“What was I doing here? What was the meaning of this trip? Was I just roaming around in a drug frenzy of some kind? Or had I really come out here to Las Vegas to work on a story? Who are these people, these faces? Where do they come from? They look like caricatures of used car dealers from Dallas, and sweet Jesus, there were a hell of a lot of them at 4:30 on a Sunday morning, still humping the American dream, that vision of the big winner somehow emerging from the last minute pre-dawn chaos of a stale Vegas casino.” *

So recently I returned from a trip to the USA where, amongst other things, I:

• failed to cash in the World Series of Poker Main Event
• saw Snoop Dogg perform only yards away at a private party
• nearly angrily took out a GM with the Killer Dutch in a crucial last round game of chess

Rock and Roll.

*So says Raoul Duke in Hunter S. Thompson’s classic novel Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.

I’ve never been to Las Vegas before and I’m not sure I particularly want to go back for any great length of time. They’re soulless and in many ways depressing, these casinos. There’s nothing else to do but gamble, once you’ve seen a few shows.

Having said that, I did have a good time! I was there to play the Main Event of the World Series of Poker, having qualified by virtue of making Supernova Elite on Pokerstars last year.

Pokerstars hospitality was fantastic: we were put up in a suite at the top of Palms Place that was roughly twice the size of my old flat. Two 42” plasma TV screens? Check. Jacuzzi in the bedroom? Check. Two bathrooms? Check. Walk-in shower (three shower heads) big enough for five? Check. You get the idea.

Then there was Snoop Dogg at the Pokerstars party. There he is, on the right, in a Spain shirt. It was the day of the Soccer World Championship Finals, whatever they are?

Penn and Teller were good too.

I busted the Main Event about ten minutes before the end of Day 2A.

The first day had gone pretty well, I’d chipped up to 45.5k (starting stack was 30k) without any major drama or excitement. I check-raised a low flop against a young internet qualifier, turned the second nut flush then check-raised him again. He tanked and folded. The very next orbit I flopped a full house against the same player’s early position open, raised his continuation bet and he immediately shoved all-in with his flush draw, drawing dead but to a runner-runner straight flush. That was about it.

The second day I back-raised a shortstacked Marcel Lüske (‘The Flying Dutchman’. Trademark – wearing sunglasses upside-down Upside-down? What? Why?) and beat his ace-queen with my pair of tens early on.

Nothing much happened after that, until about ten minutes before the end. I had 60k with blinds of 500/1000/100 and opened ace-queen suited on the button to 2.5k. The very active, aggressive, drunk, irritating, young, fidgety and bad player in the small blind re-raised to 7.5k, so I made it 20k hoping to induce a light shove. Which I did, but unfortunately he had a pair of sixes that held up without even a sweat, because he flopped a set. So that was that.

There I am checking my cards, on the left.

I don’t want to dwell on the exit hand too much, except to say I think my play is fine, if high variance, against this particular player. Obviously there are other options that might be ‘better’ in some sense, such as taking a flop in position or just shoving over his 3-bet. But it was a good time for a flip – either I lose and head off to see San Francisco for a few days, or I win and come back on day 3 with a very healthy stack and a great chance of cashing/going deep. That was the first time I was all-in all tournament.

So San Francisco it was, then. I liked it. There’s culture and stuff to see and do. It feels “European” even, you could say. There’s the bridge, on the right.

Next it was on to L. A. First stop, the Pacific Coast Open. A 6-round weekender, American style*, in a sleepy town called Agoura Hills. I limped to 4/5 and found myself sharing the lead.

*bring your own sets, boards and clocks, players in  the same tournament playing different schedules, high entry fees and big prizes for all sections.

Ramirez, Alejandro (2562) – Ansell, Simon (2398), Pacific Coast Open 2010 (6)

You can replay the game on a Flash board at the bottom of the page.

Why was I angry? There were three of us sharing first going into this, the last round. I had White against IM Enrico Sevillano. So I prepared for an hour or so – there was $3000 at stake after all. It was the only possible pairing.

Apparently not, according to the USCF pairing system, as I discovered five minutes before the round. Colours are not important, I can play a fourth Black against the top seed instead. Marvellous.

Fortunately I knew the perfect opening for my angry, unprepared state.

1. c4 e6 2. g3 f5! This would be it. 3. Bg2 Nf6 4. Nh3 I was glad to see this, because Simon doesn’t rate Nh3 systems in his DVD. The way to play against them is a quick …e5, keeping the knight from f4. 4… Be7 5. O-O O-O 6. d4 d6 7. Qb3 c6 8. d5!?

Probably not great, but a reasonable idea. The h3 knight won’t have a home on f4, so White tries to exchange it on e6 when the light-squared bishop could dominate. Romanishin played a similar idea against me in Iceland in a game I promised to annotate for this website but have been too lazy to do so, so I had some idea what I should be doing here.

8… cxd5 9. cxd5 e5 10. Ng5 Na6! Obviously this knight wants to be on c5 and as a bonus, I gain time on the White queen.

11. Nc3 If 11. Ne6 I can just take it and play 12… d5 with a huge centre, then round up the e-pawn. 11… Nc5 12. Qc2 a5 Possibly not necessary, 12… Ng4 immediately might have been better… 13. Rd1 …because now White could have played 13. Be3 instead. 13… Ng4! The key move, after which Black is fine, if not slightly better. I also played this move in the game against Romanishin but here I have an improved version because of the time gained on White’s queen.

14. Ne6 Nxe6 15. dxe6 Bxe6 16. Bd5 16. Bxb7 is impossible due to 16…Qb6 hitting f2, so White looks for positional compensation for the pawn instead. 16… Bxd5 17. Nxd5 Rf7 My computer says 17…Kh8 is better, but the principle is the same, to avoid any nasty tactics on the a2-g8 diagonal after White plays Qb3.

18. f3 I’m not sure this is best, White will take the pawn back but lose all the positional advantages. 18. Qb3 would have kept the tension. 18… Nf6 19. Nxe7+ And now possibly taking on f6 then b7 was superior. 19… Qxe7 20. Qxf5 d5

21. Be3 21. Bg5 is also possible. 21… d4 22. Bf2

22… Nd7! I had my longest think of the game here. c5 will be a good square for the knight – it blockades the c-file, a potential source of White counterplay and controls the d3 and e4 squares, which are important because they’re where the Black pawn breaks might be. 23. Qg4 Nc5 24. Rac1

24…b6? Desirable, but unnecessary. 24…Raf8 would have stopped White’s next, his only pawn break, when Black has a great position. I’d seen his next move and had a response ready, but I misjudged the resulting endgame. 25. e3! e4! The only move, but a good one. 25… d3 is answered by 26. e4 when now White is better as d3 can’t be held. The next few moves are forced.

26. exd4 Nd3 27. Rc8+ Rxc8 28. Qxc8+ Rf8 29. Qc4+ Kh8 30. Rxd3 exd3 31. Qxd3

The smoke has cleared. I’d assessed this position as ‘good winning chances’ for Black due to the weakness of the White pawns and the white squares around his king. What I’d failed to consider was the weakness of my queenside pawns. White has to act quickly…

31… Qf7 32. d5! …and he does. 32… Rd8 33. Bxb6 Qxd5 34. Qxd5 Rxd5 35. Be3 Rd1+?! Perhaps there were still winning chances if I’d have transferred the rook to c2 via d6 and c6. 36… Rd6!?

Now it’s just a draw.

36. Kf2 Kg8 37. h4 Kf7 38. h5 Ke6 39. Ke2 Ra1 40. a3 Kd5 41. Bd2 a4 42. Bc3 g6 43. hxg6 hxg6

1/2-1/2

Sevillano won his game to take outright first.

Equal second, a couple of rating points and $720 is better than a kick in the teeth and more than I’ve made at poker recently! Perhaps a new career as a chess professional beckons?

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