I could only squeeze one WSOP event into my summer due to an internship to strengthen my resume before I apply for law school. I decided to come out for the $1500 NL event 49 which was an event that my good friend, Taylor Douglas, got 2nd in last year. It was my first live tournament. I am obviously an online regular, so I was really excited about playing a live event to test my skills and to see how I would stack up against the competition.

The event started off great as I doubled up with an early set. After this, Day 1 was just basically a joke. I was able to consistently accumuluate chips throughout the day. After the dinner break, I came back and spent the rest of the day with Men "the master" Nguyen to my right. This turned out to be pretty cool. I three balled him pretty light with KJ, and www.pokernews.com was watching the hand and taking pictures of us as he tanked...so i showed the bluff and got some applause from a pretty large crowd on the rail.

Taylor Douglas and I were the only 2 out of the 4 of us that started the event (Yellowsub86, tbthanx, tdomeski, threatnasty) who made it to day 2. We both went into Day 2 with ~88k chips at 800/1600. This stack allowed me to consistently accumulate chips despite a day marked by miserable cold streaks in cards and bad beats/coolers. I lost a 70k pot with JJ to 99 right before the 2nd break. It dropped me from 160k back down to like 90k. This was pretty early on in Day 2, with probably about 80 players left, and I didnt really let it bother me at the time, but this was a pretty crucial pot in the grand scheme of things as ppl made it to the FT with less than 200k chips.

All in all, the event was a really awesome experience. I played exceptionally well. I feel somewhat validated from a 13th place finish. And I can't wait to play another big live event.