I arrive at San Francisco International at 6:45am on July 31st. My flight isn't until 9:30 on Virgin America. My buddies slowly start showing up at the gate. We are all excited to take yet another trip to Vegas. This is our second trip going as a big group. Our first one was in October 2007. I haven't eaten anything for breakfast, so I take the chance of getting $15 breakfast at the airport. (I don't when I'll get the chance to eat next.) We board around 9:00am. Virgin America didn't offer the interactive screen going there, so that kind of sucked. But we were getting amped because we knew in an hour and a half we were going to be in Vegas. 6 out of the 12 were on my flight including me. 4 were taking United, and 2 were driving the 600 miles to LV. On the flight, we were just playing Hold'em Against the Dealer with the bags of pretzels we didn't eat. We land around 11am at McCarran. We catch up with our 4 friends who took United and pick up our bags. Finally, a trip that took nearly 7 months to plan is here. 12 guys, all around the 21-22 age, 4 days in Vegas, DONE DEAL. We walk with all our bags to the Hotel Shuttles. About 25 minutes later, we are in the lobby of the Venetian. Each of us throw in a tip of $5, and I walk over to the front desk with a buddy. It was 12pm, and check-in was at 3pm. I had the $60 tip sandwiched between my license and credit card. Two connecting rooms, 18th floor, beautiful view of TI and the Venetian pool, and late check out on Sunday from 11am to 1pm, GOTTA LOVE IT. We all get up to our rooms, and we all get amped even more. Beautiful rooms to party in for 4 days. All of us soak it in, unpack, and fill the tubs with ice to put numerous bottles of water and alcohol that we transported in the car that two of our friends drove. The time is now about 1pm, and I start to get antsy. Time to play poker. Little history about myself. I'm 21, have been playing since 2003, have about 25 poker books, watch and tape a lot of poker, consider Full Tilt my online home, and strive to be the best player I can be. I try to be a more composed and experienced player for my age, instead of the asses on TV. I try to be courteous during every hand that I play. Anyway, I've come to Vegas with about $1,000. I was planning to come with $500, but I made a fortunate call in Tahoe for a $700 pot and $500 profit. If any of you are in Tahoe, Montbleu Poker Room has pretty good action. I head down to the Venetian Poker Room with my buddy and start playing around 1:20pm. Played until 6:20. Nothing too memorable, but left with a $115 profit and 5 hrs on my Players Card. Venetian is just how I remembered it last year. Good 1-2 action, can make alot of money if you find the perfect fish. Got a burger at he food court at the Venetian. Pretty good, had the Mushroom Swiss with a load of fries. Head to the room around 6:45. Most of my friends are loaded on vodka and Fat Tuesdays.
After my burger, we crack open what is my favorite drink, Hennessy, and we start doing shot after shot. After we think we've had enough, we all start to shower and iron for our first club, Jet, at the Mirage. Before leaving we take a Vegas Everclear community shot. Everclear is f*ckin gross. Get to Mirage around 9pm. The club doesn't start until 10:30, so we all gamble a little. I head to the poker room. I never played at the Mirage Poker room. Wait for about 15 minutes for a seat, and when I do, I sit next to the blind guy, Hal, from the 2007 Main Event. He is a pretty good player. Played for about 30 minutes, lost about $40. A lot of the players were experienced. Not a profitable room unless you like playing with 9 other good players with no fish. Go to Jet, have some drinks, dance a little bit, and leave with my buddy around 12:15am to go play 1-2 at the Venetian. Sit down around 12:40am with my same buy-in of $200. Sit in seat 7. My buddy sits in seat 8. We gamble it up showing a little profit after 2hrs. Villain takes seat around 2:45 in seat 9. He was a good player, but a little cocky. He buys-in for max buy-in of $300. A little while later villain gets down to about $200. I have about $275, when this hand comes up. Raise under the gun to $10, to people call, I call with pocket 5's, and villain calls on the button. Flop is J,3,2 rainbow with about $53 in the pot. Three check in front of me, and I bet $20 to see where I'm at. Villain min raises to $40, 3 in front fold. I think for a cluple seconds and he has been pretty aggressive since he sat down. I had some respect for his game but not for this particular raise. One over card to my pocket pair, min raise, and an aggressive player. I call. Leaving villain with $150. Turn is a red 5. Lightning in a bottle for me. I check. Villain bets $50. I contemplate for about 10 seconds. Semi-hollywood because hes not putting me on pocket 5's. I slide in a $100 bill with ten $5 chips on top to but villain all in. He insta calls and suddenly turns into Hellmuth, berating my play. I told him his raise was weak and to take it easy. He raises to $20 on each pot preflop for about half an hour. I take a break with my buddy and tell him I didn't want to leave until that guy left or I lost a big chunk to someone else. I win another $150 from the guy. It's 6am and I'm $400. Seat 6, who had a great attitude, gambled it up, and overplayed many hands, came from TAO upstairs, was sitting for about 2 hours. He was taking Patron, shot after shot. He raises to $20 in middle position. I look down at 99's . I reraise to $60. He goes all in for $130. I end up calling. He has JJ. Oh well. I lost that hand to a funny guy who I didn't want to see leave. Oh, by the way, William Hung was playing 4-8 limit the whole time I was playing that night. How random is that?? Lost another $30 in the next half an hour and decided to call it a night. Left with about $240 profit. After cashing out at the cage, I walk back to the villain and shake his hand, telling him no hard feelings. He was in better spirits. I think he was on his 4th max buy-in by the time we left. Another 6hrs on the players card. Good first day in Vegas. Wake up around 12pm. Go to the pool for a little bit. Very refreshing when it's 110 outside. Leave again with my poker buddy and grab Chicken and Waffles at Cafe LUX. Thanks Venetian for the comped meal. Head to the poker room again for more 1-2. Sit down around 3:30 pm. Gamble it up. Played tight aggressive, and very aggressive on the strong draws I caught. End up leaving at 6pm, losing my profit from day 1. Oh well, what can I do? I coudn't ask for a better table to make money, but my draws weren't getting there. Head up to the room. Drink numerous shots and get ready for PURE at Caesars. Took a little while to get in. Better vibe than Jet. Stay there longer than Jet. Leave PURE with my buddies and a couple of girls we met to eat some McDonalds and call it a night. Get into bed around 4:30am. Took a shower and set my alarm for 10:30am. Wake up and get dressed. Getting mentally ready for the noon, $330 buy-in Saturday tourney at Caesars. My buddy and I get to Caesars around 11:40am. Pay $330 for 10,000 in chips and an extra $10 for 2,500 in chips added on. What a great chip stack?? Combine that with 40 minute levels, antes not starting until the 8th level, and you get a lot of value for the buy-in. 91 runners ended up playing. My first hand I flop a set of nines and chip up to 14k. Couple of hands later, I have AK under the gun. Raise to about 250. One calls. King flops. Bet on every street. Seat next to me catches two pair with his king and takes down a 7,500 pot. I'm down to 6,500. Break every 2hrs. My buddy gets knocked out pushing with 5k with AA, gets called with KK, king flops. Oh well, until next time for him. He actually made 9th last time we played in October. Two big hands kept me in the tournament. I pushed all in with QQ with 7,500 left, get called by the big blind with AA. Queen flops. Another hand push with 77's with 12,500 left, get to callers, flop is Q,7,2 rainbow. River is a 2, I fill up, and I take down a 38k pot. Play until 10pm. Finish in 8th place. Better than my 81st place performance in October. I love this tournament, great structure, good payouts. Leave the poker room amped and grab the calamari and fries at the food court. All my friends are at TAO. Two of them leave to take more shots at the room, I eat, and get dresses for TAO. My buddies walk back in with their stamps, and tell the bouncer I just flew in. I tip him $20, skip the huge line, and party with all my boys. Best club I've ever been to in my entire life. All the girls, good alcohol, watching a black guy dance on top of a table, swinging his shirt, OH WAIT, THAT'S CUBA GOODING JR.!!!! We all had to get in our "SHOW ME THE MONEY!!!" That was hilarious. Call it a night around 3am. Wake up. Pack all our stuff. Do as much cleaning as we could, because we didn't want any maid service being that we had 12 guys stuff in the room. Tipped another $60 for the maids. Walked it over to Bellagio for the buffet. Made bets of $20, $20, $40, and $20 all on black at Roulette. ALL WERE RED. WHAT ARE THE CHANCES?? Watch the Bellagio water show one last time. Head to the airport around 7pm for our 9:30 flight back to SF. What a trip!!!! Until next time Vegas!!! Thanks to whoever read this!!