What It Was Like to Win $1,500,000 in a Poker Tournament at Age 22

Hey guys! I’m a professional poker and Daily Fantasy Sports player. Here was my introductory post with an overview of my career and some Q&A: https://steemit.com/introduceyourself/@daut44/introduction-and-ama-ask-me-anything-about-being-a-professional-poker-and-daily-fantasy-sports-player-cross-post-from-poker

I’ve been tentative to do so because I don’t like to brag or talk about big wins, especially when I have a self-deprecating sense of humor, but some more experienced Steemit users such as @steemrollin @stealthtrader and @razvanelulmarin have urged me to write a longer blog about my big tournament win in 2007: going through the lead up to it, how each day went, how I felt as the tournament progressed, and my emotions and thought process towards the end.

22 year old me with slightly more hair than 32 year old me:

Beforehand

The two main formats of poker are cash games and tournaments. Leading up to 2007 I played almost entirely cash games: players join a table, play as long as they'd like or as long as the game runs, can reload money along the way, and whatever they sit and leave with is how much they win or lose.

In tournament poker, generally (exceptions exist) people enter and play until they bust and the tournament runs until there is 1 player remaining, with the payouts reserved for the top 10-15% of finishers and increasing from the first payout to the tournament winner. For instance, if 1000 people play a tournament with a $1,000 buyin (usually $1000+100 with the house taking the $100 cut), there is a $1,000,000 prizepool, the first 850 people out receive nothing and the top 150 people get paid. The lowest payouts are usually about 1.5 times the buyin, in this case $1500, and they exponentially increase with first place receiving roughly 20% or $200,000.

As said in my introductory blogpost, I deposited $45 online, and over the course of a year and a half grinded it up to a little over $100,000 playing almost entirely cash games. Before this big win I rarely played tournament poker. I was at the time enrolled in a math PhD program, but between first and second semester there was a large poker tournament in the Bahamas called The Pokerstars Caribbean Adventure (PCA) with an $8,000 buyin. I tried to cheaply enter, playing a few satellites that cost $300-$600, but I never qualified. At the last minute I decided to get a passport and buy in directly for $8,000 to play the event.

Day 1 of PCA

Nowadays if you sit down at your first table in a big tournament, the entire table is young aloof looking kids with steely demeanors and headphones on. Generally the more of them there are the tougher the table will be, these are the kids who honed their skills playing online for countless hours. I sat down at my first table and was pretty sure of the 9 other players there was at most 1 other professional. I was extremely focused and for the first half of the day ran my table and more than doubled my stack. I don't remember the exact details, but I do recall a hand early on day 1 where I check raised a T9x flop with QJ, turned a flush draw to go with my straight draw, bet again, then went all in on a blank river. My opponent thought for at least 5 minutes before folding. This instance is a microcosm of the variance in tournament poker: if he calls I bust on day 1 and who knows how my poker career ends up, he folds and I go on to win the whole thing.

As some of the weaker players busted, better players joined, then I was moved around to other tougher tables. I also wasn’t accustomed to the long hours of a poker tournament because I was used to playing 2-3 hour sessions of cash games, so my focus drifted away later and I coasted out the day, ending with 32,000 chips from a starting stack of 20,000.

Me looking extremely uninspired towards the end of day 1

Day 2

Since 937 people entered the event, the staff running the tournament split half the field into day 1A and half the field into day 1B because there likely wasn’t enough room for the entire field to play all together day 1. I played day 1A meaning I had day 1B off. Like a moronic 22 year old on vacation, I went out, got drunk, and woke up hungover for day 2.

At one point during day 2 I started having extremely bad gas from all the beer the previous night--I just couldn’t stop farting. I tried to hide it but it was pretty obvious to everyone around me I was having a rough day, but that’s the upside of unstoppable farts, at least I made it so they were having a rough day as well.

I mostly coasted through Day 2 playing small pots, managed to flop a set of 7s and double up one hand, but other than the extreme gas, the highlight was that we made the money. This tournament paid slightly more than 15%, so the top 180 made the money. By the end of day 2 there were 121 players left and we were all guaranteed $11,797.

Day 3

I came back to Day 3 feeling significantly better than I did day 2. I started the day with about 120k in chips at 2k/4k blinds (forced bets which drives action at the table). Early on day 3 I was able to win a big pot.

Barry Shulman (owner and CEO of cardplayer.com) raised to 10,000, I called in position with Th9h (Ten of hearts, 9 of hearts). The flop came Qh 9d 4d. Barry bet, I called. The turn was the 9c giving me three of a kind. Barry bet again, I called. The river was the 8h. Barry put me all in. I was slightly worried since Barry is known as someone who only plays premium holdings, so there was a chance he could have QQ (full house), JT (straight) or a better 9. But ultimately I decided I had to call because not only did I block some combinations of JT (I have a ten in my hand means he has less possible JT combos), it was extremely unlikely he had a 9 due to me having one and Barry only playing premium holdings, and he could also have AA, KK, or AQ and underestimate the strength of my hand. Barry had KK, and I was up to over 300k in chips and one of the chipleaders.

Finally have a formidable stack to play with instead of donking around with peanuts

For the next few hours my stack plateaued, and as the blinds increased I was getting short stacked despite maintaining my chip count. With 27 players left I won a big pot where I more than doubled up with AA v QQ and I ended the day strong. We stopped play for the day with 16 left and I was in 6th place.

Day 4

I wasn’t very nervous prior to this point, but now I was getting really tense. Here were the remaining payouts:

While $45,000 is a great payday, especially for someone with only about $100,000 to his name, it was a far cry from the higher payouts up the ladder. I really wanted to move up and guarantee a bigger payday before doing anything risky.

With 16 players left, we were split into two tables of 8 players each. Unluckily for me, I drew the much tougher table with the better players who had more chips. Justin Bonomo, who is still one of the best tournament players in the world today in 2016, was at the time by far the best player remaining, and he had a huge chipstack. Also at my table was the chipleader, Isaac Haxton, who today in 2016 is also one of the best players in the world. This tough table draw gave me even more incentive to remain conservative.

Within 45 minutes we were down to 11 players, when Justin and Isaac played a 6.6 million chip pot (1/3 of the chips in play). Isaac had AA, Justin had KK, Justin was eliminated, and we consolidated to a 10 player final table. Although having 10 players at the table meant I could remain cautious, I was even more nervous. If I could outlast 4 more players I would guarantee my payday up from $99k to nearly $250k and the final 6 would be aired on the Travel Channel a few months later.

I slowly chipped up and then won a big hand. I raised AK from early position and was called by the button. I bet 110k on a Kd 9s 4s flop and was raised to 300k. I called and the turn was a Kc. I checked, my opponent bet 400k, and I called. While I had an extremely strong hand here, I simultaneously wanted to play it safe verse possible better hands and also not scare off hands that were worse but would fold if I played it stronger. The river 5s brought a possible flush, we both checked and I won. Soon after two players were eliminated and I had made my first TV final table.

Day 5

Before Day 5 I was required to do some interviews for tv. I did just what you would expect a nerdy, immature 22 year old to do: make an ass of myself. Not only did I wrongly guess that a 28 year old player at our final table was in his 40s, but I told my farting story in another interview. I was off to a great start.

the final 6

The upside was that my nerves were gone. Just at the time we are playing for huge amounts of money and I assume everyone else’s nerves are increasing, I felt more relaxed than ever. I was guaranteed nearly $250k, I had a solid chipstack (was tied for 2nd in chips with 2.3 million and had about 12% of the chips in play), and I thought I was the best player remaining. I considered anything more as just a cherry on top, but at the same time I was focused and ready to play my best.

I started off playing aggressively, then backed off the gas and let players eliminate each other. As the field shrunk, I stayed cautious but never fell below 2 million chips. By the time we reached heads up play, I had roughly 25% of the chips in play and was guaranteed $861,789.

The Tell

I’m mostly a mathematical player. I try to play game theory optimal (GTO) and unless I have an extremely good reason to do so, I rarely deviate from what I view is the optimal strategy in a situation. But an acquaintance of mine named Jason Laso, known in the online poker world as mkind16, informed me that he noticed a physical tell on Isaac. Many recreational players would stare right at you when they were weak (trying to convey strength) and look away when they had strong holdings (trying to convey weakness). Isaac knew this and tried to do the exact opposite. If he looked away he was weak, if he looked at me he was strong.

I spent some time on the final table trying to confirm this tell, but by the time we reached heads up I was confident in Jason’s read. Every time I had a close spot and I used physical tells to make my decision I was right. I started winning more than my share of pots and evened the chip counts when i doubled up with an ace high flush draw against his straight draw.

The Bluff Rebluff re-re-Bluff Hand

I think Isaac was getting a little frustrated with how heads up play was going. This frustration combined with a gigantic set of balls led to us playing one of the most famous hands in poker tv history:

Due to the physical tell, I was convinced Isaac had nothing on the river. I also thought it was conceivable for me to have a queen, which made my raise believable. I didn’t know this at the time, but Isaac is brilliant. He has one of the best poker minds in the world, and even though he was at the time a less experienced player, he was able to deduce that I likely had nothing because of the way the hand played out prior. Two young unknown kids vying for $700,000 and playing like controlled maniacs, this is what poker is about.

After that hand, it was all downhill for Isaac. I won a few big pots to cripple him and eventually finished him off with AT preflop against his Q8. The final payday was $1,535,255.

Since poker tournaments are so expensive, many players make deals prior to entering, sharing action with friends or selling percentages to investors to decrease the buyin. I swapped 5% with my good friend Steve Costello (known as Pooruser in poker), so I had to send him a little over $75,000 after the tournament, but generally players have much less than 95% of themselves in an event and I had more than 15x’ed my bankroll so I was ecstatic. This tournament would forever change my life.

I invited some friends over from a poker forum I frequent. They didn't participate in the AMA, but I'm hoping to get some more bright poker players with years of experience on internet forums on steem, so they may ask me completely unrelated questions to this post. But feel free to ask anything about the event, poker in general, or any of my other interests.