Is it too early to post this? Yeah, I think it's too early to post this. I still have 12 days until my trip, but I'm sitting here trapped inside on a Saturday with a mild cold and a growing case of poker fever. We're entering summer TR season. Reading through the other entries is getting me excited for my own annual sojourn to the desert, so please forgive me for the premature etripulation.

Honestly, I didn't know if I'd do a TR this year. When I first came out for the WSOP in 2018, it was my first trip to Vegas in 5 years and my first time EVER being in town during the series. It was a very special occasion for me. Everything was fresh and exciting. After five years of doing these, I've begun to feel a bit like the jaded old-timer. I've played over 100 MTTs in Vegas since that 2018 trip. I've seen all the sights and played all the rooms. I've achieved a lot of my initial (modest) poker goals.

What's left to do? What's left to see?

One of the ironic things about poker is the paradoxical diminishing and increasing returns. Hear me out. On that first trip in 2018, I played a $110 nightly at the Nugget. Low stakes, low pressure, low prestige, but...this was possibly going to be my first ever recorded live MTT cash (I had cashed a couple small untracked events at the local tribal casino in college). When we went on break near the money bubble, I was so excited that my hands were shaking. Now I can be sitting at a final table playing for a decent chunk of money and feel almost nothing. That's what I mean by increasing and diminishing returns. My skills have gradually improved with experience, while the excitement that I derive from the game has dropped. For the most part, the tense spots no longer affect me very much.

You can see how so many players fall into the trap of always trying to play bigger, like a junkie chasing that first initial high.

Ultimately though, bigger is not always better. While I do yearn to level up and play bigger (more on that later), I still find poker intrinsically rewarding, even if the adrenaline spikes have waned. Like a lot of poker players, I enjoy the puzzle and strategic aspects of the game. I've found that you can have as much fun in a $200 event as you can in a $1k if you focus on the process and not the extrinsic rewards. Likewise, the process of writing these TRs is enjoyable for me, even if there's not necessarily a lot of fresh ground for me to break. I like writing them. I like going back and reading them.

With that mind, I guess Nitty by Nature 6 was never really in doubt. Hence the title of this year's entry:

"The kid stays in the picture!"

Before I look ahead and discuss this year's plans, I'll start by looking back.

BACKGROUND

Like a lot of people in my age bracket, I'm a Moneymaker baby. I played poker sparingly in high school before catching the fever in college. The early WPT seasons on Travel Channel and ESPN's constant reruns of the 2003 WSOP kicked my curiosity into overdrive. I began splashing around live and online, first in LHE and then later moving on to NL. I eventually became a prolific 180 man SNG grinder on PokerStars in the late 00s. I wasn't winning a lot of money, but I was winning, over a huge sample size.

Black Friday hit, other life priorities took precedence, and poker took a backseat. I effectively quit the game for most of a decade, though I would still sweat the WSOP every summer with intense pangs of FOMO. Finally, in 2018, the stars aligned for me to visit Vegas during the summer and fire my first official WSOP event (the $365 Giant). I didn't cash, but I was hooked. I've been back every year since.

In the next entry, I'll take a quick stroll down memory lane, covering some of the highlights from my first 5 years attending the WSOP.

Always down for a DogFace TR!

Looking forward to it

Greetings! looking forward to overlapping with you. hopefully we can meet at a final table

It's an explosion of trip reports. Everyone rejoice! Looking forward to reading a trip report from the perspective of a savvy veteran.

2018

You always remember your first time.

I've had better years at the WSOP where I achieved more and played in better events, but nothing will ever compare to that first trip 6 years ago. You arrive in the Rio and see the WSOP signage on the front doors, not sure where the action is, but knowing that you're tantalizingly close to the heartbeat of the entire poker world. After a few minutes of wandering aimlessly, a Rio employee guides you towards the correct hallway. You stroll down the over-air-conditioned corridors of the Guy Fieri highway, and suddenly you're in poker Mecca, surrounded by hundreds of tables and the riffling of countless chip crickets.



The spectacle was overwhelming. For me, it was love at first flight. I fired an evening flight of the $365 NLHE Giant. As previously stated, I did not cash, but it was a thrilling experience all the same. On this same trip I chopped a very small event at the Nugget and min-cashed a Rio daily deepstack. It wasn't a lucrative trip, but I didn't come up empty either. I could not wait to come back and try my luck again next summer.

2019

This year was all about hunting that mythical first cash in an official WSOP event. Though I managed to final table one of the small daily deepstack tournaments this summer, my numerous shots at the bracelet events yielded no success. The enduring sense memory is chilling behind the Rio on dinner breaks, admiring the skyline, wondering if the much-needed rungood was ever going to materialize (spoiler alert: it never did).



Still a fun summer despite the financial gore. I played my first $1k and had my Johnny Chan Rounders moment when I won a pot against Alex Foxen. I had my table sweated by Norm MacDonald (RIP) in a STT. I played a Colossus flight in the Rio bowling alley. I ran into Hellmuth in line for pizza at the Aria, made the questionable decision to bother him (he had headphones on and seemed avoidant), and wished him well in the WSOP. Couldn't help myself. Fanboy moment.



Even when you're getting your teeth kicked in at the tables, the WSOP can be a strange and magical place.

However, this year was ultimately about coming up short. Four shots at bracelet events. Zero cashes.

That left a bad taste in my mouth and made me eager to try again next year.

As it turns out, "next year" wouldn't quite be next year. The world had different plans.

2021

If I had known that "next year" was going to be 28 months away, I might have emptied my bank account in search of that mythical first WSOP score in 2019. Lo and behold, a certain global pandemic put a bad beat on society, sidelining our favorite poker series for over two years. The wait was brutal. The summer of 2020 came along. Reservations and plans were cancelled. The WSOP was online-only. You tried to survive on a diet of dodgy Jeff Platt Twitch streams, but sweating those digital final tables didn't quite satisfy the appetite like the real thing.

Another year ticks off the calendar. Summer of 2021 comes and goes. Still no WSOP, but there's a light the end of the tunnel. It's fall of 2021. COVID is waning. Nature is healing, and the degens are cautiously creeping back to the watering holes to dip their snouts in dirty pools of dopamine. Yes, it's finally here. The World Series of Poker is back, for one last hurrah at the Rio.

This will always be a memorable year for me, partially due to the bizarre circumstances, and partially because I finally broke my duck in the bracelet events.

After battling masked villains for hours, our hero cashed the $600 DeepStack Championship and bagged a medium stack.



While I ultimately fell (well) short of the final table, it was a great way to cap off the Rio era.

Alexa, play Boyz II Men - "It's so hard to say goodbye."

And with that, we said goodbye to the Rio forever. Goodbye to curious smells and crumbling amenities. Goodbye to the Gold Coast and late nights of post-score Ping Pang Pong. None of it was glamorous, but all of it is nostalgic. For all its shortcomings, the Rio was a great venue to hold a huge series. It was a poker oasis in the middle of the desert. After growing up on a diet of WSOP broadcasts from the storied confines of the Brasilia and Amazon, I'm grateful that I got to play the venue a few times before it was phased out. Who knows, maybe I accidentally breathed in a few of Jamie Gold's errant skin cells, forever merging us into a monstrous top-top wielding poker super god? There's magic in these walls.



2022

Are you an NFL fan? Who's your favorite punter?

This summer, it was me.

The WSOP had a new home on the strip (cool), and I got my ass totally kicked there (not cool).

If this entry seems short then that's only because, after hundreds of sessions with highly-paid therapists, I've managed to repress most of these memories.

2023

Year two in the new venue was slightly better than the first. I actually cashed something at the ParisShoe.

You know how rec players who have cashed the WSOP Main always manage to slip that fact into their table talk within the first half hour?

"Back in 2009 when I made my run in the Main Event..."

That's me, except with the Monster Stack. I can be talking about literally anything with anyone and I will swiftly redirect the conversation towards this topic.

"Who do you like for the NBA Finals this year? Is Minnesota for real?" "Well, that's a good question. It reminds me of back in 2023 when I cashed the Monster Stack at the World Series of Poker..." "What's your favorite movie?" "I like Goodfellas, but I also enjoy 2023, when I attended the World Series of Poker and cashed the Monster Stack." "What are your thoughts on the conflict in Palestine?" "If I can quote a wise man who once finished inside the money in the $1,500 Monster Stack tournament at the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas..."

So, anyway, I cashed the Monster Stack. I'm gonna cling to that because it's all I got.



Apart from that, the poker gods were making this face at me all summer.



Come to think of it, that's the face they usually make at me.

Sub. Love it.

Great start!

THE FUTURE aka THE PARADOX OF CHOICE

I guess all of that history leads to the question: What's next?

There are so many options for MTTs in Vegas during the summer that choosing your schedule can be dizzying.

My first few trips to the WSOP were motivated by the desire to cash an official bracelet event. Years of watching WSOP telecasts had successfully brainwashed me into believing that WSOP cashes were the height of MTT poker achievements. As mentioned, I was able to notch that precious first WSOP score in 2021. The next two summers were built around aiming a little higher and playing the Monster Stack, which I consider the closest thing to playing the WSOP Main besides actually playing the WSOP Main. After playing it two years in a row and cashing it last year, I think I'm satisfied on that front for the time being.

When I first started booking for 2024, I initially targeted weekend dates with the Millionaire Maker in mind. It's another great tournament that provides a prestigious large field experience and good structure at a reasonable price point. However, when the WSOP announced that most of their marquee weekend events would be adding another day of starting flights, it was enough to dissuade me from playing. These events are already gigantic top-heavy lotteries. Adding another flight only makes them more of a lottery and also somewhat favors the toughest regs who are working with big budgets and can fire max bullets at everything. Barring a surprise, I won't be playing the Monster Stack, Milly Maker, or Colossus this year. They are fantastic tournaments with great value and structure, but I have other targets in mind.

The white whale for me has always been the $10k WSOP Main. I talk about it every year, and yet I still haven't played it. I have every intention of doing so eventually. $10k is probably too much for me to spend on a poker tournament outright. One idea I had this year was simply to book a July trip and fire my entire poker budget into satellites for the Main. This would be a sensible course of action, but the megas to the WSOP Main have fast structures and are very luck-based. If I'm spending $500-1000 on a tournament, I generally want to feel like I'm getting a decent structure in return. The thought of firing several thousand dollars on glorified bingo tickets is just not quite kosher for me, so that's not the likely course of action.

Instead what I'm trying to do is just play some good value MTTs with solid structure relative to the price point. Unlike the all-or-nothing satellites, these should be a good experience in and of themselves, yet they also offer routes to a big payday if I happen to run hot. That seems like the best of both worlds to me. If I play well and run super hot, there's a remote possibility of winning enough $$ to play the WSOP Main. If not, at least I got to play some good events.

I really like playing Wynn and Venetian. For most of the year, these are the epicenter for MTTs in Vegas. I have a lot of experience in both rooms. Both venues will be running extensive summer series. The price points for many of their marquee events are a little too high for my usual range ($200-1k). However, I've identified Memorial Day weekend as a sweet spot where I can potentially play some great stuff at prices I'm comfortable with. Wynn will be running a multi-day $600 with 40 minute levels while Venetian will be running a $1.1k multi-day with 40 minute levels. The day twos don't overlap, meaning it would be possible to play both. The current plan is to fire a couple bullets the Wynn $600. If I cash anything at Wynn in my first three days in town, I will also play at least one flight of the Venetian $1.1k. All in all, I should have 3-4 bites at the cherry before I skip town on the 28th. There's also the possibility to extend the trip if I'm running hot, as I have no work obligations around this time.

But don't think I've totally forgotten about the WSOP. I have a second set of dates booked exactly one month later, 6/23-6/28. This will allow me to play the $600 DeepStack Championship and the $500 Salute. I honed in on these events because they are budget offerings that still provide great structure, yet without the multi-flight lotteriness of the Colossus, Milly Maker, Monster Stack, Mystery Bounty, etc. One day 1 only. Good price points and 40+ minute levels. You can't ask for much more from a budget MTT. It will be a way to get a little taste of that WSOP magic without breaking the bank or wasting time on silly events. And with any luck...

I actually have a third block of dates booked, 7/3-7/10. We'll call this the "wishful thinking" branch of the trip. If I happen to bink big on either of the first legs, I have dates carved out to play the WSOP Main. Is it likely to actually happen? No, but Doctor Strange has peered into 14,000,605 timelines and assured me that one of them features me punting off my stack in the $10k Main. "So you're saying there's a chance?"



Ultimately, this TR is really the umbrella for three separate trips, the last of which is a longshot to actually happen.

PART 1 (5/23 to 5/28) - Play Wynn and hopefully Venetian. Stroll through WSOP on the first day of the series (5/28).
PART 2 (6/23 to 6/28) - Play the $600 DSC and Salute at WSOP. Maybe fire some bullets at satellites for big stuff (there are some nice $2-3k MTTs in this window).
PART 3 (7/03 to 7/10) - WTF we are shipping the Main?

Reservations for the trips are at Harrah's, Flamingo, and Harrah's respectively. Budget-friendly. Close to the WSOP. Also close to Wynn and Venetian.

Flight for Part 1 leaves the evening of 5/23. Let's spin it up!

I’m definitely curious to know which tournaments you’ve identified that have a good structure.

I looked at the Wynn series, and the Venetian series, but to me the value vs price point isn’t there. As buyin goes up from a few hundred to over a thousand, I’d like to see a commensurate increase in guaranteed prize pool. I don’t see the point in playing a $600-1.1k tourney for a lower guarantee than a $400 at WSOP.

I agree the structures are better…. But this is why I’m playing the Monster Stack for the first time this year. Yeah, $1,500 is a lot to pony up, but it’s a legitimate shot at well over a million.

…Maybe I’m just the fish for chasing the top line number and the glorified bingo tickets! I feel like all tournament poker is that, to some extent.

The cool thing is that there's really no right or wrong preference. It's all just a matter of what you want.

I don't like turbos, but I want to say that in the heyday of PokerStars, pros were some of the biggest proponents of turbos. I guess the logic was just to maximize their value-for-time. Whatever EV they lost from a fast structure and more variance was probably made up for by increased volume. I also know from playing a fair amount in LV that good regs are some of the most likely people to show up and register right before reg closes. I like to play from level 1, minute 1, but I don't think it's objectively "right". It's just my preference to play the max amount of time if I'm going to pony up the $$$.

So when I talk about good structure, there's an element of personal bias there. What it generally means for me is an event with a big starting stack and long levels. I don't care about guarantees. I never even look at the guarantee unless it's a possible overlay situation. I figure if it's a big event, I'll be happy to win regardless of the number. I do care about levels and stacks though. Something like the $1k Mini Main (30 minute levels) is going to play faster than something like the Deep Stack Championship (40/60 minute levels). Given the choice, I'll play the DSC and get a deeper structure at a lower price point. Some people may prefer the bigger and faster event. It's not about being right or wrong so much as it's about knowing what you're signing up for, and picking the option that suits you.

Payouts for stuff like the Monster and Colossus can get absolutely nuts at the FT. In the Monster, you can win a million dollars off a $1.5k buy-in. For me personally though, that's not what makes the tournament special. What makes it special is getting a 50k starting stack and 60 minute levels for $1,500. You might not see that slow of a structure in that price range again all year. You can be very patient in such a slow structure. Off a 50k starting stack, my stack probably never went above 70k or below 40k on day one last year. I never had more than 2.5x starting stack in the entire tournament, and I still cashed the event. The luxury of a deep structure is that you can be more patient about navigating the spots. In a turbo, you are going to be in push-fold mode a lot faster.

There's no right or wrong preference, but I'm usually going to aim for the slower events (40-60 minute levels) and dodge the faster stuff (20-30 minute levels) when given the choice because I think I'm getting more value and time for my money.

What an excellent start to the TR. "Love at first flight" is cute.

Sent from my SM-N970U using Tapatalk

Great start, nice writing and stories! I'm in!!

Travel safely, run good.

Not me, or I just barely remember it. It was when everything was still in the Amazon room. Very cool, because you were never very far from a poker celebrity of some sort. David Williams in the reg line. I remember him because it was the year after Raymer won. Standing in my own reg line for the Single Table Tournaments, with Freddy Deeb right next to me playing in something. It was close quarters then.

My time in the only bracelet event I played was short. $1500 was the smallest one they had, and you got T1500 for it. Around level 6 I started getting short. I looked up at the clock, and 2/3 of the field had already been knocked out. I felt prideful that I outlasted so many, 90% of whom were much better players than me I'm sure. Dealer made a mistake counting my stack in the knockout hand, and the other players were of no help - half of them were friends of my opponent. All sitting together, no less. Ah well, I would've been very short, but I'd still have been alive, and it left a sour taste in my mouth.

I did get to witness some of the Phil Hellmuth wizardry, playing in the next row over. The Main was going, and obviously Phil had been knocked out. He had a big pile of chips. He'd play a hand, win it, and then go bother players in the Main. Remember, the whole thing took place in just the Amazon room. Ten minutes later he'd come back to play a hand, win it, and go back to the Main to bother people. It seemed he could win at will. Didn't hurt he was his table's chip leader.

Where is that?

Paying $1500 to get 1500 chips is wild. I think in the early years of the poker boom they were still doing the 1:1 ratio for the Main Event where you got 10k chips for $10k. Seems to me like it would've increased the importance of getting lucky in the early levels.

The giant smiley face is in Resorts World. If you walk in from the LV Blvd side and walk towards the main gambling area, you should see it.

I think when the Main was 10K in chips, the blinds were lower. When the increased, they also increased the blinds--so no more extra play, just bigger numbers for (then) ESPN to televise.

Yeah, this is very much the truth.

So great about the Summer series that there’s so much to choose from.

That sounds right. Maybe they had a 25/50 blind level back then and some smaller jumps up. A 75/150 blind level sounds vaguely familiar.

I know it was a gradual increase to the current starting stack of 60k, and not an overnight change. I think they ratcheted it up to 20k-30k somewhere around the mid-late 00s and just kept cranking it up until they hit the current level. I've heard that the Main was always a relatively slow tournament. Now it's a marathon unlike any other. Still a lottery, but the days of a truly weak player winning it seem to be over, as there are just too many pitfalls across 7-8 days for a leakbox to avoid.

I want to praise the slow structure, but I need to be careful about using that word. If someone took a shot for every time I've typed structure in this thread, they would already be dead. Maybe I'll informally challenge myself not to mention it again in this TR, as it's not the most thrilling subject matter. Suffice to say I think slow and deep events are a great way to maximize your table time-for-money if you are working on a modest budget. To each their own though.

I haven't been playing the WSOP long enough to speak all that much about how the player experience has evolved over time, but I've been around just long enough to pull the, "Back in my day, we didn't have a big blind ante. Everybody had to pay their own ante!" card. I believe 2018 was the last year with widespread use of antes in NLHE. The big blind ante was introduced to some events on a trial basis that year. I want to say it was the standard for almost everything by 2019. It speeds up the game, and you no longer have to worry about the Prahlad police busting you for not paying your share (see: 2006 WSOP Main).

Another big change I've experienced is the proliferation of budget events. Like pig4bill said, at one point $1.5k would've been the cheapest event on the schedule. I don't recall the exact year when they first ran the Colossus, but it opened the floodgates for sub <$1k tournaments at the WSOP, of which there are now many. On the one hand, you can argue that modest buy-ins diminish the prestige of the WSOP. On the other hand, they provide a gateway drug for tentative participants such as myself. Playing the $365 Giant in 2018 put me on the path to playing bigger stuff in subsequent years. Without that ramp, I might not have taken the leap. WSOP has traded a bit of prestige for a much larger player pool, which seems prudent from a pure business standpoint.

Wow, didn't know it was up to 60K. I just remembered Lon acting al excited when it went up to 3o.

I think the series has always had the $500 Employee, and a few $1K specialties like Seniors. I played a couple $1k opens before I was old enough for Seniors.

I think I'm a fan of the lowered buy-ins as well, for the reasons you state. Some (lots?) of players don't aspire to be anything more than decent recs (myself included), and to have spots for those people is nice.

Everyone thought it was weird to get more chips than you paid for when they started raising it. I think the first level was 25/25. As I mentioned, after 6 hours only a third of the field was left.

I've only been in Resorts once or twice. I seem to have a foggy memory of that thing now that you mentioned it.

We're less than a week out. I'd be lying if I said I'm not counting down the days, minutes, and hours.

Sometimes I get caught up in the anticipation for my next Vegas trip while other times it seems to sneak up on me.

No sneaking this summer. I will be ready to get out there.

THE PRE-SWEAT SWEAT

Before I even play any cards on this trip, I already have a small sweat. I like to throw down the occasional small sports bet. Key word here is small.

Back in August I put down a few $10 wagers on a handful of interesting teams to win this year's NBA title. I have tickets for...

Denver Nuggets +400
Milwaukee Bucks + 750
Golden State Warriors +900 ?? (gifted this to a family member, although it's irrelevant now anyway)
Miami Heat +900
Minnesota Timberwolves +7500

Needless to say I was starting to get excited when Minnesota went up 2-0 on Denver. There are still two rounds of playoffs to go, but $760 off a $10 ticket would be a fantastic bink. My excitement dropped when the Wolves proceeded to lose three straight, but they managed to claw back to even with a blowout win last night. Game 7 is on Sunday. I'll still have a horse in this race regardless of who wins (Denver or Minnesota), but of course I'll be favoring the T'Wolves. If they somehow run the gauntlet, I might have to name my first-born Anthony Edwards. It's a small sweat, but something I'll be keeping an eye on in the next few days and/or weeks.

NUMBERS GAME

I already wrote a little bit about the increasing and diminishing returns of playing poker. My first time cashing a live MTT in Vegas was thrilling, as were my first time playing a WSOP event and the first time bagging/cashing a tournament at the World Series. Those are still great memories for me, but the more often you make deep runs in things, the less special it all feels. The pure visceral rush just doesn't quite match those first few epic dopamine spikes.

Where you see gains (hopefully) is in your process. You feel calmer at the table. The tricky spots become increasingly routine. The pattern recognition and heuristics that you've developed over many long hours at the table start activating in various moments like your own personal GTOWizard, helping you avoid potholes and find good lines.

At least, that's the idea anyway. You want to think you're always getting better with experience, but it can be hard to say how much of that is legitimate and how much is self-delusion. Personally, I feel like I've "leveled up" over the past 1.5 years. Countless hours of mistakes, reflection, and learning have improved my process. My results seem to support the idea that I'm slowly getting better. I track every live event that I play. My overall stats are...

2018-2024: 119 entries, 23 cashes (19.3% ITM)

2023-2024: 49 entries, 11 cashes (22.4% ITM)

These are tiny sample sizes, so this effect may be pure variance, but it at least provides some objective support for what I've been feeling.

I feel like I've become a tough out in my usual stakes. I'm making more frequent runs.

However, there's one room in town where I've consistently been a clown show.


THE FACTORY OF SADNESS

Many people consider the Wynn to be the nicest casino in town. When you stroll through those elegant hallways amid a sea of glamorous guests, it's hard not to understand that sentiment. The Wynn is a nice place to gamble and a great place to play poker, but it hasn't been a great place to play poker for me. After chopping the very first daily I ever played there, I've put together an impressive 1-for-17 run. Overall, I'm 2-for-18 at the Wynn (11.11% ITM). This is a very small sample size and my hit rate is not THAT bad considering that this venue typically only pays 11%, but it FEELS really bad when my overall ITM% has been almost twice that.

I've been getting my ass kicked at the Wynn.

Part of this may simply be down to the fact that the Wynn is the toughest room in town. I'll stand by that statement. When it comes to MTTs, the Wynn has the toughest fields on average relative to the buy-in level. You may get the occasional whale or pure tourist blasting off, but it's often a sea of regs and you are liable to face some killers if you want to go deep in anything. Part of why I've struggled there in certain events is just flat out getting rekt in spots by superior players. I'm not delusional. Actually, I appreciate those harsh lessons, even if they sting in the moment. That's how you get better. Iron sharpens iron, and all that.

But another chunk of it is just pure, unbridled runbad. Nobody likes bad beat stories, so I'll give you several. My all-in pre-flop Wynn bustout hands from the last few years include AA < A3s, AA < AKo, KT < K7s, JJ < 99, and your usual assortment of lost flips and 65/35s. Many of these defeats came deep in events, close to the bubble. Now, I know what you are probably thinking: 'Dog, please stop whining. I'm sure you are forgetting all the times you have gotten it in bad and won.' There have been a few of those, but nowhere near enough to compensate for all the brutality I've endured on the other end.

The Wynn is a beautiful venue, but I've come to associate those glamorous hallways with pain and misery. Call it PTSD: post-traumatic suckout disorder.

While I once again want to acknowledge that the sample sizes are minuscule, it still amounts to many fruitless real-life hours punctuated by pain.

There have been many nights when I've staggered out of the Wynn in a dazed stupor, questioning the very meaning of life.

A logical (or at least emotional) reaction might be to avoid this venue. If the Wynn always kicks my ass, why bother to play there?

Because ultimately, luck is not real. If you feel like your results don't match your efforts, the solution is to keep firing. Volume is the cure for variance.

Therefore we do not run away from the Wynn. No, my friends. We run TO it. Far from avoiding the factory of sadness, I will once again throw my meager body into the breach like a brave (or possibly just stupid) warrior. I will repeatedly bash my head against the bubble until something breaks: the payouts or my sanity.

My tentative schedule for the first block of my trip looks like this:

5/24 - Wynn $600 NLHE Day 1B
5/25 - Wynn $600 NLHE Day 1C
5/26 - Wynn $500 NLHE 1-Day
5/27 - Wynn $600 NLHE 1-Day

If I bink anything there, I may venture over to the Venetian to try their $1100 multi-day, but at the moment I am planning a steady diet of Wynning.

One week from today I will either be sitting at a blue table with a healthy stack of chips in front of me, or stomping in circles, wearing holes in the carpet outside the Awakenings theater, cursing under my breath, promising myself 'never again'...




Shortly before I return the next day to do it all over again.


We will Wynn the money or die trying.

Subbed! Good luck Wynning some money this trip mate!

You are the William Wallace (Braveheart) of poker charging fearlessly and ferociously onto the field of battle toward an opposing force of massive firepower. Rage on!

I liked your story about the Wynn.
hope I meet you at the final table on Memorial Day