WSOP Las Vegas 2010 - Trip Report - Cactus Kev
This was the year I decided I would treat myself to a fantastic birthday gift of playing in the World Series of Poker. I decided to play one of the "lesser" events -- not the $10,000 NLHE Final Event. Instead, I chose the $1,500 Limit H.O.R.S.E. Event #31. In addition, my poker pal Ron Lyons would also be joining me in the WSOP, with him playing in the $1,500 NLHE Event #30 (right before mine).
TUESDAY
Arrived very late in Vegas, around 10:30pm Vegas time. Couldn't get a direct flight with AirTran, and both flights were delayed by an hour. Took a shuttle to the Gold Coast hotel, checked in, and tried to stay up as late as possible in order to shift to Pacific Standard Time quickly. Still wound up waking up at 8:30am the next morning.
WEDNESDAY
Ate a great buffet breakfast and then headed over to the Rio to take in the sights and officially register for my WSOP tourney. Met up with my buddy Ron Lyons, who showed me around the WSOP area before his noon tourney started. He was playing in Event #30, the $1500 No Limit Hold'em tourney. My $1500 H.O.R.S.E. tourney started at 5pm, so I had time to look around and soak it all in. Met Greg Raymer, but didn't have my camera on me at the time. I swung by to see how Ron was doing, and then headed over to take my seat. Daniel Negreanu was seated four tables away from me, but no poker celebrities started at my table.
Everyone started with T4500 in chips, and because we would be playing various Stud games, there was a maximum of eight players at each table. There were 828 entrants in this tourney. I wrote down various noteworthy hands that I played.
During Hold'em, I played KQo, which lost. I played A9o, but folded after a King flopped and somebody bet. My QTs wound up winning when I flopped a Queen. I didn't want to play many of the Hold'em hands, because I felt my strength was more in the Stud games.
In Omaha Hi/Lo, I played AdKd8s6c, flopped A6x, but lost on the river to a Straight. Lost a huge hunk o' chips when I played Kd2d3c5h, and the flop came 3d3h6d (giving me trip Threes, a Flush draw, and a 632 low). The turn was a King, giving me a small Full House and still no low. The river is the Ace of diamonds, giving me the nut Flush, but I already have a Full House. I now also have a 6532A for low. I'm thinking SCOOP, baby!! Well, I lose both ways. Somebody tabled A3, giving a 333AA Full House (beating my 333KK), and someone else tabled 24, giving them a 6432A low. Unbelievable. I'm down to T3700 after that hand.
When Level 3 starts, I have T4075. The blinds are 100-200, and we all ante T25 on the Stud games. I didn't get any cards during Razz or Stud worth playing. I win T800 in Stud-8 when my Queens and Jacks beats a smaller Two Pair, and there are no lows. I thought I'd scoop a Stud-8 pot with (A4)736A(3), but somebody catches a river Flush so I have to split the pot with them.
I have T4650 when Level 4 starts. I make a winning Flush hand in Omaha, and the two lows tie and are quartered. Sweet! Then, I win a mammoth hand when I make Broadway and actually knock a player out. Now I'm at T7300. Excellent! Things are turning around for me!
And then Razz is played. And I get strung along with hands that fail to deliver. Now I'm back down to T5875.
I look up and see my pal Ron standing along the rail. I give him a look that says "How's it going in your tourney?" but sadly he shakes his head, informing me that he has busted out. I get the details later.
Norman Chad is moved to our table, and he's actually a pretty funny guy. I can't believe my luck when I win high holding (A3)5T6T(J) during Stud-8. Yes, I won high with a pair of Tens. Norm won the low hand.
When Level 5 starts, I still have T5875. We are down to 712 players. I'm the BB in Hold'em, am dealt KJo, call a raise, and fold when the flop fails to hit. Then I get dealt AJo as the SB, call a raise, and again fold when the flop fails to hit. Then Razz and Stud drain me with unplayable hands and a T50 ante each time. Ouch.
I'm down to T5275 when Level 6 starts. 640 players remain, the blinds are 300-600, the antes are T75, and the bring-in is T100. I play A4s in Hold'em and flop an Ace, but I lose by being out-kicked by an A7. Ugh. Now I have T4150.
John Juanda moves to our table and sits immediately to my right. Wow. I refused to be intimidated. He lets me take our picture together. I hit a bad streak of cards, and I'm folding alot, but the T75 antes are killing me. Plus, I keep getting hit with the forced blind during the Stud games. I'm down to T3700. John Juanda proceeds to win three Razz hands in a row, and triples his chip stack in no time. Pretty easy when you start catching decent Razz cards. Geeeeesh.
It's almost time for a break and the end of Level 6. Then it happens. We are playing Stud. I'm dealt (JJ)2. Another player has a Jack showing, but I decide to call anyway. The guy to my left showing a Nine raises, and I am the lone caller. I get dealt a Deuce. I have Jacks Up. I check, Lefty bets, and I call. My third card is the case Jack. I have Jacks Full, and unless I get dealt both remaining Deuces, my hand can't get any better. I bet, Lefty raises, I re-raise, and he calls. Next I get an Ace, and Lefty gets another Nine. He bets, I raise, he re-raises, I re-raise, and he raises again. Hmmmmm, now I'm wondering what the deal is. He also has an Ace face up. Could he have started with pocket Aces, and now has Aces Full of Nines? I shudder, and just call. We each get our down card, he bets, and I call. Well, he doesn't have Aces Full, but instead he shows Four Nines! Ouch. He started with a set of Nines, and caught the case Nine on sixth street. Double ouch. I'm down to a single T25 chip. I realize that I'm probably out of the tourney.
I throw my T25 into the table as a side-pot ante, and everybody folds except John Juanda :) He winds up making Kings and Jacks. My hand is (Q9)JJT9(?). I have a couple of outs. Any King or Eight gives me a Straight. I turn over a Nine, giving me a Full House of 999JJ. Woo! Now I have T200. Plus I can now say that I sucked out on John Juanda :)
I'm dealt (88)x in the next hand, and commit the rest of my stack. Sadly, I lose to Aces Up, and my tourney life is over at 12:37am. I head out during the break, and Ron and I chat with Norm Chad for a bit. We then head to Ron's room to upload pics to Facebook, and I send out the reluctant email telling everyone that I'm out of the tourney.
THURSDAY
Ron came over to join me for another buffet breakfast, and then we headed over to Treasure Island for their 11am tourney. We both decided to hit as many casino mini-tournaments as possible today. I had compiled a list beforehand of all the casinos that had poker tournaments, and their start times and buy-in amounts. In addition, I always collect a poker chip from any new casino I play poker in (whether it be a tournament or a cash game), so we tried to hit casinos neither of us had played in before. We get to Treasure Island, register for the tourney, and I watch Ron play some slots while we waited for it to start. Neither of us placed, so we moved on to the next casino on our list.
I wanted to visit the Wynn casino to play a little regular poker and collect a poker chip, so I played Limit 4-8 Hold'em for about an hour while Ron played some video poker and slots. Wound up winning a little over $100. Then we were pretty hungry again, so we ate at the nearby Stripburger. Excellent burgers! Next, we took a taxi to the Stratosphere for their 4pm tourney.
There were only 14 players in the $60 Stratosphere tourney, and we started with T4000. I eventually go all-in with T2675 holding JJ, but some schmuck big stack calls holding T9o. Of course, the flop is T94, and turn and river doesn't help me, so I bust out. Ron is still in, so I do some sightseeing in the upper section, and then meet up with him afterward.
While walking thru the casino, I see a poster for the Stratosphere revue show "Bite". I'm a big vampire fan, so I mention to Ron that I think me and my buddy Jeff will have to see that show when he gets in town, and a shoe-shine guy overhears me. He motions me over and gives me a 2-1 ticket for the show. Sweeet! If I hadn't been wearing my sandals, I'd have let him shine my shoes :)
We head over to Planet Hollywood for a final tourney at 7pm. $80 fee for T3000 in chips. Not much to work with. I play well and have T6900 at Level 4. I then get dealt pocket Jacks (again!), push all-in, and get two callers. One of them being my buddy Ron!!! Well, they both turn over AKo, and I'm ecstatic! They have both counterfeited each other. I win this hand 2 out of 3 times. Excellent time to triple up, baby!! Well, of course, a King flops, I lose, and they both wind up chopping my all-in stack. That's it. I'm done with tourney poker for the night. Heck, probably the rest of the week. I leave Ron to continue playing and head back to Bally's to pick up the shuttle. I pass a lovely female street performer dressed as a dark bat-winged angel, chat with her for a bit, and get my picture taken. I do not get my picture taken with the nearby Freddy Krueger, who I think acts as her bodyguard. The pic is sorta blurry, so I tell her I'll return for a better pic once my photographer friend Jeff arrives the next day. She says she'll be there. I call Jeff and ask what time he thinks he'll arrive on Friday. He thinks between noon and 1. I call it a night.
FRIDAY
I sleep in and wait for my buddy Jeff to arrive, who was driving from Los Angeles. He shows up around 1:30, so I take him to my favorite Vegas restaurant — the Harley Davidson Cafe — home of the best chicken corn chowder in the universe. I'm worried that they may have removed it from the menu, or perhaps changed the recipe. But they still have it, and it still tastes awesome. Also awesome is our lovely waitress Angel. We leave her a nice tip.
I ask Jeff what he'd like to do, and he mentions the BODIES exhibit at the Luxor. We walk over there and check out how amazing the human body is. Next, we decide that tonight is the night to see the "Bite" revue, so we taxi over there to get decent seats. The ticket lady informs us that for $15 extra per person, we can be seated closer to the stage in the VIP section. Jeff asks, "Do the vampire vixens come down to your table if you're seated in that section?", and the answer was "But of course!" Sold!!
We walk back in the hot desert sun to the Riviera, so that I can play a little poker and collect another poker chip. Jeff plays some slots while I win $24 playing 3-6 Hold'em.
We head back to the hotel to clean up, and then look for a nice place to eat for dinner. We both want Italian, and it turns out that the Stratosphere has a nice upscale Italian restaurant Fellini's. Couldn't be better! We make reservations and taxi over there around 9pm. The "Bite" show doesn't start until 10:30. The food is excellent, although the waiter tricked us into buying an appetizer of cheesy bread.
We get to the show and take our seats at a round table near the stage. There are already four people there, and they've already taken the good table seats. We chat with them a bit, and they tell us they've seen the show twice already. That bodes well. We look behind us, and notice a half-booth that is empty. All the other half-booths are full of people. Jeff and I decide that if nobody is sitting there five minutes before showtime, that we will scoot back there for even better seats. The lights dim. We scoot back. Score! A booth to ourselves, and fantastic seats for the show.
The show is great. Blaring classic rock music. Incredibly hot vampire dancers. Great stage production. At one point, the Lord Vampire starts playing this mammoth grand piano, and suddenly all the vampire chicks come crawling out of it. Later, they come into the audience and grab potential victims. One snarled at us in our booth, but alas, neither Jeff nor I were chosen to go on stage. Once they have six or seven audience members on stage, the Lord Vampire chooses one to be his new bride. Obviously the girl he chooses is part of the show. He makes her his bride, and the show ends after much mayhem, dancing, singing and drama. Afterwards, the entire cast is waiting outside the theater for some photo ops. Very cool.
It's late, but I tell Jeff that we have to hit Bally's again before heading to the hotel, in order to get a better picture with Dark-Angel-Girl. Just as she promised, she's still there. She happily lets us take four or five pics, and the last one is a keeper.
We walk down to the Hooters casino and I play a little late night poker, collect a poker chip, and call it a night.
SATURDAY
We sleep in on Saturday, and then hit the hotel buffet for lunch. I want to visit the Gambler's General Store to buy some poker chip protectors, so Jeff offers to drive since the store is over in the "Old Vegas" part of town. I buy some loot, including a way cool poker poster, and then we drive through the old part of Vegas for some sightseeing. I have a craving for a chocolate milkshake, so we hit a nearby McDonald's, where we spy a young couple making out in the grass under the golden arches. Only in Vegas! We head back to the hotel, and then over to the Imperial Palace to see the Auto Collection of classic and antique cars. Jeff is really into cars, so he is a great tour guide to have along. We take lots of pictures and see many beautifully restored cars. On the way out, I stop by the poker room, thinking that I might play for a little in order to collect a poker chip. However, the Imperial Palace has one of the ugliest poker chips I have ever laid eyes on. It's a drab gray-green chip with a cheesy gold foil stamp in the middle. I decide to pass.
We head back to the hotel, and I take Jeff over to the Rio to take in the WSOP sights, and hopefully get some poker celebrity photos. I tell him that the photo I really want to get is of Shannon Elizabeth, the gorgeous actress and poker player. I know she is playing in various WSOP events, but I haven't seen her yet. Well, we are walking down the WSOP corridor and a huge influx of people start heading towards us. It must be the one-hour dinner break. I glance up and spy an attractive woman walking our way. I do a double-take, and lo! it is Shannon Elizabeth! I grab Jeff's arm and we swing around trying to catch her. She is rather tall and taking huge strides. It's obvious she wants to get to dinner quickly. We finally reach the casino and still haven't managed to catch up with her. Suddenly, somebody at a blackjack table calls her name, and she stops briefly to hug two friends. I make my move and get in front of her. When she resumes her walk, I quickly stop her, tell her I know that she's on a short time schedule, but I'm a big fan and ask if she would mind getting a quick picture. She asks if I have the camera ready, and I immediately cue Jeff to move into position. He snaps a quick pic, I profess my gratitude, and she's off like the wind. I would have loved to have had more time to talk with her, but I guess that will have to wait until next year if I'm lucky enough to be seated at her table.
Jeff and I head back to the poker room, I do some shopping until everyone is back from their dinner break, and then we walk through the tournament room looking for other poker celebs. My buddy Ron was amazing at picking out celebrities from afar. Unless you are playing in the tourney, you can't go into the players area to take pics. I was able to snap a pic of Joe Hachem, Mike Matusow, Vanessa Rousso, and Phil Hellmuth. I tried to get a good pic of Jennifer Harman, but I just couldn't get the right angle. The guy next to her saw me struggling and nudged Jen. She looked up, smiled, and waved me over for a quick pic together. She was extremely nice and I wished her luck in the tourney. Later, we saw Chris Ferguson bust out of the tourney and start to exit. I wasn't sure if now was the right time to ask for a photo, but a nearby lady said that he wouldn't mind. So on his way out, I approached him, told him I was sorry he busted out, and asked for a quick pic, which he graciously obliged. He is also quite tall.
Eventually, I ran out of poker celebs to stalk, so we headed back to Ron's room to view the pics and upload them to Facebook. On the way through the Rio, we noticed a bank of twelve slot machines in a box formation surrounding a mini-stage. Vegas never ceases to amaze me with new and bizarre sights. To our surprise, there was a female go-go dancer on the stage, dancing around to the music while senior citizens played the slots, quite oblivious to the booty shaking going on right above them. I should have snuck a quick photo.
SUNDAY
Jeff was leaving today to head back to L.A., so we both did the breakfast buffet and then headed over to the brand new Aria casino (which opened in December 2009). The entrance was difficult to find, so we were glad we took a cab. At first we thought that it was perhaps the world's first non-smoking casino, because I didn't smell any cigarette smoke at all in the casino; however, I soon saw a couple of smokers so that shot down my theory. I guess the building still had that "new casino" smell. We ate a highly overpriced lunch at Café Vettro (one of their restaurants), and then took a walk around the upper levels. Lastly, I found the poker room and played a few hands in order to obtain another poker chip.
I saw Jeff off around 3pm, and then tried to figure out what to do on my last night in Vegas. I thought about seeing another show, but finally I decided to take a swim at the Rio pool for a bit and then treat myself to a relaxing massage. Now that I was fully energized, I changed and walked over to the nearby Palms for some more poker and to visit the Playboy Club. They had a 3-6 game available, so I sit down to play for about an hour. On my first hand, I'm dealt K4 suited in Spades. Somebody raises and about four of us call. Well, the flop is A96, all Spades. Oh yeah! I call all the way to the river with other players doing the betting for me, and the board doesn't pair, so I win a pretty nice pot with my nut Flush. Later, the game switches to 2-4, so I cash out and head over to the Fantasy Tower.
They want a $20 cover to enter the Playboy Club, but after chatting with the attendant about poker and the WSOP, he decides to let me in for free. Good thing too, for once I got up there, the drink prices were outrageous. We take the elevator to the 52nd floor, and I step out to a spectacular view! And I'm not just talkin' about the Bunnies :) They had a couple of gaming tables of Blackjack and Roulette, but they were all $25 minimum bet. I ordered a drink from the stunning bartender Alyse, and chatted with her and the bunnies for a bit. There was also a dance club called "Moon", but it was closed on Sunday nights. Spent about an hour and a half there, and then headed back to start packing.
Got to the airport with plenty of time to spare. Had a direct flight home with Southwest so that was nice. Watched the 2007 movie "Fracture" on my Zune on the flight back. Arrived a little ahead of schedule, called The Daughter to come pick me up, and made it home by 10:45pm.
CLOSING THOUGHTS
I realize that poker pros like Phil Ivey and Daniel Negreanu are better card players than I. However, most of the pros will enter anywhere from 15 to 25 tournaments during the WSOP. When John Juanda sat down at my table, he told me that he had already played in 12 tourneys so far. If they bust out in one, they just switch to another. For that reason, I believe that's why some of those players have won bracelets. I'm not discounting their skill. It's just that if you enter 25 WSOP tourneys each year, you are bound to make the money (or even win the bracelet) eventually. But with me just entering a single tourney, I only have one shot per year to win the bracelet. If I have a streak of bad cards or get my Full House beaten by Quads, I don't have another tourney as a fallback plan. So although I'm sad I didn't make it to Day Two in my HORSE tourney, I am proud of my play, and I seriously think I had a shot at making the money or even the final table. The caliber of players was definitely above average for my tourney, tho. I didn't see anybody playing junk.
If you are a poker player, I highly recommend coming out to play in the WSOP sometime. Even if you do bust out early, Vegas will keep you entertained for the rest of the week.
Photos from my trip may be found here.