Amy Trodd's Poker Diary 6/11/07

Welcome to my diary – this weekly episode will briefly touch on what I have been up to in the last week or so, which games I’ve played online and live, and keep you updated with my progress. Sadly, I can’t compete with the likes of well known bloggers and big online stars but if you’re interested in how a 22 year old girl feels doing the rounds on the poker scene in and around London, then read on…

Last weekend was very profitable for me as well as being unusual; I’m not an online player - not since my student days spending my life online losing all my student loan. Last Sunday was different, however, when I managed to spin $100 into over $1,500. This is a very unique situation for me but it was one of those days when you just can't stop hitting cards!

On Tuesday night I headed down to Gutshot in Clerkenwell, now the ‘Powerhouse Sporting Club’. I don’t usually head down to Gutshot on Tuesdays! I sat down on a cash table with many familiar faces – it was all going well until I was on the BB.

A young guy in early position limps in and then Paul, a journalist who’s often sitting on the same table, raises to pot, making it £5. With two callers after him I decided to put the other £4 in to see a flop. The original raiser also calls.

I have and the flop comes giving me a flush draw and top pair. I check and the guy to my left pushes all of his chips into the middle. Paul then re-raises, putting in £100. The next guy folds the other guy shoves - Paul has us all covered. It comes round to me, and obviously I know my top pair is no good. I decide to call as the value in the pot is too tempting and as long as I’m not against a higher flush draw then I’m in good shape.

The cards were flipped, young gun to my left with Paul with and the final guy with a set of . Turn blank, river - giving the other guy a house.

I decided to quit and buy into the tournament.

Gutshot host an odd tournament on a Tuesday evening where each player is given the option of buying either £5, £10, £15 or £20 worth of chips and then playing as a freezeout. A strange structure, but that’s Gutshot for you, and, as always, it was the standard crap shoot. The table was disastrous, having to tell players to leave their cards on the felt, picking up on their string bets, disallowing their raises when they threw one chip in with out declaring ‘raise’.

I lost half my stack on the second hand when a rookie to my right called me all the way to the river with a Gutshot straight draw, and, of course, hit! I then threw the remainder of my chips in the middle with . Small blind called with . Flop comes , turn another , river – !

I didn’t want to double up anyway, becoming increasingly impatient playing these small buy in tournaments.

Many of you may have heard of a game show called 'Golden Balls' hosted by Jasper Carrot. The game show involves golden balls which in some ways resemble a poker player's hole cards. You have to either let the other players know the value of your balls or deceive them into thinking you are stronger then you actually are.

I have previously been on this show, made it the final and built a jackpot of £16,000 with my fellow 'team-mate' Dawn. In the final showdown both Dawn and I were given two balls, one with split and one with steal. This is how it happens - If we were both reveal 'split' then we’d share the jackpot taking home just over £8 grand each. If one of us were to 'steal' and the other to 'split' then the contestant who stole would take the entire prize pool. If we were both to ‘steal’ then we would both leave the show with nothing. As it happens, I was evilly deceived when Dawn from Hartlepool wickedly stole all the money from me.

ITV called me and asked me to go back on the show with three other previous 'losers'. I will let you know when it will be aired on ITV but I regret to say I didn't make it the final two. Two welsh blokes who had previously been conned by women didn't believe that I had over £40,000 in front of me and stupidly voted me off!

Sadly didn’t get to play any poker this weekend though I wanted to play the £300 at Gutshot on Saturday night. Apparently there were only 30 runners so I’m glad I didn't bother making the trip anyway. This has been an unusually quiet poker week for me but I hope next week's entry will be packed full of poker antics.

Tournaments planned so far:
Offline - £75 No Limit F/O at Gutshot on Wednesday night
Online - Poker Verdict Invitational $500 Added on Thursday at 8pm