Ok, Party poker is having a Million Dollar Guaranteed Tournament on April 17th.

The prize pool is Guaranteed to be $1,000,000 USD. The buy in for this tournament is $600(entry)+40(house fee)

A little steep, I think.

But here's the cool thing, you can play single table tourneys to qualify. There are direct $64+6, 10 player single table tourneys and sub-qualifing $7+1 10 player tourneys.

No brainer right?

So I play a couple of $7+1's last night, win them both, then lose one this morning. So I have 2 free $64+6 buyins to try to win a seat in the main $600+40 Million Dollar event.

Problem is, I've had a hard time finding 9 other people to fill the $64+6 table to get a tourney started. I log on at like 2am tonight and find 1 person sitting in the $64+6 room waiting for people to join, I also take a seat, plus I sit in three $10+1 cash tournaments.

After 45 minutes, we have 10 players and begin the $64+6 table. By then I've busted out of one $10+1 early, Busted out on the bubble (4th) on another, and am playing heads up for the win on the third (I lost).

So I won $30 on the $10+1's that cost me a total of $33 to enter, net amount -$3.00. (bummer, but I was really close to hitting big)

Anyways, the $64+6 goes on forever, partially because you start with 1000 tournament chips (T1000) as opposed to the normal 800 tournament chips (T800).

At one point it was down to 5 players and I'm short stacked, I make a few moves, and end up going all in 4 times to take the lead with around T4500 (out of 10,000 total).

Suddenly the game becomes an all in orgy, seriously, for like 8 hands in a row, there is no flop and someone is always all in before the blinds get a chance to act.

Finally someone gets called and busted out. We're down to 4, I lose the chip lead as I'm forced to throw away some real crap hands to modest raises.

Another one drops and we are down to 3. The player with the chip lead around T5500 starts using his big stack to push us around, he is doubling the big blind every hand, I get a good hand and go all in to double up.

I have A9s and the flop comes QA7, I check, he checks behind me, a rag hits the turn, I again check.

A ten comes on the river, I again check, he bets out and I triple hit bet with a raise, he calls and I take down about T3000

Finally the other two go heads up and he's crippled even more. Soon after he finally loses it all on a despiration move-in.

Now we are heads up. I get a decent hand and go up to T6000 vs his T4000.

A few hands later, he moves all in with a pair and I call with my ace, and he hits, and I dont. I'm down to T1500, I get delt crap and have to fold a few hands and steal a few blinds to survive. At one point I'm down to T700. I get a few bluffs to work and catch trip Kings with my K9 all in vs his 910o and I'm back to T2000 at least some breathing room.

I play tight and slowplay some top pairs, finally I'm up to T5800 after grinding it out. I get my K9o again, he moves all in. I've had good luck with the K9 and I've got the chip lead so I can afford a loss here, so I call, taking the chance to win the satelite. He turns over A2o, I'm behind and will need to catch some cards to win.

The flop comes 4h 2c Qc no help for me

The Turn is my miracle King of diamonds.

as long as I avoid an ace I'll be the winner.

The river is the moment of truth, it's another red card, and it's image slowly hits my eyes, and it's a 9 of diamonds, giving me two pair and the victory!

I've turned my $8.00 tourney fee into a $640 seat in a million dollar tournament. This is almost as good as playing in the World Series of Poker!

It's now 6am while I write this, so I should probably get some sleep. Here's the cool thing though, I still have a few seats for the $64+6 single table tourneys left, and if I win one of those, I just get the $640 in cash! Cha-Ching!

"Until later, may all your pots me monsters!" - Mike Sexton (WPT announcer)

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--Chris Falco