Well the BS and trashtalk came deep and fast in this one...So much aggression, stealing, and restealing...if they were showing this one on TV, they wouldn't of had to cut out ANY hands...they could have aired them all...
The British Massive put up a very respectible showing, threatening to take it all...Briachek and Ricardoon stayed around to the final few and Superman (Ricardoon) almost took it all down, but finally got taken out in 2nd...Briachek got in the money in 5th spot, and an impressive young Brit named Prebbz really showed his stuff, patience especially. Course Interupt showed how good he was by making it in the top 7 without any terribly good hands.
One of the best reads of all time was applied by the Mad Genius on a massive all in pot by Stelvsk...Genius read the bluff right and called and became a massive chip leader at the time...Stel. had been the big chip leader for quite some time and was deadly with his aggressive play and stealing bluffs.
This was the tourny of massive suckouts too...if you were the favorite on the flop, you were almost guaranteed to get beaten on the turn or river...the poker gods were pulling for the underdogs.
I found myself getting shortstacked, at 8 BB's, when Kowboy raised it up 3x, so with my QJs i went all in, knowing it'd be close whether he called or not, being the pot odds weren't too bad for him...he did, with his AJo,,,and the flop couldn't have come down much better for me with QJx...but the pg's liked this Texan, and gave him the A card on the turn and sent me packing...in 19th place.
But he may have cursed them on our flop, so they took their vengeance on him a hand or two later, with his AK and an AKx flop, he got it all in, only to have run into an unlikely set of x's, and so he was out right after me...
While all the trash was talked, especially in the final 5, sitting over in the corner, shining his Colt 45, was the ever deadly Gary Cooper and TJ Cloutier and Dan Harrington of poker all rolled into one....Ronm23....who WAS this guy??!!! He showed the true value of patience...finally caught a big hand and went from low guy to big stack, thereafter picking his spots, and finally taking it ALL down for a well deserved 1st. Congrats to all...everyone who played was a winner...

any key hands from anyone else?

knew i'd forgot one of the UK'ers, sorry Excession, i stand corrected...Excession made a valiant and Braveheart worthy run...anyone at the final table could've taken it all down

Who were you TightWad? ...am sure you weren't one of the trashtalkers

Thanks for the kind words Wildbill. Winning was a result of the cards cooperating rather than my poker skills, or lack thereof. I had a blast. Looking forward to next month's tourney.

You're right about having not many good hands.

I had about 4 good hands, AT, AJ, AQ, QQ and JJ. Course I was in BB for QQ late on and everybody folded to me. I laid down JJ to Excession when the flop came Kxx and he bet the pot. I had a strong feeling he had a K and he was nice enough to show me AK.

Won AT with top pair on the flop, hit an A with AJ, laid down AQ AFAICR after hitting nothing.

The biggest pot I won was with a suckout that knocked someone else out for their stack of around 4k if I remember rightly. I think I made trip 9s or something on the river after the opposition had KQ and paired on the flop. I don't recall if that's entirely correct, but sorry dude!

Mind you, I got knocked out on a suckout too.

What I was really pleased about was laying down hands to Excession. Whenever he tried to steal my blinds and I folded, he generally showed, and he normally held better than me (example A5 vs A3 for me).

So I had to steal a lot, since MG had so nicely laid a supertight, superweak image for me in the past few months

I think I'm getting better, anyway!

A key hand against me was when Ronm went all in with A 9 and I called with pocket Q's (had him covered) and the poker gods definitely were in his favor as he made a full boat and I was left with about 3-4 BB's left which lasted one more hand.

yeah, i remember that hand RSwheels, i was pulling for the QQ as i hate seeing them get beat, deju vu...RS played brilliantly too to make the final table, to get unseated with that hand...like i said, the number of outdraws after being behind was amazing in this tourny.

My biggest hand was a 99 UTG, i didn't want my biggest hand to get beat, so i bet about 5 BB's and everyone folded...Kowboy commented i shoulda slowplayed that big hand, he suspected QQ or KK or AA or AK i suppose, but was glad to not see a flop there.

tetsuo, I wasn't gonna believe you had an ace in that hand. Weak-tights just don't raise A9 UTG. I would re-raise my Queens 90% of the time, but against you, I didn't feel comfortable doing so because quite frankly, I thought you had a big pair also and I wasn't sure who's was bigger. Anyway, I guess it doesn't matter since I am a big luckbox.

I remember laying some great beats, one with AT against some guy called Bryan when the board had 99KQ or something and I rivered the ace to beat his KQ. That was poor by me but then sometimes being lucky is better than good eh?

Don't remember much beside that, though I had a "who has the bigger dick contest" with both Bri and Stelv when it came to blind stealing. I am bigger then Bri but smaller than Stelv so I guess I should be happyish. Gonna get the Swedish Penis Enlarger out before the next tournament...

Rich

briacheck -
i wasn't showing crap to everyone else. only *showed* crap 4 times by my count. A9. J6, and 46, and 79. showed far more solid hands that than.

the rest of the time i wasn't showing.

You're just bitter. : )

im happy with my first place bust
QQ v AK all in PF
what can ya do?