-mandatory £5 straddle and with players like Dharm in the game, it is commonly £18 minimum to see a flop.

I needed a change of luck and I got it ! I jammed my chips in pre-flop in a raised pot with a big pair, which held and gave me some chips to work with.

After that, things just worked out much better. I really started motoring when I saw an unraised flop with 88xx. The flop came 8s6c5c. With top set on a very connected board, I opted to lead out for £20 which was called in three spots.

Does that mean no-one has the straight yet ? That is my assumption but it's really hard to tell how people are playing, I find.

The turn was an offsuit Queen. Unless someone just made a set of Queens, it changes nothing really. I bet £75. Now Chinese Tim - on tilt from the previous hand - moves all in. Not great, and I don't like it much when Scottish Rob puts all his chips in as well.

Still, Rob only had about £100 so I am playing a decent side-pot against Tim. It's about £180 more to call and I presumably have outs even if one or both have the straight.

The river is the Queen of clubs ! We didn't see the other hands and my 8s-full is good enough for the lot.

There were some fantastic hands - like when I rivered the nut full house on a flush board and I was bet into ! There were some downswings too - e.g. when I flopped the nuts on a 554 board only to lose to 56 in Mike Tse's hand. I bet the flop and turn (6) and check-called £125 on the river (4). I was only losing to 56 and 66 but it's Omaha so you have to believe they may have it.

I didn't try moving all-in to represent 44 or 66 myself ! Maybe it would have worked, but I didn't want to put in £500 to test it.

My luck was certainly running. I remember seeing a QT7 flop with AKJ7 in my hand. I checked, to face a £75 bet by Disco Dave and a call. With a 13-card wrap to the nuts, I elected to move in for an effective £250 bet (the largest of the opposing stacks).

There were two clubs on board (I had just one club) but I decided to view this as an opportunity to get the chips in with what I thought was good equity.

What I didn't know was that Dave had AAKK with clubs, and the other players had some of the wrap cards as well.

Still, it didn't matter as the non-club Jack fell and the river blanked. £600 pot, ship it!

Another lucky hand developed with I called a 3-bet with JJ66 against what I thought were obvious Aces. The flop came T65. I check-raised the £65 bet to £200. The other fella obviously thought I was at it and moved in for £350 more.

I still put him on Aces, and didn't see how I could pass now, so I called pretty quickly. A 9 on the turn completed some straights, and I really hated the Ace on the river but my set was good (he had KKxx).

This was a huge pot, and the tilt factor was good for another few hundred later in the evening.

My stack ebbed and flowed somewhat, but there was no doubt that I was running well.

We now reached the stage in proceedings where I couldn't leave. Not because I couldn't get home, but because I didn't want to break the game ! Eventually, we ran out of players and the game came to a halt at about 11:30 the next morning.

So, £60 to £2,200. That's a pretty good spin up. If only I hadn't started out by turning £1,300 into £60 to begin with it would have been fantastic ! Why does Omaha have to be so exciting. Well, probably that's why we play ...