Bruised but not battered by Vegas.

On paper October has been the worst month of the year for me so far, but seeing as I,ve just been to Vegas paid for by winnings, I,m not losing too much sleep about it!

Vegas was a blast - as ever - results were pretty crap overall. I managed a couple of cashes at the Aria, but nothing too meaty. I chopped one tournament at The Golden Nugget as well to keep losses in check and I impressed myself by managing to have the discipline to avoid playing cash for the full week. I find that with all the free beer and whisky on offer at the Casino's that when the tournament enters the later phases I tend to be a bit less on the ball than I might be and I find that the locals pick off any mistakes pretty ruthlessly.

Its probably my favorite week of the year, but is pretty full on, making the move from playing a couple of times a week to all day every day for a week, I struggle to keep the focus abit.

 

Aberdeen

Another first for me was playing at the G Casino in Aberdeen. The G casino,s must have a bit of money behind them, as they are pretty amazing. The last time I played at one was in Dundee a few years ago and the places are pretty glitzy with light shows going on in the roof and the like. The casino is pretty cool and its got a decent card room with about 10 tables. Only real gripe is the plastic chips! When your used to proper heavy chips, the plastic ones feel so cheap. They,ve spent so much money on the place, it seems like a crazy economy its not like decent chips are that expensive.

I,ve not been in Aberdeen for a few years and could not believe how wealthy this place seems. From the cars people are driving, to the shops and to the houses you can see this is a seriously rich city. As long as the oil keeps flowing from the North Sea, I guess this will be the case.

I was only there for a day so the game that was on was a "free" entry (£3) With 2x £15 add ons. Wasn,t a bad turnout for a mid week tourny with about 50 runners.  It was a bit of a minefield game. Two guys at the table in particular, weren,t interested in grinding out a result and were going all in blind, calling blind, raising blind etc but fortunately we managed to lose them after a while. The game was a bit turbo in structure but I managed to avoid any coolers and somehow ended up in the last 3. At about 3 in the morning with the blinds and antes absolutely huge, I was quite happy to take a 3 way chop for about £350. So the month ends as 3 figure loss rather than 4!!

Fontainebleau - The great blue elephant.

The picture does't really do the size of this place justice. I was interested in seeing this place after seeing a documentary about it a year or so ago. 

This 68 story high hotel casino had 2.9 billion dollars spent on it before the bank pulled the plug and its now derelict.

Its the 2nd highest building in Vegas, and would have had a cool 4000 rooms. Its reckoned another $1.5 billion is needed to finish it. It may well never be finished as alot of the interior finishings bought for it have already been sold off to another casino who was having a refit.

It did strike me as a bit of a gamble building something that size at that end of the strip, as the north end of the strip struggles to get the tourists away from the lure of the south end with the Bellagio fountains, The Mirage, Paris,  Venetian etc. If you walk up the Strip, the Wynn and the Encore are like the sort of cut off of the modern bit and it gets more rundown the further up you go.

I read alot about Vegas being on its arse, but theres not much sign of it at the south end of the strip - Bills Gamblin Hall is being demolished and rebuilt, the Imperial Palace has been replaced by the quad, and the New York and Monte Carlo casino's undergoing upgrades.

Long day

I was playing a home game last night which finished at about 4am, then had to get up at 6 to catch vegas flight. 11hrs later and I,m here. i did think I might wilt a bit after entering the $125 game at 7 at the Aria, but I needn,t have worried about a late night. Of the 77 that entered I went out in 70th..after an hour and a half..

it was all pretty quiet to start with and then it all went wrong. I limped on the button with q8 along with 3 other players. 

Flop came down KJ9. 

It got checked round. Turm card comes a 10. Loose italian guy who is first to act fires 700 at the 1500 pot. 

i reraise him to 2100. He eventually shoves alll, and he,s got me covered. i call and he turns over pocket tens for a set.

River pairs the king, and I,m out.

not so good!

Vegas bound shortly and Sep results

I finally managed to cash again...not a massive one for £130, but at least it puts a stop to the form slide. I made a loss for September, which isn,t too disappointing.., as it breaks my win lose win lose cycle I have been on all year, and as I,ll be in Vegas in one weeks time that means I,m going to win big!!....hmmm. Aria here I come.

Sliding downhill rapidly.

I on a pretty wretched run just now. I,ve not been playing that much as work has been pretty full on, but results from tournaments I have entered are poor.

Last night at the £40 tournament I had I built my stack steadily for 2 or 3 hours and lost the lot in one v the table nutter. 

I,d raised with AJ flop came down j 7 3. I c bet, he raised me and with out too much ado I shoved my stack in. He,d been pulling the reraise move all night and did a similar move on me earlier (with pocket 4,s).

He instacalled and showed his pocket 7,s. No miracle arrived and I,m toast.

Then I dipped into the cash game for a few hours and managed to lose a £100 buy in after blowing most of it with AK on a king high board v a guy who turned a straight.

Not great preparation for Vegas next month but  the month ain,t over yet I guess..

August results - a month to forget

August has been the worst month of the year for me so far with a cool £444 loss for the month.

8 tournaments played, zero cashes.

I,m not panicking at this stage as half of this is due to the one larger buy in tournament I entered at £240. I was on the wrong end of a cooler in this one and sometimes you,ve just got to take it on the chin in cards. I,ve been reasonably happy with how I,ve been playing. and I have had a few deep runs in the month.

The year continues with the profit loss profit loss cycle, which worryingly means that if the year continues like this, my next losing month will be october when I,m in Vegas..

Still, on the plus side, I did best a field of ten at a very drunken homegame last night to put the brakes  on my form slide.

Birmingham Roadtrip

I was looking forward to this roadtrip for a while. I had to go to London on the Sunday night so the Broadway casino in Birmingham seemed like a good staging point for the Fri and Sat night.

The Broadway has been my lucky casino and a bit like a bank machine for me over the last few years, so I was hoping to boost this months figures a bit and have a decent drinking session with some buddies at the same time!

Birmingham Broadway Cardroom