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[hurleyp]

I had my first trip to Vegas last week and it was even crazier, bigger and more plastic than I imagined. I loved it.
My trip was for work so each day we were basically booked up from 9 until 5 and then out to dinner in the evening, so I had to squeeze in some poker around this.
Nevertheless I managed to have a few games as follows:

Monday 4pm Luxor tournament.

I'm not a cash player and I didn't want to play any cash games there (something I stuck to), so I was on the lookout for some decent sit n gos and tourneys. As you can imagine, sit n gos don't make the casinos any real money and when I turned up to my first tourney I was less than ecstatic to find we got 400 chips (count em) and blinds beginning at 25/50 and going up every 15 mins. Go figure. It was an all-in fest and I did well to finish 14/32, well out of the money, with my A 10 losing out to the big blind's AQ. I vowed never to play at the Luxor again.

Monday 6pm Mandalay Bay evening tourney

Onwards and upwards, and a decent structure. 600 chips to start but blinds began at a reasonable 10/20 and changed every 20 mins so plenty of time to play some proper poker here. A lovely card room too with friendly dealers. I adopted some SLT power tactics and only played big hands for the first hour: it worked, and not only did I get to the final table but I also cashed in fourth place when my KK was beaten by 45 (yes he pulled two fours).

Tuesday 6pm Mandalay Bay 6 pm tournament

Second day at this tourney and a similar result: 4th out of 32 and in the money again. Heck even an old-timer shared a joke with me. I felt quite comfy here, and reckon that any of us would have adapted to it. I think I paid $65 for this 6pm slot with $10 going to the house/dealer.

Tuesday 9pm Mirage $50 sit n go
I decided to go for a wander on my one night off. Checked out the Ballagio and Caesars Palace (both had beautiful card rooms) but alas no tourney or sit n go action. But the Mirage was also classy and did have sit n gos. Unfortunately I got 400 chips for my $50 with blinds again starting at 25/50. Somehow I survivied until 4th (by not playing any hands), but I didn't like the structure (too mean), the casino (tables too close together) or the dealers (assholes).

Tuesday midnight Luxor $50 sit n go
I broke my promise never to play at the Luxor again after some cajoling from some colleagues who were way more drunk than me. I sensed some easy money, but forgot the golden rule: never play with someone who really doesn't know what they are doing. Just missed the money though coming 3rd when my QQ was taken down by A7.

Wednesday 6pm Mandalay Bay evening tourney
Back on home ground and soon sped through to another final table (not that hard with only 23 entrants). I decided to up the ante a bit in the final part of this match,but lady luck was against me when a loud frenchman drew a straight on the river to beat my set of threes. I was out in 7th - if he hadn't rivered me I would have been chip leader or thereabouts.

That was it. Short but sweet. Even though I made a loss overall I was pleased to cash twice in the bigger tourneys. I was also interested to see a poor level of play in the first 30 mins or so of each tourney: people do literally join in just so they can say they had a hand of poker in Vegas. Lots of people playing A-anything as if it were gold dust. And true the torneys could have had more entrants, but my schedule didn't allow me to enter them as the larger fields were later in the evening. The sit n gos were a waste of time though. But overall I am enthused more than ever about playing, and would love to go back and have more time to play.

[Maria B]

That is all really interesting stuff Paul and congratulations on cashing out twice.

I have to get there this year...fingers crossed.

M

[m4rkie]

For some reason I thought you'd been there before...

Well, i guess the casinos need to churn out the SnG's so they make some kind of money, hence a crapshoot.. but the Mandalay games sounded good.

Anyway that mite be a next holiday tho Matt isn't very keen!