Another report from Shane down at the Aussie Millions with CarbonPoker Players
Day 3 opened with only one Carbon Poker survivor, Elliot “ilikebiggirls” Smith. Elliot had run riot over day one almost recklessly attacking every table he sat down at, while day two saw Elliot switching gears with other aggressors at his table he had to chose his spots more carefully come day 3 he needed a little of both.
He started the day chipping up hard, possibly the biggest pot came from a fantastic read. With a 6KT85 boards featuring 3 hearts Elliot bet out onto to have his opponent make it another 150k to play. Elliot gave him his patented stare looking for a read and got it when his opponent got up from the table to avoid the stare, embarrassingly being told by the dealer to take his seat. Elliot made the call and his QT of hearts was good for a queen high flush and the pot, his opponent showing 78 of spades.
His early aggression along saw a couple of bustouts which led to his table breaking, his new assignment was both a dream and a nightmare. Two places to his right… 2007 Aussie Millions champion Gus Hansen. On his left… poker legend Barry Greenstin and the best female player left the field Annette Obrestad. Talk about being caught between a rock and a hard place! After staying quiet for a few orbits Elliot found his groove. Looking at a huge Gus Hansen raise from the button he asks Gus for a count of his stack and goes deep into the tank, even deeper than usual. Elliot reraises and finds a Gus fold, I guess he read Gus’s book showing every hand of his 2007 win!
The next big hand of his tournament saw him take down not just the pot but a sweet souvenir. Barry Greenstein finally made his last shove holding KQ all diamonds and was called down by Elliots AQ all hearts, Elliots hand held up and to go along with the chips and of course the thrill off knocking out a legend of poker he got an personalised autographed copy of Barry’s book with a description of the hand inscribed. Now there is a souvenir you can’t buy in the shops!
While watching this table a Russian media group interviewed Gus and gave him a Russian doll as a gift, Gus looked like a kid at Christmas pulling apart the doll at the table.
At the dinner break its down to 36 remaining players and play moves up to the TV studio, a redraw of the tables see’s Elliot very happy to be getting away from the established pro’s with a table of unknowns. Unfortunately the fish feeding frenzy he was looking for didn’t eventuate and throughout the evening he started to bleed chips. Late in the night he did catch one break when he doubled through the then chip leader with his KQ offsuit making a higher pair than his opponents pocket 8′s sending Elliot to day 4 with 410,000 chips.
