Another Day in the Office - Part 8

By Neil Channing - June 2005

Having decided against the $5000 PLH I was free to do a lot of sleeping and swimming. I played the daily $540 Bellagio Tournament (2000 chips, start 25,25, 40min rounds, 100 runners) and waited until 20 left before making a total mess of it. I also had a walk on the strip which got me to thinking. Why do the Mexicans hand out cards for hookers to 60 yr old couples? More pertinantly, why do the 60 yr olds take them? Are they so naieve that they think they're getting a coupon for a free buffet? Is it that they're thinking:

"Why don't we get an 18 yr old stripper direct to our room dear? It'll be a nice change from Keno."

There's one guy I keep seeing at the smaller events around town who is a great candidate for The Camel to hate. One thing that really gets Keith's goat is people who make money out of poker by other means than playing it. I first sat next to this guy in one of the late night tournaments and he certainly had the look of a South California Pro Poker Player. He also had the arrogance and the superiority complex. Just for my amusement, I asked him if he was a pro (mentally I'd bet 1/100), and he told me he was a poker coach. It didn't take much cross-examination before the whole business model was revealed. Basically he gets customers via his web site and they pay $30 to take part in a multi-way conference call while he plays an online sit 'n' go and explains what he's doing. If they're not satisfied that they learned something he gives them another one free. From that he gets new clients to receive extra tuition for which he charges by the hour. Money for old rope. I must have
seen him ten times now and he's never been within a hundred people of a final table. He also now thinks I'm his mate. Marvellous.

Can't remember much about Tuesday's 2nd Chance Tournament but my records show (225), and also that I played three one table sats, so it can't have lasted long.

The third one was purely down to Carlo. It was quite late and I was off to bed when he begged me to help start up a $525 1ts. I raised on the first hand with 4s7s and flopped 10high, all spades. Carlo moved in with JdJs(he was ever so pleased) and I never looked back. Went to bed slightly later and with an extra $5k including last longer bets.

Wednesday I never even made it to The Rio. I had already tried a couple of tournaments at The Palms and thought they looked pretty good. They are so popular there now that they're holding FOUR tournaments a day. The 3pm was being won by Dennis O'Mahoney (to go with the $60 odd grand he won in the cash game the day before) when I arrived. That got 60 runners and was a $300 freezeout. There had also been a noon tournament, and I was playing the $230 7pm competition (one $200 rebuy, 30min clock, 160 runners). At 10pm 100 people played their $125 freezeout. It seems you can't have too many poker tournaments in this town, although one guy told me he won the Golden Nuggett tournament the other day beating 14 runners (who managed 9 rebuys for $100).

Everything went smoothly for me including not managing to swap a % with Roy "The Boy". (He had loads more than me when I first saw him and then I massively leapfrogged him). There was one hand when we were down to 18 when I played K6 spades against the 2nd chip leaders A8 spades. After a flop of 10,9,2 all spades things looked a bit tricky but I still went to the final with plenty. The other two didn't really understand the finer points of dealmaking...or maths...and I walked away with $10,700.

Neil Channing is sponsored by Betusa.com  

Click here for part 9