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Trip Report Second timer Vegas Trip Report 6/2-6/4 Date: 06/09/06 Player: xynxz For Rooms: Bellagio, Summary: Bellagio poker room over 2 days on June 2-4. Content: Day 1 6/2: For those who missed my first trip report (from 5/4-5/8 of this year) you can find it here: I had such a great time in vegas playing live poker for the first time ever, that I wanted to get back as soon as possible. So when I got home after the trip I booked a weekend trip for June 2-4. I couldn’t get anybody else to go with me so I went by myself this time. I left work on Friday the 2nd to fly out from Atlanta. With the 3 hour time difference I left at 5:21 and arrived at 6:30 from the four hour flight. I stepped out to get a cab at McCarran and this time the taxi line was half as long as the last time I was here so I only had to wait about 15 minutes in line. This was a blessing as the temperature was over 100 degrees every day I was in town. Hey, it’s not the heat, it’s the humidity, right? This time I wanted to stay at the cheapest place possible, since I would never be in my room except to sleep. The cheapest place I could find (that I felt would be a ‘decent’ hotel) was the Tropicana. Not bad, but certainly not great (and no feather pillows for those that hate the foam rubber pillows most hotels have). The problem on this trip was that due to some work issues and a late arriving plane into Atlanta on Monday evening I was severely sleep deprived going into the weekend and seriously considered staying home and going another time. I wanted to be able to enjoy the experience and also to play optimally, which I felt would be compromised by the sleep deficit. However, I decided to go anyway and see what happened. I deposited my bags at the trop and took a cab up to Bellagio to try my first experience in their poker room and my first experience at 4/8 (after exclusively playing 2/4 my first time and going away as a $355 winner last time). A couple of people responded to my last post suggesting that I should try higher limits so I decided on the Bellagio since so many have spoken highly of the room. It is a very nice room. However, what is up with a paper waiting list and no computer lists with screens? Other than that it seems to be the place to play in vegas. (I did try the Wynn room on Sunday morning and they had 3 tables going only one of which was a shorthanded 4/8 game. I went over to Bellagio and there were at least 15 games going and at least 2 were 4/8). I inquired at the desk about a 4/8 game and was told they were just opening a new table and I could sit down immediately…sweet! In my first session of 4/8 I played from 7:30 PM to 2:30 AM. The first hand I was dealt Jacks UTG and raised. Everybody, including the blinds, folded. Uh-oh…However, the table just needed to get going and within 20 minutes it was routine to see 4-6 people in every flop. The table played a little tighter than the 2/4 tables, but not much. After the Jacks win I went card dead for a couple of hours and was down about $50 after my $200 buy-in. I then got some good hands, played some nice drawing hands and ended up $192 for the night, a comeback from being down of $242! I was pleasantly surprised and I loved every minute of playing 4/8. The players at 4/8 did not seem that much better than the 2/4 players I had played with on the last trip, although most of them seemed to be more knowledgeable about the game. I was exhausted by 2:30 AM (sleep deprived and 5:30 AM Eastern time) and headed back to the trop for bed. I didn’t sleep well since I sleep with a feather pillow back home and when I was in vegas last time the luxor got me a feather pillow so I slept fine when I was there. However, I didn’t get much sleep my first night which helps explain what happened Saturday night. Details to follow tomorrow… Day 1 Totals: Up $192! Day 2 6/3 What a day. I woke up about 8 AM, although technically I barely slept during the night so waking up didn’t really occur. I was tired from the lack of sleep the week before and even more exhausted from the lack of sleep on Friday night. I got up and got going by having the breakfast buffet at the Trop. Kind of mediocre and not really any kind of a destination buffet, but at least I was fueled and ready to get going. I headed over to Mandalay Bay to see about the Super Satellite into the WPT event on Sunday. Now for some background: I had called MB the last couple of days to find out what the blind structure and timing was going to be for the $1000 super sat. I was first told it would be 3000 chips and 40 minute blinds. Next call I was told it would be 1500 and 15 minute blinds. Next call I was told first the 3000 chip/40 min blinds, then it was corrected to 10,000 chips 60 minute blinds. It was unbelievable! Not one f’ing person there had their sh!t together enough to provide a definitive response. When I referenced the previous responses the person would hem and haw, put me on hold, etc. So that’s why I walked over Saturday morning about 9:15 AM. And the same thing happened…I was given the same variety of responses. I then decided it just wasn’t worth sticking around to see if I could qualify. If they run their tourney with the same level of professionalism as they answer legitimate questions about blind structure and timing I didn’t want to be a part of it! On the other hand the attire of the MB cocktail waitresses was outstanding! I also ran into Amarillo Slim hanging around in the poker room and said “Hi”. He didn’t look like he wanted to engage in conversation so I left him alone. I remember seeing this guy on the Tonight Show years ago and although he’s aged, he still looked pretty good. I left MB and took a cab to Bellagio (already almost 100 degrees by then) for some poker before heading over the Caesar’s for their 2 PM tourney (the noon tourney moved to 2 PM because of some world poker open tournament thing that started at noon). I played from around 11 AM until 1:30 PM when I headed over to Caesar’s. No particular hands stood out, just good solid poker and a $117 profit at the 4/8 tables at Bellagio. Although many have said the Caesar’s tourney has a good structure that allows you to play (40 minute blinds starting at 25/50) I have to say it still is a crapshoot after the first break. The third level gets you to around an M of 20 or so if you have 6000 chips. By the 4th blind level your M drops to 10 and then it’s close to ‘all-in’ time. I busted out about half way through the tourney. I’m not sure if it’s sour grapes or what, but I just don’t seem to play well in the live tourney’s I’ve been in with 1 final table and 2 bust outs in the middle of the pack. I think I’ll just leave them alone in the future and stick to the ring games. It’s after 4 PM and I was really starting to feel tired so I grabbed a sandwich at the Bellagio café and headed back for some more poker. I played for a couple of hours and was up $33 when I just had to leave and head back to the Trop for a nap. I was so tired my gums were aching and I could barely keep my eyes open. I got back to the Trop about 7:30 on Saturday night and went to take a nap. Next thing I know I wake up at 4:30 AM! WTF! I’ve just missed some of the best, most lucrative poker time in my 48 hour stay. And yet I was still so tired I fell back to sleep for another couple of hours. Sleep is definitely –EV in Vegas! Day 2 Totals: Up $150! Trip Total: Up $342 Day 3 June 4 I got up and went to the Wynn since I had heard about their poker room and how nice it was. However, when I got there they only had about 3 games going and the 4/8 game was full with one ahead of me on the waiting list so I went to play some video poker. I had been told by a friend to play some video poker since he has won money on it almost every time he’s gone to Vegas. (Before going to Vegas I had read a book on perfect strategy and brought some strategy cards. I had also subscribed to the video poker yahoo newsgroup for locations of the most +EV machines and there were some 100%+ machines at the Wynn, which I found and played). However, I ended up putting $160 in a quarter machine over an hour and a half and lost the entire $160. Never again! Stick with what I know and that appears to be poker, not video poker! I did, however, get their “Red Card” and if you give them your email address they give you a $10 credit. I used that at their buffet to get it for $15.95. Wow! Best buffet I’ve ever seen or eaten. The quality of the food was outstanding with carving stations for beef, omelet stations, Asian cooking stations, sushi, and some pretty outstanding desserts, just about anything you could want to eat. I would recommend this buffet to anyone. After the buffet I went back to the poker room (around 10:45 AM by this time) and they still only had 3-4 games going and the 4/8 was shorthanded (looked like 4-5 players). I decided I would head back to Bellagio for my last day of poker. I sat down at 11:00 AM at a new table that was just starting up and at the same time Wynn had 3-4 tables going Bellagio had 12-15 tables going and 2-3 of them were 4/8. I started out not doing to well. Up to this session I had strung together ten winning sessions in a row and only one loss (my first session at live poker in May). I bought in for $200 and steadily lost $100 the first few hours. Nothing fantastic, but a couple of second best hands and mostly card dead with nothing to play so $6 down in blinds each orbit with at least 3 orbits an hour means an $18/hour loss that begins to add up with a couple of losing hands. An interesting dynamic then occurred at the table around 1:30 PM or so. A maniac sat down in third position (I was seated directly across from him in 8th position). This guy played in over 80% of the hands. That is, he would bet in to see the flop and frequently go to the river (and would fold on occasion at the river to a bet). Often he raised and less frequently he would limp in. When he would go all the way to the show down he would often win with the worst hands that should never be played. An example was winning with a pair of Kings. Maniac was UTG + 1 and open raised. When he showed the hand down and won he had K 2 offsuit! This maniac open raised with K 2 offsuit UTG + 1. He just kept putting pressure on the table with his raising and playing in almost every hand and I had not seen this type of play at either 2/4 (which I played last time in Vegas a month ago) nor at any of the 4/8 tables prior to this one. In fact, I was playing in between two guys who were way more experienced than I was (both are frequent players and sometimes at higher limits) who also were expressing their amazement at what was going on and consternation at his continued success in bullying the table and winning with substandard opening hands out of position. This went on for over three hours and try as I might I was getting a little frustrated. From 11-4:30 I didn’t win any hands and only got involved in about 7 or 8 hands. After losing $100 and buying $100 more, I did it again and by about 4:30 or so I was down $350 (44 BB’s) which left me just about even for the trip. I turned to my more experienced neighbor (the other one had left hours earlier due to his frustration) and said that I was going to stay for one more orbit and then leave for the MGM if I didn’t win at least one hand (since my backpack was at the Trop I could just walk across the street to get it and then go from there to the airport to catch my plane at 10:30). In middle position I was dealt JQ hearts and limped in with 6 people to see the flop. Ace, 7 hearts and a blank on the flop. I check next guy bets and 4 callers for the turn. Turn is a 10 clubs giving me the 2nd nut flush draw and an inside straight draw. Another round of betting ensues and I stay along for the ride as the pot is now around $90 (over 11 BB’s) so it’s a no brainer as far as pot odds goes. River is a 2 of hearts! I’ve now got the second nut flush and there are no pairs on the board. I believe I’ve got the best hand at this point and since I was UTG and the blinds had folded I bet out (maybe I should have checked for the check raise, but the heart was a scare card and I didn’t want to miss any bets). A couple of people called, including the maniac. I show the JQ hearts and the maniac literally throws his cards (unrevealed) onto the table and was he pissed off. So I finally held my ground against the maniac, got up over $150 and began to feel like I could get back some of the money I’d lost during the session. Returning to the maniac, he looked very angry and he even said something like “I knew I had the best hand.” He then got a couple of racks and started stacking his chips to leave the table. Amazing! I put the beat down on this guy and he starts pissing and moaning and is getting ready to leave the table. He’s still at the table finishing up racking his chips when he doesn’t ask to be dealt out of the big blind and the dealer deals him in. Mr. Maniac gets all pissed off again and says he was leaving why did the dealer deal him in. Dealer says Mr. Maniac never asked to be dealt out so he was going to have to post his blind. Ahhh…a nice touch to the end of Mr. Maniac. Within about 10 minutes of Mr. Maniac leaving the table the atmosphere and texture of the table had changed from tight, quiet and apprehensive to more open, relaxed and 5-7 people in the pot (in fact we had one hand with everyone limping in for a 10 handed flop!). However, I was still running fairly card dead and was back down to around $100 (down $300) about an hour later and I said to myself if I don’t win a hand this orbit before 6:00 PM I’ll head over to the MGM. You guessed it, I won another hand, nothing big but a pot of around $60 or so and I stayed to see some more hands. Around this time a couple of guys who had just flown in from England sat down at the table and began to play. It was 3 AM body clock time to them and they had just flown 10 hours and had a 2 hour delay in customs, but they came to GAMBOOL! These two guys dumped over $200 in the next couple of hours. I got to talking to one of them and he said that poker had really taken off in England about 10 years ago and the players over there were much more knowledgeable than over in America so they come over to America to play against the easier competition. Interesting. Anyone else heard anything like this? Then again, he was playing 4/8 . From around 5:45 to 8:15 I got my stack up to around $230-$240 and decided this would be my last orbit as I had to get back to the Trop for my bag and get to the airport for my flight. I got nothing until my last hand when I was dealt A-10 spades UTG. I open raised and got 5 callers. Flop comes up Q clubs, 10 hearts and 2 spades giving me 2nd pair, 5 outs to either two pair or three of a kind and runner runner straight or flush draws, worth about 2 outs each. I check, flop gets bet, no raises so I stay in to see the turn. Turn is a J spades giving me an inside straight draw (4 outs) four to a flush (9 outs) and the original 5 outs from before for 18 outs. I check (maybe should have bet or check raised) and call the turn when it gets bet. River is the 9 spades :grin:. Sweet! The nut flush and the board hasn’t paired so it’s now just a matter of how many bets I can get. I bet out and get a couple of callers and take down the final pot of over $100 for my 48 hours in Vegas. Final result for Sunday is $400 of buy-ins, down to $50 at one point and leave Bellagio poker room with $310. From 5-8:30 I won $260 to bring my loss for the day to $90 and the overall trip total to $252 won. As much as I enjoyed winning the money in my earlier sessions I really enjoyed the challenge of coming back from $50 on Sunday and felt like I had learned a little more about dealing with adversity at the tables. I played for 9 ½ hours straight with no food breaks (a personal best for longest time playing for me) and felt like I really learned some things about poker and myself. My question to all you 2+2’ers is how do you deal with a maniac like the kind who was at the table? Do you tighten up and take your shot? Do you move tables to get away from him? What’s the right play? I know it didn’t help that I was card dead during the time he was there so I know that I don’t have the best understanding because I never had premium hands to go up against the guy. Any help/advice would be most welcome. Day 3 Totals: Down $90 Trip Total: Up $252 Final observations: I really enjoyed my quick trip to Vegas. However, I learned that I really need to get my sleep in and be well rested before I go (and to bring my own pillow). I’m sure I missed out on some money making opportunities by sleeping through Saturday night in Vegas! I loved the Bellagio poker room, great opportunities to play, lots of games at different levels, pretty good cocktail service (although definitely very mediocre looking servers, except for Francesca…Yow!), and a willingness to start new games up as soon as they had enough people. I will definitely be heading back to Bellagio for poker. Any other suggestions for a great experience at 4/8 or 5/10 besides Bellagio? Looks like I will be back in August with the wife and in October with my buddy so any assistance on other places to play would be welcome. In the meantime thanks to all who have posted here and helped me build a profitable poker game since I began reading here 2 ½ years ago. I know I’m a better player because of all that I’ve read and learned here! |
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