Vegas Day 4&5

Day 4

Sorry I didn't post yesterday. I wound up running straight over to the tables after the conference let out and trying not to continue my pattern of winning one day and losing the next.

That pattern is currently unbroken.

I dropped my first buy in on a stupid semi-bluff with a pair of jacks. I had one caller who had made a straight on the turn. My second buy in was dropped when I felt I had pot odds to make my Flush. I had A7h and had raised 7 pre-flop and got several callers. The flop contained low cards, two of which were hearts. I pushed for 15, and had 2 callers, and then a guy put me all in. I figured it up that I had 9 outs for hearts, and 1.5 outs for a runner-runner 7 high straight. Multiply that by 4 (2 times the number of cards yet to come), and I figured I was at about 40% give or take. Since the pot was so big, I was getting about 2:1 on my money. I went ahead and called, but didn't make my flush.

-200

Total: -190

After that I tagged along with a guy from work. First he was playing Roulette, so I sat down with $40. I played numbers once (-10), then black twice (+20), then red (+10), so I had am currently +20 on roulette. Then I dropped a quarter into a slot machine. The stupid machine was difficult to use, so I used my tried and true method of handling stubborn electronics: I started mashing every button. Apparently that's a good tactic, as I got it to spit out a ticket worth $10.15. Apparently 10 years of computer support has finally gotten me somewhere.

Then we wandered around sight-seeing. The casinos are really just about all the exact same place. Someone asked me what I thought of Vegas. My answer is that I'd really pretty much rather drive to Tunica. The games are going to be exactly the same, the people seem nicer, and you don't have to walk 10 miles a day to get anywhere.

Day 5

I slept in till about noon, as we didn't get in till after 2 the previous morning. I once again wandered over to the Venetion Poker Room. I managed to find a tight table, and spent about 2 hours making turning $100 into $116. I cashed out, and went to grab some lunch/dinner around 3:00. Then I went back to another table, and watch my $100 turn into $78.

-100
+16
+78
----
-6

-190
-6
----
-196

With the $78, I bought into a $65 NLHE tournamet which I heard had 32 entries. There was a single $40 rebuy, which I made after having my pockets 3s outraced by an AQ. However, I managed to hold out till the money. 6th place bubbled, leaving the 5 paying spots looking at the top prize, which I calculate to be around $1300. 5th place was a short stack who pushed all in with AQo or so, and was called by the guy to my right who had 23o. The flop came 456, and we were down to 4. It looked to me like the gentleman two to my right began pushing the table around, raising 3 times in two orbits (8 hands). I caught A2h in my big blind, and I resolved to push all in if he raised. He did, and I did.

I think my real mistake here was resolving to do something before the situation arose. I thought he'd push, and I thought I should go all in, but I needed to take 30 seconds to look at him, at my hand, at our stacks, etc... before deciding what to do.

Anyway, he promptly calls, and shows AA. That's big trouble, but not impossible. Pre-flop I'm at about 11%. However, the flop was beautiful. There were two hearts, and no pairs or the last ace. Now I'm looking at 37% to win. But once again my final heart fails to come through, and I'm knocked out in 4th, which paid $392

-40
+392
----
+352

-196
+352
----
+156

So, I'm walking away from this poker trip +156. It was looking bad in the late game, but I pulled out to a pretty good lead at the end. And since I'm getting on a plane at 9:00 tomorrow, and it's after 1:00 now, I won't be playing any more poker for a little while.