Megan Thompson, Poker Champion
Yep, you read that correctly. I won a poker tournament. My first poker tournament. My second poker game. It was a good day.
Background:
My department hosts monthly happy hours so that we can relax and get to know each other better. These usually have strange themes. We had Mardi Gras, a celebration of comfort foods, international day, etc. This month, the special event was a Texas Hold'Em tournament. It was free to play, and there was a reward for the top player. I've wanted to try poker for a while now, so I thought I'd give it a shot. In case you don't know, winning in poker is all about skill, so it's a game you have a decent chance in if you are relatively good at math and intuitive. I knew I wouldn't stand a chance against someone really good at reading people, but I was comforted by the fact that neither can most engineers and that none of us have really spent a lot of time playing. You are supposed to go into a poker game believing you can win. I went in believing I could make it past the first table.
The Tournament:
We played no-limit poker, and the blinds went up every ten minutes. I noticed right away that most of my table were playing every hand. Raju, who had never played before, got a little coaching from Jud, who was just spectating, and folded often. I did too. We had eight people at our table--that's a lot of free chances to bail. So as my pocket cards were consistently such beauties as a 4 of clubs and a 7 of hearts, I was folding and watching. I actually got to the point where I had a pretty good idea of whether people were bluffing, and if not, what they actually had. I played a few times when I had a strong starting hand and mostly won. Since I know I'm bad at bluffing, my strategy was to make people think I would never try. Then I built in a little bluffing later. I'd also play with nothing (if forced in by a blind and able to check my way through or bet very little) if I knew someone else was probably bluffing and won a few that way. Little by little, I pulled in more chips and watched my opponents lose more. At the final table, I was short-stacked vs. the blinds (but second or third in chip count). I got a great hand--king and jack of clubs--when I was late in the bid order. I went all in before the flop, and I got a couple of takers (I thought I would probably just win the blinds and whatever had been thrown in so far, but I knew my cards would probably back me up. I think that my large stacks of lower-valued chips tricked people into thinking I had less money than I did). As we flipped our cars, everyone groaned. I ended up with two pair--kings over jacks--and won. From that point on, I was the chip leader by a large margin, and I knew that if I didn't make too many mistakes, I'd win.
Finally, it happened, and I got a really cool poker set. =)
In other news, I finished Like Water for Chocolate and have moved on to Truman Capote's In Cold Blood. Next will probably be Isabelle Allende's The House of the Spirits (wanting to experience more magical realism--this particular book at the recommendation of my brother) and Kramnick and Moore's The Godless Constitution: A Moral Defense of the Secular State, following my fiction/non-fiction rotation.
Background:
My department hosts monthly happy hours so that we can relax and get to know each other better. These usually have strange themes. We had Mardi Gras, a celebration of comfort foods, international day, etc. This month, the special event was a Texas Hold'Em tournament. It was free to play, and there was a reward for the top player. I've wanted to try poker for a while now, so I thought I'd give it a shot. In case you don't know, winning in poker is all about skill, so it's a game you have a decent chance in if you are relatively good at math and intuitive. I knew I wouldn't stand a chance against someone really good at reading people, but I was comforted by the fact that neither can most engineers and that none of us have really spent a lot of time playing. You are supposed to go into a poker game believing you can win. I went in believing I could make it past the first table.
The Tournament:
We played no-limit poker, and the blinds went up every ten minutes. I noticed right away that most of my table were playing every hand. Raju, who had never played before, got a little coaching from Jud, who was just spectating, and folded often. I did too. We had eight people at our table--that's a lot of free chances to bail. So as my pocket cards were consistently such beauties as a 4 of clubs and a 7 of hearts, I was folding and watching. I actually got to the point where I had a pretty good idea of whether people were bluffing, and if not, what they actually had. I played a few times when I had a strong starting hand and mostly won. Since I know I'm bad at bluffing, my strategy was to make people think I would never try. Then I built in a little bluffing later. I'd also play with nothing (if forced in by a blind and able to check my way through or bet very little) if I knew someone else was probably bluffing and won a few that way. Little by little, I pulled in more chips and watched my opponents lose more. At the final table, I was short-stacked vs. the blinds (but second or third in chip count). I got a great hand--king and jack of clubs--when I was late in the bid order. I went all in before the flop, and I got a couple of takers (I thought I would probably just win the blinds and whatever had been thrown in so far, but I knew my cards would probably back me up. I think that my large stacks of lower-valued chips tricked people into thinking I had less money than I did). As we flipped our cars, everyone groaned. I ended up with two pair--kings over jacks--and won. From that point on, I was the chip leader by a large margin, and I knew that if I didn't make too many mistakes, I'd win.
Finally, it happened, and I got a really cool poker set. =)
In other news, I finished Like Water for Chocolate and have moved on to Truman Capote's In Cold Blood. Next will probably be Isabelle Allende's The House of the Spirits (wanting to experience more magical realism--this particular book at the recommendation of my brother) and Kramnick and Moore's The Godless Constitution: A Moral Defense of the Secular State, following my fiction/non-fiction rotation.
posted by megan at
10:29 AM
1 Comments:
Wow, you're my hero! Don't let Trevor hear that you're into Texas Hold'em now, he'll be wanting to play. And I can't have you taking all his money. ;)
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RebeccaP, at 3:15 PM
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