I have been waiting for sequel. Let's go! I hope you run pure and manage to find some of that same enthusiasm you had back in 2018.

Let’s goooooooo!!

I have to be against your Wolves bet.

OTOH, I'm pro-Nuggets.

Either way, good luck.

Planning to play a few of those, so you'll have at least one idiot diluting the talent.

Dog,

outstanding recap of previous TRs - sizzled up from the typical posted links recap. I'm looking forward to riding along with you as I have most years. I'm also purposely diving in to try to get myself back into the poker mindset myself - about 4 weeks out from my trip and I haven't played a hand of poker since LAST SUMMER. Good luck out there - sending all the run good.

PardoG

Thanks for all the comments so far. I hope it will be a fun ride for everyone.

To some degree, poker is like riding a bike. If you have the foundation and experience, some of the process is automatic. You can get back into the rhythm relatively quickly. One month should be enough time to get back into a decent mental space. On that note, I'll mention a psychology study that always stuck with me:

Psychologists did a study of free throw shooting (basketball) with three different control groups. First, they measured baseline performance by having all of the subjects shoot free throws and recording the results. Then they established a training regimen for each group. One group practiced free throws every day. The second group took no actual physical shots, but regularly imagined themselves shooting. The third group did absolutely nothing. Eventually the psychologists measured performance for each of the three groups again. As you might expect, the group who did not practice free throws did not improve at all while the group that regularly practiced free throws got significantly better. What might be surprising is the third result: The group who took no actual physical shots also showed some improvement. They didn't improve as much as the group who took actual physical free throws, but they did get better. This suggests that just thinking through a process can improve your performance.

There's been some debate in the poker community about theory vs. "feel". That dichotomy is at the heart of Negreanu's prop bet involving Jeremy Becker and Landon Tice. Daniel argues that just playing a lot of poker and developing your instincts that way (Becker) is more effective than being book studied (Tice). I think that it's a false dichotomy to some extent because a lot of what we call "feel" is just naturally arriving at many of the same conclusions you'd get from looking at solver outputs. Phil Ivey is a famous example of a player who claims not to study much. He claims not to know what ICM is, yet he implements sound strategic practices in a lot of spots because he intuitively arrives at good conclusions through experience and reflection. In other words, his "feel" is just him internalizing theoretical concepts through trial-and-error (and analysis). The difference between feel players and theory players may not be very pronounced in reality, since both groups are likely to land on many of the same conclusions about what constitutes good play.

I don't know if playing poker is better preparation than just thinking about poker, but as in the basketball study, both are probably better than doing nothing. I've tried to do a bit of both ahead of my upcoming trip. I haven't been to Vegas since March, but I played a little $125 multi-table satellite at my local room last weekend, which was primarily an opportunity to get cards and chips in my hands again. I did not cash (open shoved TT < KK pre-flop on a 10.5BB stack maybe 65% through the field), but it felt good to go through the paces again. I've also been watching PokerGO's 2023 coverage of the WSOP Main. I started on day 3 and am about halfway through day 5 now. I don't do any formal solver work, but I try to think through the hands as they come up. 'What would I do here?' 'Was that the best play? Why or why not?' It's probably not optimal study, but it at least puts my mind in a poker space. I'm taking mental free throws, if not physical shots.

GOALS

I've covered most of the relevant background info prior to the actual trip(s), and won't have much of substance to post for a few days.

As stated, I'll fly out on the 23rd. I'll get in relatively late, and probably won't play any poker until the Wynn tournament on the 24th.

One thing I haven't talked about is goals. My first year or two going on these summer trips, I set some specific goals (i.e. play a WSOP event, cash a WSOP event). That helped give me a sense of purpose, but the sample size on these trips is so small that it's not necessarily helpful to become emotionally invested in the outcomes. Across the two guaranteed trips, I'll be playing maybe 15 events total. That should translate into a lot of hours at the tables, but it's still only the equivalent of maybe one day's volume on PokerStars in my online years. It's not a meaningful sample. I'll be at the mercy of variance, so I don't want to get caught up in concrete goals like "cash X tournaments" or "make X money".

Cheesy as it sounds, my goal is just to be process-oriented and try to make consistently good decisions. I've said similar things in previous years, yet have had a tendency to become too caught up in the outcomes. Of course I want to run deep and bink some scores, but I'll be playing stakes and games that I'm comfortable with. If I brick everything, so be it. I can live with that. Sometimes it's just your turn to get killed. I only want to give myself a fighting chance and avoid major mistakes. With any luck, that will translate into some good results and fun milestones.

SUB-PLOTS

Last year I noted that I'd never made quads in a live tournament, even though I'd played enough hands to where I should've seen it a few times. Gambler's fallacy paid off almost immediately. I made quads twice at the WSOP (including the beautiful AAAA). I took that a step further and recently made a diamond royal flush (at the Wynn, of all places!). When it comes to making monster hands, I have no grounds to complain for a while.

However, I have another weird statistical anomaly to report. This one is even more unbelievable. In all my years of playing live tournaments, I have never won an all-in in a pair vs. overpair situation. That's not to say I've never gotten lucky. I've won bigger longshots like AKo > AA > QQ. I've had the usual array of minor suckouts come through like AT > AQ or sets making boats against flushes and straights. However, to the best of my recollection, I have NEVER won one of those 18% pre-flop spots, which is fairly crazy considering how much poker I've played (and how many times the reverse has happened to me).

So while I won't be trying to get it in bad this summer, if I do get it in bad, I'm "due" for some suckout rungood. If gambler's fallacy is to be believed, my next 18% spot will really be an 82% spot. I guess I should be five-bet jamming 22 at the first opportunity. That's good process, right?

My weird statistical anomaly: AA has held 17 straight times (over the course of a little more than a year, I think(.

good luck OP. Subbed to decrease/increase my FOMO for not being there this year

Sent from my SM-N970U using Tapatalk

Slay the Wynn for all of us, sir. Our fates are now irrevocably intertwined with yours. Lord help us.

FLIGHT NIGHT

It's T-minus a few hours until my flight is set to take off.

The plan is to land, unpack, and maybe get in a brief cash session before I go to sleep. I'm currently in the habit of waking up between 7-8 AM, so staying up late tonight to start getting myself acclimated to "Vegas time" doesn't seem like the worst idea. I'll play it by feel though. The most important thing is to be well-rested for the days ahead.

The Wynn event starts at noon tomorrow. Hopefully it will go well and I'll be there all day. If I bust very early, I may fire a second bullet. If I bust in the mid-day, I'll head over to Venetian and try their $300 milestone satellite @ 6:10 PM, which would be an opportunity to win $2500 for the trip bankroll. That would allow me to comfortably fire some bullets at their $1100 MSPT event.

I might post some live updates throughout the next few days if anything interesting happens, but I'm likely to lean towards more of a daily recap type of format for this TR, as that seems to make for better reading than a steady stream of low-effort chip updates every couple hours.

At any rate, the anticipation is (almost) over.

good for you! safe travels

Good luck at the Wynn!

…You’re WAY due.

Hope you did better than I did. Was at 3x starting stack before beginning the inevitable crash down to earth. Played decent, won 1/3 of flips, made one tragic mistake and at least one other notable but (at least to my terrible level of play standard) forgivable mistake. I had fun and it was nice to have chips in hand again as I haven't since covid (after several aborted trips). I'm no blogger though (and this isn't my blog), so I'm looking forward to hearing how your day went.

I know this feeling all too well

It's trip report season. I hope you start us off with a bang!

the later the day goes, the more i feel like we will!

I laughed.

DAY ONE - 5/23

The flight to Vegas is mostly uneventful, which is probably the best type of flight. No news is good news.

It's after 11PM by the time I've dumped my bags in the hotel room, which features the usual Harrah's ambiance with the added bonus of a chirping smoke alarm. Did they upgrade me to the dying frog suite? Every minute or two I'm hearing a loud electric shriek in my ear. I let the maid in the hallway know (surprised someone is still working this late) and she advises me to call the front desk. I do that and they promise to send someone to fix it. I wait a few minutes before I realize that this probably isn't going to be an instant process. I throw my laptop in the safe, leave the rest of my stuff in the room except the obligatory poker player backpack, and head over to the Horseshoe for some 1/3.

Bravo showed a very short list at the Shoe. Just 3 names. By the time I actually arrive at the poker room, that list has shrunk to zero. I'm seated instantly. Right from the start, I'm running hotter than the sun. I manage to be dealt 2-7 twice within the first five hands. A bad omen for the trip? No. I remind myself that this is a marathon, not a sprint. Folding for an orbit or two gives me a chance to get a feel for the table. It seems on the drunk-casual side tonight, with lots of chatter and loose calling. I want to pay homage to BigWhale and give you some detailed HHs, but I didn't really play any interesting spots in my brief time at the table. Eventually I won medium pots with QJ (turned two pair) and AK (tptk) before tapping out $90 richer at 1:30 AM. Not an amazing night, but we'll happily take it.

When I return to the room, the dying frog is dead. No more shrieking from the smoke alarm. I crash out around 2:30 AM, hoping to get a lot of sleep.

As feared and maybe expected, my biological clock activates at 8:00 AM. No sleep for you. I'm still on my regular 9-5 rhythm, Vegas be damned. I guess I'll have to catch up on ZZzzs at a later time. Waking up early does come with some perks though. I can take my time heading over to the Wynn and grab a breakfast of some sort somewhere along the way. I'm thinking of finally trying Urth Cafe, which I've alternatively heard is amazing and overrated.

Before I get ready to leave, I check the chip counts from Day 1A. Mid stakes monster James Romero, a tablemate from a 2019 WSOP event, sits atop the counts by a wide margin. That's not really important to me though. I'm more curious about the turnout. 267 runners. Day 1B and 1C are both likely to be larger, meaning we're probably looking at 1,000+ players in this field with ~$100k going to first place. It may not be the WSOP quite yet, but those aren't Geoffrey Dollars either. Someone is going to win a nice brick of cash. Why not me? Well, because I'm a mediocre shitreg, but in the parlance of Norman Chad, I'm a mediocre shitreg with a dream.

Thoroughly enjoyed every word of that.

It pays in cash money American?

Hey, I got flight miles. Don't need a room to play a satty for 4 or 5 hours, right?

DAY TWO - 5/24

Listen, here's the thing. Poker is an easy game. You just get the money in bad and win.



My first attempt at the Wynn $600 was a dramatic affair. After a few slow levels, I managed to pick off a pot-sized river bet with A7o on a double-paired TT8x8 board. That brought me up to about 40k from 30k starting. At some point the seat to my immediate right was vacated and then populated by a Tough Player (TP) with high six figures in Hendon winnings. He mostly folded for the first orbit or two until the following spot came up.

Folds to TP in the BTN. He opens to 2k (800 blind level). I look down at AsJs in the SB and decide this is too strong to just call. I make it 5k. TP jams for his 24k stack. Now I'm facing a tough decision. Do we call off 25 more BB here with AJs in a blind vs. button situation against a wizard? By my rough calculation, we need about 40% to justify the call. AJs is flipping with stuff like 88-TT. We're ahead of wheel hands and non-ace paint combos like KQ, KJ. We're in rough shape against AQ+ and big pairs.

It felt like a close spot for me, especially with the suited variety of AJ, which adds a few percentage points. However, it may just be a pure fold for the sake of preserving our stack. I may have also leveled myself by giving TP too much credit for making next level plays, knowing his history of strong results. I ended up calling it off and was greeted by the ugly sight of AdKd. I flopped a jack...but he also flopped a king. No drama on the turn or river and I ship about 2/3 of my stack his way. Cooler or misplay? Maybe a bit of both? I lean towards it probably just being a sigh/fold after his 4-bet rip, but as mistakes go, it's at least somewhat understandable.

I was left with about 12k after that slip-up when another weird spot came up.

I open KQo UTG to 1.8k. UTG+2 flats. UTG+3, an aggro short stack who has just lost a huge pot, jams for about 10k total. It folds back around to me and I have another tricky decision. I feel like we're in pretty decent shape against UTG+3 since the steam factor and short stack frustration factor weigh heavily. I'm a little worried about UTG+2's flat, but him just flatting likely removes most AK, TT+, and maybe AQ from his range. If we're up against medium pairs, random paint hands, and weak Ax most of the time here then jamming our KQo seems good, so I rip for 12k. However, as it turns out, UTG+2 had near the top of his flatting range (AJo) and called. It was KQ vs. AJ vs. KJs.

I often complain about getting it in good and losing, so I have to acknowledge when I get it in bad and get lucky. A beautiful Q arrived immediately on the flop. Nobody improved on the turn or river. Suddenly, after being down in the danger zone, I have a new lease on life. I'm back over the starting stack.

I make a few more hands and leave for dinner break with a healthy stack of 70k, over 2x starting.

I come back from the break and win a quick one by 4-betting AKo vs. a BTN 3-bet. He folds. That brings me up to 80k with the BB at 1.5k.

A New Player (NP) arrives with a healthy stack two seats behind me. UTG folds. NP makes it 3.5k in the UTG+1 seat. Action folds around to SB, who calls. I look down at a beautiful AA in the BB. It's the first time I've seen AA all trip and there's action in front of me. I'm doing cartwheels on the inside, but on the outside I remain calm. I don't think slow playing is ever good here against an EP open and another caller. We have to raise. I land on 14k for the 3-bet size. After my raise, action is back on NP. Now I start praying. Please have a hand, please have a hand, please have a hand. My prayers are answered when he slides out a chunky 4-bet to approximately 40k. SB folds and it's back on me. There's really only one move here. ALL-IN. NP calls quickly.

My AA is up against his JJ. Great spot for us.

However, the flop is a scary one. KQT. We're not behind, but we don't love it either. Any 9 or ace makes a straight for our opponent.

The poker gods send express delivery pain with an instant 9 on the turn.

Now I'm drawing to two outs, cruelly needing the very same jacks that my opponent holds in his hand.

River is a brick and I'm out of the tournament. I would've been sitting on approximately 5.5x starting stacks, worth maybe $2.5-3k in real-life EV.

Instead I'm left with another joyless march out of the Wynn, wondering how it's possible to run so bad in the big all-ins.

What I'm feeling is not nausea or pain, but a sensation of bewilderment. Is this real life or am I the subject of a cosmic practical joke?

It's frustrating, but you have to step back and look at the bigger picture. I got it in bad a couple times earlier in this event. I easily could've lost the KQ vs. AJ vs. KJ spot. The AA < JJ bad beat never would have been possible if I hadn't sucked out earlier. In that sense, I was lucky to even still be in the tournament.

There are lots of ways to bust tournaments and none of them are fun. This was a gross one, but it's just one result. I can't let it linger. We have three full days of poker left on the trip and several bullets to fire at other stuff. If I try to be process-oriented instead of focusing on the disgusting conclusion to today's session, I think I played well overall. Apart from the AJs spot, which doesn't seem horrendous, I struggle to think of other glaring mistakes. Mostly I was calm, confident, and making good decisions. All you can do is control what you can control, so that's the plan. We return tomorrow to the torture chamber for another lesson in misery.

How did you know who TP was? Did he tell you his name?

Your name is on the slip of paper that you hand to the dealer. I suppose there might be a slight ethical question of whether or not it's cool for neighbors to peek at that, but anyway there's your answer. I saw the name and recognized it.