Irish Pride

Ireland is an old land, made of mountain, hill, and glen
....and many a crop she's given to us of great Fenian men.

For those of you who are wondering, these are the first two lines from a poem that I wrote about the mother land many years ago.

Anyway, after the Austrian open was over and done with, Roland De Wolfe and I were en route for the airport and heading for Ireland when one of the more unusual and somewhat delicious prop bets that anyone has ever offered me was given by "Luckbox" (Roland).

You see, we had stopped by the duty free along the way and Roland had bought this HUGE bar of very rich chocolate. So after we had eaten about a third of it he comes up with the idea that he will give me 2/1 for $300 that I can't finish the rest of the chocolate in three minutes. I tell him that I'll take the bet on but should I vomit after finishing it that I still win the wager. Hmm… only after about 20 minutes of debating Roland decides to withdraw his offer due to the fact that by now my tummy was starting to rumble again and he figured that at this stage I was at best, only even money.

....Touchdown.

We arrived at Dublin airport to a blistering welcome, yes my friends the wind was a howling and the rain was beating down and with the song of, 'Dear auld Skibereen' playing in the back ground. I was home and I was happy.

After spending a few days down in the rebel county of Cork with my Mother and the rest of the family, I was back up to Dublin for the PaddyPowerPoker.com Irish Open (try saying that ten times).

All I can say to describe it was, that it was excellent... absolutely excellent. From the lady that made my bed to the man that made my breakfast, from the double bogie I had on the par three to the double Vodka I had at the guest bar, all had been done with such a splendid service and an air of great kindness that made a man beam with pride, Irish pride at that. Yes indeed my friends, it's the type of feeling that one can only get in Ireland.

The hotel was packed with poker players from all over the world, they came by boat and by train, by bus, and by plane, all lusting after the whopping €3 million guaranteed prize pool. It brought the card player, the horse punter, even the greyhound men turned up to lay claim for this giant prize. They played music in the players bar and the old folk clapped their hands. The visitors from foreign lands enjoyed the hospitality and pledged to one day again return. And all of this before the event even started!

March 20 arrived. I awoke that morning to the sun peeping through the curtains and my heart beating like crazy. I looked over to see my friend Mick McCool down on one knee asking the good Lord too grant him one wish and let him capture the Paddy Power Poker Irish Open. I let out a roar, "Would you take second right now Mick?"

"I would" he said, and after I gave him a slap with the pillow, we were away off down to get the breakfast.

After the grub I met up with the master himself, Mr. Padraig Parkinson. He had an air of confidence about him and a spring in his step. He told me that he was ready and intended to leave every last drop of effort in this great tournament.

We talked about strategy and the importance of taking it easy early. The objective of the day was to try and get to about 25,000 in chips and then enjoy the day off.

Ask and you shall receive, as that's about where we both ended up. Padraig played a blinder finishing on 28,000, and considering he was down to only 3,000, well, it just goes to show you that you must never give up. I ended up just slightly north of that with about 29,000. Mick had 33,000 and Rory Liffey was sitting like a king with almost 60,000.

We were still in, but unfortunately, hundreds of others had said their goodbyes.

The next day we played some golf and took it easy. At this stage I was now sharing a room with Rory. Just watching him prepare for day two with his attention to detail was intriguing, with his 3am yoga sessions to the half dozen raw eggs in the morning, well it made me feel like I was a Rocky movie. And you know what? That morning Rory was Rocky, he wanted that title bad, really bad.

Starting on day two there were only 265 players remaining. Considering we had started with 667 players we had lost over 60 percent of the field. I had a really nice table draw for day two with most stacks around the same as mine along with a few short stacks as well. After a few hours I had chipped up a little bit to 31,000 and I really liked the way the table was playing. Tony Cascarino had joined our table and all of a sudden I felt like a little kid again. Who can't for get those wonderful years he had playing for Ireland (the football team, that is) which saw us go to Europe twice and to two world cups. God bless you Tony Cascarino, and thank you for all those great memories..... and I told him as much.

Here is where it gets a bit crazy, but I'm not going to go in to it too much; lets just say a couple of mistakes here and there and a few weird table changes that threw things off a little bit and my Irish Open dreams were over for this year. Ahh well… we live and learn and then we learn some more. I went out with A-K against T-T with about 130 players remaining.

Mick was sent packing around the same time. While Rory could only shake his head and pump his fist saying, "it just means it will taste that much better Ciaran when we get it next year" and away off to the bar he went to deal with it like true Irish men.

I ended up doing the commentary with Jesse May and we had a blast. He has such a great feel for when to turn up the tempo and insert that burst of energy, which is so crucial to making a good show great.

I definitely learned a great deal from Jesse. Thank you, my man, for all the tips and making me look really good, and thanks Mickey (Jesse's wife) for all those fabulous pictures.

With three tables remaining we unfortunately saw the end of Padraig's effort for this year going out in 26th place, congrats P and commiserations at the same time sir, you did well.

The final table brought a lot of excitement with Neil "One-Out" Channing eventually taking down the title but not without a gallant effort from Tipperary man, Donal Norton, who finished second picked up €420,000, and Channing, for his troubles, received almost €800,000. Fair play, Neil, and congratulations indeed.

In my humble opinion, you were definitely the better player on the day, sir, and in deserving of the victory. Great Job lad!

I'll leave you with this; a final note. Some people took money home with them and some went home broke But I think I speak for most when I say that all at the very least took home a wealth of fine memories and some great stories to tell.

Well done to all the Paddy Power Poker staff and what a pleasure it was for me and so many others getting to know you all, Orla, Nikki, Cormac, Paddy Power Jr, Nic, Keith, Ross, Eric, Mike and Daragh and to anyone else I forgot.

Ciaran "Big C" O'Leary