Good Things Happening

Yesterday Ashton Cartwright played well enough to win a 100k guarantee tournament on Pokerstars for 22k. He was the last man standing after almost 3 thousand people entered. He had a stack most of the way and then on the final table went back down to 9th in chips before staging a pretty awesome comeback. I knew he was going well but I didn't really get too excited until they got 3 handed and a few things worked in his favour. Heads up he carved up the guy and won it pretty easily.
www.ashtoncartwright.com for more info.

It was a pretty fun day. My internet kept cutting out. I think the weather affected my mobile broadband reception. I moved in recently and I have a list of things to do which includes going and getting a fixed line installed ASAP. I toyed with the idea of going down to Melbourne for the Joe Hachem Deep Stack Series but instead I think I will get things done here and go direct to Perth for ANZPT.

Go to the Source

'The door to your right leads to the Source.'

A week after Adelaide ANZPT I travelled to Dubbo to visit the Team 1 Team base. I got to catch up with Dingo, Browny, Westy, Baza and Lukey. I got to experience the good life on the 'run good' internet connection and shipped a couple of tournaments in one night! I also had a great time at the Dubbo Railway Bowlo, getting getting ko'd by Baza88 on the APL final table. It went something like this;

On The Mac; 'I'm all in'

folds to Brad in the big blind.

Baza88; 'How much do you have?' (looking at a message on his phone)

On The Mac; 'I'm sitting on about eighty-eighty thousand Baza (blinds 5k-10k).'

Baza88; (After a slight delay, some may say 5 minutes) 'Um, I call'

On The Mac; 'I have 88, you got AJ?'

Baza88; (After a few more moments) 'Oh'

Mac; 'Humph'

I think you know by now he has Aces and is slow-rolling me in a 11 re-buy at Dubbo Railway Bowling Club to the laughter of all the local regulars. Classic Baza, nothing like Dubbo hospitality. They make you think you are good then bring you back down to earth.

I got the Mayoral tour of Dubbo from Brad Bower, (he is known as the 'Mayor of Dubbo' to many Australian poker players and these days doesn't answer to much less). He has been known to answer Skype calls with his robe on and not the usual Full Tilt one that most have.

I got my grind on and I was able to focus really well. We mostly ate out or had food delivered. We prepared a few cocktails. I flew my Dad in from Mackay and I stayed for about a week. Originally I was going to do a road trip but the flights were only $144 and the car needed a service.

I also sent my mum and brother on a trip to the Philippines and I am planning to go on a few trips between ANZPT's. I've basically been moved out of Neutral Bay now as the place I was in has changed ownership in preparation for development. It was a good base to have between trips.

Late one night I went on a drive up through Manly and to Palm Beach and back. It was really awesome to drive through at night with the car recently serviced and there not being many other cars around. I blasted through Whale Beach and stopped of at 2-3am at Palmy which is a really nice spot at anytime day or night. It had a different feel to it this time as it was so early in the morning that not many of the house lights were on that usually illuminate the beach front. It is usually really cool driving around the last bend onto the beach front area and the area being lit by the houses on the hills. The beach was really calming and I had a snack and listened to some music then drove back.

I was kinda bored after the drive and wasn't ready for bed, so I ducked into Star City to see if there were any games running. There were like 3 tables and I mixed it up on the 1-2 $200 buy in table. It was a bit unusual as normally you can get at least a 5-5 $500 table running, but I played for a bit until I got hungry and bored an went for breakfast at the Queen Victoria Building. I decided to get a taxi from star as it can be hard to get parking in the city and I realised I had a few questions to ask at the Apple store.

I went in and the service was great. I ordered my iMac and an additional screen online whilst in Dubbo (it was delivered to my place as i arrived back in Sydney), but I had a few questions about the setup. I also found that I could just purchase an iPhone with no wait at the store. I bought one outright and then took it to 3/Vodafone and told them I wanted a BYO contract as my contract for both phone and internet had just completed. I had been on a waiting list for 6 weeks with 3 mobile for an iPhone and it was really satisfying being able to just walk into the Apple store and say, 'here is the cash, thanks for the phone'. It really was a pleasure. Sometimes I think that the telco's in Australia don't like money. They are slow, unreliable and expensive compared to other countries.

Some of my goals have changed after recent events. I still am looking to do some work with Paul Penna on mental/life skils. He was our former sports psychologist at the institute of sport and I found him to be excellent and I am sure he can transfer his knowledge over to apply concepts to poker. I think that both of us are challenged and excited to be working on this project. Utilising Skype we can do some work while I am away.

Perth is the next stop on the ANZPT. It should be fun times. I have many good friends in Perth and a lot of the tournament guys will be there. We have been on some pretty awesome trips to Queenstown and Cebu and it is always good to catch up with everyone.