Just got home from Seneca Allegany. Poker tournament started at Noon Sunday. Seneca officials estimated that the tourney would feature 300 players at a $225 buy in. Thirty places would be paid out with a $20,000 first prize.

I was told by phone that no one would be turned away. Open registration bginning a 9:00 AM

Well we got to the casino at 10:30. I registered as the 417th player. They ended up cutting off rgistration at 478 players.

Although they told us that the top 30 places would be paid ( based on 300 entries ) the fact that hey added another 178 players, they decided to pay out 36 places. IMHO, they should have paid out 47 places ( 10% of all the players ).

This really comes into play as I finished the tourney in 46th place. My buddy finished in 38th place, so as you can see it was more of a donation to the cause.

They also increased the first place money to $27,000 because of the added players. Again I wonder how going from a payout of 20,000 for 300 players went up only 7,000 for another 178 players. $25 of the entry money went to the casino, then I was told that 3% of the jackpot money was kept out for the dealers.

In addition we were told that there would be "celebrities" in attendence. There were none.
We also were given a 60 minute break for dinner after six hours. Would have been nice had they included the cost of the buffet in our entry fee. We paid for that ourselves at $15 per head.

This was the biggest tourney I have played in and my first casino sponsored tourney ever. Great experience and I am a stronger player because of it. 46th place wasn't great, but I was proud of the way I played. Hey I finished in the top 10%, and there were some tough players in this crowd.

When you factor in that I went out into the casino after the tourney and managed to win $227 for the roulette whhel and another $110 from the craps table, it tourned into a profitable fun Sunday, and great learning experience.

Tired now going to bed. Goodnight from Northeast Ohio