The Best Game I've Ever Been In?

In these last few days before I head off to Vegas for the WSOP I'm planning to take it easy, play a few smallish buy in tournaments and not do any serious playing. At least that was my plan until I saw someone who clearly didn't belong playing $50/$100.

I know I've mentioned the pokerstars VIP system before, but to briefly refresh your memory (since it pertains to this story) there are 6 levels: Bronzestar, Silverstar, Goldstar, Platinumstar, Supernova and Supernova Elite. About a year ago they started allowing players to display their VIP level for everyone to see. You don't have to show your level and maybe only 30%-40% of players choose to do so.

When you open an account you are instantly Bronzestar. You can't be any lower. If I started from scratch it would take me about 2 hours to earn silverstar status. So if I see someone who is bronzestar it means they played less in the last month than I did in the last two hours.

I've played against at least a hundred if not a few hundred bronze star players who have advertised the fact that they are bronzestar. Not one of them has been any good at all and most are absolutely terrible players (at least by my standards). Usually they show up at the $10/$20 games with $150 lose it in a few minutes and quit. I make it a point to never leave a game with a bronze star player in it until they go broke or leave. To date that has never taken longer than 90 minutes. I'd never seen a bronze star player play above $15/$30 until this week.

Today I saw a bronze star playing $50/$100 and he had FIVE GRAND in front of him! I was in a state of drooling shock. I got the seat just to his left which was perfect because it meant I'd be acting after him in the vast majority of situations which would give me the best chance of getting his money.

I bought in for $3,000 and was prepared to go a few thousand deeper if I needed to. A few hands in, I got dealt AJ in the big blind. The first player to act (who is a regular $100/$200 player and was the only tough spot in the game) raised to $100, another player 3 bet to $150, bronzestar called from the small blind and I called from the big blind with AJ.

The flop came down AJ6! BINGO! TOP TWO! The preflop 3 bettor, bronzestar and I got four bets each in on the flop. I was almost 100% that the 3 bettor had AK and had no clue what the bronzestar had. I bet the turn (which was a Q) and they both called. I bet the river (which was a beautiful deuce) and they both called. The 3 bettor flipped up AK and the bronzestar had JT! Only a total goof would think JT had any chance of winning that pot vs two opponents.

I dragged the $1,800 pot and then something else good happened. The 3 bettor starting bitching about the fact that I called his three bet before the flop! He started talking about how online players all suck and went on and on about how bad I was playing. This was a clear indication that this guy didn't have a clue either.

A little later I saw a hand where another player in the game raised under the gun with 84s and got called by the bronzestar who had 92! It became crystal clear in the first 5 minutes that I had three clowns to my right and they were the best kind of players to play against. They all did a lot of calling, but not much raising. Mr. Bronzestar in particular was seeing about 65% of the flops regardless of the action in front of him. If he bet it meant he hit it. If he raised look out. But other wise he just check called to the river and paid you off with anything ace high or better not matter what the board looked like.

To top it off I was getting cards! I've been in a lot of great games where I thought "man if I could get any kind of cards I'd make a fortune!" I wasn't exactly getting aces every hand, but I was getting my share of face cards and pairs and for the most part my good hands were holding up. I took a few bad beats but nothing that made me want to jump out the window.

When the smoke cleared an hour later and two of the three clowns (including Mr. Bronzestar) beat it, I was up $4,500!

I think this might be the best game I've ever been in in terms of what I could make long term if I could play those players for those stakes every day. I suspect that my long term hourly rate in that game would be on the order of $400-$500 an hour.

I made note of Mr. Bronzestar's username and you can be sure if I see him again I'll clear my schedule and play until I keel over as long as he's in the game!

My WSOP Schedule Revisited

I'm off to Vegas on Friday for my 5th trip in as many years to the World Series of Poker. Now that all of my backers have given me their share of the money, I know there are at least a dozen of you who are eager to hear more about my schedule, plans and which events I'll definitely be playing vs which ones I might miss.

Let me start by saying that there is still no chance of my playing the $1,000 ladies only event even though I'm sure I could sneak in if I just put on a dress. I mean we've all seen six foot five bearded women before right?

My flight arrives just after noon on Friday which should give me plenty of time to register for the tournament, check in to my room at the Rio, get some food and take a nap. By the time the tournament starts I should be in top form.

My first tournament is $2,500 buy in 6 handed limit hold'em at 5 pm. Clearly it's 100% that I'll be playing that one! On Day 1 (like all the 5 pm start time events) we'll play eight 60 minute levels with a 20 minute break every two levels and a 60 minute dinner break after level #4. Play will resume the next day at 2 pm.

The next day (June 6th) I'm planning on playing $1,500 7-card stud which is also at 5 pm (All of the tournaments start day 1 at either noon or 5 pm). I'm not sure how long they'll allow late registration, but I assume they will for at least an hour if not two. So unless I make it 4 hours into day two of the 6-max limit I'll be playing this one (I'd give it 90% overall)

June 7th is a blank day for me. The events that day are ladies only NLH and $10,000 Omaha hi-lo. Of course I hope to be in day 2 of the 7 card stud or at the final table of the 6-max limit.

June 8th bring me back to the action with $2,500 no limit 6 handed (Close to 100% that I'll play this one). I made the money in this event last year. This event starts at noon so we'll play ten 60 minute levels with a 90 minute dinner break after level 6 before day 1 is over. We'll resume the next day at 2.

June 9th is the $3,000 HORSE which happily is at 5 pm. That means even if I make day 2 of the 6 max NL I'll have to go at least 3 hours deep on day two to miss the start of the HORSE. I think I'll have to finish in the top 2%-3% of the NL to miss the HORSE (95% chance I'll make this one).

June 10th is also a blank which is fine because with the late start of the HORSE and the fact that the larger buy in tournaments come with more chips, it's maybe 50% (or higher) that I'll make day 2.

June 11th $1,500 No limit hold'em. There at six $1,500 NLH events at this years WSOP and they draw the weakest players. That one is at noon(Close to 100% chance of playing this one).

June 12th is $1,500 limit hold'em. If I make it to day two of the NLH from the day before I might still play this one. It will depend on my stack size. If I'm on fumes in the NLH I'll sigh up for and play the first two hours of the limit. Then I'll go back to the no limit and just get slowly blinded off in the limit. I'll jump back and forth on my breaks and play them both until I get eliminated from one or the other. That's a real balls to the wall thing to do, but I wouldn't be the first person I've seen do this (90% chance of playing this one).

June 13th, guess what? Another $1,500 no limit hold'em also at noon. If I'm still in the limit from the day before or I'm just beat I'll skip this one since it's nothing special (60% chance of playing this one)

June 14th, more HORSE! This one $1,500 and at 5 p.m. Again given the late start it's very likely that I'll play this one (95% chance).

June 15th $2,000 no limit hold'em. This one is at noon and I will gladly skip it if I'm still in the HORSE which is likely given the late start (50% chance of a skip). I don't care as much about the no limit hold'em tournaments (except for the main event!) I think my edge is much greater in the other games and while all of these WSOP tournaments are VERY important to me, the NLH events have to take a back seat to the others.

June 16th, more $1,500 no limit hold'em at noon (85% chance of playing)!

June 17th is my planned departure date.

Here is a summary:

Friday June 5th - $2,500 6 handed limit hold'em
June 6th - $1,500 Seven Card Stud
June 7th - Off
June 8th - $2,500 no limit hold'em 6 handed
june 9th - $3,000 HORSE
June 10th - The HORSE starts at 5 pm so I'm hoping I'll make it to day 2)
June 11th - $1,500 No Limit Hold'em
June 12th - $1,500 limit hold'em
June 13th - $1,500 No limit hold'em
June 14th - $1,500 HORSE
June 15h - $2,000 No Limit Hold'em
June 16th - $1,500 No Limit Hold'em

July 6th $10,000 No Limit Hold'em Main Event.

While I'm planning to leave on the 17th if I really kick ass, I might stay a few more days. There is a $2,000 NLH on the 18th, a $2,000 limit on the 19th, a $1,500 no limit on the 20th and a $2,500 8-game mixed event on the 21st.

I'd really like to play that mixed event, but I'm sure I'm going to be missing home and my family. My wife and son as well as close friends are going to be visit the second weekend so I won't have been on my own the whole time but it's draining to spend so much time on the road. I'll have to make a game time decision.

Also I just saw that there is a $10,000 limit event on june 15th at 5 pm. If I've knocked one out of the park before then I'll gladly skip the other tournament that day and the one the day after and go big!

I'll do my best to put up individual event previews as we go, I'll probably put up one more post before I leave town and if anyone has any questions please put up a comment.

$2,085 CSPC Final Table Recap

The bad news is I didn't make a staggering comeback to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. The good news is I moved up one spot and finished 4th which paid $8,800. I lasted about an hour and went broke the hand after the 5th place finisher. When I finished the tournament I felt like I was 95% sure I'd play the $5,100 main event. An hour later I was 50/50. Now I'm 100% not going to play it.

I've been playing well, but feel like it will be better to go home with a few grand for my efforts and good momentum going into the WSOP.

It will be back to the grind for two weeks and then off to Vegas!

CSPC $2,085 NLH Recap

This was a tough tournament. Only 46 players started, even the worst players were OK, and they only paid 5 spots (if 50 players had entered they would have paid 9).

I got off to the best possible start. On the second hand of the tournament I got dealt KK vs QQ and got it all in on the turn. We'd started with 7,500 chips and I was up to 15,000 before my seat got warm. I won a few more hands and was up to 23,000 in the first half hour!

Then things were steadily boring. I dropped to 17,000 or so at the end of the first hour and stayed there for a long time. After 2 hours I had 17,000. After 4 hours I had 18,000. After 6 hours I had 15,000.

Around 7 hours in some major good shit happened. The blinds were 300/600 with a 50 chip ante and I was starting to struggle. I had something like 12,000 and we were down to 12 or 13 players. I got dealt K9 in the big blind and the big stack (who was a great player) raised to 1,500 from the button. I decided to call at take a flop which came down T 9 6. Not exactly the nuts, but I did have 2nd pair. I checked, my opponent bet 2,500 and I went all in. He instantly called me with AT. But, I nailed a 9 on the turn and doubled up.

A round or two later I was on the button with 75. It was garbage, but the blinds were playing so tight preflop that I thought I had a good chance to steal the blinds and antes. I raised to 1,800 and the big blind reraised to 3,200. I still had garbage, but his reraise was so small I had to call and I thought I could out play him after the flop. The flop came down J 6 4 and my opponent bet 5,000. After about 10 seconds I moved all in. I had a straight draw and more importantly I had 23,000 chips which I thought was enough to win the hand right there. After 2 long minutes my opponent called with QJ. But the turn was an 8 giving me the nuts and a huge pot!

One the very next hand I got dealt 66 and again raised to 1,800. Both blinds called and the flop came down AK6! BINGO! To my total shock and delight the small blind moved all in unprovoked for over 25,000 with AJ! I called in a millisecond and was up to 80,000. A few hand later we were down to 9 players.

I was in first by a hair and it was 12:45 am (we started a 5 p.m.). Then I ran SOOOOOOOOOO bad. Everyone was making smaller than normal raises and since I was so deep stacked I was inclined to take a lot of flops with sort of marginal hands. I dropped 20K pretty quick. Then I lost another 20K with top pair vs AA.

It took until about 2 am to lose two players, another hour to lose one more and another TWO HOURS to lose the 6th place player. During this time I played almost no hands. I got total garbage, the big stacks were very good players, and even though I felt short I still had enough chips to wait it out. During the last hour I was really starting to sweat making the money, but in the end after the shorter stack had survived an all in 3 times, we finally lost one.

We go back today at 4:30 playing 5 handed. The blinds will be 600/1,200 with a 200 chip ante for a few more minutes and I have 18,100 chips. I'm in last, but the other players have 25K, 42K, 49K and 210K. Clearly that one guy is running away with it, but if I can double through one of the others I've got a chance.

5th pays $4,500, 4th pays $8,500, 3rd pays $13,500, 2nd pays $22,000 and 1st is just over $40,000. I'll let you know what happens.

If I go broke before 7 pm I'll be playing a $540 satellite to the $5,100 main event.

Change of Plans

Well, I went broke in about an hour in the $335 (top set vs a flush did me in). I feel pretty good right now so I've decided to go back to plan A and play in the $2,085 tournament at 5. Wish me luck!

Call the Sheriff! Somebody Stole My HORSE!

We started the $1,065 HORSE tournament at the CSPC with a field of 60 players. Most of them were very tough and included a few multilple WSOP bracelet winners. On the other end there was a guy at my table who kept asking how much he could bet and wasn't really sure how all the games worked! That's L.A. for you!

I started off good and kept it going taking my starting stack of 5,000 up to 12,500 by the time we had lost 20 players, which took about 5 hours. But after six hours we were down to just over 30 players and I was down to 3,700 chips as we took our third 15 minute break (there was one every two hours).

Then I went on a run. I went from 3,700 to 33,000 in the next two hours of play. I was feeling great. Around this time I was almost sure I'd make the top 8 spots and the money. By the time we made it down to 15 players, average was 20,000 I had 40,000 and was in first place. We were playing 800/1,600 stakes at the time and I was hoping I could press my advantage.

Then I went stone cold dead. I couldn't win a damn thing! I started with the best hand quite a few times, but the only pots I won from there on out were either just the blinds or just the antes. To make it worse there was plenty of action which made every brick more expensive.

In the end I finished 13th. The money in this tournament wasn't insane. First was $20,000, 8th was only $1,200 and I'd sold off a fair chunk of my action. But missing out on the final table after being in such good shape was a major disapointment. I'm not sure it it was because it was 5 in the morning when I went broke or what, but it hurt pretty bad.

I feel better today, but I still feel a little tired even though I slept until almost 1. So I'm 90% sure I'm going to skip the $2,000 NLH that starts at 5 and instead play a $335 NLH with a $200,000 guaranteed prize pool that starts at 2.

A Final Table Dud

When I saw the chip counts for the 10 handed final table of my $335 NLH event at the CSPC I confirmed that I was in second place. In fact with 95,700 I was only 4,000 off of first, but I was only 55,000 ahead of 10th - the chip stacks were very tight.

This was an incredibly boring final table. It took close to 3 hours for us to lose one player and that player was almost me! In the same amount of time the $335 Stud tournament from the day before that restarted at the same time we did played from 16 players to conclusion (the made a deal when they were down to 4).

I dribbled away my stack for the first two hours, getting no cards, finding no good spots to make a move, and finding myself with about 60,000 chips. Then I picked up QQ and got it all in vs KK who had 50,000.

After that hand I was down to 10,000 when I found a real miracle. The blinds were 2,000/4,000 with a 500 chip ante and I looked down at KJ. I moved all in sure that at least the big blind would call me. Instead I got called by the big blind and the small blind. The flop came down A 6 4 and the small blind moved all in! YUCK! I was sure I was against an ace.

In fact I was against A4. I needed either running KK, JJ or QT to win the hand. As the turn was coming out I said "Put a queen up there." BANG, a queen comes. "Put a Ten up there" I called out. BANG, a ten. I was up to 35,000 and while still in last, I was back in it.

I never made a full recovery, but we lost three players while I was hanging on for dear life. I finished 7th which paid $2,227 (at least I beat lollipop who finished 8th!). Not what I was hoping for at the start of yesterday's action, but still a great result for the tournament as a whole.

The winner got a trophy that was basically just a big ass grizzly bear. It wasn't huge, but it was pretty big and I swear it was made of solid iron and weighed at least 40 pounds. With all the tournaments I've won, I don't have any trophies, bracelets, rings, ribbons, plaques or anything. I want one of those bears!

Today it's HORSE time! Maybe if I win I'll get myself a similarly sized horse and have it riding the bear trophy!

A Great Story and CSPC $335 NLH Recap

I had a great day yesterday in the $335 hold'em tournament at the CSPC. We started with 230 players each with 3,000 chips and I seemed to get good but not great cards all day. It made for interesting, fun play and I didn't often find myself sitting there doing nothing for long stretches.

I'll fast forward through the early stages to the point where I had about 25,000 chips and we were down to 35 players (27 spots paid). I had the best seat at my table, just to the left of the two best players who were both very aggressive Vietnamese fellows. I'll call one gap tooth and one lollipop since one had a massive gap between his front two teeth and the other was sucking on a lollipop and then a stick the entire time I was playing against him.

Gap tooth was good, but tilt prone. He had about 50,000 chips when I sat down (average was around 20,000) and was using his big stack to play a lot of pots against the short stacks. He's also made some big calls with very marginal hands so I knew I'd need to make a hand to get him, but if I did I was likely to get paid off big.

After almost an hour of waiting I got my chance. With blinds of 400/800 with a 50 chip ante the under the gun player went all in for 2,000. Gap tooth was in the small blind and just called. Later he said he got distracted by the loudmouth who was all in and forgot all about me which led him to call instead of reraising. I looked down at K3 which is total garbage, but there was already 5,200 in the pot and it would only cost me another 1,200 to call. Also I knew I could get action from gap tooth if I hit big.

The flop came down K 7 3. BINGO! Two pair! Gap tooth checked and I bet out 4,000. Against someone else I might have slow played or bet less, but I thought even if he missed he might try to take me off the hand. He reached for chips slowly, counted out 12,000 and pushed them into the pot. I tried to look worried as I thought for 30 seconds. Then I said "I'm all in."

He wasn't happy, which I knew meant I had the best hand. After the dealer counted down my stack he called with KJ. The turn was a 4, the river was a 6 and I was over 50,000!

I took out a short stack with AT vs 88 which put me at about 60,000 when the next hand came up. Gap tooth was steaming at this point. While he'd won a few big hands with garbage and taken his stack back to 50,000 he'd just lost 20,000 with AA vs 44 which had him back at 30,000.

The blind were 600/1,200 with a 75 chip ante and gap tooth made it 4,000 to go. I looked down at KK and had a tough decision to make. How was I going to play this hand? I could just call hoping to trap him and maybe get someone behind us to move all in. I could make a standard reraise to something like 14,000. I could reraise small to 9,000.

I took my time and eventually decided that I should just move all in. It would look weak like I didn't want a call and since gap tooth was on tilt he might just get fed up and call with a marginal hand.

So after 20 seconds I moved all my chips into the pot. Gap tooth looked like he was going to explode and said "I call." When the cards got turned over he had QJ off suit! The board was all garbage and I took down a huge pot. I was proud of myself for reading this situation right and getting someone with 150% of an average stack to get it all in with me 5 spots short of the money as a major underdog.

I won some more pots and found myself with 110,000 chips when the average was 23,000. I was in first place in the whole tournament by a mile and no one at my table had more than 40,000. But that 40,000 chip stack was in the hands of lollipop.

When we got down to 28 players - 1 spot out of the money - I made and extremely bold play (This is the great story part). I was on the button and the blinds both had about 10,000 chips. It was obvious to everyone that there was no way they were calling anything. They were just going to wait until they were in the money before the did anything. When it got to lollipop he made it 4,000. He'd be doing this time and time again stealing the blinds. I'd played back at him once with a reraise a while earlier and he went all in. He'd also shown a propensity to call standard reraises and take a flop. I wanted to stay patient, but I felt like I was getting run over.

I knew he could have just about anything, and I was tired of him stealing all the blinds that I should have been stealing! I was the big stack! This was my house! After he made it 4,000 I thought "If I have anything at all here I'm moving all in." I looked down and saw 72! The worst possible starting hand. I paused. "We're one spot short of the money. No one is going to call me if I move all in, it doesn't matter what I have" I thought.

In a moment of boldness I said "I'm all in." The blinds quickly folded and lollipop said "Really?" Immediately I knew he had something. I thought it might be AQ or a pair below JJ. He'd been thinking for about 90 seconds when someone went broke at an other table meaning we were now in the money. "AHHHHHHHHHHH!" I thought. Now the pressure was off him to some degree.

He kept saying things like "This is a $300 tournament. If this was a $10,000 tournament I'd fold. This is a $300 tournament." It was pretty clear he read me as weak, but didn't want to risk his whole stack. Now everyone had gathered around. After this hand we were going to redraw for seats and everyone was just waiting. There were about 50 people watching the hand and I could hear whispers about what I might have and what he might have. No one was saying they thought I had 72!

I was trying to think if there was anything I could say to get him to fold, but I decided to stay quiet.

Finally after close to 5 minutes he pulled a quarter out of his pocket and said "Heads I call, tails I fold." Then he threw the quarter at least 10 feet in the air as everyone held their breath. It bounced in the middle of the table and hopped up on to the rail (the edge of the table) looking like it was going on to the floor, but stopping just short.

It was heads. Everyone said "heads!" Instantly lollipop said "I call." "AHHHHHHHHH!" I thought. When I turned over my hand everyone said "OOHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!"

He had pocket tens and there was a ten on the flop ending any chance I had of a miracle. I was down to 70,000 and in the money which was still great, but I was feeling a little like an idiot.

At my new table I quickly lost two small all ins with 88 vs JJ and 66 vs A9. I was down to 35,000 and feeling like I had one foot out the door wondering how I'd gone down hill so fast.

But then things turned around! I won some pots made some head way I ran it back to 95,700 which is how many chips I have right now. We stopped at 10 players and I'm going back today at 4:30 to finish the action. I'm not sure if lollipop is still in it, but I think I'm in 2nd or 3rd chip position. While I'm only guaranteed something like $1,400, first place is close to $20,000. Hopefully I can finish the job and take this one to the house!

People often refer to a confrontation between a pocket pair and two over cards as a coin flip. They say "You need to win some coin flips to win a tournament." This is the first time I've ever lost 40,000 chips on a literal coin flip!

CSPC $215 NLH Recap

There were over 1,700 entrants spread over two days in my first tournament of the California State Poker Championship. I played on Day 2 and got about what I expected from my competition - a bunch of crappy players!

We started with blind of 25/25 and 3,000 chips. My first good hand I raised to 75 and got 5 callers! OK I guess I need to go bigger. Next I raised to 100 first in and got 6 callers! Finally I raised to 125 under the gun and got called by 7 players! It was insane. The first guy in after me in that last one had 53s and the player after him had 56 off. We saw every single flop for the first hour and there were only one or two preflop reraises. These guys were weak!

Players tightened up a little as the blinds got bigger, but the play was still pretty weak. In my first big confrontation I raised JJ and got called by the woman just to my left. She was pretty tight and I'd seen her smooth call with 99 a few hands earlier.

The flop came down 8 7 5, I bet 500 into the 550 chip pot and she made it 1,000. ACK! This was screaming set, but I decided I wasn't sure enough to make a lay down this big. I decided to go for it and reraised all in. I wasn't surprised to see I was up against 55, but I was happy when the turn came a 9 and the river a ten. The only downside is I had to hear her bitch about this hand for the next hour as if it was the worst bad beat of all time.

From there I ran my stack up to 10,000 and was feeling good about my chances. Then I got 3,000 in preflop with TT vs QJ. After that I lost another 3,000 with JJ vs AQ.

On my final hand the blinds were 150/300 with a 25 chip ante and I had about 4,000 left. One player raised to 750 and got called by the guy just to my right. The first player was raising often and the other was calling a lot with a wide range of hands. I thought there was a good chance I could get them to fold if I moved all in and considered doing it no matter what I had. When I looked down at my first card and saw it was an ace it was an easy decision.

Sadly a third player woke up with JJ behind me and moved all in. My kicker turned out to be a 2 which meant I was in big trouble. The first card off the deck was an ace, but the second was a jack and that was it.

The good news is I went over to a nice $20/$40 game, won $500 in about 45 minutes and then got a call from my wife telling me her sister and boyfriend were free for dinner and I should head out.

Today I have $335 no limit hold'em at 2 and there is a $335 7 card stud at 5 pm. Late registration for the stud stays open for 2 hours so if I go broke anytime in the first 5 hours of the NLH I'll be playing the stud as well.

Wish me luck!

WSOP Warm up In L.A.

The WSOP is right around the corner, but first I'm off to Southern California for a week of tournaments at the Commerce Casino. These tournaments are part of the "California State Poker Championship," which actually started April 30th, and should attract fairly large fields (for in person tournaments).

The great thing about tournaments at the Commerce is they do them right. They give you long limits, slow blind increases and plenty of chips even in the small buy in tournaments.

For example my first tournament (on May 16th) is a $220 NL hold'em ($28 goes to the house instead of $15 like online - it costs A LOT more to run a tournament in person!) and we'll start with 2,500 chips, 40 minute limits and 25/25 blinds (that's not a typo - in order to avoid using chips with less than a 25 denomination in the first round the big blind and small blind are the same). (I love parentheses!)

My second tournament is $335 NLH and if I go broke in the first 3 hours in that one I'll play the $335 7-card stud that goes off - as you may have guessed - 3 hours later in the day.

The day after that is a $545 heads up matches tournament. I think that one would be very cool to play in but since they are limiting it to 128 players I suspect it might be sold out by the time I get to town.

The tournament that was the real inspiration for this trip in on May 19th. It's $1,065 HORSE! I have never played HORSE in person, but the evidence that I kick ass at it is overwhelming. I'm pretty excited about it.

The day after the HORSE is $2,085 no limit hold'em which is followied by "Super Satellite Day." The main event in this series is $5,100 no limit hold'em (15,000 chips and 60 minute limits in that one) and on super satellite day there will be three $540 qualifiers - one at 11 am, 3 pm and 7 pm. My plan is to play all three.

Of course if I go bananas in one of the earlier events or stomp the shit out of some people in the cash games I'll play the $5,100 event even if I don't win a satellite seat.

I'll be posting results daily so you can all read about my latest quest for glory.

This makes me think of a story!

It's been a little more than 5 years since my first trip to the Commerce. It was right about the time I first started playing online poker and I was still grinding it out at the Oaks club. The point of that trip was to go play a $1,500 no limit hold'em tournament. Before that the biggest tournament I'd ever played was $215, $500 was a big win for me and I still knew how many times I'd won over $1,000 in a day (it was about five at the time - now I'm not sure how many times I've won more than $10,000 in a day!).

I made the 6 hour drive with Matt Lessinger who also played the tournament. When I sat down I was crazy nervous. A few hands in I got dealt pocket kings and my heart rate shot up. It's not scary to get dealt bad cards and fold them, but I knew I had a hand I would almost certainly take to showdown and there was a chance I could go broke.

I made a standard raise and got called by one player on the button. I was terrified. I didn't want to come all that way for this one tournament and go broke in 10 minutes. "I don't know if I want to make a set. I could never get off a set and if I lose with a set it's going to take me a month to recover. GIVE ME QUADS!" I thought as the flop came out. I flopped a king and heart rate went up even more. I got hit with a gallon of adreneline and my hands were shaking as I put the chips in the pot to bet. I honestly think this might be the most nervous I have ever been in my entire life. Please God do not let me lose this hand. I am going to pass out if I lose this hand.

I got called and the turn came out. It was another f-ing king! I couldn't belive it! I had made quads in the biggest tournament of my life!

I checked and my opponent bet! "AH HA! PLEASE HAVE SOMETHING YOU BASTARD!" I thought as my heart contunied to pound at what felt like 200 beats per minute. "I'LL GET HIM ON THE END!" The voice screamed in my head. "THIS IS GOING TO BE SUCH A GREAT SLOW PLAY!" I just called and checked the end expecting a bet. But alas it got checked behind me and I took down the pot. A lowly pot. I'd taken my starting stack of 5,000 all the way up to about 5,700.

"How am I ever going to make it though this tournament?" I thought. "If I get another hand like that I'm going to be dead. Not from a heart attack, but from a f-ing heart explosion. They guys in the seats next to me will be lucky to survive the impact of the shock wave."

After a few hours I settled down. I'd budgeted for the $1,500 loss and won a few bucks in the cash games so it wasn't like I was in over my head. On my last hand I got it all in with 55 vs 99 and missed. I lasted about 8 hours and finished in 64th place out of 309.

I've come a long way since then. I've literally played millions of hands in that time and I've never been even close to that nervous again. It's not one of my favorite hands, but I know that hand with those kings is going to stick with me forever.

I can't wait to get down there and kick some ass!