Last December I attended the grand opening at Playground and had a great time. A few months ago I was fortunate enough to get invited to their players club and this weekend had my second opportunity to visit the club.

I flew in Friday night and although multiple groups of friends were going out to a club called wood 35, I ultimately was too tired and wanted to be well-rested for the tournament and opted to stay at the hotel. Playground picked out a hotel for me and it ended up being really nice in a great location downtown. In the morning I got up nice and early and met up with my friend Marc Karam. He gave me a ride down to the poker club and we grabbed breakfast at the rail fire bistro.

If anyone hasn’t eaten here, I can’t stress enough just how good the food is. I’m used to eating pretty bad at casinos, but both my brunch there and the Salmon and veggies I had for dinner were fantastic.

I got my seating assignment and after a few fortunate pots(got flush draw against lower flush draw against 2 people… One where I called him down in a big pot when we both missed, the other when I won a huge pot when we both hit to be up to 90k from a 40k starting stack just 2 hours into the tournament. Soon after things took a turn for the worse when I had KK lose to KQ in a 4bet pot when he called my cbet on J92 and turned a T. He only had about a potsize bet back at this point but I was unable to find the fold and was soon back down to starting stack.

All throughout the day I had a roller-coaster of a tournament… At 500/100 I was up to 140k and among the chipleaders, and then back down to 50k at 800/1600, before back up to 170k at 1k/2k. Eventually the blinds got very high and I made an ill-timed bluff against an opponent who I thought would fold his small overpair on 6536 in a 3way 3bet pot, but he made a great call to take me back down to 50k. Eventually an opponent floated me with KQ on AT72 and rivered a J to knock me out of the tournament when I shoved the river.

Its always disappointing to bust after having so many chips(I had already envisioned myself wearing the championship belt) but I’m excited for my opportunity to win one again in the 10k high roller this Saturday.

After that I met up with some friends at the bar in the poker room and had a few drinks before heading out. I’m pumped for my next chance to return to the club, for now I’m back to Waterloo for a few days before flying back again this weekend.

Oh ya, if anyone at playground is reading this, where did you guys get the chairs? I’m looking for a new office chair and the poker room chairs are far and away the nicest I have sat in! As I grind SCOOPs each day, I wish I had a chair that comfy to sit in!