(continued from this post) ... I was short-stacked and on the big blind with 8-7 off-suit in my hands when someone with about the same chip count as me went all in. the small blind and those who called folded and it was on me. I called and ended up hitting a straight beating his high pair. I raked in all of the guy's chips, the calls and the antes, and that was enough to put me in the comfortable position as the 2nd chip leader with close to 50k chips and 7 people left at the table. a few bad beats and good raises by my honorable opponents set me back down to 20k. two more players got eliminated and the high-stacks began to coast, hoping the blinds (at 6k/3k 1k ante) would grind out a few more players. I took the chance to move in on other short-stacks and took three of them out to become to chip leader. then it was heads-up poker. I came out on top first with more than 120k in chips, and then things went the other way after a few all-ins. I was able to come up even with the other guy again when the blinds hit 12k/6k 4k ante. I started betting aggressively pre-flop whenever I feel weakness from the opponent. that was able to get 80% of the total tournament chips on my side. my opponent Josh ended up having to go all-in and I called, and that was the end of the tournament that evening.

big thanx to
- Todd for organizing the tournament and being the dealer at the final table
- Sergué(?spelling) for keeping the points and running the games
- JF and Dave for the exciting showdown (and your chips, hehe :)
- Cindy for making me admit my age, and
- Josh for the heads-up action

throughout the tournament I knew I made quite a number of mistakes, such as bad reads and, especially, wimpy raises and folding to obvious bluffs out of fear of being eliminated. during the heads-up, I was checking/calling too often when I should've raised. I'm glad I realized those problems early on and was (more or less) able to correct myself. in short, I still have a LOT to learn. .e  02:27