Jason Velasco promised his girlfriend he wouldn't make the trip to The Bahamas for WSOP Paradise, but plans changed after an $11 satellite on ACR Poker led to a $30,000 ticket that was too good to turn down.
Lucky enough for Velasco, the decision turned out to be a good one after he brought home a top-100 finish and six-figure score in the Super Main Event just in time for the holidays.
"I decided to fire up a satellite — even though my girlfriend and I had talked about not actually going to this Bahamas trip," Velasco told PokerOrg in the Player's Lounge just outside the main poker room at WSOP Paradise. "But I fired it up anyway for 11 bucks in the last 30 seconds of the tournament."
$11 ticket to The Bahamas
Jason parlayed his $11 satellite into a ticket to the $95 Beast Mega, where he won a $30K WSOP Paradise package. He was one of 15 players who played their way to The Bahamas on ACR. "I was like, honey, you're going to be both happy and mad. So I won this big package for 30K."
Naturally, It took his girlfriend some time to process the news. "By the morning she was like, I'm really happy for you, I'm really proud of you, this is exactly what you've been looking for. You know, this is your passion, this is your dream, and you should follow that."
A very serious part-time job
Velasco's passion for the game extends beyond the felt — he runs a performance coaching business called Balance Poker. "I just started. I come from a legal technology background, and I've been an entrepreneur. I started a few companies in that particular area and I've worked with consulting firms and things like that."
"So for the last six months, I have dedicated myself to having a very specific pre-game routine that I follow at all times. I don't play poker unless I've gone through that pre-game."
For someone who considers himself "basically semi-professional," Velasco treats it like a very serious part-time job. A ticket into the Super Main Event is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for someone who would never play a $25,000 tournament. Now, the $110K score opens up other opportunities.
"I manage my bankroll very specifically. I don't play above my means. I'm very cautious around all these things. This does give me the opportunity to start moving up and thinking about bigger tournaments."
Surviving the gauntlet
"I still have a lot of leaks," Velasco explained, having dealt with a first table that was full of Triton crushers and bracelet winners.
"And one of the things that I realized after going through that initial gauntlet was I was not playing my game. I wasn't myself. I was trying to be like them because that's the way they are on the TV and that's what I was trying to personify. And that wasn't who I was."
Velasco bagged for Day 2 and made a few adjustments to his approach that led to a top-100 finish for six figures.
"I'm the off-kilter one. They don't know how to play against me. So I took that into Day 2 and just had a good run. It was really cool playing against a lot of players that I've actually seen in a lot of their training videos. I knew the way they were thinking and I made a couple of really good value bets against them."
Velasco's next step after an early exit from the $1M Super Saver was to change his flight out of The Bahamas. He originally booked a Friday departure just in case he had a final table to play on Thursday.
"I always plan on making it to a final table, so I never book a flight on the time that there's going to be a final table. Again, mindset."
After a short stop home in New York City, it's off to Vermont for the holiday, where Velasco can make up for the disruption that his trip to The Bahamas caused — and prepare for the Borgata's Winter Open in January.
