$1k Golden Nugget ME tomorrow... 1 time.

Take it down sir.

Wainy,

Caesars have satillites to their ME on Monday (ME is Tuesday)

12pm is $180+20, T6000, 25 min clock
4pm and 8pm is is $100+20, T4000, 25 min clock.

1 seat for each $1060 in prize pool.

The Caesars Palace tournament room is a fantastic place to play cards. Lofted and with elegant coving, it is a huge space specifically designed for playing cards, unlike the warehouse feel of the Amazon Room, or the conference space used by the Golden Nugget. And so it was with excitement that I sat down at the first real poker game since my arrival in LV.

Wiggly, Judith and I had all bought into the $330 deep-stack that Caesars were now running daily at noon, having abandoned their previous schedule due to 2+OMGers using their internets to berate the structures and leading to deathly low turnouts. They now had a 15k stack and structure probably slightly better that the Venetian, where 600+ runners were showing up daily. We saw 179 start. The news of the change had not gotten around at that point.

Although the room is vast, the tables there are not. I was shoulder to shoulder, literally, with players in the 7 and 9 seats and glad to be on a corner. We each had 15k in chips and with 50 minute levels, most people spent the first couple of hours feeling out the table. I say most, as the gent in the ten seat seemed oblivious to the rest of the table and relentlessly played his cards, which were not keeping up their end of the deal most times.

So when I got AA under the gun, I limped to him after noticing his pre-counted raise. Sure enough, and with two limpers before him, he made it all of three BBs to go. Two other callers, no doubt attracted to the pot odds, meant I had to re-pop it quite severely, and I was half expecting him to fold for what equated to about a third of his remaining stack. But no, he smoothed and we took a jack high rainbow (TM) with nothing scary for me on it. I bet again, enough to commit him and at least he had the decency to move all in. I called and his KJo didn’t improve. At the first break I was up to 30k.

Comparing notes, Wiggly was also a buy-in up, Judith was the only one of us to have suffered. He had dropped to the not too terrible level of 12k, but was now in the mood to play some cards. We wished each other well and returned to the coal face.

If session one was fun, session two was all about losing chips slowly through blinds and antes. The only problem with the structure at Caesars remained the jump from 100/200 with a running 25 to 200/400 with running 50. As I still had an M approaching 30, I wasn’t too worried, but it was surprising how quickly being card dead eroded my stack. I literally played no hands for almost two hours and by the time we reached the second break, my table had just broken and I sat out a button with 26.5k.

Judith was now much improved, well into the late 30s and Wiggly had mirrored me again, falling off the pace but far from out of contention. I spent the last few minutes of the break winging to the players at my new table about how dry I’d run up until then. Hand one, king-king in the hole and an early position raise. I re-raise, he calls only to check-fold on the baby flop. Up to 35k just like that and smiling broadly.

I was a bit upset with the table I had been moved to for two reasons. One, it was third in line to break again, meaning I wasn’t going to get much time with these players. Two, because a player from my previous table had come with me and was an aggressive trout with it in for me.

Before we broke, he’d been moved to my original table, and almost immediately called a decent raise pre-flop from a solid player. The board had two Queens on it and two hearts. Solid player bet, dodgy player raised and solid player moved all in for a more than pot bet and for almost all of matey’s stack. He called pretty much straight off the bat with K2h for the non-nut flush draw. Obviously the other player had AQ and obviously the river flush knocked him out. Fishman was then very defensive about not being able to “put him on a queen”, much to the amusement of the table. So sure enough, he was re-raising me pre-flop 100% of the time and I decided to rock up a bit.

As I was waiting for a hand that Pottsy might limp, one of those great moments in poker occurred. I was small blind in the 8 seat and the 10, 1 and 2 all folded. While seat 3 was thinking, seat 4, who was my friend Cunty McCuntyflush, announced a raise. Woah there, horsey! Player with action.

Seat 3 decided he was going to raise himself and merely doubled the bet. Now 4 seat looks a bit sick and smooth calls, as does some doddery old cowboy in seat 5. Folded back to me, I say something about, “can I be priced into this hand” before folding a hand my brain chooses not to remember.

“I am priced in,” says the BB, who is dramatically short on chips and calls. He then flashes me 42o. Errr?

The flop ran 2-3-5 and, figuring correctly that it wasn’t going to get much better for a hand like his, the big blind moved all in. Seat 3, the original raiser and a player I already thought was pretty solid, thought long and hard before laying down what he later confessed to me was AQh. Seat 4, the twat, called loudly and my friend with the 42o tabled his hand!

This was ignoring the fact that seat 5 still had action. The dealer, quick thinking as he was, noticed the mistake and, more importantly, that Mr Magoo was still looking at his own cards. He quickly slapped his right hand down over the exposed four-deuce.

Magoo looked up too late to notice and we assumed problem solved, when the muppet in seat 4 decided to table his hand as well!

“No!” cried seat 3, as it was his turn to spring to action, turning the cards back over before Pops could rotate his tortoise-like neck a second time and see what all the new fuss was about. Again, it looked as though disaster may have been averted when seat 4, the moron, took umbrage at seat 3 touching his cards and swore at him while flipping them face up once more. The old geezer couldn’t help but see the A5o this time and the dealer, deflated, called the floor.

After about 15 people had recounted their version of what had occurred, the floor ruled that Magoo’s action was still his own, and that he would get to see all of the cards before he played. It’s not often you get that sort of info.

I could have kissed him when he said, “All-in”, if only for the look on A5o’s face as he was forced to fold. The grinder had 66 which held and we lost the guy on my left. More importantly, Sir Reraisealot now had less than me and the bullying ceased.

My next move wasn’t long coming and I was happy to get the table right at the very front, knowing that now I would never see another table break. On my new table was an older gent who seemed very talkative. Judith was on the table behind me and had been complaining about the incessant chatter for a while now. I shut him up by out playing him with a bluff and showing it.

Also there was a bloke I sort of knew from Bluff and a young lad who I recognised from the Gutshot. The pace was a lot more relaxed and I was able to take what was now a trifling 20k and pretty quickly build it into a more than decent 50k. I was still short, but I was a lot happier.

A full ten hours into the tournament I had my first all-in with all of my chips at risk, and as it turned out, I had a marginal hand. With 77 against AQ, I was surprised that the guy called me, but delighted to have it hold up and I was up to 120k when I found out that Wiggly was out. Judith was pretty much running his table and was unlucky to lose a 70k pot in a race, otherwise he would have been a big chip leader. We were now down to about three tables, knowing that only 18 of us would get paid. The plan was to play down to either a final table, or 2am, which ever came first.

I was still getting no hands and having to make a few shove plays to keep my head above water, the blinds were huge, but the nature of deep-stack poker meant virtually no one was comfortable and they certainly didn’t want to be calling off their chips after so long to win nothing, so positional betting became the order of the day. Finally, down to 20 players, the TD asked us to redraw seats and take a short break.

On that breather, I suggested to Judith that we might make the money a bit faster if people weren’t so scared of the bubble. So on our return, I suggested to the remaining players that we all put $30 into a cup and produce two $300 bubble prizes, so that day wouldn’t be a total waste. Everyone agreed pretty much straight away and the TD applauded us as, although similar offers had been made in previous games, we were the first group to agree to one. We all felt very good about ourselves.

Judith then bust in 20th. I’m not sure what his break out hand was as he was on the other table, but I think he’d been crippled previously after making a good call. And so it was down to me. Looking around my table, there were three very short stacks. I decided to play AB poker and forget about C.

The first all in came pretty quickly and was called. KJ looked in big trouble to KQ until it rivered the Broadway. Next up, a similarly dominated KT to AK with the three outer making it safe. Just through the blinds (now 5,000/10,000 with running 1k), I looked down at AKs and it folded to me in the cut off. Now, with 11 bets left, I wasn’t about to fold here, but I wasn’t happy about shoving either. Yet, I did.

Button… fold. Small Blind… fold. Big Blind… dwell. Uh oh.

This was the guy who had held the AQ in the crazy hand earlier. A guy who’d sat on my right all the way down to the last 20, a guy who I had great respect for.

Right up until the point where he called me for 80% of his chips with KQo.

The first card out of the deck was a queen and I heard Holman but couldn’t see him.

“Un-fucking-believable!”

And that was that. It was the stroke of 2am, I’d recorded 14 hours of some of my best poker for years and made a net loss of $30. A bit like a cash game, then. I think there is something funny (although I wasn’t laughing too much at the time) about myself and Holman suggesting the button saver to grease the action only to both become victims of said lubricant. Ah well. There was always the next day…

I love pot limit Omaha hi/lo, or PLO8. It’s the game I play most and possibly the best. The good people at Sharkscope tell me that my ROI for PLO8 sit and goes is a shiny 32%, so I was very much looking forward to the deep-stack PLO8 game at Binion’s the day after our Caesars near miss.

The $230 buy-in got you 12k in chips, long levels and a fat field. I had played in these sorts of games before and sure enough, the majority of the players were old. And I mean Methuselah old. There are tables full of these codgers all over Vegas, grinding away at each other at 3/6 or 4/8 limit O8 tables. In my experience, they just keep betting or calling until they back into something, even if it’s just a quarter of the pot. So I had decided, I was going play tight and very aggressive. I was not going to make a single call.

My first hand was mucked for me as I was darting my way to the table from the café that serves a very tasty Philly cheese-steak sandwich, but my second was a joy to squeeze. AK23 with clubs. Nice.

The action limped around to the button who put in a pot bet. I was in the small blind (annoyed about my missing the big blind due to the call of melted cheese on meat) and so re-popped it. Imagine my surprise to find the button pushing back at me! I was now, at 50/100, being asked to commit over half my stack to play on. Sod that.

I moved all in and he called me with the rather annoying AA28.

The 7 on the end ensured I made ¼ of my chips back, but I was less than impressed with my old mate, Fate, as my button cards were dealt.

The far uglier KTJ5 with hearts was only worth a limp as 7 other players had decided to do so. We all checked the ace high board and they all checked to me again as I turned the nut flush with no low out there. I bet 800 and everyone ran away. Meh.

Hand 4 saw me in the cut off. This time I had A288 with spades and I made a small (300) raise that saw me alone with the button.

The flop was Q,8,T and I bet to defend my set. He called and the turn ten saw me check raise him this time, pretty much committing me. His QQxx was good and I tapped Wiggly on the shoulder on the way out saying, “That was fun.” I think he assumed I was chipped up and having a break. I wasn’t.

That sort of tournament can make you reassess why you even bothered flying to Las Vegas. I still had it in my mind to play the PLO8 World Series event, but how could I justify it after a game like that? I decided this was not my time and that I was better off just getting a bit drunk. Vegas can make that happen for you. With all of us bar Paulie out pretty early on, we were off to the shiny new “M” resort south of Vegas for video poker in Jim and Jase’s case, and several of their 80 or so different draft beers for me.

The next day was more Omaha, but this time the PLO variety. Now, for all I profess to being good at hi/lo (although obviously I am mistaken), my pot limit high only Omaha is probably best described as “mediocre”.
With that in mind, I was at the Golden Nugget in good time to register for the $230 deep-stack event. Jim and Jason were pretty excited about this one. They had pretty much sworn off the hold’em for the trip and both had already gone deep in the tournament at the Excaliber.

Other notables in the field included Carl Weeks and Padraig Parkinson, the later of whom was sat at my table. I have no idea what happened at this event. It’s been a while and I think it says a lot about how much I care that I can tell you the specific bets on certain hands I played in LV and yet I can’t even remember four cards together in this thing. I do remember that I was comprehensively out-played by some twat on the button, who’d just sat down, to my small blind. I had AAKQ and re-raised his position bet. He re-raised me and I shoved.

“That’s not good,” he said, “I though you were just staging.” He called with fluff and the flop was fluffy. I was out so quickly I had time to play in a second chance $80 hold’em donkament they were running at the back of the room, go relatively deep, bust out and still have to sit around while Jason played on. We were all going out for dinner that night (having obviously zero belief in our combined ability to run deep) and here was Mr Nunn, keeping us all waiting.

I played on a “Double Diamond” fruit machine to try and alleviate my malaise. I won $130 in a couple of spins. Chuffed.

Jason, maybe sensing the hunger of his friends, didn’t make it past the last 40 or so, sadly. It was a great performance in a strong field yet all we wanted to do was get seriously large portions of steak down our necks. Well played mate, now let’s get out of here!

Maggiano’s is one hell of an experience. That said, Tazering yourself in the balls is also one hell of an experience, but it’s not for the faint hearted. With Jason out of the PLO, we made our way to the Italian restaurant to end all Italian restaurants.

Based in the Fashion Show Mall, opposite the Wynn, we got Jim to drive us in his cry-baby car (the alarm would beep randomly as its “Daddy” walked away from it). It had been raining earlier that afternoon, but the sun was back out now and we preferred to sit in the a/c cool of inside. We got a booth big enough to cope with James, Jason, Nigel, Carl and myself, escorted there by the very lovely Dominique.

“You’re all so tall!” she exclaimed, obviously talking to me.

“We’re from England.” I offered up as though it was some sort of explanation.

“Well, you know how crazy American girls go for English guys, don’t you?”

“No, but let me finish my meal first and then you can show me, eh?” It appeared I had crossed a line. Cyndi Lauper is full of shit when she says, “Girls just want to have fun.”

Our waiter was called Todd, although he might just as well have been Julian, or Cup-Cake. Jason was going to be trouble here. Sure enough, we hadn’t been sat down two minutes before he asked, “What’s the campest thing on the menu?”

Apparently it’s Fusilli.

We were continually warned about the size of the portions, but I’m a decent eater and I fancied my chances. As such I went for a starter of tomato and buffalo mozzarella salad. Jason had some calamari and I seem to remember Jim and Wiggly with starter portions of pasta and Carl with Garlic bread.

Sure enough, these starters would threaten any main course in a human restaurant. I was a bit annoyed that, rather than lots of vine tomatoes, they had decided to make my salad with the worlds largest beef tomatoes. These are a terrible accompaniment for the fresh mozzarella, which was milky and delicious, so I left a lot of them. That in turn meant I had no problem eating my Filet Mignon.

Again, I forget what others were eating at this point. I was pretty focused on my own meal, and polishing off the bottle of Malbec we had to go with the meat. However, my steak enormous. I wondered then, as I wonder now if the farm hand tasked with placing a single bolt deep into the skull of any bovine colossus from which such a piece of meat could originate shat himself. What if it just enraged the beast?

We had several sides, the nicest of which was the asparagus bathed in garlic. We all ate noisily and deep. Even Todd was impressed with our gobbling. And just when we should have been stretchered off to hospital for the stomach pumps that would save our lives, I asked for the desert menu.

I can only assume that the New York Cheesecake is so named because it’s big enough to house over 19 million. Even I struggled to get to the end of it, yet I thoroughly enjoyed punishing my internal boundaries.

A tiny coffee with a shot of Bailey’s in it later and I was ready for the ambulance. Poor Dominique would have to wait.

And that. ladies & gentlemen, girls and boys is why Maggiano's should be on the list of MUST VISIT places on Las Vegas.

Forget seeing the casinos..seen one, seen 'em all. In the words of Mr Theobald..."Maggiano’s is one hell of an experience".

[/seconded]

I see Virgin have dropped their prices to match BA, I'll stick with BA for this next trip as I'll be flying from and back into Heathrow, Virgin will be out of Heathrow and back into Gatwick, a real bummer if you've parked at Heathrow.

I see Virgin have dropped their prices to match BA, I'll stick with BA for this next trip as I'll be flying from and back into Heathrow, Virgin will be out of Heathrow and back into Gatwick, a real bummer if you've parked at Heathrow.

Thanks for pointing that out Jim...I'd have probably missed it

“Well, you know how crazy American girls go for English guys, don’t you?”

“No, but let me finish my meal first and then you can show me, eh?” It appeared I had crossed a line. Cyndi Lauper is full of shit when she says, “Girls just want to have fun.”

Move back to the UK, you nob, I owe you a beer for the joy of spitting my coffee out.

This is all gold mate. Gawd luv ya'.