Sun City Card Club to Host $15k Tourney Tomorrow

Being St Valentine’s Day and all, I should be writing beautiful love sonnets for my wife, but instead I have chosen to blog about El Paso poker. Though today’s article is related to St Valentine’s Day. Kind of. Okay not really. But what is true is that Sun City Card Club is firing off its first flight for their “Who Killed Cupid?” $15k Guaranteed multi day tournament tomorrow. The final will play on February 19th.  

This tournament will be implementing a new rule, or rather, a new practice. If you qualify for the Final day, and you can purchase your Final day add on immediately following your qualification. Players may also wait until the day of, but must purchase their add-on before the beginning of the first hand of the final day. Players that are late will have their chips at their assigned table and seat, and will be blinded off. 

I think with the recent “add-on controversy” this is a great implementation, and I expect players will fully embrace this practice.

I thought this would be a good time to get to know Sun City Club Owner, Larry Ayoub. I have known Larry since my freeroll days. I remember the VFW in the Northeast hosted the best freeroll in town. Back then I would really look forward to those Friday night freerolls. It was a good time, and it actually had a great structure. This is where I met Larry. Then from there Larry of course started his legendary home game. “You going to Larry’s?” was a common question amongst the El Paso poker community back in those days. Oh and the food at that game. It was World famous!  And here we are today with Mr Larry as co owner and managing partner of Sun City Card Club.

Larry, I never asked you, how the fuck did you even get started in poker? 

“It all started in 2003 for me. I remember seeing the WSOP on ESPN and asking my girlfriend at the time, what game they were playing and what hands were the winners. I had only played blackjack, my game of choice. Ironically a game I can’t stand to play now lol. From there I was so intrigued by the game. I started playing at different bars. I loved to play and hated when the tournaments would finish. I always wanted to keep playing. Some of the early tournaments I would play at were at Shooter’s bar and American Legion in the Northeast, Chit Chat & Misbehaving bar.”

Oh shit! That’s right. Shooters had that $20 buy-in tournament until they got busted lol. That tournament was the nuts at the time! And yeah, I remember Chit Chat was decent for a while. Wow. Good times. Okay, and then what happened, Larry?

“From there I met lifelong friends and found a new entire poker community I never knew existed. I literally found my beautiful wife playing me heads up at a final table lol. (If that isnt the most romantic story for your Valentine’s day, I dont know what is) Soon after I was exposed to house cash games.”

Haha, “exposed” to cash games. Like it was drugs. That’s the way it was. I was happy playing my little freerolls, but then these house cash games opened their doors to us freerollers. Damn. That was something else. 

“I played at a legendary game, at Joseph Hudson’s home game. He was a hometown hero who was an Ex POW in the gulf war. I started to become a familiar face at his weekly games. I was an average player at those times, at best. Through his games I met many El Paso personalities who I think helped shape the El Paso poker scene. Jojo Ortiz, King Kong Kelly, Big Rich, Pony, and of course, Hudson himself.”

But who exposed you to Alex Guadalupe, Larry? Anyway, sorry for interrupting. Go on, please. 

“I started to frequent Las Vegas tournaments & Ruidoso’s Inn of the Mountain Gods. When Hudson decided to cancel his home games, I saw a chance to start my own game. I hosted poker games for many years. I remember when the Dr. Dre Beat headphones came out I did a promotion. Last man standing gets a set of Beats! The game went for 4 days straight lol.”

Haha, I remember that. I didn’t play that game, but everybody talked about it. 

“We had some great times. To say I’ve seen the good, the bad & the ugly is an understatement. Fast forward to 18 years of home games! Texas had been seeing a poker boom in bigger cities when actual poker rooms were popping up in Houston,  San Antonio & Austin. This really caught my eye because I wanted to bring El Paso poker from the underground to the forefront. My original plan was to open a club in Northeast El Paso. But after meeting with a former partner he persuaded me the best move would be East El Paso where one other poker club was operating. This is when Sun City Card Club was born. Our goal was to bring the best for El Paso poker, a clean modern room with all amenities and the best overall poker experience. We pride ourselves on great customer service and friendly atmosphere. It was a hit almost four years later and we are still providing players with that experience. Sun City is open seven days a week. We host daily cash and tournaments! We offer great promotions & World Famous Food!!”

Thank you very much for sharing, Larry. I really appreciate hearing your story. 

Larry Ayoub is probably the nicest card club owner in El Paso. The dude just always has good vibes. I don’t think I have ever seen him upset. It is always a pleasant environment at Sun City. Especially at the cash games. But what I have always complained about at Sun City is their tournament structures.

“Freezeouts” with add-ons (by definition, a tournament is not a Freezeout if it has add-ons), Larry calls these El Paso Freezeouts lol. And then small dollar amount add-ons for a bunch of chips. Having to rebuy immediately, but late registration is still for another 2 hours. But the one thing that I really complain about is their blind structures. It seems Sun City’s goal with tournaments is to get them over as quickly as possible. 

But obviously there are players that prefer these tournaments and structures. Their tournaments always go, and yeah, even I have fun playing them. I hear at other tournaments some players complaining that the tournament is taking too long to finish. So I get it. A card club or tournament director is never going to make everyone happy. But this Kill Cupid tournament or whatever it’s called, should be a good tournament. I fully expect Sun City to exceed the $15k Guarantee. Here is the tournament structure for this tournament. 

As you can see, when the ante kicks in it will be a Big Blind Ante, instead of a Small Blind Ante, which should help the tournament finish fairly early. I prefer the SB ante. What about you all?