Are there any major hoops to jump through to play in this tournament? Can you register w/o having a players card? Can you register on 9/20 and then go sightseeing in the area, and then return the next day for the tournament? Does the casino expect tournament players to "qualify"?
The only hoop you need to jump thru is a one night motel stay down the street in old Temecula at 80$ a night. Nice motel is the Ramada if you dont want to pay Pechanga price for a night. You can register via the web page without a players card but you will need one at the MANDATORY evening before registration. Yes you can go sight seeing. I take the rout right over to the Pala Casino where they offer a good 6 deck game of BJ. To qualify you only need to pay $149. You will need to win your table of seven. Rebuys are likely not offered. They do run a good game, dealers OK and staff very good.
Hi Barney Thanks for the info. I paid for the tournament and reserved a room at the Ramada. Everything went smoothly. The lady at the casino was friendly and helpful.
You know, rooms @ Pechanga were only $119.00 for a double queen on Sunday night. It may be worth the few extra bucks to stay in house (unless you want to avoid the urge to play).
I was hoping to go and just watch the tournament, but I just got off the phone with them and they tell me I can't. Edited to say: I just got an e-mail from the Director of Table Games, who tells me that indeed I can go and watch. So - I will.
As far as staying at the Ramada-you save about 50 bucks considering the price difference and the free Ramada breakfast. It is about 10 minutes thru medium traffic to the Pechanga. This BJT is an invite/open and most rooms are comped I think. Of course if you play there you might get a players rate. Julie, you can see the BJT tables fairly well from outside the ropes. Last game I played there I was in a fight with one lone aggressive player, most are very aggressive. I noticed a lot of regulars crowding around our table behind the ropes. My competitor charged ahead and won. It turns out my competitor is feared because he has some ability to smoke a CSM. He is well known to build huge stacks. If they dont offer rebuys I suggest asking the TD to think about bringing them back. Asking politely. I think one reason staff get so sick of BJTs is we as a group demand and demean too much. BJT'ers complain like there is no tomorrow for the most part.
9/21 Pechanga Casino $50,000 tournament UPDATE That is correct. Continuous Shuffling Machines were not used for the prior Pechanga tournament, and they were not used for the 9/21 tournament. The area used for both tournaments is not wired to provided electricity for CSMs. When the tournaments are held in areas with the proper wiring, the CSMs will likely be used. Today's tournament used 4 deck shoes and the cards were hand shuffled. Report on the 9/21 tournament: Today there were four 1st round heats almost all if them with 7 players to a table. I don't know how many tables there were. There were a lot of players. The person with the top chip count from each table advanced to the Semi Round. Seven Wild Cards were drawn for the Semi Round. The person from each table with the top chip count advanced to the Final Table. No Wild Cards were drawn for the Final Table. There were 7 players at the Final Table. Each heat for all rounds consisted of 21 hands. You got new chips if you advanced. You did not take your chip count with you. After the tournament, 10 tickets were drawn and $500 was given to each ticket holder. It was more like 14 or 15 tickets drawn, as you had to be present to win. The tickets were included with your chips when you played the 1st Round. A nice touch in today's tournament was that two large screen monitors were set up ---one on each side of the final table, and the final table action was "televised", but w/o sound or any narration. The camera was pointed straight down at the table which resulted in that only the top of each stack of chips was shown. It was impossible to tell how many chips were in each stack. Also, the denomination of most of the cards was difficult to see. The camera needed to be focused a bit better. Next tournament: The casino intends for the near future to conduct one tournament a month. The date and prize pool for the Oct. tournament have not been announced. Please post the details on Tournament Updates if you get any information. There there will be a format change for the Oct. tournament---it will be of a sit-n-go style. After you get your table and seat assignment, you will immediately take your place at the table. When all 7 players have arrived the action for that table will begin. The Oct. tournament will be held in the Ball Room which is not wired for CSMs.
Thanks for the detailed report! I had a great time watching the tournament - my first ever. It's almost like watching a completely different game. I agree about the camera - it might as well have not been there. I talked to a lot of people who were comped the entry fee.
The "Oak Pit" uses CSM. Because of complaints they were removed for 6 deck shoes at 9 am the day of tournament. I watched them being carted away. The staff has this tourney down- Im surprised they will change the format. They register the 300ish players in a 3 hour period the night before cleanly. Then the next morning they set up in an hour or so before and then first quals at 10am on the hour. The final table at 3pm and drawings done by 4 as staff cart away tourney equipment. During the final/drawing period the BJ tables are being loaded with live play chips. So, for the most part the day time staff of 3 pit critters 2 security and 16 dealers do the job w/in a work day. Ive seen some BJTs where they but in 15 straight hours for a 300 person game. Im glad they will change the format. Even tho I give the staff and dealers an "A" traveling to a game with 1/7 advance and no rebuys stinks. I hope moving it to the HUGE ballroom will bring something better. One other note. The guy who won was jazzed. I mean jazzed. Great to see.
Is it common for finalists to agree to split the winnings before they play the final round? I overheard one of the finalists telling someone that they had tried to work out an agreement between them that whoever won, the winnings would be split up between them, with the winning getting more than the others but not $20K. Two players wouldn't agree to this and they ended up #1 and #2. I can understand the philosophy; however, when the casino makes you sign a tax form right there, big winners going to take a tax hit for the full amount - I'm not sure how you'd report to the IRS that you split the winnings with the other players.
If you use 4 decks you run a high probability of two shuffles, about every 9 hands considering 8 hands-dealer and 7 players in a 21 hand game. My dealer said 6 decks cut at a half deck. If they were using 4 decks you could easily see shuffling at hand 19 as well as 9, or so, which gives a risk of a last hand shuffle. Pechanga uses a few 6 deck hand shuffles in the casino mostly CSM. If they move the game to the ballroom Im guessing they will go to 6 deck shoes because there isnt electricity on the dance floor for csm's . They had a 300k tourney a couple years back with what I remember 45 tables in the ballroom. Im excited about the potential changes Pine Tree mentioned. Julie, one of the finalist told me he wanted to chop the pot but the casino wanted to show off the big winner so it played out. I think this is a change from the past games.
The table I was at was at was using 4 decks. I have played plenty of 6-deck games and if that was a 6-deck the cards must have been really thin. The little gal we had as a dealer picked the whole stack up rather easily. Anyway, it really doesn't matter. If they do make those changes that would be pretty cool. I don't like having a tournament on a Monday since that pesky thing called work gets in the way. BTW, is anyone going to try out the Agua Caliente Tournament?
Hello JulieCA. Nice to see that there are people in here from California. I feel that California gets no love. For crying out loud. Barney is another one of my favorites. I find it to be very disrespectful for the West Coast players all together. I don't mean Las Vegas as well. What I mean is that here in California many people in the country don't understand that this is a commuters state. Therefore, it takes you hundreds of miles just to get to some of these casinos. I keep stating that the closest Vegas style casino to Los Angeles with slots that is identical to Las Vegas is San Manuel. And just to get on a $5.00 table at any give time and day is a nightmare. Listen people. I do a great deal of traveling you wouldn't believe. I've been going up North lately. Been to the East Cost, been to the middle of the country, been to the South a million times, and they still don't compare to the West Coast in my honest opinion as far as casinos everywhere. It's just many of the casinos in Cali are not in the most well populated areas. Many of them are on/near Indian reservations. And I'm not talking about the likes of The Commerce because that is just a Poker haven in my honest opinion. The blackjack play in these local casinos in Los Angeles suck. We don't have the big time tournaments that Las Vegas, the South(where I'm orginally from), and the East Coast have. I think it is a shame that if you look on the map of the amount of casinos that California has, it's like the fourth to fifth largest population of casinos in the entire nation. Yet, we don't get the big money tournaments like we should. Anyway, I was half way to the tournament and I called the office at Pechanga. They do use the CSM during the tournament. That was my invitation to turn around. Next, you have to come down on Sunday during registration, even if you registered online. Turn off number two for me. I want to sleep in my own bed in beautiful Pasadena,CA and would be willing to drive right back down to Temecula because I love the game that much and play it every single day. I just wanted to appologize for not responding to you on the other site JulieCA. I just stopped coming to the forums as much because I got bored with this site and the other one. I was especially angry that me and Ken Smith had words in the beginning when I first signed up. That really turned me off and ever since my participation on these sites have been null and void. Lastly, I have a great respect for the most part(other than a few I won't name) all of you because I think the more experienced players are some of the most kindest and thoughtful people in the world. I felt that I wasn't welcome here because many people would do more fighting on here with each other instead applauding each other. Listen, I agree with being different, but I feel we can agree to disagree Well, let God be the glory, good luck to all of you, and may you have blessed fortunes at the tables.
Hey all, late for this one, but future tourneys at Pechanga.... You can shoot down the 79 to either Casino Pauma for $10/double deck or a little further down to Santa Ysabel for $5/single and $10/double, both with 3:2 BJs and classic Vegas rules (DAS!). And if you like cheap Pai Gow, SY has $5 while Pauma has $10. Sorry I've been offline for a while...been working the racehorses for a while. ;-)
