Not bad, not good

Went to a live tournament (NL Texas Holdem) arranged by the same crowd that has done so before.

Eighteen players, three tables. Unlimited rebuys the first hour followed by a possible addon.

I did really well after I had made a rebuy. Had 45 spades in the big blind and the flop comes 236 and I get an all-in against me. Bingo! A while later I get AA with blinds 100/200, raise it to 500 and another goes allin and I quickly call. He has 99 and my aces hold up. We started with 1000 in chips and I now have 8-9000.

When the rebuy period ended I therefore wouldn't gain much with an addon. Some players made up to eight (!) rebuys. Quite a substantial prize pot, five places (out of eighteen) paid.

The play changed drastically, the boisterous shouts "rebuy!" and "all in!" disappeared. Knocked one guy out with 55 in the big blind, calling his shortstacked allin and flopping trips.

I make it to the final table which will have eight players. Now I'm a shortstacked player with 5200 in chips. They're consumed by blinds and calling unraised that aren't helped by the flop. With 8T in the big blind and the flop 567 this could be it... The turn is an eight (now I have pair of eights) other player goes all in and I call with what little I have left. Nope, he has a nine (a 5-9 straight made for him) so my only hope is a nine on the river giving me a better straight. As one other player commented: "Well, you're not drawing dead". It doesn't come and I'm out at eighth place.

Analysis: I don't think I could've done anything differently during the whole tournament. It was just that little bit of edge and/or luck that wasn't there for me.

Oh well, there'll be more tournaments.