Spoiler
The first time playing poker was at the age of ten when my childhood friend hosted a home cash game of 5-card draw. We played micro-stakes no-limit 5-card draw and Texas hold ’em. In the beginning, we played full-ring cash games with up to nine or ten players from the neighborhood but only a select few stood pat and did not leave after having lost a buy-in, two or three. However, the poker phenomenon died out and we ended up playing short-handed cash games with a tight-knit group of friends until two of us started dominating and others refused to play. I did not play poker for years until ninth grade. I started playing a great deal of live poker — cash games and or sit-and-go tournaments in friends’ homes and or billiard halls. The billiard halls exposed me to sports betting. I had not played online poker until ’13. My childhood friend used the identity of his older brother to register on PokerStars. We shared the account and made deposits. Since then I have played poker as a hobby. I have played short-handed micro-stakes no limit Texas hold ’em cash games online, short-handed and full-ring micro- and low stakes no limit Texas hold ’em cash games, sit-and-gos and tournaments live and sports bet online and live. I am a break-even player with my five-figure sample online but I am a winning player in live cash games and sit-and-gos. In February ’14, I played the first major live tournament of my life. A €20 buy-in side-event of the GamingHill.com poker tournaments in Olympic Voodoo Casino at Radisson Blu Hotel Latvija. I did not cash but I survived until the first level of play after the first break. I found pocket aces in an early position and open-raised to 3bb, the action folded to the chip leader of the table in a late position who cold-called. A loose-aggressive player from the blinds 3-bet and I 4-bet all-in with my pocket aces. The tight-aggressive reshoved after half a minute of thinking and the loose-aggressive from the blinds snap-called. My pocket aces were in a very good shape against the ace-jack of the tight-aggressive and the pocket kings of the loose-aggressive to triple up and take the chip lead of the table. However, the jack-jack-x flop left me with one out and the turn nor the river helped me. In early ’14, I withdrew my money from PokerStars, registered on 888poker, made a deposit of $40 and bought the small stakes hold ’em version of PT4 for $59,99, and the Silver status on PokerStrategy for $9 on June 1.
A poker game in a pub, spring 2013.
That’s me!
My username at 888poker is “steesteestee.“
