Hi,

Deep with 10 players left. The FT bubble had lasted for a couple of orbits and the stacks were getting shallower and shallower in this turbo format.

The first villain pushing has been playing to ladder the final table but he was down to less than 4BB and finally pushed. Given that he was UTG I assume he pushed super wide, he could not afford to go through another round of blinds and if he doubled up he would have become close to a lot of other stacks. At the other table there was a 6BB stack
The second raiser was the most active player, he seems good (he beat me in HU in a 180man 15usd turbo once) and quite aggressive. He had opened a third of the pots in the last 2 orbits and had been moving up.

So I figure that I have most likely the best hand here, and that I probably dominate at least one of them, it is obviously massively +cEV to call but the ICM sucks : as usual with pokerstars the prize pool is ridiculous where 9-10th win barely more than 18th while 8th wins double 9th and 7th triple.

The prize structure was starting from 10th: 494, 672, 1147, 1858, 2649, 3439, 4625, 6642, 9331, 12496

I’ve done a bit of ICMIzer and get the following figures: if I fold my ICM is 3273usd, if i win and double up it is 6075 (3rd stack), if i just win the side pot it is 3626.

Looking at the numbers I struggle to point out what the best decision was as I think it was rather close. Estimating equity against the following ranges: 50% for OR and 25% for reshover I get a close decision where my ICM of calling is 3224 so -50usd for a call.

It’s actually a very interesting one I think, to be honest on the spot I underestimated the value of ICM stack when folding. I figured that if folding among the short 3 of the FT (3 at 7BB or less and the rest at 10BB+) it was too likely I finished 7th or worse : I would have folded if everyone was deeper or slower structure but left with 7BB in a turbo tournament it does not leave many options for the FT.

Do you think those ranges make sense? Doubt that they are much wider to justify a call, especially since I’m not looking for a marginal ICM gain with so much variance, before doing the calcs I kind of thought I would have a 300usd+ kind of gain by calling.

PokerStars – $30+$3|30000/60000 Ante 6000 NL – Holdem – 5 players
Hand converted by PokerTracker 4

UTG: 3.84 BB (VPIP: 14.55, PFR: 11.11, 3Bet Preflop: 7.69, Hands: 55)
CO: 14.47 BB (VPIP: 20.00, PFR: 22.22, 3Bet Preflop: 0.00, Hands: 41)
BTN: 6.8 BB (VPIP: 26.19, PFR: 17.11, 3Bet Preflop: 0.00, Hands: 84)
SB: 11.6 BB (VPIP: 19.81, PFR: 19.37, 3Bet Preflop: 13.95, Hands: 310)
Hero (BB): 8.2 BB

5 players post ante of 0.1 BB, SB posts SB 0.5 BB, Hero posts BB 1 BB

Pre Flop: (pot: 2 BB) Hero has A Q

[color=red]UTG raises to 3.74 BB and is all-in[/color], fold, fold, [color=red]SB raises to 11.5 BB and is all-in[/color], Hero calls 7.1 BB and is all-in

Flop: (20.44 BB, 3 players) Q 5 3

Turn: (20.44 BB, 3 players) A

River: (20.44 BB, 3 players) 2

[spoil]SB shows 4 4 (Straight, Five High) (Pre 42%, Flop 13%, Turn 14%)
Hero shows A Q (Two Pair, Aces and Queens) (Pre 36%, Flop 87%, Turn 86%)
UTG shows 8 A (One Pair, Aces) (Pre 22%, Flop 1%, Turn 0%)
SB wins 20.44 BB
[/spoil]