Playing the WSOP Main Event is a bucket list item for poker players around the world. Busting out first hand is the nightmare that's only suffered by a few.
ACR Stormer Travis Darroch was granted entry into that exclusive club today, busting on the very first hand of the very first flight of the Main Event when he ran his full house into quads.
Darroch chronicled his preparation and his excitement at playing the Main Event on his Instagram stories directly before and after the bustout.
"Good morning, it's quarter to noon," he said as he walked towards the Main Event. "At noon starts Day 1A of the $10,000 WSOP Main Event. Looking forward to it. I slept really well, got everything prepped. Couple of good snacks packed in the bag, water and everything. Meditated, relaxed a little bit."
Dreaming of playing the Main Event
Darroch admitted to suffering from nerves ahead of the start.
"I've played one or two $10Ks before so it's not a huge deal," he said, "but it's a huge bucket list thing. I've been dreaming about playing this since I was 16."
"From all the stories I've heard, it seems like we play very, very basic poker," he added. "It's deep stacked, we play five two-hour levels. I don't know if I'll give you guys too many updates, but I'll keep it to the most simple poker I've played all series. I won't get too impatient... I feel good, well I feel nervous."
15 minutes later and he was out.
Travis Darroch: 
David Williamson: 
Board: 
Williamson led the river and Darroch shoved.
Blink and it's gone
"Well, this has got to be some sort of sick dark comedy or something," he said on Instagram afterwards. "For anyone watching, I don't blame if you laugh because it's pretty ridiculous. So I got knocked out first hand."
You can watch him talk through the brutal hand in the video at the top of the article.
"Very disappointed, heartbroken. I was fine getting knocked out on Day 1, but not getting knocked out on hand 1. I've been pretty good about dealing with loss but this is a heavy one. I'm probably going to have to take some time off for a little bit."
Travis is an ACR Stormer who streams his game on TwitchBack on the horse
Thankfully, there's a happy(ish) ending. We managed to get Darroch into the PokerOrg Clubhouse a couple of hours after he bust and he's already over it and ready to fire the next one.
"I've been playing professionally for about seven years, and most of my friends have played the Main Event", he told us.
"I remember watching WSOP when I was 17 and daydreaming about it. Yesterday, I decided to play a satellite, I didn't re-enter and just won it on a sun run. I'm supposed to fly out tomorrow morning so I thought I'd play Day 1A and if I have to extend my trip if I make Day 2, that's okay. 16- year-old Travis will be jumping for joy.
"I planned on playing pretty simple poker but I didn't get that chance."
Even now, with the heat of the battle still smarting, Darroch can zoom out.
"I've been here a couple of weeks. I haven't put in a ton of volume, but when I reflect on everything I'm very happy with how I've played this series," he said. "I'm overall very happy with the majority of hands that I've played.
"I will be thinking about this for a long time but I already know in a very short period of time I'm going to be having a laugh about it.
"For the last few months I've had this saying in my head, 'If I die, I die'. It's a little bit pessimistic but it's more about embracing that poker death and being accepting of losing that cash. If your only expectation is to win you're going to be unhappy very often.
"And, you never know how the variance gods are going to invert it. Next year I could win it."
You can follow Travis Darroch on Instagram and Twitch.
