Gaining a reputation for always having a stable of horse in most of the tournaments he enters, Lindgen was busy buying pieces of other players right up until the moment the tournament director announced, “Shuffle up and deal.” He had entered the Amazon Room with, to name a few, Huck Seed, Chris Bell, and Anthony Reategui, who in an amazing coincidence were all sent to the same table as Lindgren. “Somehow they put us all at the same table,” he said. “It’s really unfortunate. I’ve got them all to my left so I’ve had to play really tight solid poker, which I would probably be doing any way. They don’t give you enough chips to actually mess around. You can’t just bluff your way through. It would be pretty stupid.”

In an encounter that showed how problematic it has been for Lindgren to have so many tough players sitting on his left, he opened for a $600 raise from the cutoff seat and Huck popped it to 2k from the button, forcing Lindgren to muck his cards. “I don’t think Huck necessarily had anything,” said Lindgren afterwards. “Our table just sucks right now. It’s the worst table in the joint. There are 3,000 people here and I’m playing with four really good players and five other guys who can play.”

At the fifteen-minute break between level 5 and 6, Lindgren had about 3.7k. “I’m alright,” he said, “but I had better make something happen this next level. I’m getting in trouble.”

[Lindgren would get eliminated by Huck Seed shortly after returning from the break.]