Headed to London this past week for the Victory Poker Launch Party and to play on the “Party Poker Big Game lV” television show. There was a great deal of hype about the possibilities of Isildur1 playing in the game as well, which would have been awesome (whether he wore a mask or not) but sadly he didn’t make it and I didn’t get to offer him a sponsorship deal like I’ve been wanting too : )

The game was a $10,000 minimum buy-in, 25-50 no-limit with a straddle and had a wide array of players from Europe & America. I got there @ 8 pm and didn’t sit down in the game til 8:30 am!!! It was easy to stay awake because I’ve been working 18 hours a day so it was exciting to be around real life poker, especially with the level of action that Luke “Full Flush” Schwartz, Justin “ZeeJustin” Bonomo & Neil Channing were creating against the one and only David “Viffer” Peat, who was stealing the show. I got super lucky in taking the seat of Isaac Haxton since he’s one of the top 10 no-limit players on earth! We were also playing the Seven-Deuce game where if you win with 7-2 in your hand, you receive $500 from every player at the table as a bonus! The game was a ton of fun, and even had Intro-Songs for when each of the players took their seats at the table,,, mine was Kanye West’s “Cant tell me nothing” which the players sang off & on for a few hours throughout the game since the chorus is so catchy.

I got my chips all-in with Viffer multiple times but so did everybody since he managed to win £150,000, which is the equivalent of 3,000 big blinds in a 48 hour period!!! The other interesting twist was every few hours we eliminated players off the table like the show “Survivor” which was quite an interesting dynamic. Viffer was never gonna get voted off since he created all the action and they’d be silly to vote the young CEO off,,, so after getting tired I eventually tried to nominate myself off and even that didn’t work!!! You’ll be able to see all the action on SKY TV in Europe this Summer and on Youtube type websites in America.

During the same week I also received AMAZING text messages from Antonio Esfandiari & Alec Torelli who were doing a cameo role on my hands down favorite show ever, HBO’s ENTOURAGE! We all thought there was a 5% chance they would actually allow Victory patches on there shirts but once they got onto the set, I think Antonio used his charm to make them feel like it would be more realistic for them to wear their logo’s (which is true) so hopefully they’ll be visible on the Season Premiere this season!

The whole thing is surreal to me since half a year ago Victory was just an idea in my head and now there’s so many cool things coming to fruition. Thousands and thousands of people are registering from so many different countries, it’s so exciting to see things happening so far ahead of schedule.

The title of this article actually came from the combination of all these tv marketing things happening last week along with the next fun part of the story… So I’m flying from Malta to London with Keith Gipson & John Tabatabai and while flipping through the 11th magazine on the plane I see this photo of a UK Model named Emma Glover and I instantly fell in love. I wake up my flight companions and tell them that the second we land we HAVE TO find this girl and book her for the Launch Party that’s taking place in 18 hours! They were a bit upset with me for waking them up, but it was “true love” so I couldn’t help myself : )

Upon entering the hotel, I emailed Emma Glover’s name to the staff in Vegas and the owner of BLUFF Magazine in Europe whose birthday was going to be happening during the party. He responded by saying “are you sure?” and my 3 word response back was, “YES, TRUE LOVE”

Somehow at 7:29 pm as we were setting up the party, Michael Caselli who must have worked hard on his birthday to pull this off,,,, walked around the corner with Emma and all I heard in the nightclub was John/Keith saying “SHE’S REAL, SHE’S REAL!!!”

I immediately told her the fun story of seeing her in the magazine just 18 hours prior and luckily she was flattered which broke the ice and led to an unforgettable launch party.

The moral of the story is to pursue the things that you want in life even if it takes a great deal of work or seems crazy to other people! You only have one life and everyday is truly important,,, so put forth the effort, be good to people & your hard work will pay off… Whether it’s launching a new company or wanting to meet your dream girl, it’s the hard work & things you do in life prior to those moments that can turn your “Fantasy into a Reality…”