Hey everyone, I hope all is well because I'm doing quite alright myself. A week and a half ago I made the somewhat last minute decision to go to lapt(latin american poker tour - run by pokerstars) san jose, held in costa rica, the second ever lapt. It was definitely a fun time overall and I'm glad I went. The hotel I(and everyone I knew for the most part) was/were staying at was not more than a 5 minute walk to the tournament area which was nice, and the hotel itself was a very nice establishment(and they give you warm cookies when you check in which is just about the coolest thing ever).
Some other cool things about the hotel were that it was not entirely an 'indoor' place, if that makes sense. There were a lot of areas were there was an awning or something to protect you from rain(because in the rainforest, which is were costa rica is, it rains just about every single day) but you are essentially outdoors and there are cool plants or trees all around you. Secondly, there was a bar built into the hotels pool and stools built into the pool around the bar, which I was looking forward to enjoying but unfortunately it remained closed all week.
The tournament itself was boring, it was a $2700 buyin and had a nice structure - a bit fast in the beginning but seemed to have a nice amount of play when it got deep. I lost the vast majority of my chips in a standard hand on day 1 where Andre Aakari(team pokerstars pro and tournament legend!) opened the cutoff to 1200 at 2/4/50 and I found KTs in the BB and happily jammed for my ~8k, he called ATo without too much thought and I was left with 1 SB which didn't last me too long although I managed to get it up to 6 BB's before shoving Q5o in mp and getting called by AK.
My friend Steve known online as 'zugwat' managed to get really deep in the tournament and entered the final table with the chip lead. I was obviously pulling for him because he's a really nice kid and a hell of a tournament player(and overall poker player) in his own right, and we had swapped 2.5%! Unfortunately, he took some absurdly sick beats at the final table, specifically getting a hungarian to 5-bet T5s AI and run out a flush vs his kings for what was easily 75% or more of the chips in play which would have gotten him heads-up with a huuuuge chip lead as he had some chips left behind. Then later on, still 3 handed, he managed to get it in with 55 vs the hungarian's 22 for what was likely roughly 1/3rd of the chips in play only to lose to another backdoor flush, which although obviously all the chips went in pf it's still an emotional roller coaster and extremely devastating to be such a huge favorite and have to progressively watch the tournament slip away as each card is dealt(hell, it even had my heart racing on the rail) - in live tournaments at least, where it's all slow and dramatic.
The night life in costa rica was quite a disappointment after how much I enjoyed myself at PCA, but it just didn't compare in my opinion. Mainly because just about every girl was a hooker and I'm just not into that. The whole idea of paying money for sex just seems a bit silly to me. Same thing with strip clubs, because now you don't even get anything but cock tease. That being said I've never been to a strip club(though I plan to go in the future) so I don't know that much argument holds much weight because I might enjoy myself.
Lastly, I'm really jealous of everyone who's 21 and heading out to vegas for the series about now. Next year I'll be out there though as my 21st is in September. That said I'm really excited about the summer because I'll be living in a beach house with 3 friends I've met through poker, known online as randallin, zugwat, and kingdan. I'm moving in soon, probably in a week or less and am really looking forward to it. Obviously the beach/party scene should be great, but besides that I think I'll be motivated to play more poker(though this hasn't been as much of an issue as it was in the past) as being around people who have the same goals as me should help with any motivation I was lacking. I also think we'll all become better players being able to constantly bounce ideas off one another, especially since I respect the games of all 3 of them to begin with.
