Secrets of the Amateurs

... or can you ? Today's tournament at the Orleans started you off with 50 big blinds and an hour clock. With a noon start, the antes didn't kick in until 9-15 pm. Play goes through till 3 am if necessary and starts again at 3pm tomorrow.

Not for me though, as I found no hands and few situations. Down to half my starting chips, I ended up all in with A7 v KK in a blind-on-blind coup. In fact he played it in the single way that gave me a chance to escape (limp-min reraise) but I wasn't quite sharp enough to take it. At least it didn't take all day which, with 450+ runners, it will for many.

There is such a thing as a structure that's too slow in my opinion, and this may have been it. 16-18 hours of play for a $200 tournament ? It's not going to add up to much of an hourly rate. I wonder if they were responding to "player pressure". You can't please everybody - within five minutes one woman complained "you only get 1000 chips" and "we have to play till 3 am ?". Which goes to show there are some people you can't please any of the time :-).

At least there's a good old crapshoot tonight. 20 minute levels that's the ticket. I think I should have at least as good an expectation in that, and it only takes a third as long. In fact, the antes start in the 7 pm tournament before they do in the 12 noon ! Should suit me better. All yin !