In preparation for Las Vegas, I finally won a lol-small live tourney yesterday (last live tourney win was two summers ago in Las Vegas):

https://events.playgroundpoker.ca/pp...-wins-event-1/

I credit the win to some study / improvements I've made recently (including no drinking) and given that it's two weeks to the day until I fly to Las Vegas for at least one months' grind, it's time to set some challenges (because some have to be done before I leave):

Pre-Vegas:

1) Purchase and complete RYE Tournament Masterclass (2 weeks for 20+ hours of study)
2) Continue to drink no alcohol and add no sugar/honey to my tea for the month of May
3) Get in the best shape of my life before I leave down to ~83kg / ~10% body fat (currently 85.5kg / 12-13% body fat, but already improved a lot in the past 2 weeks)
4) Workout with weights eight more times (4 muscle groups x 2 weeks: chest/triceps; back/biceps; shoulders/abs; lower body)
5) Add four uphill treadmill one-hour walks to my workouts (or replace with outdoor uphill walk to St Joseph's Observatory)
6) Playground Power Weekend Events to the best of my ability: Event #2 $220 $100k GTD; Event #7 $220 50/50 Bounty $15k GTD; Event #9 $220 6-Max 50/50 Bounty $15k GTD
7) 40 hours of Playground 2/5 NL cash games with full discipline / zero tilt
8) Get 40 hours of consultancy client study done (total 160 - 240 hours to be done from now until end-July)
9) Pay all my bills and get all paperwork done and off my mind
10) Finalize Vegas Tourney schedule

Las Vegas - June 1st to June 30th

1) Arriving June 1st, primary focus will be to play one MTT per day from June 2nd to June 29th (28 MTTs for around ~$21k buy-ins / ~$760 abi): current draft schedule has me playing 14 Wynn, 7 PH, 6 Rio, 1 GN; goal is to cash for $30k+, but we know tourney variance is a ***** and this can easily go much higher or much lower and is largely out of my control; what I can control is to play focused, disciplined and fully exploit my opponents, who are largely going to be weaker MTT players than me.
2) Given tourney entries will last around an average of 5-6 hours per day, we will play 2/5 NL cash at Encore for around 4 hours per day. We will try to avoid tourney re-entries, certainly if buy-in stacks are <30bb, but that decision will be taken on a case-by-case basis. Encore cash games we should be able to print given how soft they are in the summer, but we will be careful to table select and not play too tired (12-hours before next day's MTT cut-off unless table is super juicy). Goal is to make $5k+ from cash games, which is readily achievable as long as we don't punt, play drunk or tilt.
3) Spend two hours each weekday morning on consulting work (minimum 40 hours total in June = $6k income outside of poker)
4) Eat clean and healthy at least six days per week (i.e. one cheat day allowed): cooked large healthy brunch at the condo; one healthy meal at the tables/MTT dinner break; one protein bar/shake
5) While we will not go zero alcohol in Vegas, we will limit this while playing to maximum 3 glasses of wine per day / max 14 glasses per week (i.e. we might have some dry days). I find that 1-3 glasses over a few hours relaxes me while playing, whereas more than that impacts my focus/discipline
6) We won't have access to a gym or weights at our condo, but we need to squeeze in 4 x 1 hour body-weight work-outs (plus might take some relatively light dumb-bells) each week
7) Spend 30 mins by the condo pool each morning sun-tanning and thinking about the day ahead
8) Keep our spending to a minimum, especially for food, but also zero table massages ($2/min is ridiculously expensive), zero bars/clubs and zero casino games (we usually have an expensive Black-Jack habit, and although we are several $k up this year, we know this cannot last and we'll give this money back to the casinos if we play; just don't!)

Looking at the above my days are going to have to be super-disciplined to get all this in. Typical day when playing a Noon Tourney has to be:

8-8.30: Wake-up and get some breakfast
8.30-10.30: Consultancy Work
10.30-11.30: Work out for an hour
11.30-12.30: Post workout shake/snack and sitting in the sun for half an hour
12.30-1: Shower / Drive to Casino
~1pm: Late reg for MTT (I think one-hour late reg for the MTTs I'm playing is fine and better optimizes my time)
~6-7pm Average bust-out time (and/or dinner break)
7-11pm Encore 2/5 Cash Games
~11.30-12.00 Back to Condo / Sleep for 8 hours

Keeping to the above is a major challenge. We will struggle on days where the tourneys start earlier and it is advantageous to be there early (e.g. Colossus, WSOP/Wynn/PH Seniors, Rio Bounty) but if we schedule these on non-workout days I think we'll be fine.

July?

Our challenge, starting with ~$20k BR, is to reach the end of June with at least $30k from MTT + Cash Games wins. If we do so, we're going to take a shot at the Main Event. From BRM perspective it makes no sense, but we're not doing this for a living (we make enough from consultancy for that) and it is the softest $10k of the year by far.

So let's do it!

Good luck OP! Will be following your progress! I will be in Vegas with a buddy of mine from 6/29-7/3 and we will be playing mostly tourneys (a couple of WSOP events and PH/Wynn and/or Venetian). I agree with you that the Encore poker room will be great and perhaps we will see each other at the cash games at the Wynn/Encore. I usually play 2-5 there.

Accountability: Week 1 of Pre-Vegas Preparations:

Pre-Vegas Challenge:

1) Purchase and complete RYE Tournament Masterclass (2 weeks for 20+ hours of study):

In progress: purchased last Monday and have completed all but one of the Preflop Videos, started to improve my preflop ranges and studied lots of spots in Live MTTs/Cash Games related to the videos to date.

No doubt I'm learning a lot of great stuff from this course, but it will be tough to get it finished Pre-Vegas, so it looks like I'll have to complete the course while there and continue to put in serious study effort.

2) Continue to drink no alcohol and add no sugar/honey to my tea for the month of May.

100% success this week!

3) Get in the best shape of my life before I leave down to ~83kg / ~10% body fat (currently 85.5kg / 12-13% body fat, but already improved a lot in the past 2 weeks)

Weighed in at 84.6kg this morning, maintaining around 1000 calorie per day deficit. I realize this is a little on the extreme side, and could lead to muscle loss, but I'm taking BCAAs / getting around 50% daily intake from protein (and most of the rest as good fats) for muscle maintenance.

4) Workout with weights eight more times (4 muscle groups x 2 weeks: chest/triceps; back/biceps; shoulders/abs; lower body).

Four muscle groups done to perfection this week!

5) Add four uphill treadmill one-hour walks to my workouts (or replace with outdoor uphill walk to St Joseph's Observatory)

2 hours 15 mins on the uphill treadmill this week!

6) Playground Power Weekend Events to the best of my ability: Event #2 $220 $100k GTD; Event #7 $220 50/50 Bounty $15k GTD; Event #9 $220 6-Max 50/50 Bounty $15k GTD

Played them all, without success, and generally played well, apart from one punt in Event #9 that could have been avoided (bad 3B selection with 89o from SB versus somewhat loose but sticky rec and went broke shipping PSB on 8626 turn when I could have probably checked down / check folded given that villain absolute nit-rolled me with JJ and was clearly terrified I had a better overpair).

7) 40 hours of Playground 2/5 NL cash games with full discipline / zero tilt

Played 32 hours of cash this week, primarily 2/5 and 5/5 with moderate success having definitely ran cold / bad in a few spots (+$450). Also played 2 low buy-in nightly tourneys, without success, to practice pre-flop ranges.

I was fully disciplined and experienced only minor tilt on a few occasions:

After the JJ nit-roll when I punted with 89o on 8626 turn. This was because I was mad at my own mistake.

Huge whale managed to 3B pre / GII on KT7sxx flop for around 80bb at 2/5 NL with T9ss versus my KQo and hit another Ten OTR

Observing a drunk whale punt off around $3k to regs at my table while I ran super cold, he then managed to play a hand like this versus me:

Whale in BB, we open KJo to our standard $20 UTG (because we want to isolate the whale in position as often as possible), he makes it $75, we call.
Flop ($150) Q97r XX
Turn ($150) To whale checks again and we decide he's not strong so we don't want to blow him off the pot with too big of a bet, so we make it a modest $100 and he calls.
River ($350) Ao whale checks again and once again we don't want to get too greedy so we bet $275, which he snap calls with TT.

WTF just happened there!!? This whale is supposed to stack off to me 100% in this spot (we had around $800 behind). Previously he had been leading flops/turns/rivers for 150-200% pot with single pair hands and now he goes into XC mode when he turned a freaking set! Just unbelievable and certainly put me on tilt, then 5-10 minutes later this happened:

Same whale is ready to quit / punt off his last $400, having open shipped 80bb the last two hands, now decides to limp UTG, UTG+1 calls, and we raise UTG+2 to $35 with KK. Villain jams, we snap, and he freakin' has the other KK. FML. He stacks off the very next hand to someone else and we're left shaking our head at our bad luck, having won very little of his $3k-$4k punt off.

I applied a lot of deep stack tips from the RYE course that are working out well and certainly have increased my 3Bs, tightened my EP/MP opens, focused my defending ranges, etc.

We still have to improve our tilt control when running cold / bad, although I don't think it cost me any $, we just don't need to negativity, since the luck will turn and I'll crush this game when it does.

8) Get 40 hours of consultancy client study done (total 160 - 240 hours to be done from now until end-July)

Only 10 hours done - took second fiddle to Fitness / RYE / Live Poker, but client is really laid back and I don't think it's going to be an issue.

Nevertheless, we're going to try to get at least 20 more hours done before Vegas.

9) Pay all my bills and get all paperwork done and off my mind

Did the major stuff and just a few loose ends to tie-up over the next few days.

10) Finalize Vegas Tourney schedule

Work in progress.

Flying to Las Vegas this morning - looking forward to crushing!

Accountability: Week 2 of Pre-Vegas Preparations:

Pre-Vegas Challenge:

1) Purchase and complete RYE Tournament Masterclass (2 weeks for 20+ hours of study):

Probably got about 12-15 hours of study done: I completed all of the Preflop Videos, 2 of the Post Flop Videos, improved my preflop ranges and studied lots of spots in Live MTTs/Cash Games related to the videos to date.

The course is a lot of work, very useful, and I'll have to complete the course in Las Vegas and continue to put in serious study effort.

2) Continue to drink no alcohol and add no sugar/honey to my tea for the month of May.

100% success! (Looking forward to a drink tonight in Las Vegas!)

3) Get in the best shape of my life before I leave down to ~83kg / ~10% body fat:

Weighed in at 83.8kg this morning, having maintained around 800-1000 calorie per day deficit per day for the past two weeks.

Looking at my muscle definition / vascularity versus internet photos, I think I under-estimated my body fat % and over-estimated my lean body mass, because I'm clearly still > 10% body fat (probably 12-13%), so I've adjusted my stats and aiming to get down to 82kg to achieve ~10% body fat. I'm basically half-way there on my cut and need to keep it up in Las Vegas (but I'm going to adjust my intake to a more reasonable daily deficit of around 300-500 calories per day).

4) Workout with weights eight more times (4 muscle groups x 2 weeks: chest/triceps; back/biceps; shoulders/abs; lower body).

100% success!

5) Add four uphill treadmill one-hour walks to my workouts (or replace with outdoor uphill walk to St Joseph's Observatory)

100% success!

6) Playground Power Weekend Events to the best of my ability: Event #2 $220 $100k GTD; Event #7 $220 50/50 Bounty $15k GTD; Event #9 $220 6-Max 50/50 Bounty $15k GTD

Played one more live tourney to tune my game: $115 + $15 8-max. Played really well with excellent decision making to make it to the Final Table, but unfortunately I was extremely card dead from around 25 players, going from an above average stack, to one of the FT short-stacks.

My bust-out hand is the only one I'm not sure about, although I don't think it was terrible (but maybe ICM-wise avoidable): 12kbb, LAG 2nd in chips makes it 27k, folds to my BB with 84k behind and I look at Q9o. It's not strong enough to ship because I've very little fold equity, but can I afford to peel and leave myself PSB on the flop? I decide that I can and we see Flop AQ6csd. I've hit second pair, which I feel may be good at this point, but decide to check because I expect villain to c-bet all of his air, which he'll then be forced to call way behind. When he checks behind it's somewhat suspicious, but I don't think we can only put him on an Ace with this play. Turn is Js, making a lot of potential draws for his opening range, so we decide to ship it in and get nit-rolled by A4o. Questionable?

7) 40 hours of Playground 2/5 NL cash games with full discipline / zero tilt

Played 55 hours of cash in the past two weeks, primarily 2/5 and 5/5 with good results (+$2950). Had a hot run at a good 2/5 table a couple of nights ago playing one of the most aggro players in the club, where we made this hero call-down based on live reads / playing history:

2 posts, EP limps, 2nd post (LAG villain) makes it $25, Hero calls BB with JT, limper calls. Flop $80 KQT checks to villain $40 and we decide to just call because if we hit we feel that villain will keep betting in position, EP folds. Turn $160 6 hero checks villain $130 call. River $420 2 hero checks villain $350 and we go with a read that bet-bet-bet is weak (because when he was strong he had always checked at least one street). He shows 77 and we take down a nice one, also putting villain on tilt.

I applied a lot of deep stack tips from the RYE course that are working out well and certainly have increased my 3Bs, tightened my EP/MP opens, focused my defending ranges, etc.

8) Get 40 hours of consultancy client study done (total 160 - 240 hours to be done from now until end-July)

Only ~15-20 hours done - took second fiddle to Fitness / RYE / Live Poker, but client is really laid back and I don't think it's going to be an issue.

9) Pay all my bills and get all paperwork done and off my mind

Done!

10) Finalize Vegas Tourney schedule

Done!

I'm not sure I'll do this every day due to time constraints, but today I was awake super-early due to jet lag, so here goes our Day 1 update:

June 1 Wynn 2/5 3pm $1000

First few hours were not too interesting except for making flush over flush twice versus rec on my right and getting paid both times to be up around $750.

Apparent whale then sits down with a big wad of cash and limps his first hand in the CO, SB rec calls and Hero raises BB to $30 with T8. I do this first hand because I instantly recognise an opportunity to play versus a big whale and want to maximise my hands versus him ASAP. Both Call.
Flop $90 K86. X Hero Bets $35 and both Call.
Turn $200 Q XX whale bets $75, SB folds and Hero Calls.
River $350 K X whale bets $150 and we bluff catch and win versus J7 😎

I won another ~$200 from the whale where I made a hand and got called until a big river bet, but it wasn’t so interesting.

Then I got one more interesting hand before he quit. He limps in CO, BU limps, I make it $30 from BB with A8 and both Call.
Flop $90 JT7 I c-bet $35 due to my backdoors and only whale calls.
Turn $160 is a beautiful Q, the perfect card to continue with and size larger, I make it $105, whale says “you’ve got AK” and sigh folds. I say “close” and show him just the A.

Unfortunately he quit at that point having dumped only around $1000 to the table. The other rec also donked off his last $200 with a seriously bad bluff (not versus me) and snap quit too.

That made the table really boring full of complete nits. I lost a few hands missing flops and towards the end of my session, playing a bit tired and having run cold for the past hour or so MP limps TAG CO $25 hero has TT in the SB. This is a clear 3-Bet, which I did think about at the time, but somehow I decided to flat call and limper came along too.
Flop $80 752. I don’t like Donk leading in general and think check-to-the-raiser is the right line but when he bets $25 I think I should make a raise, but again I decide to just call.
Turn $125 3. Ok now it really is time to start betting my hand to protect my equity, but again I somehow check and villain checks behind.
River is the worst card in the deck A and we check fold to villain’s $125 bet.

I really butchered this hand bad, I was tired, the river put me on tilt and I should have snap quit the game at that point but I stayed another orbit or so winning no more hands. It kind of spoiled my session, even though I ended as +$680 winner. I need to stop playing when I’m tired and making mistakes like this!

The condo is kinda meh and cooking my Whole Foods grass-fed steak breakfast was a bit of challenge this morning, but it's ok, good location and very cheap! First buddy Andy arrives today, second one Gary tomorrow. Let's see how it is with 3 of us in the place!

Now it's time to get my first workout in: I managed to check-in ~30kg of dumbbell weights spread into 3 bags without violating my Air Canada Super Elite allowances, although lugging those bags onto the rental car shuttle / up to the 2nd floor condo was a real challenge, but worth it.

I've got two different dumbbell full body workout routines to follow, so I'll alternate starting with the easier one today...let's go!

Awake super early again today so time to post about yesterday's MTT:

June 2 $550 Wynn 12pm (I got seated at ~12.10pm with 180bb)

Result: Min-Cashed 30th for $1100

Early stages there were not too many interesting spots but then got crippled BB vs SB Bad LAG Rec:

Effective stack ~18k
150/300/300 SB completes, Hero BB 1k with K8 SB calls
Flop 2.3k A86 SB C/R Hero's 600 to 2k. Given this villain's tendencies, he never has an Ace here, since he limped preflop, and likely has a draw because he always bets his draws, so we decide to call and evaluate the turn.
Turn 6.3k 3 SB leads for 1.5k, further reinforcing my read that he's drawing and we quickly call
River 9.3k 5 SB bets 7k and we're only realistically losing to exactly 97 here, so we call, and that's what he's got!

After that we grinded our short stack like a ninja eventually getting two double ups in quick succession to make it to the dinner break with 30k - only 10BB for the next level.

First hand back UTG, who had lost most of his big stack just before the break, shipped 33k, we woke up with JJ UTG+2 and happily shipped, SB over-shipped around 65k and we're up against 33 and AK for a triple-up: J in the window no sweat, oh wait Q on the turn...Ace on the river...phew!

With 30BB+ we actually got to play some poker for a while and ran it up to around 110k before dead cards and rising blinds brought us back into short stack mode.

At this stage, we tried to play perfect strategy as much as possible, making clear +EV plays for the most part, but in my notes there were just a few spots I wanted to check versus RYE's recommended ranges:

Jam A9s 22bb over 2.5X CO open? I did, and villain folded, and RYE agrees that I should be jamming up to 25bb with A5s/ATo over this raise.

HJ 26bb 88 versus UTG 2.5X UTG+2 flat? I did and although it's hard to find this exact spot with RYE's ranges it seems to be the recommended play.

UTG+2 ships 17bb Hero MP with 32bb and AJo? I decided to fold because so many players left to act behind me and again it's hard to find the exact spot on RYE, but it seems I need AQo+/ATs+ for a +EV play, so I'm happy with my fold. As it happened, villain had ATo and player behind called with 99: Ace on the river!

UTG+2 opens Hero has 22 in the BB with 22bb? I decided to fold and RYE agrees, although it is a recommended ship with 20bb or less.

After that I really went card dead and had to keep folding, especially as the money bubble was approaching.

On the bubble, Big Stack LAG opened EP 2.5X and we look at KQo in the SB with ~12bb behind. Normally this is clear jam, but with very little fold equity and an $1100 bubble, we decided to fold.

We made the money, went an orbit or two, when we finally busted in this spot:

Big stack competent BU opens to 2.5X and we look at A2 in the BB with 10bb total (including our BB), after posting the BB ante. So we can win 12.5bb for a bet of 9bb, meaning we need ~41% equity. I thought we had it versus any pair, any Ace, any two broadway cards and that's true (we have 43.6%), but I guess the question is whether this edge is enough versus the edge I could find shoving 8.5bb sometime in the next orbit.

We're at 30 players and the pay jump at 27 is not significant, so I don't think ICM comes into it much, if at all, but should we take this small edge in this spot? We also know that if he's slightly tighter than our assigned range, folding some of his broadways, we're -EV.

I gambled and lost versus TT, missing 12 outs in the river, but perhaps I can fold and find a better spot...?

Quick daily update with key hands analysis:

June 3 1020am 2/5 $1100 buy-in

Out 1215 -$25

Big lay down...? Seemingly competent guy straddles the button SB completes and Hero makes BB $60 with AQ. BU Calls SB folds.

Flop $130 QT8. Due to being OOP and with so many draws we decide that X/C and evaluate the turn is a better line than betting (somewhat influenced by RYE guidelines to check draw heavy boards OOP). BU checks behind.

Turn $130 T and although we were intending to bet safe turns we’re thinking this is not so safe because Tx hands will almost certainly check behind on the flop. So we check again and he quickly fires $105. I feel like I’m beat at this point, but I don't think I can just X/F top-top to an unknown villain, so I call and hope he’ll slow down OTR.

River $340 6 check and he quickly bets $250.

I go into the tank and someone calls clock after a couple of minutes. I can’t really find many bluffs here except complete air balls, which seem unlikely, especially as I have the key bluff blocker A. As far as value hands that I beat could he really take this line with KQ or QJ? I don’t think so; even Tx may have trouble continuing on this river, although to a thinking player he should not be worried that I possibly made a flush or a straight, so Tx v-bet versus my range makes sense, as well as J9 and all boats. I just can’t find enough combos I’m beating so I decide to fold and show to hope to induce him to do likewise but he demurs.

Just after the clock was called, with Hero clearly struggling to make a decision, villain took a drink from his water bottle. I took this as a strong tell, tipping me over to folding (although to be honest I was already there). Clearly I’m still unsure about my line or my fold but I think I’d have hated to give away $250 there.

Another frustrating spot: Weak Rec limps EP I iso-raise with 87 tight old guy calls IP and limper calls.
Flop $80 KJ8 and I decide to continue with a small $30 c-bet due to having a pair and backdoors. Both villains call.
Turn $170 4. It’s a good card to continue with and size up our bet although we think in a multiway cash game scenario it’s probably not optimal but we just want to try it and see if it works since it’s something we just learned from RYE. We size to $125 and nitty old guy ships in for $350...oh well!

Entered $1100 Tourney at 1215 with 20k chips (200bb)

200bb level Hero opens BU to 500 with A9o BB 1.7k and it’s the second time he’s 3B our BU open, so we think we need to 4B bluff here and put in 4.5k, but he ships and we snap fold. He said he had KK.

200bb level Rec fish open raises UTG+2 to 1.2k (6X lol) Hero has TT next to act and decides to flat.
Flop 2.9k Q94r and he bets 2.5k Hero folds.

Table becomes totally sick with 5 young guns raising like crazy. We mostly stay out of it, but at 600bb level MP LAG opens 1.2k Hero 3-Bets 99 in CO to 3.5k MP calls.
Flop 8.5k 987r X Hero bets 5.5k MP ships Hero calls and he shows us JT, I implore dealer to pair the board and she kindly rolls out 57 😎

Out at 5.45pm 1600bb level LAG limps UTG+1 and even with just 27k (17bb) we decide we’re getting a good price to complete SB with QT BB checks.
Flop 6.4k KJT XX villain makes it 4.5k and I think it looks kinda weak so I ship but he calls with K9o and it runs out 8Q to give him the straight versus my two pair.

Analysing the equity on this one: I’m betting 26.5k to win 33k meaning I need 45% when called but also I should generally have some fold equity here too: say 50% of 11k = 5.5k meaning we need just 41% when called.

Putting him on the following range gets us to 42%, which seems reasonable 99+,A8s+,Ac7c,Ac6c,Ac5c,Ac4c,Ac3c,Ac2c,K8s+,Q5s+,J 8s+,T8s+,
98s,8c7c,7c6c,6c5c,5c4c,ATo+,K9o+,Q9o+,J9o+,T9o,98 o

Nevertheless, like yesterday's bust-out, perhaps we're gambling in a spot where the edge is not sufficient whereas we can wait and find better edges.

I'm still not sure about this, but it is something to bear in mind: think carefully whether we should gamble our tourney life when getting only very small +EV or marginal breakeven spots, even when < 20bb?

Back to cash game at 6.30pm $1500 buy-in

Hero straddles due to drunk BB extreme rec four limpers we raise A5 to $40 one caller.
Flop $110 543 Hero bets $85, villain raises to $350, Hero snap ships to ~$1100 and villain tank folds what he said was 66 no diamonds.

I said I'd analyse this spot to see if villain should be calling with 66. He has to call $750 to win $1550 so he needs only 32.6%.

For my exact hand clearly he has the equity (51%) and against a reasonable range he has 46%, so he made a clear mistake by folding, and this is a clear example of the power poker making $$$.

Out at 1am +$350. The table was soft and I should have made more money but a couple of hero calls cost me...it's a recurring problem, although I also made a couple of sick correct calls too...hmm?

Week 1 Recap

MTTs Played: 6
MTT Entries: 8
MTT Cashes: 2
MTT Results: -$2620

Cash Game Results: +$6245

Poker Total: +$3625

Expenses: $1215 (including flights etc. averaged over 29 days)

Work-Outs: 3 (one under my target)

Healthy Eating Days: 6 (on target)

Cheat Days: 1 (on target: gotta love a Holstein's Burger + Fried at the bar watching the hockey last night paired with a nice bottle of Californian Red, especially as I faded the CC roulette for the bill!)

Poker thoughts: happy with my play in MTTs, making good decisions, good ranges, except perhaps a couple of punts and one missed bluff-catcher call down. My short-stack play has been pretty much perfect, shoving and reshoving in all the right spots.

As far as cash games, I've definitely run well taking shots at juicy 5/10 games, winning another $3k last night against a somewhat tougher line-up than previously, but still profitable with my patient style because most of my reg opponents were playing highly aggressively giving me good opportunities to win big pots, such as these two from last night, where we were playing 5/10/20 due to mandatory straddle:

EP opens $60, Hero flats CO with 77 super-aggro villain with estimated stats in this session of 80/60/40 makes it $210 from BB, EP folds, we flat around $4.3k deep. Flop $500 J97 villain $220 hero $650 villain calls. Turn $1800 5 X hero $1500 call. River $4800 K X Hero ships $2500 and villain tank folds JT. I'm somewhat surprised he didn't get it in on the flop, but nice to hold in a 60/40 for a big pot!

Tom Middleton, UK pro around 8 beers deep but crushing, opens to $60, Hero $200 with AA, super-aggro player from above flats, Tom makes it $650, Hero $1500 with around $4500 behind, both fold. Tom said "I was just making a move!"

That's Life - Frank Sinatra

"Each time that I find myself flat on my face, I pick myself up and get back in the race"



After posting my positive weekly update Friday AM, I had the worst day ever of poker. Nothing went right: I busted the PH $600 $1M GTD before noon; I busted three times in The Wynn $5k Survivor; and then I found myself as the fish at the table in a tough 5/10 NL Cash Game where I got completely owned to stack off over $3k in one pot and $5k overall, to give me a daily loss of over $7k. All my Vegas winnings were wiped out in one terrible day.

So what did I do? Did I mope around and say FML? Nope!

I got up early Saturday, studied another two hours of my RYE Tournament Masterclass, had a great breakfast, did some chores, and got over to start The Wynn $1100 $200K GTD at Noon.

My first several levels were grim, losing half my stack early and then grinding a short stack for hours. I survived until the dinner break with 15bb.

Then it finally hit me - boomswitch time where I caught some major heat (as well as playing flawlessly) to make the money with over double the average stack and then chipleader from around 18 players down to 11.

Had a sticky patch from 11 to the FT, but came through it with disciplined play, good decisions and a little luck (AT > short stack KK to break the FT bubble).

At the FT, we went pretty card dead, but worked through it, picking our spots, chipping up and seeing others fall by the wayside. Online legend "charder" (Christian Harder) had a massive chip lead and was abusing the table, but we ground it out, seeing him go out 3rd to get us into the Heads Up battle for the win.

We fought for two hours HU, played tremendously, but unfortunately lost one massive coin-flip for most of the chips in play to end as Runner Up with 45,000 reasons to be happy with that.

That's Life!

Nice read. Gl for rest of the series. Win that money

Nice score. Stick to your original plan and 2/5 instead of 5/10 and your Main Event ticket is covered. Maybe you should head to the Rio and buy your entry as soon as you get the chance. It will be easier to complete your trip on a positive note knowing you have already achieved one of your major objectives.

Agreed. I'm definitely sticking to my MTT plan until end June (abi < $1k; max $1.5k) and I will not be tempted into playing 5/10 unless it is a super-juicy line up (min 2-3 known fish). I'll be heading over to Rio to play the Seniors on Friday and, yes, it's a good idea to buy my ME ticket at that time.

Week 2 Recap (June 8 - June 14)

MTTs Played: 8
MTT Entries: 14
MTT Cashes: 1
MTT Results: +$35,730

Cash Game Results: -$3,495

Poker Total: +$32,235

Expenses: $1,520 (including flights etc. averaged over the trip)

Work-Outs: 2 (two under my target)

Healthy Eating Days: 5 (one below target)

Running Totals

MTTs Played: 14
MTT Entries: 22
MTT Cashes: 3
MTT Results: +$33,110

Cash Game Results: +$2,750

Poker Total: +$35,860

Expenses: $2,735 (including flights etc. averaged over the trip)

Poker thoughts: last Friday was a terrible day of poker, where I ran bad in MTTs and then made the worst and most expensive river call of my cash game career. Then on Saturday the stars aligned and I binked a $45k MTT score, which was amazing, but also the result of good play throughout the day. I'd put to rest the demons of the day before and got to work.

After Saturday, I've run bad in MTTs, losing to coolers/bad-beats/lost flips time after time, but they've been much easier to take with money in my bankroll. Nevertheless, perhaps I've had too many tourney re-entries rather than just quitting MTTs for the day and trying to grind cash games.

This culminated in a rather bad day on Friday, June 15 (which will be part of next week's results summary), where not only did I lose over $3k in MTT entries, but I ended the day with a really bad river call-down that cannot be rationally explained. Simply put, it was a brain fart and I need to write it here to stop it from happening again:

2000bb level in the Wynn $1M GTD $1100 buy-in, I have ~110k after late-regging at the dinner break with ~16bb (20k) and sun-running it up in the past 2 hours. I'd been moved to my new table around 30 mins earlier, which was full on young competent regs, and witnessed a lot of action, but hadn't played too many pots.

Also, and this is very important, I was well into consuming my third glass of red wine in two hours, which I believe clouded my decision-making.

Hero opens MP with AK BU and BB call.
Flop (18k) K45 X hero bets 6k BU calls BB folds
Turn (30k) 9 hero bets 17.5k BU calls
River (65k) 9 we already had alarm bells ringing after getting our bigger bet sizing called OTT, but somehow feel that we can still go for three streets of value. With 65k in the pot and ~80k back, we think a smaller sizing is ok and bet 25k. Villain tanks forever, the whole time I'm thinking he's going to slide out a call and pay me off, but dreading him moving in with an obvious flopped set. He finally moves in. We say out loud "You've got a set of fours or fives", pause for a few seconds, and...call.

WTF! Why did I call when I knew what he had?

It was simply drink-induced spew and has to stop now!

Week 3 Recap (June 15 - June 22)

MTTs Played: 9
MTT Entries: 15
MTT Cashes: 2
MTT Results: -$2,960

Cash Game Results: -$1,670

Poker Total: -$4,630

Expenses: $1,150 (including flights etc. averaged over the trip)

Work-Outs: 1 (my motivation / energy to get these done has really sapped)

Healthy Eating Days: 5-6 (can't really remember all, but keeping my daily calories reasonable)

Running Totals

MTTs Played: 23
MTT Entries: 37
MTT Cashes: 5
MTT Results: +$28,150

Cash Game Results: +$1,760

Poker Total: +$29,910

Expenses: $4,075

Poker thoughts:

MTTs were very frustrating this week with lots of cooler/bad beat type bust-outs and a couple of punts. I probably shouldn't have tried two very late entries into the PLO Giant, but the players were incredibly bad (and I'm not that competent at PLO, but I was definitely in the top half at each of my tables).

My biggest frustration came late last night when I thought I was going to turn this slump around, amassing the CL in the Wynn $550 with around 20 players left, only to bust out 12th for $4,200 after having JJ cracked twice (first by 45o defend from BB; then losing a massive 1M chip flip OTR versus AK).

When the King hit the river I lost my cool and hit the table in frustration, walked away for a cool down, but couldn't really dismiss the tilt I was feeling. I know these emotions do me no good and those rivers are all part of the game, but I don't think I'll ever be able to just sit their stoically when I've lost the chance to play for tens of thousands of dollars on a bad river (although I was perfectly calm when I lost the $27k HU flip a couple of weeks ago - weird that, but bubbling FTs always seems worse than losing at an FT).

I'm taking today off to go visit Red Rock Canyon with the wifey. She leaves on Sunday so we need some time together and I need to get away from The Strip and chill in the countryside for a day (although at > 100F I clearly won't be chilling!)

Week 4 Recap (June 22 - June 29)

MTTs Played: 7 + 1 STT
MTT Entries: 8 + 1 STT
MTT Cashes: 2 + 1 STT
MTT/STT Results: +$4,138

Cash Game Results: -$50

Poker Total: +$4,088

Expenses: $1,570 (including flights etc. averaged over the trip)

Work-Outs: 0 (my motivation / energy to get these done has gone)

Healthy Eating Days: ? (we're definitely not eating as healthy as we should, but not too bad either)

Running Totals

MTTs Played: 30 + 1 STT
MTT Entries: 45 + 1 STT
MTT/STT Cashes: 8
MTT/STT Results: +$30,568

Cash Game Results: +$1,710

Poker Total: +$32,278

Expenses: $5,745

Poker thoughts:

Started the week with another semi-successful, but ultimately frustrating Wynn $1100, where I got 20th place after running bad deep and the frustration continued on Sunday at the Rio Monster Stack.

This led to a Sunday night Degen where I got drunk and gambled. It was stupid and I woke up with deep regrets. I'd already bought my ticket to the Rio $1500 Bounty Event and after just a few hours sleep, still drunk/hungover, I just caught my ride there at the last minute and got to the tourney on time.

I then proceeded to run hotter than the sun for the next few hours, quickly winning 5 bounties and running up a 70k stack. I was playing great, fearlessly bullying the shorter stacks until my table broke. I didn't run so good at my new table, but still made in through the day with 7 bounties and an above average stack.

Day 2 was a grind. I quickly became a shorter stack and had to apply all of my cockroach skills to stay alive through the hours, finally losing a standard coin flip just before the dinner break for 83rd place and total cash-out including bounties of ~$6k.

The rest of my week was similarly frustrating (except for chopping an STT at the Rio), with disciplined short-stack grinds not quite making it until Friday's try at the Aria WPT500 (which really should be in next week's results, but I'm writing this a little late). In this tourney my short-stack grind actually panned-out when I caught some heat late in the day, ran up a stack, and made Day 2 with 325k (around an average stack).

It's a big opportunity to go deep, with 155 remaining when we resume today. My table has no big winners on it and I feel confident and comfortable with my situation. Let's crush it!

Week 5 Recap (June 29 - July 6)

MTTs Played: 9*
MTT Entries: 12
MTT Cashes: 3*
MTT/STT Results: -$2,260*

* WSOP Main Event still in progress

Cash Game Results: Zero played

Poker Total: -$2,260

Expenses: $1,465 (including flights etc. averaged over the trip)

Work-Outs: 0 (my motivation / energy to get these done has gone)

Healthy Eating Days: ? (we're definitely not eating as healthy as we should, and it's getting worse...)

Running Totals

MTTs Played: 39* + 1 STT
MTT Entries: 57 + 1 STT
MTT/STT Cashes: 11
MTT/STT Results: +$30,028

Cash Game Results: +$1,710

Poker Total: +$31,738

Expenses: $7,110

Poker thoughts:

Started the week busting early in the WSOP Turbo Bounty Event and jumped right over to Aria for the WPT500 where we ran up a Day 1 stack, made Day 2 and felt like a deep run was coming, but it didn't materialize and we finished 76th.

Tried a couple of Mega-Satellites for the Main Event and almost got there on the second one. We played perfect short stack survival strategy, actually never having a showdown while we built our stack from 13K to 70K, but then went card dead / situation dead when it counted, blinded off and finally had to gamble and lose on ATo < 84o only 6 spots from the seats.

This resulted in paying the full entry fee for the Main Event, which we started on Weds (Day 1C). This was a tough day since our starting table was like a ridiculous reg-infested cash game where nobody could win any money. We ended the day with 30K.

During the intervening day off from the Main, we tried to relax with a Wynn daily, but ended-up firing 4 bullets and losing A9 < A8 when in the money ($1,700), but not enough to cover our buy-ins ($2,200).

Day 2C of the Main Event started very badly, with a grim first hour where we went down to 17K. Then we finally caught some heat and ran our stack up to 80K on our first two tables, which were both much softer than our Day 1 table, before finally ending-up in the Amazon Room for the last 5 hours.

This was a tough table, including Men The Master, with only 1 or 2 soft spots and we struggled to find momentum. The primary way we kept our chip-stack moving was three well-selected light 3-bets, which all worked, but we couldn't overcome being very card dead, especially for the last 3 hours, and finished with 78K.

This is still a workable 39bb stack for Day 3, which starts in 4 hours.

Before that we have the small matter of England's World Cup Quarter Final...It's Coming Home!

Good luck on day 3 of the Main Event! England looked good today. I got them going all the way.

Yep it was a good day, although utterly exhausting.

Started with England's World Cup victory, then breakfast, then over to the Rio for a real grind for several hours. Finally we caught a little heat and got to a comfortable stack for the bubble, finishing with 219K, which is fine for Day 4.

I just have to say that the way Jack Effel and the floor team handled the bubble was an Epic Clusterf**k, causing far more stress and taking way too much precious time. To f**k up so badly at the expense of the players, and then not adjust the Day 4 start time to compensate is unconscionable.

Complete Las Vegas Results (June 1 - July 15)

MTTs Played: 45 + 1 STT
MTT Entries: 67 + 1 STT
MTT/STT Cashes: 15
MTT/STT Results: +$36,062

Cash Game Results: +$2,610

Poker Total: +$38,762

Non-Gambling Expenses: $8,610

Poker thoughts:

We cashed the WSOP Main Event for the first time, which is a major achievement, although finishing 677th after a bad beat river from a highly questionable pre-flop call by a known pro (Jake Cody) was frustrating. For completeness, I'll post the hand here, but it really doesn't matter since my play was pretty flawless:

Blinds 5k/10k/1k ante, Jake Cody has been highly active, sitting with around 300k, opens MP for 22k, hero ships 118k from SB with ATo, Jake tanks for a while and says "I think I'm just about getting the right price" and calls with K9s. Flop QT9r Turn Q River J. He had to call 96k to win 159k, so he needs 37.6% equity. Giving me 22+, A8+, KJ+, KTs, QJs, QTs, JTs he has 38.3% so it is possibly mathematically correct, but I wouldn't do it in his spot because he loses a lot of stack playability 62% of the time. Whatever.

After that we jumped into the Little One for One Drop, fired two bullets, and cashed for a small profit.

On to the Wynn Main Event, we fired 3 bullets, built a stack with our third and easily made the money. We had a nice playable stack, but managed to bluff away two-thirds of it in a BB vs BU spot where villain doesn't have it a large percentage of the time, then got our remaining chips in cold 4-betting from SB with AJs versus two over-active CO/BU players and running into BU's QQ. Quite sigh, since this event had a great structure and perhaps there was some ill-discipline in both plays whereas we could have ground it out and found better spots.

Final weekend, we just played Wynn daily tourneys, came close to the money in the Final $1100, before making the money in our last tourney on Sunday ($550 buy-in).

With 28 players left we had a good stack (405k) at 8k/16k blinds. Active player opens from EP, we look at AA in HJ and decide to just flat call given that many of the stacks behind might shove, which instantly happens as CO ships it in for 380k, EP folds, we snap and get shown AKs.

The dealer rolls-out KQJr flop, 6 turn and another freakin' K on the river. Basically that was the chip-leading pot, enough to make the FT, and have a good run at the win, gone to the worst bad beat of the summer, to end my summer on a sour note.

Looking at my summary results above, I should be happy, but I'm not. There are a number of reasons why and I'll list them here because I need to improve on all of these things for next summer:

1) I had planned to stay away from the pit. I succeeded until June 25, which was the day my wife went home, but then fell spectacularly off the wagon and degenerated into bad old habits. These past 3 weeks have seen me gambling way too often, for much higher stakes than I am comfortable with, and it needs to stop. Needless to say my gambling losses took a big, painful bite out of my bank roll.

2) My exercise regime petered out in mid-June and never recovered. I was in great shape when I arrived on June 1, but looking at myself now, I've lost muscle definition and just seem soft / flabby (but my weight is down - see next point). Next year I need to keep up my fitness regime throughout the series.

3) My healthy eating regime also suffered, although not as badly as I thought, since my weight this morning was 81.9kg (i.e. less than when I left). Actually I probably ate too little, especially of good things like proteins and vegetables. For the last couple of weeks I was getting my daily calories about right (or under) but with the wrong things (too many carbs such as red wine, pasta, oatmeal, rice, potatoes and even just bad old honey in my tea). Next year I need to track my macros better and keep up with the right amount of protein and vegetables (and keep taking my daily vitamins, which I stopped along with my fitness sessions, resulting, I believe, in falling ill with a summer cold for the past several days, which my immune system should normally fight off if I've had the right vitamins).

4) Drinking too much, not so much while playing, but sometimes afterwards and at dinner breaks, leading to pit game degeneration. I've got to keep my drinking to moderate, controllable levels at all times.

5) Mental degeneration due to the Las Vegas grind: 6 weeks was too long and I wasn't able to cope with it. Next year we'll start later, probably Seniors' Week, to keep the time period down to something I'm capable of doing to the best of my ability.

6) I didn't get enough work done meaning I've fallen behind with my major client assignment. This is my breadwinner and I can't let it take such a back seat to poker next summer.

In summary, although poker itself was a success and I achieved my poker goals, I need to improve on all others aspects of my time in Las Vegas if it is to be a complete success. Next summer I shall!