Las Vegas - Feb 2009

Had a pretty successful trip to Vegas before going skiing in Colorado.

I may have found a new venue for the big game now that regular host Louis has run off to Edinburgh. For the bargain price of $400,000 you can get a condo just off the strip in Panorama Towers which has a play room in the basement with pool table and poker table. Also Jennifer Tilly lives there - so some good stalking possibilities...
I stayed at the Wynn encore - an excellent view up the strip but the room itself did not seem quite as good at the one I stayed in last summer.

I arrived quite late on Monday having faffed about in Denver so on Tuesday it was probably not a good idea to play in the Ceasar's megastack tournament starting at midday. It was a big tournament and cost $1060 to enter. I made it to dinner but to be honest the jet lag really kicked in by 8pm and I bust out quite lamely. I got fed up with the Irishman directly to my right nicking my blinds and took a stand calling his usual button raise with AT. On a flop of QTx I decide I am check raising no matter what (I knew he would C-bet) and sure enough it went according to plan - unfortunately he had QT.

On Wednesday I played the Venetian deepstack at midday. Only $150 buy-in and around 100 runners. Over played QJ on a Qxx board - he had QQ, so ended up relatively short and play QQ all-in against KT - he hit to knock me out. Finished early enough to get over to Caesar's for the $160 at 7pm. I don't really get any cards and weirdly get in a split with AK twice. I play another big hand with AQ vs AQ but unfortunately on a 4 club board he has Ac. Eventually I try one steal too many with T7 on the button and am crushed by the SB with KK.

On Thursday I play the final megastack at Caeasars : $240 gets you 12,500 chips and blinds start 25/50 - crazy.
At level 3 100/200 I get some good cards finishing it off with a monster pot where my slightly hooky call of a min raise with AT spades is rewarded when I make a flush on the river.
After that I coast along but don't really get anywhere - eventually I finish 11th out of 81 - two off the money at 10pm - 10 hours of graft for no pay.

On Friday I play the Wynn second chance tournament at 7pm.
This is a more normal tournament costing $230 - 116 runners 10k chips to start with 30 minute levels.
Hit a set early on and then took out the aggressive Dutch boy to my right when I woke up to QQ when he had JJ. By the time we get to the second break I have 25k and blinds are up to 400/800 100 ante and only 66 remain.

Not much happens and then I get the defining hand of the night. A medium stack pushes all-in over a standard raise. The original raiser had about half my chips as did the medium stack so I decide to isolate the all-in guy with my monster 33 by moving all-in. Unfortunately the chip leader in the BB moves all-in over the top, so the original raiser folds. I think I must be toast but then they both flip AQ - what a result when my hand holds up. This completely tilts the now former chip leader and when I min raise with AK UTG he goes all-in with Q9 and I knock him out. Talk about hero to zero. This puts me up to 90k - nearly 10% of the chips in play with 30 runners left.
I then avoid trouble and when we are down to the money on the final 2 tables I take out 2 players with AK and then 99. So when we get to the final table I have 210k.
When we get to 5 players the tournament director explains the situation with the IRS - apparently any prize greater than $5200 has to be declared so ideally the winner should not get more than that. I am chip leader with about 300k but the blinds are an insane 12k/24k with 2000 ante so I am not that safe. The deal suggested is that we get $3100 each now and the winner gets the remain $1800. Even the short stack has 100k so there seems little point in me arguing - it makes me look like the nice guy.
So we do the deal and it does not take long for me to eliminate one guy with my Aj vs KJ and the other 2 fall to my rival at heads up. I have 650 to his 510 and when he makes a raise on the button I just call with J7. I fold when he bets a KTx flop and we agree a chop at that point - it is after all, nearly 3.30 in the morning and I have to leave the next day.
We decide to determine the winner by a single all-in hand and I romp home when my 8 pairs the board. Unfortunately there is not trophy!

So total buy-ins $1800 - winnings $3900 - net win $2100. Nice