Poker

We all know it hurts to get knocked out of tournaments. It's slightly masochistic to play them at all, given that finishing anywhere except first is going to cause some pain. A friend of mine suffers physical symptoms of stress and depression when bad luck knocks him out. I can shrug off bad luck, but if I knock myself out with bad play then I will be upset for hours.

But most of the time, it's just fate. Here are two simple hands from Day 5 of the 2008 World Series - in the money - which I will use for ever, to remind myself to be philosophical about tournaments.

Keith Hawkins finds KK. Jeff Kimber (holding AQ) raises - and Hawkins reraises all-in.

Kimber calls. In another hand, Ben Roberts finds KK. Scott Montgomery (holding AQ) raises, and Roberts reraises all in. Montgomery calls. Thus four men reached a matching pair of crossroads. Nobody made a mistake: Hawkins and Roberts were right to move in with kings, Kimber and Montgomery could reasonably imagine their AQs to be good. The gods rolled their dice, and ...

In the first case, the board came 5-8-K-7-8. Hawkins doubled up and went on to finish 75th for $77,200. Kimber went out 120th for $41,815. In the second case, the board came A-T-6-5-7. Roberts was eliminated in 178th place, for $38,600.

On November 9th 2008, Montgomery will be going into the final as fourth chip leader, guaranteed to win between $1m and $9m.

· Victoria Coren was sponsored to play in the WsoP by www.PokerStars.com