The Higher Roller champ and last week's winner of Player of the Week talks about his impressive win, and playing fair heads-up...
megazord
1st - 07 November High Roller - $12,880 (read report)
So, what a win!
Saturday night [07 November] was the best feeling I have ever had playing poker. When I eventually won it was a huge relief and gave me a massive sense of achievement. It was a great feeling, and the fact that some of my family were there to share it with me made it even better. I knew I was capable of winning a big tournament at some point, but I always seemed to get a bad beat at the wrong time in big hands and had stopped playing many tournaments as on the whole, cash games are a lot easier to be profitable at. I did fancy cashing in the High Roller before the start, as the relatively small field and structure suited my game perfectly, but to win it really was a dream come true for me.
Massive thanks to PKR for giving me a free ticket to the High Roller qualifier when I became a Platinum member, otherwise I doubt I would ever have even entered.
Glad to see it went to good use! How long have you been playing poker? Is this your biggest win to date?
I've been playing about five years, and this is my biggest single win by some distance. I'm a regular $100NL cash player, and haven't been playing many tournaments on PKR lately, but I may start entering a few more on the back of this!
Describe your journey to the final table...
It all went unusually smoothly, I was getting my money in with the best hands and they were holding up. I had a couple of big all-in pots in the first two hours that put me in a great position to do well. The only trouble I had was when we were down to the bubble of the final table, where I flopped the smaller flush in the SB after a pre flop raise against the BB, and went down to about 27K. Then I had my one lucky hand where, short stacked, I shoved with 7-8 against A-7 and flopped the straight to double up.
Who was your toughest opponent?
AmokMal gave me a great heads-up battle for nearly an hour, he played very solid all the way through. But BestIP was the player who made it the toughest for me when we were down to about 18 players. He had a massive chip lead at that point and even though I had position on him, he was raising nearly every hand with the knoweledge that playing back at him would be putting my tournament life at risk, and I was pretty card dead at this stage so it wasn't a good spot to be in.
When you reached heads-up play against AmokMal, he became disconnected, and you sat out and waited for his return. I think the overwhelming majority of us would find it hard not to take the easy blinds, and go for the jugular! Tell us what went through your head at that point. Are you the Paolo di Canio of poker?
Yes I'm the Di Canio of poker - if it was live I'd have pushed the tournament director to the ground :) .
We were effectively playing heads up for $5K, I had never played AmokMal before or for that much money heads-up. When AmokMal disconnected it was a situation I had never been in and had to think quickly about what the right thing to do was, about how I would feel if I won because of his disconnection. That wasn't how I wanted to do it. I had got to heads up because I had been playing well with probably one lucky hand all tournament when I was short stacked and had to get it in, so I wanted to win because I deserved to and beat AmokMal fair and square.
The way I saw it, AmokMal deserved to be heads up too, he had played solid all the way through and taking advantage of his DC would have been stealing $5K from him. If it was a live tournament you wouldn't rob someone of $5K if they were feeling ill and needed a break, so why should it be any different online? Someone on the rail said 'be a gentleman and sit out' and I knew that was the only thing I could really do.
I wasn't thinking about the money at that point, more about how I would feel if the roles were reversed. Then I did get a nagging thought in the back of my mind, how am I going to feel if they come back after 5 minutes and I lose? Would they do the same for me if I was disconnected? Fortunately he came back after about 5 minutes and I could just concentrate on the cards again.
Remarkable sportsmanship, but it paid off, to the tune of $12K. What will you do with the cash - pay off some of your mortgage, a holiday, reinvest?
I'll certainly be entering more of these events like the High Roller which suit my game (being a cash player) and also the Masters. I may move up the levels at the cash tables, but at the moment I'm having plenty of success at $100NL so I'm quite happy there for the meantime. I'll also be using the money for some nice Christmas presents for the family and decorating the house. I gave my little brother a bonus too as he sat through the whole 8 hours with me.
What is your next poker goal?
I've just qualified for the next Masters and High Roller, so to win both of those would be nice!!! But mainly I'd like to just keep improving as a player.
Give us a tip for others wanting to do well in the fortnightly High Roller event…
If you consider yourself a decent cash game player, even if it's at $100NL or $200NL, you should be busting a gut to get in the Higher Roller tournament - with only 92 runners last Saturday, the top 12 getting paid, along with six seat tables and deep stacks, it is a cash player's dream. I wish I'd have entered it before! So, satellite in cheap, play your normal game and you will have a fair old chance of cashing.
Mr Megazord, thanks for speaking to us, we look forward to seeing how you did it, on PKR TV. Very best of luck for the rest of the year!