H8H8H8

Next event up was the Tag  Team event, which I entered with Daiva (one of the bloggers Christian dubbed our team Beauty And The Beast). This turned out to be the most fun event of the series and one I hope they repeat in future. Not much fun for us as a team though: Daiva played the first hour and preserved our starting stack without any real hands, and passed on a wealth of notes on hands played and opponent reads. I played the second hour and lost the lot with two premiums.

Hand 1: I open aces utg. An Asian playing every hand badly but hitting everything called in late position, as did both blinds. 

Flop
Kt7hh

I cbet and just the Asian called.

Turn 4 (non heart)

I bet and was called again.

River Q (non heart)

I checked to induce bluffs from missed flush draws, but when I called his half pot bet found he had a different draw that had got there (AJ with no heart)

Hand 2: last hand before the break. With less than 15 big blinds and queens, my only thought now is how to try to get all in as early as possible in the hand. So I min raise, the Asian calls, and the aggressive big blind squeezes. I now stick it in and it's off to the races against Ak after the Asian folds. The ten high all diamond flop gave him additional flush outs, one of which he hit on the turn, and all that was left was for me to find my team captain and break the sad news that she had no stack to return to.

My next event was another 1k NLH side event. This was another gritty grind it out performance to the cash but not much further. Still, I was happy with the performance and having gone some ridiculously high number of live events since February without a cash, it was nice to get a new streak of cashing two in a row (in solo events) going. The only downside was as I came back from dinner in day one I suddenly got one of the most violent sore throats I have in my life. This was the precursor to one of the heaviest colds I've ever endured which persisted for the rest of my time in Vegas and beyond. Most players seem to get sick at some point of the series (hardly surprising in a chilly crowded environment where most of us aren't sleeping or eating the best, and we are continually passing chips and cards to each other in an environment that could be described as a giant Petrie dish). I'd been feeling smug about having avoided the bug that it seemed everyone I knew had fallen foul off so I probably had it coming.

That left the main up next. I was intending to play 1b, the Sunday. Day 1c always dwarfs the others and the conventional wisdom among pros is its the best day to play as it's the day recreational players and satellite qualifiers go for to minimise their expenses. Of course, this also means it's the day most of the pros play, which is why in terms of overall numbers it tends to get twice as many starters as the other two days put together. This can make for pretty hellish scenes at the breaks when almost 5000 people simultaneously throng the corridors of the Rio heading to the restroom. The WSOP is supposedly doing everything they can to relieve this bottleneck, this year moving 1c to a Monday, making it the only non weekend day 1. I assume the thinking behind that was that a lot of recreationals would choose a weekend day over a Monday, but it didn't really work out that way for a number of reasons, at least one of which I think I know.

I'd qualified for the main through an 888 satellite a good while back. Most of the emails I got from that were short on information and long on demands (that I wear their patch among other things). I didn't really need the hotel room in the package so I asked them if it was possible to get a cash alternative (something most other sites offer, sometimes at a discount which is fair enough). They were quite vehement that it was not. I contacted their official accommodation agent who I know personally to see if they could work something out. I was surprised to be told that while they normally would try to accommodate me (and I've personally found them very accommodating in the past), they had been explicitly prohibited by 888 from doing this. It says a lot about 888 as a company that they go out of their way to act against the financial interests of their clients.

After sending a couple of emails enquiring about the registration process, I received an email suggesting I present myself at the cage on the Wednesday before. When I did, the nice WSOP lady told me they had received nothing from 888 yet, and she suggested I wait a day or two and try again. I waited til Saturday, and having inched my way to the top of a very long weekend queue, was told that my registration was there, but I had to go round to the other side of the cage to get it (where VIPs register, and payouts are done). I expressed a little surprise that the person I was talking to couldn't just walk the ten metres or so to there to get my ticket for me and save me the ordeal of another weekend queue in my flu-weakened state, but was told in no uncertain terms that she couldn't.

When I got to the top of the second queue I was told blankly that I hadn't been registered yet by 888.

"Huh? I've just been told on the other side that I was"
"By who?"
"I don't know her name but she had supervisor on the tag".

After disappearing off to consult with the supervisor, she came back and said I was registered, but had to go behind a curtain at the end of the room (this is not a joke: a literal curtain) into the employees only area to get my ticket.

Behind the curtain, three guys were discussing a satellite they'd chopped. I was told I'd have to wait til this was resolved before I could get my ticket.

First guy up was South American, without too much English. The lady told him his options.
"You can take 7400 in cash, but we have to withhold some for tax. Or you can get 7400 in lammers (the WSOP equivalent of tourney dollars), or you can pay the extra 2600 to buy in to the main event"
"I take lammers"
"Ok but I don't have lammers right now so you'll have to come back"
"I can get dollars?"
"I can give you money but then we have to withhold taxes"
"I don't want taxes. I take lammers"
"Ok but we don't have lammers right now. You'll have to come back when we do"
"When you will have? Tonight?"
"Probably not. I suggest you come back tomorrow"
"I come back tomorrow"

The next guy, an Asian, also with rudimentary English, now shuttled forward.
"You can take 7400 in cash, but we have to withhold some for tax. Or you can get 7400 in lammers, or you can pay the extra 2600 to buy in to the main event"
"I take lammers"
"Ok but I don't have lammers right now so you'll have to come back"
"I can get dollars?"
"I can give you money but then we have to withhold taxes"
"I don't want pay tax. I take lammers"
"Ok but we don't have lammers right now. You'll have to come back when we do"
"When you have lammer? Tonight?"
"Probably not. I suggest you come back tomorrow"
"I come back tomorrow"

By now a queue had formed behind me. A Scandinavian and a South American behind me asked if this was the 888 registration queue. I confirmed that it was, hopefully. My heart sunk when the Scandi confided that this was the fourth day in a row he'd been through this rigmarole, and still no tournament ticket.

The third satellite guy was French, and had apparently almost no English.
"You can take 7400 in cash, but we have to withhold some for tax. Or you can get 7400 in lammers, or you can pay the extra 2600 to buy in to the main event"
"Lammers!"
"Ok but I don't have lammers right now so you'll have to come back"
"Lammers?"

At this point, the Scandi lost patience and wailed "oh for God's sake they have no lammers". This just confused matters to a halt, and eventually I ended up acting as an impromptu interpreter to explain the situation to the French guy. He wandered off, and I was finally handed my main event ticket. Surprised to be just given one without being asked which day I wanted to play, I scrutinised the ticket to reveal I was down for 1c, on the Monday. When I told the WSOP lady I wanted to play tomorrow rather than Monday, she sent me back to the main cage queue (the one I'd started out in) to get it changed.

When I'd finally edged to the top of that queue, the guy tried to change my day but seemed unable to. He went off to get the supervisor. Together they peered at the screen for a while before she exclaimed "Oh, you're 888. They're not allowing us to change their qualifiers from day 1c".

So once again, 888, great at prohibiting their clients from things everyone else can do. And even if there's some sound reason behind forcing us all to play on the busiest day 1, it would be nice of them to tell us why. Or even that this was the case....at no point in my communications with them before, most of which as I said was them insisting on patches, was I told my day 1 was 1c, and could not be changed. When the WSOP later tweeted lamenting the day 1c logjam and asking for suggestions on how to alleviate it in future, Adam Owen tweeted back referring to my tweets that it might be an idea to have a word with their proud sponsors 888 and ask them not to force all their qualifiers to play 1c.

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