Deep in 'Sniper' MTT

I haven't played a lot of Hold'em recently (been concentrating on Omaha hi-lo, with very mixed results) and I haven't played a big MTT for ages, so I decided to enter a 'Sniper' tournament on Ultimatebet (aka Bounty Hunter, Head Hunter, etc...).

I don't usually expect to go deep in these, but the format suited me, with 12m blinds, and I picked up a couple of hands early on that held up. After the first hour the blinds started to catch up with me and, down to 9k, I was all-in with KK, and it held up against AQ - somewhat unusual for me.

I'm not an aggressive player, really, so taking bounties was not going to make me a fortune - when I did get it all-in and was called, it was always by a bigger stack (looking to take my bounty, no doubt) and incredibly my hands were holding up.

My luck changed after the 2nd break, when I limped with pocket 6's, and there were 3 callers. The 2-4-7 board didn't look too scary, so I pushed. It got through 2 players, but not the 3rd, who called and turned over Queens.

I was now down to my last 6k and found suited connectors, so had to push. Incredibly, I sucked out and hit a straight on the river and was back in action.


The very next hand, I find pocket 10's and immediately decide I am going to push - the blinds are big enough to steal. However, there was an all-in and a call ahead of me. I tanked and used up all my allowed time before deciding 'what the heck, I should have been gone on the last hand', so I pushed it in anyway.

I was delighted not to be up against an overpair, but had to dodge an Ace and a King. Incredibly I did and trebled up, taking two bounties in the process.


Of the 404 starters, I am currently 12th out of the 16 left, after my top pair on the board was beat by slow played Aces - I could have done my stack, but am still alive.

So sick, I'm out. Picked up Ah-Qh on the BB, with a min-raise from the UTG and everyone else folded. I push and he calls (not instantly). He's got Kc-Qd, so I have him dominated; just no King!!!

The flop comes down 7d-Js-3d, the hard part out of the way. The turn is the 4d, so now he's picked up the flush draw, and wouldn't you believe it, the Jd hits the river and I've busted out to a flush; insane.


The exact same thing happened earlier in the tournament and I had A-Q on that occasion, up against pocket 4's. I spiked the Ace on the flop only to lose to a runner-runner flush.

I've long believed that the deeper a tournament goes the more the table finds a way of busting out short-stacks when they are all-in against bigger stacks, and this just backs that up. There was a very noticeable pause before the river was dealt, as though the software was looking for a card that would bust me.

I suppose I did get lucky earlier in the tournament, and I cashed - for the first time in a long time, finishing 14th out of 404 runners.