Preface:
I had only been playing poker for about 2 years, but I feel like I've learned a lot rather quickly. I had played extensively at a very busy (usually 20 running tables during the week, 40+ on weekends) Indian casino on the Texas/Oklahoma border (gambling not being legal here, I make the 1hr commute from Dallas often.) Like most novices, I handed over a lot of money ($2-3k in 1/2 NLH sessions over about 9 months) until I really began obsessing over poker. I bought a couple books and watched it on television every chance I got. Once I began to understand the math and start to incorporate players tendencies, I started to refine my playing style and began to regularly beat the 1/2 NLH game (70% winning sessions) and handled myself quite well at the 2/5 NLH game (55% winning sessions.) After playing mostly cash games and the occasional small buy-in ($100 or less) tournament, I decided that I wanted to try Vegas. Since I had a great job (nice pay, total flexibility) I booked a couple tickets, a cheap little room at the Tropicana, invited my girlfriend, and set out for a wonderful week.

Day 1:
Being that I cleverly disguised this as a getaway with my girlfriend, I saw myself pulling double duty; hang out and be a tourist + get as much playing time in as possible. I convinced her that blackjack would be a good way for her to kill time, and taught her how to make basic decisions and she ended up winning about $200 playing only $5 a hand during the trip. I used every chance I could get to step away for some poker. I played my first session at the MGM. I started playing 1/2 NLH, and after about 30 minutes my $100 buy-in was now right at $270. I felt like my ability to control the action so easily meant I was playing down too much, so I grabbed my stack and found a 2/5 table nearby. After a lot of loose action, I saw people swinging $250+ each hand for about an hour. I played cautiously, but this allowed me to steal pots with strong continuation bets when I was a little uncertain or saw a dangerous flop after preflop raises. I had about $650 after 2 or 3 hours of showing down only 2 hands, and realized I had bailed on the girlfriend, so I went back to the Trop and we had dinner and saw O at Bellagio on my recent winnings.

Day: $+550
Total: +$550

Day 2: We just walked up the strip for the sake of doing it. We visited the big name places. We played 15 minutes of blackjack at NY/NY in which I won a quick $40 and we got Chinese at a place inside the Monte Carlo. Strolling through Bellagio (whose poker room was INSANELY crowded, so I didn't even bother) and landing at Caesars to hang around for a bit. I managed to lead us into the poker room where I bought in to a $65 single table SNG. I caught crap for the first few hands which allowed me to watch everything and feel people out. Then I started catching decent hands that flopped insane. K9o flopped AK9. 78o flopped 69T. 3s4s in BB flopped As9s6s. 3 hands in 5 deals that saw me check-raise people into overplaying their top pair. Each time, I busted a player. I used my big stack like a longsword, swiping away at chunks of players stacks. I used my luckbox image to gather about 60% of the total chips with 5 players remaining. I let several players pick each other off, then I picked up strong hands against people overplaying/bluffing and won the tournament rather convincingly. The girlfriend watched the whole time and seemed rather impressed with what I was doing. (Validation...yes!!) Considering the whole purpose of the trip was to play the WSOP, I saw my win at Caesars as a mini-omen and felt good leaving with an additional $305 net after buy-in.

Afterward, we continued northward to TI where I used her need for a bathroom break as an excuse to sneak into their poker room. They only had a single 1/3 NLH game going, so I put $100 and played while she handled her business. She decided to play blackjack for a bit as I muscled my way up to $275 in about half an hour after deceiving people with stone cold bluff, hand after hand. I once bluffed a guy three hands in a row, showing down each time. The next hand I had AA in the BB. He shoved (for no real reason) with about $65. I snap called and his KTo never improved. He was tilting harder than anyone I've seen to date. I could have bilked him for another 200 at least, but guilt crept in and I decided to rejoin my girlfriend for dinner. I finished up $270 net after $100 buy-in. All in all, a good day just walking around and crushing some low stakes play.

Day: $+615
Total: +$1,165

Day 3: I planned to play a $1500 NLH event at the World Series the following day, so I went to the Rio and registered ahead knowing the crowds can get big the day of. I brought extra cash for the buy-in, but bought in almost entirely on won money. I bought in and the gf and I decided to linger at the Rio and play some blackjack together (aww, how cute!) She played $5 a hand for an hour and finished up $35. I swung my bets around trying to intuitively discern future hands. (kind of like...very loose card counting. A lot of 10 values the last 2 hands, better slow my bets down, etc) I put $50 down and ran it up as high as $120 and felt pretty good doing it. I decided to play a big hand with $110 in my stack and bet $55 on a single hand. I got dealt AA against a dealer 4. SPLIT!! now I have A9 and A8. With my whole stack in the middle, I felt pretty good. The dealer turned over a 2, and I was anxious. She 4 hit her way to 15, and then...6! I threw up in my mouth a little bit. Haha. Enough blackjack for me! We finished the day exploring and actually caught a movie at the AMC behind the strip. A nice "date" sort of day.

Day: -$50 and -$1500 buy in.
Total: -$385

Day 4: WSOP 2008. Event 49. 2718 total players, and capped. I like my starting table. Everyone has 3000 chips, so you have to be cautious pretty early. I only play strong hands for the first level and manage to bust 2 players on flopped sets. We're half an hour in and I am up to 7700. Suddenly, the jitters are gone, and I start feeling very comfortable doing what I'm doing. After level 2, my table breaks to make way for cash games and I carry about 9500 over to my new seat. Jonathan Tamayo is there, but he only seems to have about 4800. On my button, and his UTG he raises the 100/200 blind to 425. With two callers before me, I look down at 7s3s and decide I have position and a hand just bad enough to get paid if I hit. The implied odds are strong since I price in the blinds with any two cards, so I call. The SB folds, but the BB calls. Half the table is in the pot which is now nearly 2500 with all the antes and calls. The flop comes 456 rainbow, and Jonathan immediately ships. I re-push quite quickly to discourage the BB from doing anything stupid. He turns over AA, and never improves. The table looks at me like I'm retarded for playing 7s3s, but I think I like my new image. I'm up to about 15,000 with 100/200 blinds and feel like I'm cruising. I improve to about 20,000 over the next hour and have the table chip lead until the dinner break. However, the problem is, no one at the table is doing much except doubling up short stacks and stealing blinds. The whole table only busted 3 players in a 3-4 hour span. Which is fine, since we're down to about 600 at the break, but no new money came to the table, so everyone essentially became a short stack but me. After the break, we're playing 300/600 with a 75 ante and the average stack is around 7500 at my table. This forces everyone to pick a hand preflop and shove. Everyone would fold, and we saw maybe 1 in 8 flops for the next hour...only busting 1 additional player in that time. Then comes the bad news...

J.C. Tran, the chip-leader with about 160,000 or so comes to the table. I'm a little star struck, but when Tommy Vu comes to the table, he criticizes the rest of the table for letting J.C. run us over for the next hour. Tommy is the only other player with more than 12,000 except for me and I have 17,000 at this point after making several cautious folds to re-raises, and he has about 30,000. He tangles a few times with J.C. and catches him being stupidly aggressive while taking advantage of the impending money bubble. We're down to around 315 players with 270 getting paid. The table runs tighter than a drum for the next 40 minutes while we all wait for our payday. J.C. never slows down, stealing blinds and small raises at will. Finally the bubble breaks and the whole room comes alive! I start re-raising J.C. with mediocre hands, and even stone cold bluffed him off of one flop just to say I did it. I run my stack to about 21,000 as the day ends, with about 220 players left. I'm exhausted, but fairly pleased with my first big tournament and go back to the room to sleep up for the second day.

Day: +$ at least $2,968 with 225 players left
Total: +$2,583 with more to win in the WSOP

Day 5: I arrive feeling like I'm on a freeroll. We're in a smaller room now, and we seem elite with our big stacks and guaranteed pay days. I sit down and recognize the name on the seat card to my left. A bag chock full of big chips and a name tag of David Pham. David "The Dragon" Pham sits directly to my left with easily 85,000 in chips to start the day. We're playing 800/1600 and I get a little aggressive raising to 4,000 UTG with 9d7d (just hoping to pay for my next blinds by stealing them) and I get popped in MP to 8,700. I only have 19,000 to start the hand...so I shove hoping he'll lay it down. He only has 30,000ish so I pray my move works. He deliberates and then moves all in (unnecessary, but whatever...haha) I feel like my suited gap connectors are just the hand to bust KK QQ or JJ, so I just don't want to see 99 because that's the hand I'm the biggest dog to. Sure enough...99. He flops the case 9 and I see no diamonds. I'm out in 192 place...caught in a move, short on chips. The gf tries to console me, but I need none. I'm happy with my first WSOP appearance and gladly cash for $3,152. We take the rest of the afternoon to just be tourists and we head to bed early.

I wake up in the middle of the night, and on a natural high from earlier...I meander over to the 2/5 NLH game at the MGM. A lot of action and I run my $200 up to $300 in a matter of 20 minutes. Then, I'm sideswiped by a hand that still has a bad taste in my mouth. I'm in the cutoff with 88. After second to act goes to 15, I three bet to 45. The initial raiser and the BB call. The flop comes 256. The BB bets 25, other guy folds I raise to 70 and the BB smooth calls. The turn was a 6 and the BB bets 50. I ship my last 185, and he calls having me covered. I'm flabbergasted to see 67o for trip 6s and I don't hit my 8. I ask him, "how can you call my three bet preflop and my big raise on the flop with just a 67o? You didn't put me on having anything?" He replies in a caustic tone, "What are you doing overbetting pocket 8s? Don't expect me to fold top pair. I'm not a superstar, but neither is anyone else here. You're not good!" I said "Dude, I had an over-pair. Keep playing like that, and you'll go home broke." To which he just shrugs off like he doesn't care. More put off than anything, I decide not to rebuy and just walk back to my room down only $200. Instead, I decide a little Tropicana Blackjack could be fun, so I put $100 down on the $25 min table. I get aggressive and hit a few hands and run my $100 up to $400 in about 5 hands. I cash out $100 up for my whole midnight stroll and return to the room. "How did you do?" she asks. "Up $100" I say, not wanting to bore her with the details. I sleep like a baby.

Day: +$3,253
Total: +2,868

Day 6: We spend the whole day on a Grand Canyon Bus Tour. We watch Phantom at the Venetian that night. A great tourist day for sure. I squeeze in another midnight session at the MGM, and quietly win another $200 at 2/5 NLH in about 2 hours or so just playing basic. Nothing fancy, just good honest grinding.

Day: +$200
Total: +3,068

Day 7: We depart early, ready for home. I brought $3,000 to play on, completely prepared to lose it all and ended up adding another $3,068 to it. An over $6,000 swing if you think about it!

That was a fun summer when I got home. Drinks were often on me, and I kept playing the 1/2 NLH at the border casino with a great experience in the book and a little extra cash in the bank roll.

Thanks for reading all this if you actually did. I know it was a lot, but this would be the one place I could share my passion for Vegas if ever there was one. And believe it or not, I made a conscious effort to not get really verbose. I didn't even talk about riding all the rides on the stratosphere, or my expedition to get a $1 chip from every casino I could. Stories for another day, perhaps! I already have my trip booked for the summer. May 31-June 4. This time...I'm bringing my brother. Hopefully his first big trip to Vegas can be half as awesome as mine was!