Me and Clara went to the european deepstack tournament in Prague last week. I played one of their events in Vienna last summer and took 10th place. This event had about 400 entries. There has also been an event in Dublin in early february which had about 800 runners. So you can imagine that I was pretty disappointedto see only 140 starters in the main event.
But let’s start from the beginning. We decided to take the bus from Vienna to Prague. I think the decision was a very good one
. We had leather seats, touchscreen entertainment system, power supplies and wifi. We also booked our room in advance, which was pretty convenient and cheap. The hotel was great, despite the high prices for beverages.
On my first night I jumped right into a 2/5 cashgame. The dealer told me I had to post to play and since I was UTG I decided to straddle. Someone raised and I called. I flopped Broadway with my
:Q, got the money in on a blanked turn and saw my first stack vanished against a rivered full house. GG, nice start. I managed to break even right before the table broke and decided to take a good night’s sleep before the main event.
The main event was over pretty soon. I lost some chips with ![]()
vs ![]()
and ![]()
vs ![]()
. From then on nothing eventful happend until the last hand before the break. I had my poker-player’s dream. Blinds were 100/200. MP opened to 500. I 3-bet to 1400. The button cold 4-bet to 3600 and the BB went all in for 45k. MP went all in for 47k. Now it was my turn looking down at my ![]()
and pushed my stack in the middle. The button folded. BB had ![]()
, MP had ![]()
. Flop brought the
and my dream turned into a nightmare. No help and I hit the rail. Out in level four.
My girlfriend and I decided to get an hour of great thai massage and went to the city to had some traditional chech food. When we came back around 10p.m. there was still no cashgame running. WTH? I had to wait an hour so I could play for about 4 more hours until the table broke again. I turned a little profit and went to bed again.
The next day we went sightseeing in Prague but that really wasn’t for us. Prague looks a lot like Vienna, only older. And even all the tourist guides didn’t offer anything of interest to us so we went back to the hotel so I could register for the 300€ side event. Which didn’t run, since there weren’t enough players. Mhh.. They started a 100€ one rebuy tournament which really didn’t look attractive at all. So we went back to our room and came back later so I could play some cashgame. But oh surprise, even at 7 p.m. there was no cashgame to be found. But the 100€ tournament was still up for late reg so we got weak and bought in. I refused to take the rebuy and just wanted to play until the cashgame started. Clara bought in as well and took the rebuy. I busted after about 2 levels, right when a juicy 2/5 table started. Straddles, restraddles and a 25€ 7-2 Bounty. Combined with some young swedish players the table looked pretty promising. But after losing my set of Queens against my opponents top pair, top kicker in a 1500€ pot it went south until I was stuck almost 1500€. But my mood got way brighter when I heard that all players were in the money and Clara was still sitting there with three guys from belgium, denmark and israel. Nice job. She even took 2nd after losing a coinflip to her danish opponent. Well done!
Right when she came to my table I got my stack in preflop with ![]()
vs ![]()
and spiked a king on the flop. A little after that I found another dream spot when one guy straddled to 10, the next guy decided to put up a re-straddle to 20 and the button opened to 80. I looked down at ![]()
in the small blind. I squeezed to 200. The button didn’t take long and shoved in his 800€ when it was folded to him. I snapped, and raked in a nice pot when he turned over ![]()
and didn’t improve.
We left around 5.a.m. slept in and chillaxed the entire sunday at the spa and in the city. There were no cashgames and I didn’t bring my laptop. A poker-free sunday. That was new
.
We traveled back on monday morning. Despite returning to Vienna with a slight profit, I imagined the trip to be different.
Up until now I played way more online then live and going to keep it that way for the most part in the near future. But more about that in my next post. Probably tomorrow..
cheers

























