In December of 2006, I experienced adventures in Florida that I wrote about in a previous column. After departing beautiful Fort Lauderdale, I headed to the Crystal Palace Resort, where I was scheduled to play in the WPT Boot Camp tournament. It was the
Battle for the Season Pass. The winner of this tournament got $160,000 in
WPT buy-ins for the next year, plus $14,000 in expense money. The runner-up got a $25,000 seat in the
WPT Championship event, scheduled for April at Bellagio. The third-place finisher got a $10,000 seat in any WPT main event of his choice, and the fourth-place winner got a $5,000 seat. Smaller prizes were given for fifth and sixth place, and second- through sixth-place winners also got $1,000 in expense money. Since the tournament was obviously very top-heavy, going for the gold with gusto was the order of the day.
Before the event started, there was a one-day seminar featuring some of the biggest names in poker, including T.J. Cloutier, Mike Sexton, Kathy Liebert, Clonie Gowen, Todd Brunson, and Chip and Karina Jett, to name a few. The men in charge, who do a great job, were Steve Berman and Ron Ruben.
Well, it was originally my intention to attend the seminar, but, unfortunately, things happen in life when you have plans. I lost my luggage for two days, and came down with a cold. Welcome to the warm and sunny Bahamas. I tried to track down my luggage and recover in time to play the tournament, so I wound up missing the seminar. However, I did recover both my luggage and my health in time to play in the tournament. The tournament was very well-run, and had a great structure. There were one-hour rounds and we got $20,000 in chips to start. The blinds started at $25-$50, so there was lots of play. We had to play eight levels on the first day, with both a lunch and a dinner break. I made it my personal goal to outlast all of the instructors and make it to the final table.
I was blessed with several big pairs in the early going, and lost only one major hand when I had pocket queens and ran into pocket aces. Fortunately, my opponent was short-stacked, so I was able to recover. There was a very interesting mix of players at my table. The most flamboyant person by far was Ben Robinson, from the Fort Lauderdale area. He kept up a lively chatter and was the chip leader for a while. He tried a few too many bluffs, however, and eventually went broke. I hovered around the $20,000 mark for most of the day, but then in the last two rounds, I went on a little bit of a rush and finished the day at $50,575. That put me squarely in the hunt. I was in 30th place out of 87 survivors. We had started with 196 players. I was quite pleased with my performance. I avoided trouble, for the most part, especially against the players who were doing a lot of gambling. I was ready to rock 'n' roll on day two.
After getting several big pairs on day one, and winning with all but one of them, I was hoping for the same on day two. I made a few straights and flushes and started out great, and soon had more than $90,000. I thought this might be my day, but after this initial surge, I fell completely card-dead. I never held a pair higher than sixes all day, and had A-K only a few times. I did one of my best survival jobs ever, and was determined to make it to the final 18, when they would quit for the day. You can't win with no cards, no matter who you are or how good you are, and fate was unkind to me. The blinds got up to $3,000-$6,000 with a $1,000 ante, and I just ran out of time. We were down to 19 players and I was in the big blind with less than $30,000 in chips in front of me. Our table was only sixhanded at the time, so the raising requirements were not as strong as they were earlier. I looked down and found my first ace in more than an hour. Unfortunately, my kicker was only a 7, but it was the best I could come up with. A player raised and essentially put me all in if I played the hand. I agonized over it. I hated my hand, but if he had only a couple of facecards and no ace, I had a chance. Well, when he turned over A-Q, I knew the bells were tolling for me. An ace flopped, but his kicker played, and that was the end of Tom. Everyone remaining breathed a sigh of relief and applauded - not so much for me, but because they had survived to fight another day.
As I mentioned earlier, I was hoping to outlast the Boot Camp instructors, and there were only two remaining when I went out. Karina Jett was the last of the women instructors, but went out early in 18th place on day three. Christian Leyser, the last remaining instructor, made it to the final table, but could not crack the winner's circle. I played a very interesting hand with him on day two. He had raised with pocket jacks from early position, and I reraised with A-K. Since I had a substantial amount committed, I was prepared to go all in if necessary before the flop. However, he flat-called my reraise. The flop came with an ace and two rags. He checked, and when I moved all in, he showed his jacks and folded. I flipped over my A-K and told him that he dodged a bullet by not moving me all in preflop. I thought he made a very solid play, because if smaller cards had come, he would have bet me off the hand.
The eventual winner of the event was Norman "Augie" Foxx of Idabel, Oklahoma. Chris Stadler finished second, and the final woman standing was third-place finisher Laurie Church.
Tom McEvoy is a representative of PokerStars.com. He is also the voice of ProPlay, a new and innovative way to learn winning poker strategy. Find out more at ProPlayLive.com/tommcevoy.
