AVP Resident Pro Benton Blakeman's Blog

BentonBlakeman · **Joined:** Tue Jul 05, 2011 8:09 pm **Posts:** 1631

Just dropping a quick line as it's been a while since I've updated this thread. I've been very busy taking care of my son so haven't been able to play as much as I'd like but I can't complain about the time with my son as it's priceless and getting to watch him grow up is amazing!

The WSOP circuit event is in New Orleans and while I couldn't make the prelim events I decided to make the drive there and play in the $1600 main event. I made it through day 1 with 52,400 chips from my 20,000 starting stack. We'll be going back to 500-1000 blinds tomorrow with a 100 ante so I have some chips to work with. It seems the average will be about 40k chips so I'm slightly above average. It drew a great field of ~700 players, maybe more. Also got to meet AVP blogger and WSOP Circuit crusher miamicane today. Always nice to meet AVPers. Anyway, hoping for a little play good and run good tomorrow, but now it's time for sleep!

As always I'll be updating chip counts on the breaks on my twitter account @BentonBlakeman.

miamicane · **Posted:** Sat May 19, 2012 2:53 am

It was great to meet you today Benton! I was only able to bag up 50k today so looks like you are the AVP chipleader going into day 2. GLGL hopefully we both run deep!

pmajestyk · **Joined:** Thu Jul 30, 2009 9:54 am **Posts:** 89

GL bro and enjoy the city while there.

vookenmeister · **Posted:** Sat May 19, 2012 6:18 am

I want twitter feeds today! GL

ChkRaisePlz · **Posted:** Sat May 19, 2012 6:10 pm

GL to both

BentonBlakeman · **Joined:** Tue Jul 05, 2011 8:09 pm **Posts:** 1631

Unfortunately busted ~140th out of 700 paying 72. It was a great warm up for the series and a good confidence builder. I have no regrets with my play and can't wait til the series!

24fanatics · **Posted:** Mon May 21, 2012 4:02 pm

Hey Benton...you heading to Vegas anytime soon?

BentonBlakeman · **Joined:** Tue Jul 05, 2011 8:09 pm **Posts:** 1631

24fanatics wrote:

Hey Benton...you heading to Vegas anytime soon?

I have family obligations for the next fews weeks but I'll be there for the AVP event at the Mirage on the 23rd and will be staying til I get knocked out (or make the October 9!) of the main event. I'll also be playing six prelim events (two 1ks, two 1500s, and two 2500s) in the two weeks before the main. Can't wait to get out there!

BentonBlakeman · **Joined:** Tue Jul 05, 2011 8:09 pm **Posts:** 1631

Finally on the way to Vegas for the WSOP. Lets hope all my dreams come true! LOL. I'll do my best to give daily updates here both on cash games and tourneys in place of my strategy articles. With a busy schedule for the next few weeks I'm making no promises :-P

Hope to see you all and meet everyone at the meet & greet tomorrow at the Mirage.
UPDATE: Got an A group boarding pass and a window seat. Score! Haha. Now to temp fate and leave my phone on airplane mode during takeoff. Take that suckers! (Just kidding, I'm a wuss who follows rules)

BentonBlakeman · **Joined:** Tue Jul 05, 2011 8:09 pm **Posts:** 1631

Bentons WSOP Diary: Day 1- Friday June 22nd

I arrived in Vegas today and headed straight to one of my favorite and most comfortable rooms in town- the Wynn. I got stuck about $2500 pretty quickly by making some bluffs that didn't work out too well in the $5-$10 NL game. Later in the night they opened a $10-$20 Pot Limit Omaha game. While i know that NL is my specialty, I also feel very proficient at PLO and am starting to enjoy that game more and more. I noticed one very bad player sit down so I thought it was a good spot to be in for me. I bought in for $2000 and eventually cashed out $4660, meaning that I turned my $2500 losing night into a $160 winner. I would have kept playing as the game was great but I had to pick up a friend from the airport.

After picking him up we had a late night dinner at Bachi Burger on Windmill Rd. The burger was delicious. It's an Asian fusion burger joint that I highly recommend. After dinner we headed over to the Rio to see what the action there was like. I had already played 8 hours and was very tired so I had no intentions of playing. I sweated my friend Joe Tehan in the $2500 O/E event for a few hands which he promptly got scooped in both. As gamblers we are superstitious by nature so I quietly left the rail without saying goodbye and said a prayer to the poker gods to forgive me for being such a cooler to him. On the way out I told my friend that we should play a satellite because I "had a good feeling," LOL. Apparently my gut was right. We each played at separate tables in $125 single table satellites and both got heads up at our respective tables. With 10k chips in play I had 4900 and my opponent had 5100. The blinds were a monstrous 400-800 by that time so we decided just to chop the satellite and each take a $500 lammer. My buddy did the same at his table but he took the $500 lammer plus the $120 in cash. So overall we had a good night.
Day one - +$525. Not a bad start to the series.

Hope to see you all at the AVP meet and greet tomorrow at the Mirage!
Goodnight.

AVP Resident Pro Benton Blakeman's Blog

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