Irish Open 2024
The Festival
Before I go into my poker for the week I'd like to congratulate JP McCann & Paul O'Reilly for putting on such a wonderful festival this year. Last year was the first Irish Open post Covid and also saw a change of venue from the City West to Royal Dublin Society (RDS).
It was a big change for organisers and players alike and the 2023 event had a lot of teething problems. I was very happy to see the 2024 festival had sorted these issues out and more. This years event went so smoothly. Everything form choice and timing of side events to the excellent players lounge and entertainment was top class.
I didn't think it was possible to improve the legacy of the Irish Open in this venue but JP & Paul have proved me wrong and deserve great plaudits for the 2024 offerings.
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| Catching up with Friends |
My Main Event
€ 1,150 No Limit Hold'em - Irish Open Main Event (Event #11) had 3,233 entries which broke all records. I think 8 bullets were the maximin amount of entries a player could have and I was prepared to empty all barrels if needed.
Thankfully I only had to fire the one bullet as day one went very well finishing with 226,000 in chips which was well ahead of average chip stack. This saw me in great form entering day two as I felt up a few €1,000 on the event already.
My entry was day 1/b and I decided to just chill for the day off before day 2. In years gone by this would have meant a massive session at the bar and a crushing hangover starting day 2. This year was spent relaxing at the hotel and a couple of long walks.
Day 1&2 are a bit of a blur to me hand wise but two went smoothly enough as well ending the day again ahead of average stack with 870,000 in chips.
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| Main Event |
Day 3 I can remember some hands a lot better, unfortunately😢. I had started the day with 30 big blinds and within the first orbit I opened Jacks UTG. Joe Baxter a good steady Northern player shoved his 24 blinds with the Aces.
I have spoken to a number of players about my call with the Jacks and to a man they thought I'd made the right decision. In a vacuum it probably is a call but I know Joe wasn't going light here and had a tight range. I probably called a bit hastily, in reality the best I could have hoped for was too see AK and a very small chance of AQs 1010. If I had of thought about if more at the time I think I can get away from the Jacks in this specific spot.
The hand left me critical with 6 big blinds including the what I had in the pot for the current big blind. Thankfully I was able to get a couple of shoves through and I won a race to get back to the 30 big blinds I had started the day with.
I was starting to feel very good myself when I looked down at the Queens. Now maybe I shouldn't have been feeling that good given my history with the Queens in the event. I have a recurring nightmare of the TV commentary my exit hand in 2010 when James Mitchell hit his rag Ace on the river to deny me the title...
Jessy May "Carr has the Queens"
Padraig Parkinson " the Irish Open is staying at home this year Jessy"
Jessy May " oh no, it's the Ace on the river"
I digress. Anyway I pick up the Queens and call a player shoves 30 bigs effective stacks over my min open with 55 and hits the 5 so it's dream over for me for another year. Out in 85th place for a payday of €5,460. I was gutted as the €415,000 first prize seemed within reach.
Side Events
I cashed 3 side events over the festival including two final tables.
First off was the € 550 Pot Limit Omaha - Mystery Bounty (Event #4). I finished 7th of the 188 starters in this event for €1,680 plus a €5,000 mystery bounty. My most memorable hand of this one is definitely knocking out my mate Bucko with 12 players left and picking the 5k envelope. It was a great start to the week for me picking up over €6000 profit and nice to hit a final table all be it briefly.
Next up was the € 250 No Limit Hold'em - The Hendon Mob Championship (Event #6) and my 2nd final table of the week and amazingly back to back 7th place finish in the field 599 starters.
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| The Hendon Mob Championship Final Table |
The story of this tournament for me was a big stack most of the way through until we closed in on the final table. I was pressing as the final table bubble approached and lost four key pots in flips or getting rivered when dominating opponents. If I win two of the flips it's 70% of the chips for me hitting the final table but they went against me. Starting the final 8/8 I outlasted one player netting €3,695. A nice return for the €250 entry but it could oh so easily been a lot more.
Having exited the main event my last tournament of the week was the € 250 No Limit Hold'em - Liam Flood Memorial 6-Max Turbo (Event #34). I made it four cashes for the week finishing 32nd of the 389 players for €660.
Merivan Hassan who is my boss at KKpoker came to my table with 36 players left. I was out in 32nd and Merivan went on to win the event for a lovely score of of just shy of €22k. It was a great week for him after cashing the main event so big congrats to Merivan.
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| Merivan |
I have mixed emotions looking back on the week. Two final tables and Two cashes including the main event is very satisfying but at the same time I can't help thinking what could have been.
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