Unfortunately, the Legends of Poker WPT at the Bike didn’t go as planned.

Last time I wrote, I was in great shape going into day two of the $2,500 tournament. Unfortunately, I lost a 40/60 fairly early in the day for all my chips and finished 16th.

I was really looking forward to playing some of the bigger events, but came down with a pretty bad fever on the Sunday after the $2,500 tourney. The fever only lasted for a few days (my girlfriend took great care of me), but large amounts of coughing and phlegm build up prevented me from being able to sit still in a casino for large hours on end (I’ll try to spare the details).

So I ended up missing all of the tournaments I wanted to play, including the $5,000 NL which I was particularly upset about.

I did, however, play the main event, and it started off great. I had great control of the table, and never had below a starting stack. I peaked at 55,000 before my luck took a turn for the worse. I think I went 1-4 in coin flips, and I also lost AK vs Q9 all-in preflop for almost 30k (don’t ask how he got his chips in with Q9. It was ugly).

My final hand involved me hitting a flush on the turn, and my opponent made a full house on the river. In hindsight, I think I should have gotten more money in on the turn, although that would have committed me even more, and certainly would not have prevented me from going broke that hand. Actually, I had my opponent slightly covered, but the 3 big blinds I had left after that didn’t last long.

I’m really happy with how well I played. I had a weird table dynamic where there were three super stubborn players that would never fold, and three super nits. The problem was they were spread out across the table, so I could never play a pot preflop against only one type of player. I think I did a great job of being able to figure out when I had room to maneuver, and when I had to play tight and straightforward.

For those of you that don’t know, there is an interesting prop bet going on between Brian Townsend and Barry Greenstein. Brian (Aba/Sbrugby online: this year’s most successful online high stakes no limit cash game player) thinks the top internet players are better than the top live players. Barry felt he had an edge over any internet player. So they cross booked 10% of my action, and 10% of Sorel Mizzi’s (Imperium / ZangBezan online, #1 rated online tourney player) against 20% of Barry’s action.

What this means is that if I were to cash for $50,000 in a tournament, then Barry would owe Brian $5,000 if he had also entered that tournament but not cashed. I cashed in the $2500 NL at the bike, but unfortunately that doesn’t count since I don’t think Barry played. I think Barry cashed in the $5k, but that doesn’t count either since I didn’t play. Barry is currently second in chips in the main event. 1st place is $1.6 million, and Brian has already stated that he will end the bet if Barry wins the first event. $320,000 would be a very large swing this early in the bet. As much as I love Barry, I hope he doesn’t win this event so that they keep the bet going. On second thought, I just realized that Sorel is in Europe right now and didn’t play the Bike, so Brian would *only* lose $160,000 if Barry won.

Personally I’m flattered that these guys think I’m on the same level as both the most successful live player in the world, and the most successful online tournament player in the world.

Next up for me is WSOP: London, which I’m both excited and apprehensive about. I think the tournaments will be great, but I tend to get jetlagged when I travel to Europe. I won’t have much time to adjust, and that means there’s a very good chance that I will find myself playing in a large buyin tournament while dealing with a severe migraine. I really hope that isn’t the case, because there’s no way I can play my A game, or even my B game when dealing with a migraine.

After I bust from the main event in London, I will fly directly to Atlantic City for a WPT at the Borgata. They have great structures, so I will be looking forward to that.

I haven’t decided if I’m going to play WPT Turks & Caicos yet, although I probably won’t play it.

In October, I will play WPT Barcelona. I will fly straight from there to Vegas, where I will play the US Poker bowl (www.uspokerbowl.com) with my superstar team. I formed a team with Jared “WacoKid” Hamby, Steve Sung, Danny Wong, Carl “Colson10″ Olson, and JC “PartyPSux” Alvarado. All of those guys are young, but extremely successful live tournament players. Half of them are at the top of the CardPlayer Player of the Year race. I think we have a great shot to win the event.

After that, is WPT Niagara, WPT Foxwoods, and WPT Bellagio (5 Diamond). Over everything else, I’m hoping I can perform well at the 5 Diamond after my 4 final table performance last year. It would make me incredibly happy if I could make the TV final table this year, since I took a bad beat to bust one spot away in 7th last year.