 Vegas June 2026 |
| The drive, Aria 7pm |
| Last Updated: 2026-06-10 13:19:45 |
| I'll say up front that yes, I can see myself doing this every year as long as we keep going out for long WSOP trips in June. I want to be able to go to places I can't walk to, I don't want to pay for a rental or pay for taxis everywhere, and now I know what to anticipate.
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| Thought I was going to comfortably make it from home to Vegas in time for the 7PM at Aria leaving around 5:30am. I figured a couple of hours for charging on top of the usual 10.5-11 hrs drive in a gas car minus the hour time difference. I still have to stop for food and bathroom breaks so there is still stopping time with a gas car, right?
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| Not so much...
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| I knew going in that driving up mountains would not be helpful for my battery life. Joann and I had tried an experiment a few months ago and saw that uphill was bad, downhill was good and got some life back.
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| The part I didn't anticipate (but should have) was the drag on the car going at high speeds. I've never added up the miles but I'm pretty confident that more than half the drive involves 80 MPH speed limits, and there's probably a good 1/3 of the drive at 75. And, well, if you've been in a car with me ever you know how I drive.
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| I'll also say that in those winding sections of road where you're working your way up or down through a canyon or something Mustangs perform really, really well. I've always said if I was ever going to get a ticket on one of these drives those are the places it'll be, and that was before I had this car :-)
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| All that said, I expected to make 5 charging stops but when I got farther from the house than I expected on my initial charge I thought I'd actually be able to do it in four stops!
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| Again, not so much ...
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Three things I learned on my long drive: - Android Auto's prediction of battery life on arrival does not account for high speed driving. If it said I was going to get to my next stop with 40% battery I'd actually get there in the 20-30% range, even in flat driving conditions;
- The amount of battery charge the car and the charging stations tell you that you are at is not accurate, because I was consistently dropping 5% in the first 2-3 miles after I left a charging station. So if I charged up to 90% I'd be at 85% in a blink after getting back on the road;
- The higher battery life you have, the slower it charges. So if you are down to 30% you get to 60% really fast ... but then longer to get to 80%, and a lot longer to get to 90% ... so there is a constant balance of how much longer am I going to sit here to get a few more % instead of just moving on to the next stop vs the more I have the farther I can get on this charge
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| As a result, my hopes of cutting out a stop were dashed when reality hit me around the half-way point of the drive. I actually ended up making six stops rather than my expected five. And at 30-40 mins a stop it adds up fast. But ... am I going to drop 20MPH on a 700+ mile drive to conserve battery? That would equally kill the overall drive time and at least when I'm charging I can read, be on the internet, etc.
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| Cost-wise I would say the expense of charging the vehicle was probably about what it would have cost me in gas. That too is probably a wash. But we spend way, way less on electric at residential rates at home vs a gas car for sure.
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| All of that said it was fun driving the car out, I had plenty of ways to entertain myself sitting at charging stations, I never had a moment of concern I wasn't going to make it to the "next one", and I was amused in that 100 mile stretch of "no gas or services" that there was a rest stop about 2/3 of the way that had a charging station so I have options gas cars don't!
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| And I would also say I used nothing but the Ford app to find charging stations and I liked that it would let me know how many spots were available and if any of the chargers were under repair. I made the mistake of not checking one time and it cost me, 3 of 4 full and one out of service when I was going to sit and eat while I charged ... but someone finished up and left half way through my meal (In & Out in Washington UT of course!) so I didn't lose too much time.
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| Got to Vdara right around 7:30pm, had digital key so I only had to wait for the bellman to bring up bags (Joann is coming later so I've got luggage, snacks, drinks, etc for over 2 weeks for two people!), changed out of my driving clothes and got to Aria about 8:15.
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| Long, heavy sigh ...
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| In the past this tournament would have 50-100 people on a waiting list to sit down an hour after it started. Not any more! In spite of being an hour and 15 minutes late I actually got an unsold seat! No waiting list whatsoever!
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| And small. 7 tables of 9, when I sat down it had 80 or 90 entries with 63 remaining on the clock.
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| Odd format, 25 minute levels so breaks come at odd times.
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| There was 15-20 minutes left in the 4th level when I sat down with 25k chips and blinds at 300/600/600 (so 40-ish big blinds). I sat through one orbit, paid blinds plus called a min-raise in my big blind, ended up folding that and was at 22,900 at the first break after not seeing a single card bigger than an 8 in that orbit.
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| But things went well between that break and the next one. One odd thing that happened to me was that for almost the entire time between breaks I had a jack-something in my blind. J-4 suited in diamonds (actually won that pot defending my blind and flopping a jack), J-5 off, J-4 suited again, J-9 off ... can't make it up! Probably 6-7 times before I had a hand without a crappy jack in my big blind!
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| But I got a double-up when pocket jacks held up against A-7 suited.
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| The guy I won that pot from was the same guy as the J-4 hand above, and basically this dude thought any ace was an all-in hand. As bad as A-2 off. Didn't matter, if he had an ace he was willing to shove or call any shove. But unfortunately every time he got all in and was covered he'd suck out after getting in bad so he was constantly building a big stack, giving it away and building it back up again.
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| I'm in the four seat, guy sits down in the 1-seat having just bought in and busts in two hands. Leaves, few minutes later sits back down with another new stack in the 3-seat.
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| First hand in he raises out, I reraise with A-K off, he calls.
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| Ace high flop, he checks, I go all in, he immediately calls with A-6 and busts again. Good for me!
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| 5 minutes later he's back in the 1 seat with another new stack of chips.
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| Can't make it up ... he actually won a few pots this time tho!
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| Anyway, we go to another break and I'm at 59,500 after winning the chip race.
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| Entries are closed, blinds coming back are 1000/2000/2000 and average stack is 50k ... so average is only 25BB and I'm above average with about 30.
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| Short stack poker!
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| Still 63 remaining, there were 128 entries and 16 places being paid.
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| A couple of tables get broken up, we're down around 50 players and nothing has worked for me. I get down to 42,500 and blinds go up to 1500/3000/3000 (so not even 15BB) and I look down at pocket queens under the gun.
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| Sweet!
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| I lead out for 6000, my buddy who thinks any ace is good makes it 15k, everyone else folds, I jam, he calls.
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| A-J off. Actually not unreasonable.
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| 2-8-7 on the flop.
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| 9 on the turn.
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| 10 on the river.
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| Done.
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| Midnight panini from the 24-hr cafe at the hotel with a pour of whisky from one of the bottles I brought and that was my night.
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| As I finish this entry up my plan for today is shower, run over to the cage at the WSOP and deposit money into the app, have lunch at Salt & Ivy, back over to the WSOP for HORSE at 2:00PM.
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| Right now this is my only planned bracelet event for the trip. There's nothing I would play in at the WSOP otherwise before Joann gets here and I'm only an "every day" player until she arrives (well and the day she arrives and the day after :-) ). Once I get through that I'm taking a few days off (maybe another 7pm at Aria if available? But around that time they are doing big multi-day events so it may not be an option either) so Joann and I can spend time together and while I will play some days I'm probably taking more days off than playing days starting the 17th. |
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