Hey guys...
Back from Vegas now and no surprise 1 day in and I am already wanting to be back with all those titties in my face.... Hmm I mean, playing poker at any time of the day.
It was an incredible trip. I have wanted to go Vegas since I can remember and just never had the opportunity to go. I was blessed enough to have that opportunity this year and I couldn't of asked for more. There was 7 of us staying in a house that we rented about 15 minutes off the strip, was quality!
I quickly realised the level of poker in Vegas is a few years behind what we have back home. Players are making insane fundamental mistakes and just in general over playing hands in so many ways. It was the first time in a couple years that I have sat at the tables and generally felt comfortable and confident and dare I say it... Unbeatable! Crazy feeling to have but it worked.
I started my trip off with a $300 tournament at Planet Hollywood, I was buzzing to be playing out there and unfortunately I busted within the first 2 levels!! I was gutted, the structure was nice but I just played way to many pots and to be fair was running in to some big coolers real early on.... I decided to just chill out and re-evaluate my state of mind and just remind myself why I am there etc.... Prior going to Vegas I had a deep chat with my girlfriend and explained to her that all the hours I have been putting in playing online and studying away from the tables will be for times like this, when I go to Vegas and have a chance of playing some big fields with good money at the end. I explained to her that I'll be going out there with the intention of cashing enough money to put a house deposit down for the both of us.......
The following day out in Vegas was the $150 Golden Nugget Series which had a guarantee of $100k. Now, I really really liked the Nugget casino and the card room. I felt comfortable and relaxed.... I sat down and my first hand saw my 15k Starting Stack treble to 45k as we get 107cc and J5ss both get it in pe flop for stacks against out KKs..... Obviously we had 2 sweats with an open ended straight draw and a flush draw for the J5ss but we fade and got a great start. From that moment forward I didn't really look back.... Everything I was doing just felt right, was playing the best poker I have ever played. This was proven on Day2 when I made a huge fold for 1.2million chip pot when the average was 350k.... I was shown the bluff too but villain had outs and if I had not folded that hand...who knows, I could of busted. Mentally I learnt a lot just from that 1 fold as well which for me is massive as every time I am playing now I am wanting to learn more and more about my game and me as a person.
As some of you saw on Facebook, I went on to the final 6 players and we discussed an ICM chop. 3 of us were on 3million....1 person was on 4million....1 person was on 4,8million and the leader had nearly half the chips in play. For some reason the chip leader was offered $20k (1st was $33k) and he snapped it up.... He couldn't wait to say deal. 2nd - $18k, 3rd - $16k and 4/5/6 - $15k. I noticed they all couldn't wait to snap the deal up and I know they had been hating playing pots with me all day so I got a bit cheeky and pushed for $200 off of everyone else otherwise we just play on for the $33k first prize. They all quickly agreed and I managed to squeeze an extra $1.2k out of the chop
So I technically got the 3rd place finish and a $16.2k score...... My biggest cash to date and an amazing start to my first Vegas trip. What a beauty!!
I actually took it pretty easy for the rest of the trip, I only had an outlay of $1800 of buy-ins across the 10days and I ended up finishing with $18k. I also had a slight sweat in a $240 Planet Hollywood game where I came 25th out of 400 runners, once again played really well and just generally made all the right decisions throughout the tournament.
Vegas has well and truly got a hold of me and I know that Vegas will be my second home every year...... The buzz of walking in the Rio, the poker being played etc.... It literally was incredible.