Live Poker Tournament Win!

Last night I went to a friend's brother's home to play in a very friendly poker tournament. It was a no-limit hold 'em tournament. 31 men paid $50 and received 2500 in chips. There was one rebuy/add-on within the first hour to get an additional 1000 chips for $20. I was the last one standing after about 6 hours of play and won $930. $850 for first place and an additional $80 in bounties. We were given a $10 bounty for each player that we knocked out of the game.

I hardly played any hands for the first 4 hours or so. When we reached the final 12 players, I only had about 6000 chips (there was over 90,000 in play). I was able to get more involved in pots because I finally started receiving some decent starting hands. I can honestly say that I did not lose one 'race' situation all night. On one hand, I was almost all-in with pocket 8's. My noble opponent showed pocket J's. I hit the set on the flop. A few hands later with AJ, I put someone all-in. He flipped over pocket 5's. I spiked a J on the flop. On another hand, I had KQ on a flop of J-10-5. Opponent (the host) went all-in with A6. I called because I had the proper pot odds (I assumed that he had a pair) and caught a K on the river. Another knockout occured when I had AQ vs KQ on a Q high flop.

When it was heads-up, I had about a 3 to 1 chip lead. It was about a dozen hands later that I won the thing! This is my biggest win ever. I think that I am still in a daze. I know that winning a tournament like this involves a lot of luck, but it is still a great confidence booster for me. I learned a lot about how to play in a live game. Hopefully I can build on this experience.

A funny side note - I didn't get back home until about 4:00 AM. We still went to our regular 9:45 Mass. Friends were coming up to congratulate me on my win before Mass, during the 'sign of peace', and as we were leaving our seats to receive Communion. My priest, Fr. Gary even made it a point to see me after Mass to congratulate me. I had just gotten home 6 hours ago! Boy, word travels fast around here.