Tournament #14

Slow start to tonight's tournament, lots of folding. I don't win a pot until my 19th hand and then it's for a measly $125 when I push all-in pre-flop with no callers. I get another decent hand a couple later when I again push all-in with no callers. Manage to hang around until there's 15 players left then catch Q/J in the big blind. Flop comes Q/7/2 with 2 diamonds and I push all in. I get one caller, a guy with an ace-high diamond flush draw. My pair of queens holds up and I've got $4700, good for 6th out of 14. Another double-up, through the exact same guy, chasing another flush. This time I've got a set of jacks and it holds to put me at $9000. Another nice pot and I'm up to $10600 for 2nd place. I can fold my way into cashing I think but need to not be too passive. Made the final table and we're down to 8 players. A couple big stacks tangled with one going broke in a bit of a surprise. Now we've got a big chip leader at $23,000 but we're into the money at 7 players! Blinded off down to $3600 with blinds at $300/600. All-in pre-flop with A/5 and it holds up for me to double-up to $7800. 6 guys left and I'm 3rd. Finally end up getting blinded off, busted in 5th when my A/J is beaten by 8/9. Pretty happy with the result overall with just a bit of frustration. The two lowest stacks when we got to 5th were all-in over and over and over and kept getting called by very poor hands so they kept doubling up. Or catching miracle suckouts. Tough to move up when your tablemates insist on giving money to the short-stacks. Still, nice to make some $$$ again.

FINISH: 5th Place
PAYOUT: $1.01
PROFIT: $0.76
BANKROLL: $58.81