Raw Power
Monday, 27 May 2013
Nicky Power on the Irish Open and Norwegian Masters.
Irish Open 2013
This was my eighth Irish Open, having first played the event in 2006 and, as poker years are akin to dog years, I played those eight tournaments over a 56-year period. The tournament didn’t change that much, year to year, although a gradual improvement in structure definitely occurred, and arguably the standard of play.
This year there was a significant structure change, however, and, ignoring registration fee, a 37.5% drop in buy-in. The tournament may have lost a few big names because of the smaller buy-in, and the bubble may have broke on day three rather then day two, but, for me, it felt as big a tournament as any other Irish Open I have played.
My tournament went OK. Unusually for me I can’t actually recall much of day one. I know from my Twitter feed I had starting stack with two levels remaining, and ended the day on an above-average 74k without playing a big pot.
I had a good table draw on day two. The only person I knew was John Stokes who I used to play a lot with in the old Blazing Aces Club in Waterford. I steadily amassed chips all day and hit 250k with two levels remaining. A lot of things had gone my way. I remember calling a few big barrels, turn and river, with ace-high and being good, as well as barrelling myself with 4-4 on a scary board and being good. At one point I got to showdown holding queen-high, which was good, and, most memorably, I recall check-shoving the turn with 6-6 on a 2-2-3-5 board, getting snapped and holding, verses a king flush draw.
Then it turned on me. I lost 150k in two flips in quick succession and, more worryingly, had a table move. Liam Flood was running the show on the new table and it really was something to see. I can honestly say for the last 90 minutes on day two Liam was by far the best player I had played with in the tournament. He had a 3-bet percentage of around 60% and chipped up from 120k to 400k. It was delightful stuff.
My chip count improved in tandem with Liam’s for the same period but in a much luckier fashion. Firstly I got my 100k in with A-K verses Q-Q and won. Shortly after, I picked up A-A and the same unfortunate player who held the queens picked up the kings. Day three would start with a healthy 375k, which was ninth of 64.
We started day three ten off the money and I drew five heroes lined up on my left. Derek Wall and Andrew Sweeney, two pretty unexploitable young pros; Mad Mick McCloskey and Liam Flood who, while having a combined age of over 300, were probably the two most frequent three-bettors in the tournament, and a gent whose only English seemed to be “raise” or “re-raise”. I couldn’t see a strategy of opening a lot of pots working here, as all were decently stacked. Well, that’s not exactly true; I’d lost 100k in small pots before I actually decided that and began to pick my spots more carefully.
The bubble dragged – and I mean dragged. It must have taken 90 minutes. We were the feature table and it can’t have made good viewing. Everyone was decently-stacked and chip movement was minimal, as at this stage everyone had realised the table couldn’t be run over. It finally popped and I had 450k – about 1.5 times the average – and felt I was in great shape to make a run for the final table.
Unfortunately this was where my good fortune in this tournament ended. For the next four hours I was dealt complete trash, and any time I tried to make something happen I lost another few chips. At dinner I was left with a reshove stack of 200k, which was 18 big blinds.
Upon returning from dinner the blinds went through me and I shoved 16 bigs holding K?9? over a cut-off raise. Declan Connolly woke up in the big blind with A-Q and it was out the gap in 35th for €6,000.
The final nine contained seven home players and, amazingly, had three previous Irish Open finalists. Brendan Ruane was third in 2006; Declan Connolly finished seventh in 2010 and Ian Simpson had won Sole Survivor with his fourth place in 2012. Add to the mix top PLO players Namir Mohamed and Mark Davies; Internet phenom Calvin Anderson; Tom Brady who was attempting the unthinkable IPO and IO double and the accomplished talents of Michael Farrelly and Adam Fallon. A classic final was set.
When the dust settled, it was Simpson who was crowned champion, taking the €265,000 first prize and, more importantly, the title of 2013 Irish Open Champion.
This festival was absolutely huge. It’s definitely the biggest poker gathering I’ve witnessed outside of the WSOP. Think the Irish Open Festival and triple it in size and length to get some idea.
JP McCann, the brains behind getting the itinerant poker festival to these shores for a second year, summed up the week’s activities: “Over ten fantastic days of poker, we had 6,153 players participate in 53 tournaments, setting a new European record for the most amount of tournaments in a single poker festival while competing for €1,840,865 in prize money.
“We set a new world record for main event players in a national event, with 1,142. We also set a new record for JP Poker Masters main event players, with 284, and came very close to a new European record for cash game tables, but fell short, with 49. The current record still belongs to 2007 Irish Open at 54 tables.”
The whole Irish poker community is firmly behind JP in his goal of bringing this wonderful celebration of poker back for a third time.
Live Irish Rankings Ciaran Cooney, the man behind the new Irish ranking system, explains the concept: “Live Irish Rankings 2013 is a ranking system covering all live tournaments in Ireland over a €200 buy-in fee. It’s non-profit and being run for the players by the players.
“Thanks to generous donations from top Irish promoters Boylepoker, JP Poker, Fitzwilliam Card Club, Poker Ireland & D4 Events, there is €2,000 in tournament entries to be won for 2014 by whoever tops the rankings at the end of the year. It aims to reward the most consistent finisher throughout the year and not necessarily the top money-earners.
“It is kindly being hosted online by Ireland’s number one poker chat and information website, Irishpokerboards.com, in their Live Tournament section. This includes the ranking table, as well as upcoming qualifying events, and even an “Irish Abroad Leader Board” to keep on top of our top Irish players’ foreign conquests.
“We expect to see a changing leader board throughout the year as the tournaments roll by, having already had the likes of John Keown, Dara “doke” O Kearney and even Nicky Power hovering near the top!”