Love is in the air

Ladies Tournament at Caesars – I arrived 90 minutes ahead of time, with my borrowed $80 ($75 entry fee and $5 for drinks) tucked away in my bra - well – not really in my bra, but it just sounds more fun than saying ‘in my otherwise empty poker wallet’.

Richard signed up for the 3/6 game – and very politely pointed out to me that he would like to play for a bit and not get my ass busted out early. Oh, the pressure!! (added for effect)

I met up with two girls from an online women poker community which I recently joined (www.pokerchix.com), from this point forward referred to as the ‘chix’, both great ladies and great poker players too!

Tournament started with only 20 players, and this is where the difference comes in between women only and mixed events. We sat down, and nobody said a word. For a long long time. We stared each other down, mentally compared wrinkles, boob sizes and outfits, all while the only sounds you heard was chips clicking, only words uttered were ‘call’, ‘raise’ and the most scary of all ‘ALL IN’.

I think most of the ladies at my tables were beginner players, they played only their hands and they played it HARD!. If you dare to re-raise the initial better, just to see where you’re at, you better be prepared, there’s no smooth-calling re-raises, and trapping was a term unheard of. Perfect scenario – all you need is a draw to come in, and top pair is going down in flames, because there is not such a thing as folding top pair.

The game became the ultimate in testing one of the most important poker skills – making the right decision at the right time. The only tell you needed to pick up, is what they’re TELLING you – ALL IN! I had to lay down hands I would have loved to take a step further, and carefully picked spots to pick up blindes and antes.

After a woman dealer came over and told us we’re too quiet and need to loosen up and threatened to get us a stripper, the gargoyle women came alive. Never have I thought that the mention of a man taking off his clothes could do that to a table full of women. Suddenly we’re sitting in a living room, having drinks and chatting away.
The poor male dealers didn’t want to make too much noise (because of threats to rip their shirts off if an Ace hits the board), but at the same time had to keep the game going, which was quite a challenge, believe me.

Long story short – took forever to get to the final table, one lady (self-confessed beginner player) had mountains of chips and whenever she sees a face card, she does the old ‘ALL IN’. What worked in her favor was that she didn’t care if she wins or loses; she was just having a great time. With five people left, she did her thing with Q9 offsuit, got two players to call, flop hit her hard, and she took both out in one hand. Which left three of us IN THE MONEY.

We played a couple of hands and somebody suggested that we split the prize money 3-ways, which I couldn’t agree to fast enough, since I was short-stacked! So, we all got $400 and that left us with another problem. The winner also gets a seat to the Caesar Classic Ladies NL event on Oct 21, 2007 (buy-in $300), and since the chipleader lady didn’t want that (she is from out of town and wouldn’t be able to play), and she didn’t want to play anymore after the chop, we (one of the chix and I) decided to draw high card for the seat.
I got the Ace of Spades and save her the trouble of drawing.

This relationship might just work out. Poker decided that it loves me after all.

Until next time.