Grinding At Grand Sierra

At work, we have rotating off days, so one week it will be Monday, and the following week it will be Tuesday, etc. I'm starting to use up a few vacation days, mostly at strategic times, like having Monday as my off day and I'll take Tuesday as a vacation day to give me a three day weekend. The following week has Tuesday as my off day, so I'll take Monday as a vacation day.

This past weekend was one of those three day weekends for me. Grand Sierra Resort is currently running their Fall Pot Of Gold tournament series, so this was a good time to grind away at the tournaments. Here's what happened:

Sunday 09/30

~ 12pm $240 NLHE ($15k Guarantee) - They had no problem with the guarantee, as they got an impressive field of 115 players. However, it wasn't impressive for me. I did hang around for awhile, but I never got a real chip stack.

When we got down to three tables in the 500/1k/100 level, I raised to 2600 from Mid with J9d. The next player called, and so did the BB. The Flop was KJ5. BB checked, and I shipped my last 8900 with Middle Pair. The next player folded what he later said was TT. The BB went into the tank for over a minute before calling with A5 for Bottom Pair. The Turn was [KJ5] A, giving him Two Pair. I missing my 2-outer, and finished in 26th place.

~ 7pm $130 NLHE Turbo - 69 players for this one. They call it a Turbo because we get less chips and they eliminated a couple of level compared to the 12pm tourney. However, it's actually a decent structure, and much better than a Daily Donkament.

Things went much better in this one. We got to the Final Table in the 1k/2k/300 level. I was 2nd in chips with 45k, but the Chip Leader had over 100k more. She was 2nd in chips at the other table, and was gifted chips in two separate hands by the Chip Leader, who ended up in 11th place.

It didn't start off well. I raised a few times preflop, and usually had to fold to either a 3-bet or because I airballed the Flop. Also, the Chip Leader lost a chunk of her stack by doubling up two different players.

Last hand of the 1k/2k/300 level, I raised from the Hyjack to 4600 with 6c 6s, and only the SB called. I've been playing with him for the whole tourney, and he's leaning towards the Super-Nitty side. Flop Tc 5c 2h. He bet 5k. He's probably got a Ten, or he could have a big draw like A3c. It was a relatively small bet, so I called. Turn [Tc 5c 2h] Ac. He checked, and I bet 8k. This is a great card to bluff because I can represent the Ace or the Flush. He called, and the River was [Tc 5c 2h Ac] Jd. He checked. I bet 13k which was about 60% of my stack. He snap-called with Jc Th for Two Pair. If he didn't hit his 2nd Pair, he would certainly folded to my River bet. Sigh!

Level went up to 1200/2400/300 after that hand. Three hands later, UTG+1 raised 9k. He's an old guy who's played just one hand at this Final Table. I'm next with AJo. I had 8600, or 3.5 BB. Yuck! I'm certain that the old guy had a bigger hand than AJ, but if I folded, then I only had a couple of hands before I lose half my stack to the Binds and Antes. I made the crying call, everyone else folded, and he had AK. I missed, and I finish in 9th for $184. Yippie!

Mon 10/01

~ 12pm $240 NLHE ($15k guarantee) - No clue why they would have a guarantee on a Monday, but they did come close to hitting it by having 73 players. Unfortunately, I didn't come close to getting anything resembling a good stack. There was the normal tournament silliness, and I finished in 43rd place.

~ 4pm $150 Omaha-8 - Only 31 players for this one, which was surprising for Reno. The thing that wasn't surprising was my complete lack of cards. I never scooped a pot for the first three hours, and went for a long stretch without a playable starting hand.

I finally got my first scoop in the 600/1200 level. I was All-In preflop for 1200 with TT42, which was one of the best hands I had seen in a while. I ended up with Tens Full Of Kings. That was the last pot I won, and finished in 16th place.

~ 7pm $130 NLHE Turbo - Immediately after I busted out of the Omaha, I signed up for this one, and sat down at the end of the 25/50 level. There was one guy at the table who was playing weird. He was overbetting, and shoving All-In in odd spots. People would pay him off, and he showed a very strong hand like an Overpair, a Set, or a Straight. I lost a couple of pots to him before I realized what he was doing.

After that, I went hopelessly card dead for a few levels. In the 100/200/25 level, UTG+1 raised to 425. She's a regular dealer at GSR and has been raising a lot lately. She also had lost a few pots lately, and only had a few more chips than I did. Mid and SB called her raise. I was the BB with 76o, and shipped it for 3150. This was a great spot to steal, as I have played so few hands lately. Unfortunately, she quickly shoved her stack in, and the others folded. She showed Q3s (not a typo). We both missed the Board, and her Q-high was good. The stacks were counted, and she had me covered by 225 chips. I finished 31th out of 55 players.

As I'm walking away from the table, she started saying some sort of excuse about the Q3s shove. I interrupted her by saying that I really didn't care, and walked away. It was true that I didn't care. To me, it was no different than if she has A3s, and I lost the race. I just wanted to leave the room, and end this miserable day.

While I was walking out of the room at 9:15pm, I realized that all three tournament that I played today were still running. That's a really lousy feeling.

Tue 10/02

~ 12p $240 NLHE ($10 guarantee) - With the smaller guarantee for this one, they had no problem hitting it with 67 players.

For me, this was a "one step forward; two steps back" experience. I would start to build up some chips, and then lose a bunch by getting a 2nd best hand and have to fold on the River.

For example, I raised to 425 in the 100/200 level with Ts Td. The BB 3-Bet to 1100. He's on the very tight side, and has been quite proud of it so far. I just call, and the Flop was something like Jc 8c 4c, and we both checked. Turn [Jc 8c 4c] Th. He checked again, and I made a 1625 value bet. He called rather quickly, and the River was [Jc 8c 4c Th] Qs. He checked again, and I went into deep thought, as I'm not sure what I can beat or what hand he would call a bet with. I finally said, "I hope I'm not being too nitty," and showed my Set. He showed Ac Ks for Broadway. I was unhappy that I lost 2725 chips in this hand, but I was happy that I didn't lose another 2000 with a River value bet.

This kept going for a few levels, but then my table got tougher, as a few Kids who knew what they were doing sat down at the table. I went into "Turtle" mode, and waited for hands. Unfortunately, they didn't come.

Eventually, one of the Kids made a standard raise again. It folded to me, and I shipped my 11BB stack with T8d. He quickly called with K6h. (why are they calling me with these hands?) I hit an 8 on the River to get a double up.

About 45 minutes later (I think it was the 300/600/75 level), the same Kid raised to 1300. It folded to me in the BB. I haven't had any opportunities lately, so my 77 looked great to ship for around 9k chips. He quickly called with KQo, and a King on the Flop sent me home in 27th place.

Overall, this was another giant waste of time and money, as I only had one pathetic min-cash in six tournaments. If I included the Atlantis's tourneys two weeks ago and the Peppermill's Deep Stack Classic over Labor Day weekend, I had one min-cash in 14 tournaments with buy-ins between $130 and $350.

Earlier this year, I did a statistical analysis on my tournament numbers. The $100+ numbers weren't good, but weren't terrible either. I said that the small sample size was a factor in the numbers. Since then, the sample size has gotten larger, but the results have gotten worse, thanks to this month and my wonderful trips to Las Vegas in June.

At what point can I not use variance or sample size as an excuse? At what point does it becomes a simple fact that I'm doing something wrong? I don't know if I'm at that point yet, but I do know that I have no clue what I'm doing wrong or what to do about it.