Five Diamond Day One

I have 65,900 chips after day one. We started with 30k. I lost 18k to Raja Kattamuri on the second to last hand of the day. He had the nut straight and I had middle pair and I called his 13k river bet. I analyzed the hand thorougly and concluded that he had the nuts or nothing. That one stings to end the day as it was one of only two real pots I lost all day. The other was with AK against Steve Dannenmann's slowplayed AA but luckily I didn't hit anything and escaped with a small loss.

It was a very smooth day. My chip stack went up every level as I continuously won medium sized pots and never lost a big one. My table was tight and no one was determined to win the tournament on day one. Raja was the most active player at the table, four to my left, with Steve Dannenmann to his left. I had Ron Stanley (4th place to Stu Ungar in 97 WSOP) to my right and Fred Sigur three to my left. I had good focus all day and I followed through on my plan to think about every play very thoroughly and methodically, making sure I gathered all the information and processed it before making a decision. It was a good day but this thing is only beginning. 2/3 of the field still remains and tomorrow I will likely be at a tougher table with bigger stacks.

At one point about halfway through the day I had just bluffed Raja out of a pot and I was talking to Dannemann. He plays very solid poker but doesn't make a lot of super sophisticated plays or incredible calldowns or anything. He said all he did was play premium hands the first six days of the WSOP and then got lucky a few times at the final table. Sitting there with the chip lead at the table I really started to feel like I could win this thing, and it made me nervous. I'm starting to really think I could make a final table in one of these events, and it doesn't just seem like a dream anymore.