Left.

Super enjoyable TR, hope you boys run good for the last day!

Trip report 100% delivering

Thanks mate!

Cheers Bloobird, good to have you on board again

Update: Dan just got this first Vegas static electric shock but only because I touched him on the back at the table to get his attention and shocked us both haha.

His response: "What is wrong with you??"

Great thread. Thinking back to my recent stay at Aria - I think I did keep getting shocks on the escalators.

The Chicken Avocado sandwich at Earl of Sandwich is a rare combination of tasty and nutritious. I try to stop by a couple times every trip.

Props for the Oasis shoutout.

Props for Best TR of 2016 from the gut and from the heart.

Well-written with great attention to detail.

Time to run it up at the pokers 1x down the stretch.

Good TR, speaking of DJ'ing the guy in the white shirt at cut looks like Hardwell.

Hey 2+2,

So after Hakkasan last night I woke this morning still in my shirt, jacket and trousers and with possibly the driest mouth I have ever had. After drinking about a litre of water I checked my wallet to see what the damage of last night was. In total the night had cost me around $500 so I knew I had some serious grinding ahead of me today.

Dan got up around the same time and after a shower and some painkillers we were ready to get on the poker grind. By this point it was around 11:30am, I had my buffet pass for Planet Hollywood but wasn't quite hungry enough for the buffet so decided to get on the grind at the Aria for a hour until I was ready to have lunch. I sat down at $1/$3 with my lucky new jacket, let the grind begin!



Ready, steady, go:

Fairly early on there is a straddle pot but I didn't realise so I raise to $12 (min raise) in MP with QJss and get 4 callers. Flop is KT3r. Checked to me and I decide not to cbet in this spot and check to a donkish woman who bets $20. $20 is called by another woman on the BTN and a guy who had called from the blinds. I call. Turn is 9h which brings a backdoor flush draw. BB checks, I check to the woman who bet but she now checks, the woman on the btn bets $55. BB now ships for $111. I think I made a mistake in the long run here, I decided to be a little trappy and gamble a little and just flatted the $111 with the nuts. Donkish woman folds and btn calls (maybe just flatting is better if the btn can reopen the action if she wants?). River 9s. I check and the btn checks back. Btn shows K3s and guy in the BB mucks what I think is a miss draw (he mucked before the hands were even shown). So I take it down.



Few hands later I get full value with KJs on Jxxxx.



Then I'm BB. Donkish woman limps utg, guy in MP limps, SB limps and I check A8o in the BB. Flop comes Jd 8d 8h. SB checks, I lead for $10 and donkish woman raises to $25. MP folds and now SB shoves for $111. Pretty sure I have the best hand in this spot I decide to gamble a little and not blast the woman behind me off a draw (But tbh I didn't think she'd raise me on the flop with a draw). I just flat the $111 and she flats behind me as well. At this point she has just over $300 behind. Praying for a good turn card and my prayers were answered when the turn was As (What a sexy beast of a turn card). I slowly slide a stack of 20 $5 chips into the middle, Jerry Yang style "raise 3 million". She doesn't take long before shoving for $300 and I snap. River is a brick. I turn my hand over and both players muck. Guy who was the SB claimed he flopped a FH but not sure I believe him, pretty sure he shows J8 there rather than just mucking, if he actually had it.



The grind is on boys and girls!

Once I'd busted this donkish woman my table wasn't great. I played a few more orbits and racked my chips up to head to the buffet. I bought in for $300 and cashed out $1205 in just over a hour of playing. If only I could always have that hourly haha. Great feeling though, I was stuck for the trip only as of yesterday.



"Three racks of high society please"

There are still a few feelings I love when it comes to poker. Like playing your first hand after not playing for a while, getting an Ace and slowly squeezing out the other one, flopping a set in a 3bet pot and like the hand above getting raised when you have pretty much the nuts. No matter how much I play poker, these situations and a few others still get my heart beating fast and give me the rush I love.

After cashing in I head over to PH for the buffet. Dan decided to stay at the Aria and use his comps there as he still has a bunch to use up. On the way out of Aria I randomly got speaking to a small 50s black guy with a limp, I can't even remember how we got speaking but he just started going on about his wife being angry at him and heading back to LA early so he spent the whole night in a strip club getting drunk. Vegas is a crazy place, where else would me and this random guys paths cross? So many different people come to Vegas. After speaking and walking/limping for about 10 mins we parted ways. I have a habit for attracting random people, maybe on my next visit I'll have more than just Ben flying in to see me haha.

I stayed in Planet Hollywood the first time I went to Vegas and have probs been in the Casino at least 100+ times now and I still manage to get lost every single time I go in there. It isn't even a very big Casino, I'm not sure how it's possible that I still get lost in there. I find the buffet area after 10 mins of searching and join the queue. I didn't realise at the time of joining the queue but it snaked around a little bit and by the time I realised how big the queue for the buffet actually was I was already pot committed and couldn't really fold. Think I queued for around 40 mins which was -EV for last day of Vegas time but teaches me a lesson for being a nit...



I'll save you pictures of buffet food this time because I think you get the idea by now At the dessert counter I was helping myself to some cookies and the large Mexican worker woman behind counter says "Sir, those cookies are sugar free" so I say "Thanks, I'll go for the unhealthy ones then" and move around to the other side of the counter to get some cookies with that weren't sugar free. The Mexican woman then looks at me properly for the first time, gives me a full look up and down for a few seconds and says in her Spanish accent "Actually sir I think you should take sugar free". The cheek! hahaha. Solid troll though, WP.

King troll:



After the buffet I wasn't really sure where I wanted to play. In the end I decide to head back to the Aria and play there. I was literally walking through the Aria Casino to the Poker room and I get a huge urge to play in the Venetian (Really not sure where it came from). But at this point I am probs 30 secs away from the Aria poker room and I do a instant U turn and walk back the way I just came from PH and the 30 min walk to play in the Venetian. Earlier in the trip I had some solid Venetian run bad but I had a feeling the curse had been lifted and I also had my lucky new jacket with me this time. I arrive at the Venetian and buy in for the max. Very first hand I squeeze out QQ, gg Venetian run bad. UTG raises to $7, UTG+1 calls, UTG+2 calls, I'm next to act with the ladies and raise to $27. Folded back round to UTG who flats. UTG+1 now shoves for $125. UTG+2 folds. I reship for my full stack and UTG folds. UTG+1 instantly flips over AA and as course for the trip I have no luck with the ladies and brick out. FU Venetian Poker! Instantly top up another $100. Few hands later UTG limps and I raise to $12 with 99. BB cold calls and UTG calls. Flop is 2h 3h 4d. Checked to me and I cbet $27. BB now ships for $111, UTG folds. I call pretty quick but knew I was almost certainly dead when the turn comes 5h. He flips over A7hh. Great start. Few hands later it's folded to the btn who raises to $9. I'm in the BB with AJhh and decide to just call. Flop comes Ad 9d 3c. He cbets $11, I call. Turn 7c. He bets $28 and I call. River Js. Now he bets $68. I think in the long run I should probably be raising this river but I decide just to call and luckily I did because he turns over a set of 9s .

The Venetian has potentially the hottest massage girl in Vegas so I decide to have a anti tilt massage. It was decent and well worth the $20.

Picture taken solely for TR, I am not a creeper:



After the massage I decide to call it a day. Down $299. Even the lucky jacket couldn't counter Sheldoms doom switch.

On the way back to Aria I decide to stop over in the Bellagio. On my work desk back in Malta I have a bunch of poker chips I like to riffle while I am working so I went to swap $10 into $1 Bellagio chips for my desk. While I was there I had a look in Bobby's room and saw Doyle and Patrik Antonius playing.



(Disapproving look from Patrik haha)

I also saw Jimmy Fricke. I've read through Jimmy's food blog many times since someone recommended it in my last TR, really decent site and worth a read for first time Vegas visitors. He is a freak and a very weird dude though



(FU Howard)

Head back from the Bellagio to the Aria and while I was walking down the strip I feel someone pinching my bum. Spin around to see a girl who can't of been more than 16/17/18 running away with a group of her teenage friends laughing their heads off. I can't even bloody walk down the strip without being sexually assaulted and made to feel like a peado all at the same time! Red faced I head back to the room to chill for a hour.

That is all for now, me and Dan are heading for food soon and then our last night in Vegas. Wish us luck!

Thanks for confirming and I forgot Americans called lifts escalators

Best TR of 2016, what a honour, thanks! Poker run up has started

HA, solid shout actually!

I thought by lift you meant elevator.

Elevator:


Escalator:

Ah yeah, you're right. Lift/Elevator is what I mean

After chilling in the room for a hour I meet up with Dan at the Aria poker room. After grinding all day he'd had a $340 winning session which meant his P&L from poker on the trip was exactly $0. I.e. He'd broken even to the exact dollar. It'd only taken him 54 hours #CompsGrinder.

We headed over to Cosmopolitan for a burger at Buns and Shakes. I've been here a bunch of times on previous trips and really like it. So I have my 50th burger of the trip which was called Gold Standard, a giant milkshake and some amazing sweet potato fries. We don't really seem to get sweet potato fries back in Europe so I get them at any opportunity when I am over in Vegas.



After way too much food we head back over into Aria to have our last evening Vegas session. It's our last chance to really have a good session and make the trip profitable. Dan sat down at $2/$5 and put his name on the $5/$10 waiting list and I sat down at $1/$3.

Tbh I didn't really feel my table at the Aria. There was probably one proper drunk fish on the table and everyone else seemed pretty solid which isn't what you want if you're sitting at $1/$3. A couple of guys wearing sunglasses as well but if you're wearing sunglasses at $1/$3 is probably means you're a fun player. I played for around 30 mins and decided to head to a easier and more profitable game. I left Dan and head over to PH.

I will miss this view:



The difference in level of play PH and Aria was pretty apparent from the second I sat down. Fairly early on a guy stacks off with Q3 on KQTr vs KK. KK had open limped in the HJ. WP. Q3 guy reloads for $150 and I wake up with AA in late position and raise fairly big and Q3 guy calls. Flop comes KQ2cc, I cbet and the short stack shoves. I call. Board bricks out and he turns over AK. So I'm up $150ish fairly on. After busting the fish a few tables merged and my table became not so great. I lost the profit back over a few standard not worth reporting hands. The game was fairly tight considering it was PH and to give you an idea of how tight the game is:

Donk on the BTN straddles to $10 which means the SB is actually first to act pre flop. SB who seemed like a fairly good player and who I'd played with a couple of nights previous raises to $35 from the SB/UTG. I'm in the BB so UTG+1 in this hand and squeeze out JJ. I 3bet to $100. Folded back round to the SB who thinks for maybe less than 10 seconds, says "There is only really one hand you can have, right?" and folds KK face up . Phew, dodged a bullet there. Being the gentleman I am I lied and told him he'd made a good fold. The PH cardroom is currently situated right next to Earl of Sandwich and the Rock Bar so is extremely noisy. There was a pretty terribad band playing in the Rock Bar, I had my headphone music on full volume but could barley even hear it due to the heavy rock coming from next door. Really not ideal.

Dan had planned to play $5/$10 tonight and before burgers was told by one of the regs that the $5/$10 game at that time was probably as good as you're going to get in Vegas with maybe 5 fun players in it. Unfortunately by the time we'd eaten our burgers and returned the game was alot less good with a few fish busting and regs taking their places. He put his name on the list but when his seat came up decided to leave it and keep $2/$5. As I said before for the trip he was exactly breakeven for poker but that was about to change:

Fairly on in the session he hits a Royal Flush with AKss on Qs Ts 4c Js. And a guy leads into him for $200 on the turn. Sat in Vegas, getting your first ever live Royal Flush and a guy is leading into you. What dreams are made of. After a flat call the board the paired on the river (FH one time!) but unfortunately that seemed to slow the guy down and he folded to Dan's shove. Still a good start to the session. Then he see's a flop with 99. Flop comes 689r. Dan manages to get it all in on the A turn vs two other players. River is a 6 and one of the players fist pumps the air and starts celebrating and turns over 8s full. Dan turns over his bigger full house and the other player mucks what he says was a flopped straight. Pretty awesome triple up though and Mr Daniel Swongs cashes out $1.9k profit for the session which now means he's up $1.9k from poker for the trip. What a way to end.

Unfortunately I ended my last evening session a small winner, winning $37 after some frustrating hands. Not the exact ending session I had in mind but still up $600 for the day.

I head back to the room around 3am and went straight to sleep after putting everything on charge for the long journey home tomorrow. I wake up at 6am the next morning way before the 9am alarm I had set (FU jetlag). Today is my 27th birthday Waking up in Vegas on your birthday is a good feeling and I honestly couldn't think of a place I would rather be. I open some cards my family had given me to open today and that's where we're at the moment.



Plan for today: Soon we'll be heading breakfast, to check out of the hotel and then to hopefully have a winning Birthday run good degen session on Craps and Roulette and grind some poker before we have to leave for our long flight back to reality at around 14:00

Your GL messages seem to be working so far so wish us luck

Thanks!

GL in the pits. Leave on a high note.

Solid trip report

Pretty decent indeed. WP sir...

awesome to hear you are both up

the day you leave vegas has to be one of the most depressing days EVER

Hey 2+2,

So unfortunately this is my current view at the moment



After months of looking forward to the trip and an amazing week in Vegas it's finally almost over. Now just a 10 hour flight, 5 hour stop over in London, 1 hour flight, night in Dublin, 3 hour flight to Frankfurt, 5 hour stop over, 2 hour flight to Malta, land at midnight Malta time and back to work at 9am the next day...

So this morning we got up around 6am and took it fairly easy. Dan went to the gym while I wrote my last TR update and had a shower. At around 9am we headed down to the Aria cafe to have breakfast.



Head back to the room, pack our stuff off, say bye to the room one final time and head to check in.



We check out and pay the donk resort fee. Drop the bags off with the luggage people and go for a morning degen. So far in the trip we'd not played any Casino games, just poker. Dan had promised me that if he was up at Poker he'd join in for my Birthday degen. In previous trips my best run good for Casino games have come at Planet Hollywood and Cosmopolitan so as Cosmo is closer we head that way. So Birthday run good, lucky Cosmo and Dan's beginners luck, this really has to work! We head into Cosmopolitan, which is just an beautiful Casino:

We instantly head to the $10 minimum roulette wheel and I change my $100 into $5 chips. As my Birthday is the 15th and I am turning 27 I put $30 on 15 and $30 on 27. Then put $10 on some of my lucky numbers (17, 20, 10, 30). The dealer spins the ball "15 or 27 one time please!". The ball lands in 29 now and Dan "Yes! You sick man" thinking that 29 was my number. $100 down pretty quick, still yet to see the Birthday run good. After the spin we head over to the Craps table. I love craps and destroyed it in my first and second trip but since then my RTP has solidly returned to normal. As Dan had never played the game before I gave him the honour of throwing the dice first. Very first throw he launches the dice across the table with one flying off the table and across half the Cosmopolitan haha. After that he throws a 6, which becomes the point. We pile our bets on, next throw he rolls a 7 (Really not sure how I pictured this session going). Now it's my time to roll, I roll a 6 again which becomes the point. We place our bets on 10, 8, hardways etc. I roll 8 a couple of times to get a little bit of money back but on my 5th roll throw a 7. Dan just looks at me and says "That is the worst $100 I have ever spent" haha. We had $28 left at this point which wasn't enough to keep playing Craps without going back into the wallet. After tipping the dealers $3 each we were left with $25. I head straight to the Blackjack table and Dan goes to Roulette, I go all in on my first. I get Jack and 5 vs a dealers 6 and stick. She pulls out 5 cards and eventually busts. I take my $50 and head back over to the Roulette wheel just in time to see Dan's number come in. He'd taken the $25 and put $15 on 18 and $10 on a another number and obvs 18 came straight in (he'd done something similar in the Isle of Man with 18 as well). Now he's solidly up for the session. I go all in again putting $25 on 15 and 27, the dream has to come true. The ball spins and I'm not kidding when I say it landed in 27, bounced out, landed back in 27 again and bounced again before eventually landing in 10 next door! What a slow roll!

We leave Cosmo me stuck $200 and a little depressed and Dan up $400 saying what a good idea it was haha....With still 2 1/2 hours to kill before getting at 14:00 we head back to the Aria poker room for one last session. Something else Dan had promised before the trip was that he would play at least one session of $5/$10 and being a man of his word decided to jump into the $5/$10 game for a proper spin up, go big or go home. For Dan it isn't just about making money but the experience to play better players and improve at poker. After just winning $400 at roulette and having the $1.9k winning session the night before I don't think he'd of been crushed if he'd lost his $1.3k $5/$10 buy in if he had learnt something from the experience. He'd brought a couple of racks of $5 and $25 chips to the table as he had planned to play $2/$5. The dealer says "You know this is $5/$10 right?" Dan responding fairly nervously "Yeah, why?". But turns out you don't play with the $5 and $25 chips at $5/$10 so after changing his chips into the proper dominations he was ready to go.

Dan sitting at $5/$10



I sit down at my normal $1/$3 and the grind begins for us both! I had a pretty strange hand fairly on. There are 3 limpers and I raise to $16 on the BTN with AJss. A young Asian guy who had limped makes the call and everyone else folds. Flop is K66hh. He checks to me and I cbet $27 and he calls. Turn is 2d. He checks again. At this point I really think I have to fire another bullet, I think he could easy have a pocket pair between the 6 and King or even Kx. I bet $57. He tanks for a minute before sliding a fairly large stack of chips across the line, there was definitely more $57 so I think it's a raise and instantly push my cards across the line to muck. Fairly luckily my cards hit the chips I'd bet and kind of bounce back across the line. The dealer says "wait, he's just calling" And gives him $15 to $20 back off the stack he'd pushed out. The Asian guy confirmed he just wanted to call. FML, at this point it was pretty obvious I had absolutely nothing. I've never a mistake like this before and I was pretty annoyed with myself. Expecting the Asian guy to instantly shove any river I resign myself to losing the hand. River is Kd and he checks and I snap check back. He says A high and turns over A2hh and we chop the pot. What a strange hand though and a few people at the table commented that it was the strangest hand they'd ever seen. For me to pretty much snap muck the turn and then just checking it down.

Dan was doing really well on the $5/$10 table. He'd built his stack up to $1.5k fairly quickly and then this hand happened: Fairly short handed, It's opened to $30 by a young looking reg, the SB calls and Dan 3bets TT in the BB to $140. Young reg calls and SB folds. Flop is J92r, it goes check check. Turn is Q and it goes check check again. River is a K, giving Dan a straight. Dan value bets $200 and the young reg snap jams (gulp). Dan makes the call fairly quickly, only beaten by AT and the reg tables AK, at first Dan only saw the A and thinks it's GG. Dan gets a $1.5k donation.

A little later on Dan opens with AJcc and the same young reg 3bets to $110 and Dan makes the call. Flop comes J92r and Dan check calls a bet of $130. Turn is a T and it goes check check. River is a Q. Dan checks and the young reg bets $300. Pretty much only beating a pure bluff with overcards and four to a straight Dan makes a really good call and the young reg turns over 56dd. In 90 mins Dan had won $2.2k. I guess this guy knew Dan was probs playing above his roll and just put him to the test at every chance he had, but he just didn't know who he was messing with Mr Swongs.



At dinner the night before he was exactly break-even for poker in the trip and less than 24 hours later with the session after dinner and now this he was up $4.1k and $4.5k if you include the roulette session. What a sick last 24 hours for him! But WP and well deserved. What Vegas dreams are made of.

Unfortunately I wasn't fairing very well in my session. There are a few limpers and I look down at KK in MP and raise to $16. CO and BTN call and now the Asian guy from the AJ hand above 3bets to $55. I flat IP and the two other players fold out. The flop comes JJ6r and now he bets $45 and I call. Turn is a 9. He checks and I check back. River is a 2. Thinking about how much I need to value bet I was a little surprised when I saw him getting his chips ready to bet. He pushes out $150. Not sure what to think I make the call and he turns over AA. Maybe I lost the minimum and not much I can really do but I was pretty annoyed with my last Vegas session I called it a morning. Down $217.

Dan decided to call it an end to his amazing final session as well. We still had a hour to kill before we needed to get the taxi so we head around the Aria shopping mall for abit but after realising the minimum cost for a item of clothing in there is $200+ we decide to leave.



We head to Earl and I use my comps for my last Vegas holiday turkey, head back to Aria, say goodbye to the Poker room one final time.

Until next time:



And get in the taxi "Airport, no tunnel please" Sad times to be leaving Vegas. Taxi with no tunnel costs $15 so we certainly got scammed on the way in. And that's it, the dream is over!

I will post P&L, hourly and sessions when in Dublin.



Until then thanks for reading!

awesome run for dan...that AJ hand is a pretty light call imo
awesome TR

Nice report, well written and entertaining!

GREAT TR!! Thanks for taking the time to do it!