I enjoyed my return to Luton (not often you hear someone say that) but sadly it wasn't to be the triumphant homecoming I would’ve liked.  Poker in Luton doesn't induce feelings of nostalgia in me now that the operation has moved across town into a newer, flashier but rather characterless casino.  I miss the yellow walls and being scrunched up in my seat between The Camel and Ray Hutt.  Wait a minute, no I don't!

Reminiscences aside, you could tell that we were firmly in 2009 from the line-up at my starting table.  Black Belter Jamie Roberts and Irish Open finalist Will Kassouf filled out a young-looking table, and it wasn't too long before top Internet MTT-er Lawrence Houghton (rivermanl) joined the fray.  Paradoxically though, I ended up making my early gains at the expense of the better players.  An attempt to steal 75 extra chips from a dead blind turned into an over the top 8,000 all-in on my part, as can happen when we Internet players get carried away.  Will reluctantly folded what he claimed to be TT allowing me to release 88 from my sweaty grasp.  Jamie found, to his cost, that you can't bluff an egg off top pair (me) and I knocked Lawrence out as well after completing the Small Blind (SB) with A4 suited and flopping two pair.

When that table broke, I moved back in time a few years as I joined a table with no fewer than three of my old foes from the £10 Stud tournament days.  Richard "Chufty" Ashby, who nowadays is more often found ironing out Gus Hansen & Co in the nosebleed (the highest stakes) online Pot Limit Omaha games, looked a bit less than chuffed to be reminded of his humble origins :-).  I nicked a few more pots to reach a high point of 40k chips - great shape with the average around 20k.  After that, I hardly dragged a pot.  I lost a chunk to Andreas Hoivold when I turned a pair and a flush draw, blind vs blind.  Monster!  Obv it went all in and I lost to his AA.  When I said I hadn't put him on that, he said "neither did I".  Down below 20 Big Blinds (BBs) I was itching to reraise shove on someone, and found the perfect hand to do it with - 54 suited.  When he called with KQ suited I was pretty live but couldn't "bink" (get lucky) like I usually do online.  Live poker is rigged!

If there's a piece of advice I would pass on to "The Novice", or any less experienced players reading this, it's don't put too much emphasis on how individual hands turn out.  When you're deeper (you have lots of chips compared to the blinds), you can occasionally knock someone off a better hand, and certainly save or gain a bet here and there with good play, but the hand is usually won by whoever has the best holding when the hand concludes, and there's nothing you can do about who that is.  Then when you get below 20 blinds it's usually about finding good spots to whack your chips in and going off to the races when someone calls.  Time and again I see players beat themselves up over a few hands that went the wrong way, or almost as bad, puff themselves up over a few hands that went right.  It's easy to do this playing big live tournaments when you have days, or even weeks in the case of the biggest tournaments, to stew over one particular event.  When you play 50+ smaller tournaments a week online (as I do), you can build up a more phlegmatic outlook, which is a lot healthier.  You just learn any lessons that need to be learned, put it aside, and sign up for the next one!

AW