If you missed the insanity on Twitter over the past few days, there was one particular house in Canada that pulled in a lot of World Championship of Online Poker cash. Even better? It's the house where Team PokerStars Online's Adrienne "talonchick" Rowsome lives.
Not only did her friend Eric win a bracelet, but the love of her life made the final table of the main event. Here's Rowsome's story
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I always knew there was something about this chair.
Sunday night, Ryan and I, along with our friend Eric, sat in the living room dreaming of the possibilities of what Monday could bring. They had both made day 2 of their WCOOP events, Eric was in the top three of the remaining or so headed to day 2 in WCOOP 63 ($215 NL) and Ryan was in the middle of the pack of the 245 headed into day 2 of WCOOP 64 ($5200 NL). They were restarting at 800 and 1130 respectively.
We woke up Monday morning, there was an energy in the air, a great feeling, we knew it was going to be a wonderful day. The rest, as they say, is history. Eric won his event, sitting in that beloved chair, while I hosted his final table sitting upstairs. Meanwhile, Ryan had started his grind down to the final table of the Main Event.
There was no time for celebrating Eric's bracelet win, Ryan had to stay focused. Eric and I sat on the sun deck (which became the moon deck as the tournament headed later in the evening), sweating Ryan from laptops/iPads/iPhones and whatever else was handy. Of course, Ryan took his position in the lucky chair. Every break, Ryan would come up and spend a few minutes quietly inverted, then return to the chair.
As in every tournament, he had to have some good fortune and some tough beats. He had always built up enough chips to survive the beats and keep his head above water, getting as low as seven big blinds when there were 20 players remaining. From there, he won a couple flips to build upon his stack and suddenly they were at the final table. Ryan knocked out the "mitadu" in 9th with his AJ > AT, then not too much longer he doubled up through "takechip" with KK > AJ, who was soon eliminated in 8th.
In my recent PokerNews interview, I named Ryan as my best friend in poker. It was an easy answer to their question, he simply is inspirational to me. Ryan works every day at improving his poker game, mental outlook and our life. He watches videos, reads books, writes down goals, talks strategy as much as he can. In the last six weeks, he started saying a mantra every morning "Today is going to be a wonderful day", I certainly believe in the powers of a strong mindset, but this is exceptional. Ryan's WCOOP run was wonderful, with final tables in the PLO8 (1r1a), the Triple Shootout and now the Main Event.
For now, we get to enjoy spending a bit of the money earned over this weekend. We don't have plans for the score yet, likely will be spent practically, first on the list is actually a new furnace for the house. Not to worry though, there is still likely to be some time at the spa in our futures, along with planning for a bit more extravagant of a honeymoon!
