The Summer Wind - A WSOP Trip Report …… and beyond!

Don’t ask me why I chose the title of an old Sinatra song to be the title for this year’s trip report, i have no idea, it just felt right.

Let’s hope the wind is at our back and propels us to an epic summer.

Firstly, apologies for starting the thread so far in advance, but I have a good reason for doing so, which I’ll get to shortly.

Also apologies for this lengthy and text heavy first post.

Regular readers of my trip reports will know that I like to bet sports, most notably football, soccer and golf.

If you’re going to compare any of those with poker then I’d say golf is the most appropriate.

In golf it’s all about preparing for the majors. Players plan their schedule to try and peak for those 4 weeks every year.

There are different approaches, some players like to rest the week before a major, others will play the week before, or even the two weeks prior, but it’s all with the same end goal of trying to peak for major weeks to be able to slip into a green jacket or lift the claret jug.

In poker the WSOP is our major. Las Vegas in the summer is the center of the poker universe for 7 weeks with the best players from all over the world vying for the chance to win a coveted gold bracelet.

If I look back to last year my preparation going in was not to have played a tournament for over 5 years. Hardly ideal, and yet somehow I managed to have a deep run and make a final table along with some other cashes.

Contrast that to this year where everything I have done was with one eye on preparing for the WSOP.

My 4th place finish last year got my competitive juices flowing and spurred me on to keep playing tournaments throughout the year.

(Cue training montage music. War by Vince DiCola from Rocky IV would be my personal choice)

I made 3 trips to Hard Rock Hollywood, 1 trip to Borgata and 2 trips to Las Vegas, playing 52 tournaments in total against some tough competition and really got into the mixed games circuit and the players who inhabit it.

Aside from that I have also re-dedicated myself to studying the game, watching and reading pretty much all available mixed games content.

So now coming into this year’s WSOP I feel battle hardened and thoroughly prepared, having done everything possible to put myself into a position to succeed this summer.

My summer planning began (like a lot of others I imagine) when the full schedule was released in February.

As I’m not Daniel Negreanu and don’t have an unlimited budget, I started on the process of whittling down 7 weeks and 100 tournaments into something more manageable.

I had a schedule pencilled in, but then all the other venues started releasing their schedules which also included some very interesting mixed game tournaments so I had to go back to the drawing board.

As much as I might have liked to, there was just no way that I could do two months straight, so this is what I came up with:

A one week trip from May 20 - 27 to play the mixed tournaments at Wynn, then return home for my youngest son’s birthday on May 28 which is a Wednesday, so we’ll celebrate with a party on the Saturday. I’ll stay home another week and then return to Vegas on June 8, staying until July 14.

I would have finished the trip at the end of June had they not put the $3k TORSE so late in the schedule, but it’s one I really want to play.

So with my schedule sorted I then added up the total buy-ins of all the tournaments I wanted to play, and therein lies the reason for this early post. It was quite a lot! [emoji44]

So to reduce that cost a bit and cut down on variance I will be selling action. I will sell two packages, a small one just for the first trip, then a much bigger one for the main trip

I will be selling with mark up at 1.10 to reflect my expenses and positive expectation demonstrated over the past year. Looking to sell between 20% - 30% of each package.

The packages are as follows:

Wynn Warm-Up Package

5/21 $600 Mixed Triple Draw
5/22 $1,100 HORSE
5/23 $1,100 TORSE
5/24 $1,100 2-7
5/25 $1,100 Omaha 8
5/26 $1,100 Big O

Total Buy-Ins: $6,100
Provision for re-entries: $2,900
Total Package Cost: $9,000

1% = $99, 2% = $198, 5% = $495

WSOP Main Package

6/9 MGM $600 TORSE
6/10 Orleans $1,100 TORSE
6/11 WSOP #39 $1,500 HORSE
6/12 Orleans $600 HORSE
6/13 WSOP #43 $1,500 Razz
6/13 WSOP $1,100 Landmark Sat for $10k Big O
6/14 MGM $600 OE
6/15 WSOP #47 $2,500 OE
6/17 Aria $800 HORSE
6/17 WSOP $1,100 Landmark Sat for $10k HORSE
6/19 WSOP #56 $2,500 Mixed Triple Draw
6/21 WSOP #58 $3,000 Nine Game
6/22 Wynn $1,100 5-card PLO
6/23 WSOP #63 $1,500 Deuce to Seven
6/24 Orleans $600 O8
6/25 WSOP #69 $1,500 Stud 8
6/25 WSOP $1,100 Landmark Sat for $10k 2-7
6/26 Nugget $600 HORSE
6/27 WSOP #73 $1,500 Eight Game
6/29 WSOP $1,100 Landmark Sat for $10k Stud 8
6/30 Nugget $600 TORSE
7/1 Orleans $600 Eight Game
7/1 WSOP $1,100 Landmark Sat for $10k 8-game
7/2 Nugget $1,000 Eight Game
7/7 Venetian $1,100 PLO Bounty
7/8 WSOP #86 $1,000 PLO Mystery Bounty
7/9 Orleans $600 TOE
7/10 Wynn $1,000 TORSE
7/11 WSOP #93 $3,000 TORSE

Total Buy-Ins: $36,000
Provision for re-entries: $9,000
Total Package Cost: $45,000

1% = $495, 2% = $990, 5% = $2,475

If anyone does want to buy a piece please message me.

As a UK citizen with an ITIN number there will be no tax withholding on winnings.

Preferred payment options are bitcoin, PayPal (friends and family) or bank transfer.

The small print.

This is a high risk investment. You could lose some or all of your capital.
Past performance is no guarantee of future results.
I reserve the right to amend the tournament schedule at my sole discretion.
The funds for any listed tournaments that I do not enter will be added to the re-entry fund.
The re-entry fund will be used at my sole discretion for re-entries or to enter any events not listed above.
Any un-used entry fees (including mark-up) will be returned after the last event.
Returns will be paid out after the last event.

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