2008 World Series of Poker Diary — Day Four

Rio Neon Originally uploaded by abostick59.

Monday was a short day for me. I woke up at 5:00 PM, having gotten six and a half hours' sleep, a good amount under the circumstances. I spent the evening — my effective morning — following what has come to be my morning routine: cleaning up, geting dressed, eating breakfast, writing up the experiences of the previous day, and doing the pre- and post-production work on my blog post. I didn't get out of my hotel room until midnight. It was oddly familiar: I was effectively on the same schedule that I had been on for most of May and June, playing 30-60 hold'em five mornings a week at the Oaks Club.

It was not quite routine when I got to the Amazon Room. Two stud/8 games were going, but they were full. There were a couple of names ahead of me on the list, and I put my name on it. None of the other games looked particularly appealing.

On a whim I headed to the room where satellites were playing. The brush was calling out that she had one seat left in a $560 stud/8 satellite. I took it, feeling that it was my best shot at winning some tournament chips to defray the cost of my entry in the big Tuesday tournament. Seven of the eight players, including me, put up $100 for a last-longer bet on the side.

I got extraordinarily lucky in the early rounds. For instance, I started out one hand with hidden jacks and a seven in the door (relax — jacks and sevens were live, and there were no overcards in anyone else's door), and wound up in a three-way pot. I kept catching low, and since the one of the other players caught a brick I kept betting until he caught a third low card. On sixth street I caught a fourth low card that gave me a gutshot straight draw, and my river card filled the hole and made my straight. Scoop! "That's a pai gow hand!" said one of the other players in the hand. Some low starters made straights; some hidden brick pairs spiked trips on fourth street. (One of those didn't hold up, losing to another player's flush; but the way my luck was running overall that hardly mattered.)

My stack started to get short as the satellite wound on — I was actually playing pretty tight, tighter than the rest of the table. I was actually surprised at how much action people were giving. I was the only player who didn't automatically defend their bring-in. Three- and four-way pots on fourth street were common.

As the limits went up I started to feel like maybe I wasn't in such good shape. But I made a stand with a small pair, stayed in until I was all-in, and when the dust settled I took half the pot, resulting in a more-than-average stack four handed. Then I wound up with half the chips, and pretty much stayed that way until the end.

When it was three-way, we agreed to split the $700 last-longer bet three ways, leaving the extra $100 for the winner.

I wound up heads-up with "Doc," who gives the lie to the old adage. He's been a regular in the cash game, and he isn't very good. I had a commanding chip lead. Then I put him all-in and he made his hand and doubled up. I was still ahead 2:1, but in our next confrontation (which took a while) he doubled through me again, leaving me slightly behind. I was able to chip away at him and regain my 2:1 advantage, but then this hand happened at the T1200-T2400 level. I had a bit less than T12000, and Doc a bit more than T4000. Doc was the bring-in with a four in the door; I had a five as my upcard and two treys in the hole. In a head-up match this is a premium hand. I raised his bring-in. He raised back at me. We both caught small, and he was all-in on the next card. His hole cards: the other pair of threes. It was a very close race; but when the dust settled, Doc had a pair of threes with a king kicker, and mine only had a jack for a kicker.

Now we were close to even again. I had T7200 and Doc had T8800. The limit was high enough to make this very much a crap shoot, reducing my edge against him. So I proposed a split: divide the tournament chips down the middle, and Doc takes the cash and the extra last-longer money. Doc readily agreed. The prize pool included $120 in cash, which Doc gave to the dealer as a toke.

So $560 plus an additional $100 yielded $2500 in tournament buy-in chips and an additional $200 in cash, for a net profit of $2040.

The main tournament registration windows were open at that hour, 4:00 AM, so I decided to buy my entry to the $5000 Eight-or-Better Stud World Championship, starting Tuesday at 5:00 PM, then and there.

Back at the Amazon Room, the stud/8 game was going with empty seats. But I suddenly realized I was desperately hungry, and a bit tired. I wanted to find something to eat, and quite possibly do so in my own hotel room kitchenette. So I started the long walk back down the Rio's convention center corridors to the main casino. Once on the casino floor, I noted that the All American Bar and Grill, just adjacent to the casino floor, was serving food at that hour, so I got a table and ordered a club sandwich and fries, with a cup of coffee to drink.

Refreshed and re-energized, I traveled long, over moor and mountain, to return to the Amazon Room, only to discover that the stud/8 game had broken. There were seats available in 2-5 and 5-10 NLHE (and much bigger games) and in 20-40 limit hold'em, but I didn't really feel like playing in those games at that point. So the better part of valor was to return to my hotel and get some rest before the big tournament in the afternoon. Before I did so, however, I spent a few minutes talking to Gary S., a sometime regular in the Oaks and other Bay Area cardrooms. He said I was looking good. I didn't say so, but I thought he looked terrible, unkempt, gone to seed. He was raving about the Omaha/8 game he was playing. Another player, he pointed out, was raising and reraising blind on every street. "It's amazing!" he kept saying. I didn't say that it wasn't that amazing; people like that come through a poker game from time to time. Raisebots can make a game very interesting and lucrative, but I don't think they're amazing.

But the writing was on the wall. It was time for me to go get some rest. I made the return journey, and was walking down Valley View Drive to the Extended StayAmerica just when the sun was rising. The mountains to the west had already been lit up in desert alpenglow, like a Galen Rowell photograph. It was not quite 6:00 AM.

2008 World Series of Poker Diary — Day Zero
2008 World Series of Poker Diary — Day One
2008 World Series of Poker Diary — Day Two
2008 World Series of Poker Diary — Day Three
2008 World Series of Poker Diary — Day Five
2008 World Series of Poker Diary — Day Six
2008 World Series of Poker Diary — Day Seven
2008 World Series of Poker Diary — Day Eight
2008 World Series of Poker Diary — Days Nine and Ten
2008 World Series of Poker Diary — Days Eleven and Twelve

Tags: poker wsop world series of poker las vegas trip report travelogue satellite eight-or-better stud

Posted by abostick at June 17, 2008 03:25 PM