Party Poker Blog

I wanted to send out a quick thank you for all the emails, notes and whathaveyou on my winning a Main Event seat. Truly appreciated.

I couldn't get my money out of PokerStars fast enough so I had to wire over 10 large of my own money, which sucks, along with faxing over my registration. The fine folks running the WSOP were unable to verify if my money or if my fax came through, so that's wonderful. Apparently I have to wait till next Saturday to find out. Not to mention I have no clue when my start date is.

Good times.

"Of course the big news is that Iggy won a seat to the Main Event yesterday. What we’re gonna do is when he sits down to play is we’re all gonna go over there with our cameras and crowd around and take about a million pictures. He’ll appreciate that."
MeanGene

Damn Gene, I know you're kidding but that still freaks me out. I truly hope all my beautiful, rich, classy, brilliant benevolent friends in the poker media are kind to me.

Or better yet, I'll get knocked out in the first hour or two and it will all be moot.

Well, I suppose the most redeeming part of playing in a long grueling poker tourney is getting a lot of poker reading done on the web. Which I did.

So there's that. But I'm so far behind on everything that I just don't have the time nor energy right now to regurgitate it.

That's right, I suck. But I'm still promising a massive uber.

So please cut me some slack, gentle reader, as I still am digesting the fact that I won a damn WSOP Main Event seat. And I just feel like imbibing a cold Guinness and rambling a bit tonight, if that's ok with you.

It was funny when I was registering a minute before the tourney began, I tried to recall the last time I had played a large MTT. I'm embarrassed to say it hasn't happened since I returned to work over a year and a half ago.

So I guess I need to read a poker book or two, eh?

Not much to say about the tourney itself except it was excruciating the last few hours. When I say excruciating, I mean that I nursed a small stack for much of it and was quite convinced in my mind that I was going to bubble. Absolutely convinced.

I didn't allow myself ANY consideration or feelings of what it would be like to win a seat during the entire end game. And when the Congratulations screen finally popped up, I let out a big old yell. And maybe a fist pump.

It was the first time I have ever screamed during/after a poker game.

And it felt good. But Lord, my wife got pissed. She thought I had fell down the stairs or something.

And while I feel a little bit like Charlie with the Golden Ticket, I'm also going into this with very, almost sad, expectations. Just getting a seat at the table is the win for me, first and foremost. And I'll be satisfied if I can just survive the first day.

Because, quite frankly, I play too tight for big stack NL tournament poker.

I've dug through my books and pulled out Doyle and SuperSystem and Mr. Harrington and am planning on some serious cuddle time with both over this upcoming weekend. And I might have to pull a McManus and reinstall Wilson HoldEm on here, as well.

Beyond that, I just want to embrace the experience. Have fun and revel in the fact that I finally get to play in this monstrosity of a lottery. When I briefly considered not dealing with the hassle of wiring the money to the Rio, battling the logistics of flights, hotels and work, and just sticking the 12.5k in my pocket, my wife mocked me.

"Do you know how many times you've told me that you want to play in this tournament over the years? Oh no, mister, you are definitely going," she stated emphatically.

And so there you have it.

2008 WSOP Main Event. Pretty much free-rolling, too.

I'll be back soon.

Stars 8000 runners.

226 win a ME seat.

I played the best weak-tight poker of my life.

Nine drunken hours later.

On a whim, I'm in the WSOP Main Event.