This weekend the April Charity Poker tournament took place, even though technically in May.  With races, MBA exams, baseball games, travel, etc.  there just wasnt a good time to have the tournament so it was pushed back to this weekend.  Initially it looked like it would be a light turnout but in the end we got together seven players including picking up a couple that hadn’t made it out in a while.  In addition to the seven players, there were three rebuys which brought the pot up as well.

In the end I came in second place which when combined with the buyins meant that $105 were raised for this years Livestrong Challenge ride.  I had a pretty good night and took out a couple players which made me the big stack at the table for most of the tournament.  In the end I went card dead and when facing an aggressive heads up situation I was whittled down to going all in on a marginal hand and losing first place.

Also I did an hour on the cycling trainer today totaling 17.34 miles.  I put it out on my deck, hooked up my Ipod and went to town for the full time.  Slowly but surely my cycling strength will come back around.

This past weekend I held the March poker tournament fundraiser for my Livestrong Challenge ride.  It was a really good tournament and one of the best turn-outs since I started having them.  We had 13 players and two rebuys which added up to over $112 raised for the Lance Armstrong Foundation.  Sadly I was one of the rebuys this time as I was getting dead cards all night long.  I could count on one hand how many hands were dealt to with me with even one face card.  The play on my table, we had two, was very aggressive which kept me from fishing to hit cards on the flop so almost every go I was folding.

So in three tournaments there has already been about $400 raised.  Im looking forward to the next one and hopefully to playing a bit better and getting a win and donating that to the charity as well.

Last night I had the February poker tournament, and yes I realize it was actually March. With everything going on last month between the Daytona trip, NC State basketball games, and Carolina Hurricanes hockey games I wasn’t able to find a weekend when I could hold the fundraiser. This month there were eight players and two re-buys which raised $75 for my Livestrong Challenge ride. I came within one place of raising more money as I was knocked out in fourth place and the payouts began with third place.

I donate all my winnings back to my Challenge ride, and if i had made it one more place I would’ve added another $20 to the total. I raised to $500 pre-flop and was called. The flop was 5-6-8 rainbow and I moved all-in since I was short stacked and still had the highest pair. My friend Richard thought about it for a minute and then called flipping over pocket seven’s. So he had an open ended straight draw plus the chance to catch either of the remaining seven’s which gave him about a 40% chance of winning the hand. The turn was useless and he hit the straight with the river to knock me out. Oh well, I probably could’ve pushed him out with a bigger raise before the flop but because I was getting short stacked I wanted to try to leverage my pair into enough money to last till the payouts but it didn’t work out that way. Maybe in a couple weeks when we have the March tournament I can do a bit better.

I also ran in the WakeMed Cary Distance Festival, the 5K option, yesterday morning. I think I got around 24:15 but wont know for sure till the results are posted, probably tomorrow.

I just got notice by email that the Discovery Challenge cycling team is fundraising to send cancer survivors to the Ride for the Roses this year.  The Ride for the Roses is a reward for those that raise at lease $10,000  in support of their Livestrong Challenge ride. To do this they are giving the opportunity to people to sponsor individual riders over the course of the cycling season. You can donate a certain amount for each mile your rider rides this year. They break down a sampling of what your pledge would be based upon last years mileage and increments of .01, .10, 1.00, etc. There are fundraising incentives to boot. If your rider records the most mileage in a given month and you’re the biggest pledger then you receive a autographed jersey. The biggest supporter of the year gets to meet the team and attend the December training camp.

Learn more about the program here:
http://www.thepaceline.com/challenge/

If you’d like, feel free to sponsor my 100 miles at the Austin Livestrong Challenge as well.  Im no Ivan Basso but could use the support as well.

January was a good start to fundraising for the 2007 Livestrong Challenge.  The first poker tournament raised $180 and there was $27 dollars donated prior to the end of last year that was put in for this years ride.  Granted the poker tournament actually only raised $90 and the remaining $90 was a generous gift from the winner, more often than not the poker tournament does raise more than just the percentage of the pot.

If this trend were to continue then over the next 10 months $2070 would be raised for the ride.  While I cant realistically expect a month to be as good as this past one this should be another good year of fundraising.