Hey guys. It's been a while since my last post. I've had a couple cashes since nothing major. Hovering just above even since my last post so no big complaints.
This is a post I've been planning to do for a long time, how I got into playing poker and how eventually it became my main source of income.
My furthest memory of poker was srangely enough at the end of 6th year in school, I was 17 and me and two friends were out renting out suit for our debs. One of the lads suggested we should have a weekly poker game for €5 or €10 with a few beers, we loved the idea. Soon after poker became a regular occurance for us and I remember we played some ridiculous rules and were pretty much clueless but it was all in good fun. After a while I began to notice certain patterns in what plays and card combinations worked better and I began winning, I think I won like 5 or 6 games in a row at some stage, of course at the time I thought it was all luck.
I then discovered online poker. VC Poker at the time (around 2006) had a promotion where if you signed up you got a free €8 bankroll. I began playing $1.10 6 handed sit and go's and done really well. Within a week I moved up to $2.20 games then $5.50 games and before I knew it I had a bankroll of €1,100 in my account, it was pretty amazing. I was quite the sicko, playing three games at a time I thought I was the cheese. I withdrew €800 at the advice of friends because I was pretty smashed as I was just starting college. Off that free bet I ended up withdrawing just over €2,000 and still had a decent 3 figure sum which I pissed away being either drunk or tilted, I was young and pretty naive but it I had done good, it was the beginning of something.
My first taste of live multi table tournament poker came in the old Jackpot €5 rebuy tournament which I had some success. I scooped a couple of times and over €300 and I remember the feeling being absolutely awesome, then came my first big result.
I had heard my college, DCU, were hosting the 2008 Student Poker Master sponsored by Boylepoker. It was a €55 freezeout. My mate Pete had told me ITB were running a €10 satellite but it was only open to ITB student so I got a friend of his student number and went up and scooped a ticket, all with a massive hangover. So along came the tournament itself and after 3 levels I'm big chip leader. Day 1 finished to a final table and I began the final table 2nd in chips. After a pretty short final table I won the tournament when my QJ outran A9 for the title and €2200 first prize. It was awesome I done an interview with FM104 after and had to give the name I was registered in the tournament as, James McKee it was. Funny times, but still up to this day this was by far my proudest moment in poker.
I'll continue with some more recent results and stories next week......
