Monday 8th June.

Entered my biggest live tournament the $330 Venetian deepstack. Played well managed to play my aggressive online game and was really enjoying it. Over 6 and a half hours managed to chip up from 12000 starting chips to 40000 but then at the 600/1200 100 ante level it came apart. I raised from mid with QQ and got one french donk caller flop 772, I bet he calls, turn was a 9 I check he checks behind, river was a unscary 3 I thought oppo had nothing and that the best way was to get him to bluff at the pot so I check and he bets 5k 2/3 pot I think I'm miles ahead but just call only to find he has 77, wtf? Amazed I lost so little pleased with the way I played it. Then came by downfall hand I raised to 2900 with AQ and got 3 callers my first mistake was forgetting the blinds had gone up and not raising a bit more my second mistake was jamming allin on a Q82 flop, there was about 14k in the middle and i had 22k left, knew I was only going to get called by a worse hand and sure enough the button had 88, Ace on the turn made it interesting but I didn't get lucky when a K hit the river. So finished 200th out of 839 runners top 70 paid though, however very pleased overall with my play.

Then got a shuttle bus from Harrahs to the Rio to see what was happening at the WSOP, saw British Pro Richard Ashby as well as Eric Seidel, Howard Lederer and old big head himself Phil Helmuth amongst those still playing. Tables didn't look anywhere near as nice as the Venetian but it was nice to see where the WSOP is played.

Had a meal at the strangely named Gaylords Indian restaurant at the Rio before heading back to my hotel.