macwjp and the Mrs aka the boss - May 27 - June 4

Well better late than never I guess. Between the distractions and the drinks I just lost the ability to keep making live updates So I am picking this up now to finish things off over the next couple of days. The remaining time in Vegas went really quickly, did not take as many pictures as I thought I would but I will post what I have with some short notes.
Starting off backtraking a bit to the WSOP we played. My wife played the evening session on May 29 and as noted ran into some unlucky beats and lasted about 5 levels. When she was taking her seat at here table she needed to show ID and was going to use her passport which she thought was in her purse. They allowed her to use her Drivers License (as permitted in the rules for US and Canadian citizens) but she was still freaked about it not being in her purse. I needed to go back to the room at Harrahs and check to see if her passport was in the room safe. Off I go, hop on the shuttle to Ballys, shuffle through Ballys to the monorail and make it back to the room, sure enough sitting in the room safe is her passport safe and sound. I send her a text to let her know her passport is safe and sound and head back over to the Rio. Walk around the Rio looking for something to do and settle on sitting at the Bar for some beers and DDB. Four beer and 2 hours later I get a text from Mrs saying she is out and is on her way up the long hallway towards the Bar I am sitting at. I play a couple more hands and cash out $85 for a $60 investment. In my haste to meet the Mrs I neglected to grab a picture. I catch up to L (aka Mrs) and she recounts the hands that crippled and then put her out, just a run of bed luck. She also tells me that Vanessa Selbst was playing at the table next to her and if I wanted she would wait if I wanted to run down and grab a picture or two, which I did.



Another cool thing that happened was earlier in the afternoon I was hanging around outside and Scotty Nguyen was walking in and I was able to get a photo with him and chat with him for a couple minutes. This turned out to be one of the highlights of my trip

 

Some other assorted pictures from the WSOP at Rio

 

A few thoughts on the WSOP in general and The Colossus, the tournament I played in:

- you never really get a perspective of how large the venue is for the WSOP on TV. I walked the entire convention centre to ensure I got to see it all...it is huge
- the setup is fantastic and the logistics of putting on an event of this size must be staggering
- watching some of the cash game tables was a trip; watched a 2/5 game that played like a 5/10 and by my rough count of stacks had close to 40K in play on the table
- the people watching was fantastic
- the tournament itself was not a let down and is hands down one of the best poker experiences I have had
- I went into the tournament with a plan and stuck to it throughout the day until my bust out hand. I played a hand I had been folding or raising with all day and instead flat called which ultimately resulted in my demise
- Learned alot about myself as a poker player in this tournament and took the opportunity to grow as a poker player
- the experience itself was priceless

I know many on the board are not into poker as much as I am and this post probably will not resonate however this was a big part of the trip for us and was a bucket list item for me.

 

We visited the Rio several times during our visit but didn't see any of the big players.

 

Unless you walk near the convention center, they will probably be pretty hard to find.

And totally agree with you mac, I did a walkthrough in 2012, and it is definitely massive!!! Nice of Scotty to stop for a pic! A few weeks ago, I learned that I've actually played 3/6 mix poker before with a bracelet winner now (Ben Yu)...lol