Yesterday continued to be bad beat city for us. Most dramtatic, Katja survived in the Limit Holdem $1500 event until level 7 when she found aces (3 betting preflop 3-ways), flopped an ace int the AJ6 rainbow flop and the flop got capped 2-ways. Turn brought a blank, lots of bettings, Katja finally went all-in. Pot-size was about 7,800, more than average stack at that time, showdown: Katja AA for set of aces, opponent KTo for a pair of tens. River Q, gutshot straight for opponent!

My own experience in the same event was even worse, I survived only about 2 hours. When I had AA in the very hand of the event when only three players were already seated I knew right away that this was going to be odd - and I was right. I won't go into the dirty details but I got 5 (!) real bad beats and finally went all-in with AKo (7 callers lol). Flop QJ5, one player was betting (no sidepot!) the flop, 4 folded, he bets the turn (2c), all other fold! When he said "you are in great shape" as he holds "only air" before the showdown I started to feel I have a chance. He showed 98 suited (lol) for no pair, gutshot straight draw. River sealed my fate with the 9 and he dragged the 1550 chips pot (1500 starting chips, 100/200 level, so that would have brought me back into the game). No comments.

I played a $225 satellite a little later. With 4 players left I had the co-chiplead when I found the AK of diamonds and raised, one caller, the other chipleader. Flop JT6 with two diamonds. He bets into me (small, 300, into a 800 pot) and I re-raise him all-in (in fact we have been dead even in chips). He calle d me in second, showing Q6o. No help for me and the sat was over. I played a $525 satellite a little later but lost to two button steals (my AJs vs QTo and my KJo vs 64s) with only 3 players left and was out there also.

It was late and Katja got tired so we drove away, Katja back to the room (she plays the NLHE 6-max $2500 today) and I went to the Wynn to play some cash games. Twelve hours later I came back to the hotel room to watch the Germany vs. Argentina match. Broke for the night. The grilled my there. Not that I was helpless or anything, I just could not get my good hands stand up. 5 times KK, lost (100%). Three times AA, all lost (100%). Flopped sets? Lost 8 (!) and won 1 (small pot). Some straights and flushes but most of them went down in flames. One those those days. The night was actually lots of fun as I was playing with Ben Lamb, who just cashed 25k getting 12th in the $1500 pot-limit event. He putted all his winning on the table and got drunk after some hours and the action got fast and furious soon. Ben just won the first place in the Scotty Nguyen Poker Challange II $1000 event so he was feeling like king of the world. My guess is he lost to the tune of $4000 there... not that I got anything from it, the only hand I could make against him was a flopped straight but he had a set of queens and rivered another queen so he got some relief from me. Anyway, I liked the guy, he was funny and he knew how to play, just over-tired and drunk.

Sebastian sent me this link, enjoy!

Today we are short on time (Event #4 $1500 Limit Holdem begins in two hours which we both play) so I post just a short update now although there are many stories to tell. Overall it was the first (and last Grrrrrrrrr!) day where nothing went our way.

We both dropped out of the $1500 pot-limit event #3 in level 5 after two breaks. It was just not meant to be, the one time I had aces everybody folded to my big blind and when I found KK in early position in level 5 I had to lay it down on a AQx flop when my opponent re-raised me all-in (when I showed my kings before folding he showed QQ, outch). I was ultra-short on chips and got impatient then and shoved with KT (a "quality" holding for many other players there worth a re-raise lol) but got called by AQ and lost. Katja lost her chips with AJ and A on the flop when opponent called with 55 and turned a 5 (money in on flop).

Afterwards I played a $175 satellite to "steam" off and got the 2:1 chip lead with 5 players left. Then I lost 99 to A4 (he shoved in the SB and I called in the BB), the next hand I went all-in on the SB with AQs but BB called with 88, A in flop but 8 on turn and he doubled up. Then I limped with K9 of diamonds, flop came K high with two diamonds, one player bets, I come over the top but he calls for all his chips with AQ. Turn J, river T (no diamond), giving him a straigbht. Now I am finally short-stacked and move all-in with 66 but no chance - JTo gets there and I am out in 5th position, oh wow.

Over to the Bellagio but the waiting list for 30/60 is 70 (!)players long so I go to the Mirage to play some 20/40. There they take $1500 from me in no time (I won only one "pot" when the SB folded and throwed his chips over with the remark "donation"). The highlight was flopping the nut flush, in no way slowplaying it and losing it on an unpaired board to the river-gutshot straight flush. Ahhh, and losing KK in the BB to the preflop 4-betting opponent holding J7 was not fun either.... he raised, I re-raised in the BB and he made it 4 bets. I just called to raise later. Flop comes three small hearts, I have the K of hearts. No help somewhere (I only called turn and river fearing AA with Ah) after the flop was capped.

Then, over to the Wynn, nice poker room, seat in the 30/60. Lots of action, wiiiild players. I lost there also to the tune of $1400. ,ostly thankfull to one giant $2500 pot when I lost set-over-set full-house with flush and straight on board (4 players!). Board was K96-5-5, one had flush, one straight, one 99 and I had 66. Me met a few people there and it was a nice evening (except losing of course).

Now we leave to the Rio, better luck today!

Our first participation in this years WSOP started with a cannonball - when we arrived at 9 AM to buy me into the days $1500 NLHE event #2 starting at noon we got informed that the event is sold out! Sold out??? What the hell.... I could'nt believe it! I walked down the hall, steaming. Ok, deep breath. Katja was suposed to play the event, Pokerstars already bought her in, did'nt they? So, we went to the "Will Call" counter and asked to pick up her receipt. Picture ID needed! Picture ID? Katja had none on her (she thought registering with her passport the day before was good enough). Ok, so Katja went back to the hotel to pick up her ID and I went to the satellite area.

When Katja was gone I went to the emtpy cashier area and tried to buyme in, regardless of what they said at the entrance. The very kind cashier man informed me that the event is sold out and we talked a few minutes. He told me that the event is sold out since the day before, 6 PM. Incredible. They not only sold 2200 tickets, the also sold the absolute maximum number of alternates (players that only start to play when annother player has already busted out) of about 500 for the daily maximum of 2,750 players! What a start into this years WSOP.

Then I went to the satellite area and played a $225 satellite. At first I was doing well when I picked AQs under the gun, made it 500 to go (big blind 150) and got called by the button who had about the same chips like me. Flop came A45 rainbow and made a pot-sized bet. Button re-raised all-in and I called. I showed my hand, he nodded and said "draw". Draw??? He showed 63s. Wow. Before I could really get shocked by his play the dealer turned a 2 and he made his straight. The river brought another -meaningless- ace and I was done. They announced the last satellite of the day I I jumped into it, taking the last seat ($175 for 3 lamers).

A chip and a chair

Again I was doing well at first, being to the left of a maniac. When we were down to only 3 players I had about the same chips as the maniac. With blinds at 400/800 the button folded, the maniac in the SB went-all in and I called with KK. He showed A2o. Ace on the flop, no king. When the chips were counted it turned out that I had one 100 chip more than he and it was my small blind now (400). Somehow I won the next 3 hands and had about 1500 chips again. The satellite manager came over and said that they need to clear the area and that the limits now go up every hand. Right in the next hand the button called my BB and the manic - annocuned all-in! The guy on the button was very upset but made the call holding TT. Maniac had something like K3. So two players all-in, me holding 68o. Flop came K54, turn J, river 7 gving me a straigt. The guy with TT lost and so we were heads up and I had about one third of all the chips out of nowhere. I proposed a deal to him, giving me one 500 chip and him two, splitting the cash. He agreed. So, I showed a profit of $140 from my two satellites :)

Meanwhile Katja arrived and I saw on her face that something was not ok. Yes, when she tried to pick up her receipt for the days event none was there. Something went wrong. Sharon from Pokerstars was on her way but we already knew that there was no real chance to do something as the event was sold out to the maximum. So both Katja and I were at the Pokerstars booth when the event started, joined by Vanessa Rousso and online poker pro "Twin Caracas" (both very nice people). Both had the same problem, something went wrong with the buyin. Finally, Sharon arrived. I wont go into details here but they were just small processing problems. Sharon apologized and offered to buy Vanessa and Katja into all events they planned to play. Well, nobody needs to say this two times to us and we went straight to the cashier. About an hour later all was done, Katja holding her paid entries to a lot of events now personally.

We went o the Forum Shoppes after that, searching for some nice clothes were Pokerstars can put thir logo on (Katja was looking for "Juicy Cotoure" or something like that). Wow shopping can be a pest! We got very nice japanese food in the Shushi restaurant there. Hours later we arrived at the Mirage where I jumped into a 20/40 game, winning >$700 in 30 minutes. Back to the room, taking a nap of about 2 hours.

Back to the Rio's, playing some satellites again. Katja played 3 satellites of $175 each but had no chance. I played two for $325 each. Good hands got cracked so I was out in 4th and 3rd position, winning nothing. I then had enough and tried the cash games at the Rio, joining a 20/40 game. First I was down about 500 when I lost a set (66 on a KJ6-A-3 board, opponent had AA) but quickly got on a rush, winning 5 biiiiig pots in row. I quited a +$1300 winning session (which just covered the satellite costs).

We went to look at the days tournament, 170 players left including our friend Casey Kastle (all in the money). Greg Raymer was sitting on what looked like a big stack. Final standings for the day here.

Yesterday we had big plans for extended action both in terms of live play and WSOP satellites. We went to the Wynn buffet for a nice lunch. This buffet is by far the best in town in my opinion. The location awfull nice, the selection is great, the quality above all questions and the service is perfect. The price? The lunch buffet is $19 per person (+tax). Decide yourself! Afterwards we browsed some more shoppes at the Wynn and in the Fashion Show Mall before going back to the room. Our plan was to sleep for 2-3 hours, go the Rio's, play some satellites and then split-up: me going to the cash games and Katja going to sleep early.

Well, the first time we woke up was about 10 PM and we looked at each other, shrugging shoulders and were like "what the hell" and laughing. The next thing I know it is 4 AM (the next day!) and we both wake up slowly. We slept >12 hours and missed all the action! Wow! And that, most remarkably, although our bankroll is still intact. That just never happened before. I mean, extended sleeping over periods of 16+ hours have happened before but at all times we have been broke to the bone when that happened with days (in 1-2 cases even weeks :) before our scheduled flight home was going. It is either we are getting old or Vegas is getting old to us, both ways being no problem, just very surprising. In my first years or regular Vegas visits I have barely slept at all during the first week, I remember a time when I fall asleep on the poker table crashing my chip stack with my forehead after over 3 days of non-stop play. When I finally went to bed after that happened I said to Katja “call me if anything, I take a nap”. About two hours (!) later she called me “come down, come down, she action is just so good!” and – I went down (losing my ass there lol).

We took a early 5 AM breakfast in the coffee shop (just salad for me, omg, what’s happending here???) and now Katja is preparing herself for the tournament with some old guy named “Harrington” (re-reading his very good book “Harrington on Holdem, Part I”). I guess I will go over to the Rio right now and start playing satellites there to get in no-limit shape – after that wild limit holdem night that maybe usefull and necessary.

Wow, action at the WSOP has started big time already! But step-by-step through the last day, otherwise I have no chance to follow what has happened when, things already start to blur vegas-style, it's all poker, cards, money, people, no days, nights, left, right, everything gets relative here. It's even hard to tell the day of the week and we have to calculate using WSOP events as markers already ("first event for Katja is #2, which happens on Tuesday so must be Monday today"). Let me try to remember how the last 24 hours went: after I posted the last update to this blog we went over to the Mirage poker room, I was stuck from the time-period before (I reject to say "night" or "day" here) so hungry to recup. They were just opening a brand new 20/40 game and I recognized 4 locals which I have seen playing there over the course of the last years and 2-3 tourists, one of them I spotted right away as a very dangerous young internet player.

While I played Katja went to do some shopping. I had a good start in the game, being up about 900 in the first hour. When Katja came back the played a $70 sng to start get into the action. After running into KK in the BB in the late stages she busted in 4th place. Meanwhile I had some up's and down's and when Katja told me she would go back to the room I decided to go with her and quit a $700 winning session.

Back in the room it was about 3:30 PM and we decided to go to the Rio's at about 6. So we relexed and sleept for about two hours and then took a taxi to the Rio's. Arriving there exitment grew as we registered ourselves (some kind of waiting line already!). Then, going into the Amazon ballroom for the first time this year I almost feel out of my shoes: the room was full already, humming and buzzing! At least 40 cash games tables were going, som kind of "Tournament of champions" was held (I saw Daniel Negrenau and Chris Fergusen thru the last viewing crowd) and about 30-40 satelllite tables were going! We had some time left until our scheduled meeting with the Pokerstars stuff so we decided to play a satellite. Standing in line we met long time buddy Ron Rose who in turn talked me into playing a $325 satellite instead of the planned $175... only fair as I busted him a little later ;) Katja entered the $175 and got a very nice 2nd place, winning one $500 buyin-chip after they decided on a saver being heads-up when she had the slight lead. In my satellite I got an early present when I found ten's in the small blind with 3 limpers. I made it 300 to go, getting one caller. Hmmm. The flop was a harmless 834 rainbow I made a 500 bet - he called in a split-second! Hmmm Hmmm. The turn was a beautyfull ten, giving me a set. I throwed my last chips into the pot (about 300 only) and again he called without any hesitation. I showed my set and expected to see slowplayed AA but the called me for all his chips in this spot with AJo !!! Unbelivable. Anyway, I used those chips to get me into the chip lead when only 3 players were left (busting Ron with AQs vs JJ on the way). Then I missed a hand and got down to average chips - when the smallest stack doubled up also we were dead even in chips I suggested to just split the price money ($3000 in buyin chips and $120 in cash). Both agreed and so I won some buyin chips also, Katja's and my result combined gave us 3 lammers for $500 each from a $500 cash investement, +$1000, very nice.

We called the Pokerstars people but they were stuck at the Mirage so we suggested that we go over there to make things easier. We grabbed a cab and only 10 minutes later I was again sitting in that 20/40 game. We took a break when Pokerstars Sharon Goldman, Vice President of Marketing Dan Goldman and Director of Communications Nolan Dalla appeared and had a brief meeting with them about some details in the endorsement deal. Everything went as perfect as possible, these pokerstars guys are realy pro's and have their homework done. A real pleasure to deal with them (not like some others we have dealt with in the recent past...). After they left we went to the new "Stacked" steak house at the Mirage (don't go, poor foot by vegas standards). Leaving there at about 11 PM Katja went back to the room and I took my seat back in the 20/40 game.

First I got ahead about $500 in that game and was already about to leave when some guy started to beat me in every hand. It was really ridicioulous. He cracked my aces with AJo, my straights with backdoor flushes, my flopped seats with runner runner better boats and so on and on and on. When another super-wild aggressive player joined the game I was already stuck about 1k and this only got worse up to the point where I was $1700 behind, still playing "normal" and patient. Being stuck and a little frustrated I decided to fight fire with fire and announced to the table that they should fasten seat bealts now as my online nickname is "50outs" and I would start to play back now (raised eyebrowes from the indeed good and dangerous internet player). And playing back I did! From that point on the game was really on, every street in every pot was capped (and called 3-5 ways) and it was fun to play. I gave my fair share of beatings, took several new ones but overall it was at least fun now. When the game broke beause 2 players run out of money it was 3 AM, I recovered to -$900. Still very awake I decided to play on, went over to the Bellagio, chatting with a good other player from that game on the way.

While I waited for the 30/60 seat there I spotted Dave "Devilfish" Ulliot (no beard, looking 10 years younger!) trying to get a girls attention by playing with her in the 15/30 game which made the whole room lauging and cracking jokes (but it worked, I saw them leaving together about 30 minutes later :). Getting into the 30/60 game there was quick and when I sat down I noticed that the lineup was very good. Asians, internet players, loose black guys, you get the picture. After five minutes of play one of those "internet" players approached me and asked if I am from Germany - I answered yes and he introduced himself as "Reggieman", a guy I have long known from the Pokerstars 30/60 game but only chatted with so far in the game and on MSN. He has a website also, www.holdemblvd.com. Reggie is one of those guys playing in the highest online games available (up to 400/800 british pounds with a 4 BPD rake/hand!!) and is very successfull from what I know and hear. We had some fun togehter, shared stories and so on. Getting my aces home, flopping a winning straight and get no calls on my bluffs was helping me further so at about 5 AM I quited a nice winner, overcoming my losses from the 20/40 game. Reggie and I took a picture and then I finally left to the hotel room. As I write this I have sleept two hours (Katja just came back from a massage), watched the game Italy vs. Australia a little bit and now we are thinking about breakfast, shopping and - getting back in action!!!

After hanging around for two more hours and watching a WSOP 2005 main event episode on the laptop we decided to go out and eat something. We went to the Venetian, checking out their new pokerroom which is *very* nice. They host daily tournaments which look like good and have a freeroll end of July for $100,000 but you need to log 200 playing hours until then to qualify and that is not an option for us unfortunatly. We had lunch in a mexican cantina at the Grand Canal Shoppes. Afterwards we went to the Mirage where I joined a 20/40 list but after two hours of waiting (and watching soccer Argentina vs. Mexico in the meantime) we went ahead direction Bellagio. On our way we checked out the also new Caesars Palace poker room, host of the NBC National Heads-Up Championship. Looks great!

Arriving at the Bellagio I joined a 15/30 list and got a seat about half an hour later. I did well until after 6 hours of playing a horrible streak lasting 30 minutes got me stuck about $1,000. That sealed our diner plans as I decided to play along (this little result oriented devil whispering "get even! get even!"). Katja got very tired watching low-limit limit-holdem and went back to the room, sleeping. I played on, very diciplined and trying to stay as aggressive as neccessary in these games. Over the next 3 hours I slowly unstuck myself, getting even ahead about $250 before another series of beats got me down to -$450 again. I remained at the level for some time when the game broke at about 3 AM. I was still behind $430 and decided to play some 30/60 to "unstuck myself".

It was only a change of two tables to the right but what a dramatic change! While the 15/30 game was easy and fun, with people cracking jokes, telling stories and anecdotes that 30/60 game was serious business. Nobody was cracking, one mafia-looking guy was staring every opponent down (lol) and the overall atmosphere was very tense and serious. Now, I don't get scared that easily. I just played my A-game, maybe a little to conservative given the cirumstances but I was tired and stuck and after 15 years of poker I know (most of the time) what is neccearry to protect me and my money. I quickly got ahead about $600 when I flopped the second nut flush one time and two pair in the big blind in another hand. Then the mafia-acting guy cracked my aces with K9o and I decided that this could be the turning point to a big losing session so I did the unthinkable - I quited! Still a small winner of $260 my total result for the day was negative, but less than $200 so no problem. We are still up for the trip, having fun and wait for the WSOP starting monday.

While playing I watched half scandinavia arriving. Those swedish and danish guys are looking so much the same, all young, tall, thin and with jeans and long shirt. Patrick Antonious and Gus Hansen being the most know players from this group. They played an "easy" game of chinese poker just between themselfes (all black chip action :).

Now, Sunday morning we have been to the pool already for two hours and are taking breakfest in-room. Soon we will leave to get into the action, Katja maybe playing a tournament somewhere. This evening we will go to the Rio's, register ourselves, meet some Pokerstars people and look around a little.

We arrived in Las Vegas. Barly. The trip was standard travel horror. We left our house at 6:30 AM and arrived on time at the airport. After 3 (!) security checks and no more than 7 times "show you passport" we were able to board the Contintal flight from Hamburg to Newark, scheduled to leave at 9:00 AM. Once we took our seats I sleept away right away. After some time that felt like an eternity I woke up again only to be informed by Katja that we have not even left the airport. Uff. When we finally left about 90 minutes late I was already half-sure we would not get our connection flight in Newark. After over 8 hours flight time we arrived about 30 minutes before our connection as going - but that does not account for the 60 minutes immigration took. When we finally left the border control/backage claim crazyness we missed the flight. Continental was not smart enough to rebook us automaticly into the next flight so we tried to take of that - no chance. More than spot 2 and 3 in the waitling list for the next flight was possible. We waited four hours for that flight but it was actually oversold so we could not leave Newark. New try, next flight about 3 hours later, we got seat for that. Wow. With a delay of about 60 minutes we could board that machine (so we spent already >8 hours in Newarks food court). Again, right after taking my seat I fell asleep. I sleept deep and when waking up we were on the airport - already but still? Unfortuntaly, still. The machine had a technical problem that took them over two hours to solve. We finally left, direction Las Vegas. 6 hours later we arrived. Total travel time: 27 hours 20 minutes.

I managed to sleep during the last flight some more so I was groggy but no too tired when we got our room. Katja went to sleep right away. I thought what the hell, go gamble!

After checking out the small new pokerrroom at the Treasue Island I went over to the Mirage and took a seat in a 10-20 limit game where along with some old pros and tourists bracelet holder Barbara Enright was seated. I had decided before that I will not play any game higher than 20/40 before getting used to the american poker style for at least a few days. I got into good rythm in the 10/20 but the game broke after 30 minutes. So I walked over to the Bellagio (it was about 4h in the morning) and checked the games there. I sticked to my rule and avoided the open seat in the juicy looking 30/60 and waited for a 15/30 seat which I got about 20 minutes later. The game was half full with people knowing what the do and the other half was just playing wild and aggresive. Overall it was reminding me very much on the online games in that limit these days. I played mostly quality cards, took my fair share of bad beats, gave one myself and did quit the game up $600 about 7 AM. Nice start!

When I got back to the hotel Katja was awake about an hour, had done some sports and was preparing herself for the pool and some breakfest. We went to a coffee shop, took an small breakfest and then she went to the pool and I went to sleep again. Later that day we went for some shopping, had fantastic Sushi at Ra's in the Fashion Show Mall and went to the hotel room again where we sleept about 12 hours (with small interuptions :). About 2 AM in the morning I woke up, Katja was still sleeping and decided to play some more, going to the Mirage. I joined a full 20/40 game which got short handed short after. I felt comfortable, playd ok and was all the time between stuck 500 and up 500. At 6 in the morning Katja came in we decided to take some breakfest togehter in a buffet. I quit a $300 winner session and we went to the Buffet. This was heaven for me! They just opened the buffet so it was almost empty which left me with the feeling that all the food is for me alone! Yum yum.

At 8 AM local time Katja went to the pool and I watched Germany-Sweden live. Germany played good, made two quick goals and I guess trainer Juergen Klinsmann must be very satisfied as his strategy to play fast/aggresive, modern soccer works out that well. Not that I understand anything about soccer, lol.

Now, the game is over, Katja is still at the pool and I will relax a little more. WSOP is starting Monday for us when satellites start at the Rio's. I will try to put some more hours into the cashgames and hopefully win a buyin or two.

So, after the horrible travel right now everthing is as good as it could be and we hope and strive that this will not change anytime soon!

It's there. The date we have long been waiting for. June 22nd. We leave to Las Vegas in only 6 hours from now! We agreed on a "free" weekend in Las Vegas before the WSOP crazyness starts on monday (we will be joining the very first qualifiers :). Especially Katja is exhausted from all the things we have done in the last weeks and days and needs some time to relax and focus on tournament poker again. So we will take a long easy weekend, have lots of fun, visit new restaurants, shows and shops and enjoying ourselves. I will play some cash games and visit the new pokerrroms in the Venetian and Caesars which we have not seen yet. Maybe we are going to play some event on sunday to accustom to the american style and the small small differences in rulings again. As said, from monday on we will visit the Rio's daily to play WSOP events, cashgames, satellites (single-tables, supers, megas, last-chances) and hopefully some 2nd and even 3rd event days (a lot of events are 3-days events this year). We are very curious if and how Harras will improve the WSOP experience as there have been some really annoying things last year such as way to less cashiers, toilet desaster, bad food on spot etc. etc. We are under the impression that Harras management really tries to improve things.

Speaking about tournament poker we closed a deal with Pokerstars. Katja will be sponsored by Pokerstars from now on and work with them in their upcoming german marketing campains and efforts. To start things she will play all televised WSOP events (except H.O.R.S.E.) and the EPT events in 2006 on their behalf.

Also today we agreed on supplying a regular column and some specials for the upcoming "Deutsches Pokermagazin" (german poker player magazine). First issue is due for August and here is a dummy how it could look like. Both Katja and I are very proud to be a small part of this interesting project and we look forward to supply some entertaining content ;)

So, we are leaving in just a few hours. Check back here for regular updates!

Yesterday TV magazine "Guten Abend RTL" aired the report about Katja playing poker. The report was a very big success and got picked up today by all other regional RTL programs already - it got aired nationwide today again. I have a first version (in low quality/big size ~40MB). To view it, download it here as .zip-file or just click "play" in the media player below:

UPDATE: RTL Nord is airing the report about poker and Katja TODAY between 18:00 and 18:30!!!

The recent already very successfull poker weekend culminated in me winning a seat for the World-Series-Of-Poker $10,000 buyin main event. In a long long grueling eight hour battle I was able to reach the final 23 players in Pokerstars $615+35 weekly qualifier last night. 411 players were trying, 23 got a seat, 2 got their money back ($650 payout) and one got $310. The qualifier started at about 23:30h and ended somewhere 7:40 in the morning. I had played live poker both weekend nights and was already tired to staying awake and focused was not an easy thing to do throughout the long sunday night. Without overestimating my abilities in review I think I played this one perfect. Had I not lost AA vs 55 with a 5 on the turn (money in on flop) it would have been smooth sailing for me without any stress but with me losing that hand I was low chipped from about 80 players on downwards. It is long ago since I was that nervous when playing poker (last time I remember me being that nervous was last years main event) but being on the edge of elemination for nearly 3 hours took it's toll on me. When I finally made it I was screaming loudly (can't even remember when I have done that last time). That managed to wake up Katja and we were celebrating some minutes before I went to sleep some time (2 hours lol).

So, I am playing the WSOP main event. This qualification could not come to a better time as we are leaving to Las Vegas this week already and hope to stay there until the WSOP is over (7 weeks!). This qualifiers opens the door to the very juicy local satelittes (if your not already qualified you don't win money or lammers there but get registered for the main event directly). Now I can play them for value!

The whole weekend was a big success which is perfect timing also as 7 weeks of Las Vegas with a running WSOP will cost a lot so a little bankroll-booster is more than welcome :)

We're very busy here preparing the travel and our time on the road. There will be one more pre-wsop post here bringing great news (hopefully) before we leave so check back!