Running good or running bad?

The other night I logged onto Full Tilt out of boredom and was thinking about finding a freeroll to play in.

Unbeknownst to me, I had $1.37 left in my account. Like a dream come true.

So I find the $1 sit-n-go, I believe with 54 players in it and register, immediately.

Early on I win a few huge hands and have the chip lead with about 42 left or something like that. Somehow, I kept this chip lead until we were down to 15 people, which is when I decided to check the payouts.

Obviously I know that the payouts are going to be extra small but I'm still interested to know what I'll get if I win. $17. Sweet. But only six spots pay so I need to play well (this high stakes poker is exciting, I know).

Then it happens, my internet goes out. And stays out.

But finally it turns back on five minutes later and I'm still the chip leader with 13 people left. I'm in the big blind with KhTh and the small blind obviously raises pre-flop to steal from me as I've been disconnected, but I re-raise and win a pot.

Then my internet goes out again. This time I sit and wait and it just stays off. For a long time and I eventually go to sleep, figuring I gave it my best shot but when you're running bad, you're running bad and even a chip lead on the bubble can't help when a shotty Time Warner cable connection has something to say about it.

I chalked it up as a loss but a valiant effort as I had once again proved my uncanny ability to beast huge tournament fields of 54 people and single-figure buy-ins.

But then this morning I logged on to check and see if I had somehow crept into the top six to win a buck or two and -- to quote the great blogger Rod Benson -- Boom Tho.

I finished in third place for $7, thus seven-tipling (?) my Full Tilt bankroll from $1 to $7.

While I thought that it was just another bad beat by losing my internet connection, I now believe that it was actually a suckout. The way things have been going for me, I would have donk'd my chips off and finished in 7th place had I been able to play out the remainder of the tournament. But thanks to Time Warner, I was unable to blow my chips off and simply blinded off to a very admirable 3rd place finish.

This is a sure sign of great things to come.

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