Back From Las Vegas

I got back from Las Vegas on Monday Morning and I have taken a full week off from poker, to recover from the Jet Lag and think about my experiences out there. Of course I spent 4 days at the Rio checking out the WSOP and being in the atmosphere, I came close, but was never able to qualify through Full Tilt for the $1500 event, and they weren't running 1-table satellites on the day I got there. So, I was cotent with watching Adrian and Nikki play in the $1500, Adrian cashed in the event, but we all played in a lot of tournaments while we were out there, was a lot of opportunity to get better.

Caesar's $220 buy-in Tourney Part I

This was the first tournament I played in when I arrived in Las Vegas, me and several of my friends decided to play in this tourney known as the best in Vegas. I like the structure because it has 40-minute blind levels, and assuming you do the re-buy (most people do) you start with about $5000 chips.

The tournament starts and I am sizing up the table, at first the table is fairly tight, but I start to notice a few players at the table who are making over bets to steal smallish pots, this didn't make much sense to me at this early stage in the tournament. The first hand I decide to play I raise to 3x the big blind, since it took me 15 minutes to play a hand other than the blinds I got instant respect from the table and everyone folded the blinds to me with one guy saying a raise from you, it's yours. The first big hand that occured was when I limped on the button with the SB calls and the BB checks. The Flop comes the small blind bets $200 the BB folds I take a little time and think about it and call. The next card is a The small blind checks I bet $200 he calls, the river card comes giving me a fullhouse 5's over 4's, the small blind bets $3000 he has about $2000 left behind him, I only called (out of stupidity) he shows fullhouse 4's over 5's, and I take the huge pot down.

Later I am moved to another table up to about $8000 chips (very healthy at this point in the tourney), and I sit down and I see 2 seats to my left is a guy with a WSOP bracelet on. After a little table chatter I realize it's Chris Gros the winner of event #1 at the WSOP this year Profile. He has a lot of chips, but I am sort of excited at the opportunity to go up against a tough competitor, about 3/4 this of the table I moved too were playing or had played in events at the WSOP. This was one of the toughest tables I had ever played at, my game tightened up a bit because of the play at the table. I was in the cutoff seat when I look down and see I typically play this hand looking to make a flush draw and in late position with no raises I raised to 4x the big blind. Chris calls my raise and everyone else folds, the flop comes I had noticed that Chris wanted to re-raise me pre-flop, but my tight image at the table convinced him to just call. The blinds were at $50/$100 he had position on me being that he called from the button, I knew I had to take control of the hand even though the situation was not optimal there were a lot of ways I could be behind at this point. So, I bet $400 Chris thinks about it, and reluctantly calls, at this point I can't really put him on a hand maybe an Ace with a small kicker I was trying to represent Ace King even though I wasn't that strong. The turn card is I know have top pair with a draw to the nut flush, I then bet $800 to make it appear that I am protecting a hand this bet is more scary coming from a tight player, and Chris thinks for a while and folds the hand to me. I never knew what he had it was hard to put him on a hand, I am thinking maybe a King, but it's hard for me to think he would have played it that way.

At this point in the tournament I am in great shape healthy and able to be selective about what pots I play and who I play them with. Part II of this tournament summary will be in the next post.