The Heartland Poker Tour is kicking off its sixth season right now … with its first ever event in Las Vegas. While an HPT series of tourneys at Red Rock might not cause too much hubbub around Las Vegas, I gotta say, for yours truly, it has re-ignited the poker dream.

When you’re surrounded by poker but aren’t winning let alone competing in the events you’re covering, you tend to lose the WSOP main-event dream that brought so many of us here in the first place. You understand the lottery component, and you just have seen up close so many people live relatively pathetic degenerate lives in pursuit of it all. However, the HPT offers something a little bit different, and seemingly a lot more attainable.

I got into a $250 satellite on a freeroll. (Pokerati has its privileges.) And I’ll be playing that tonight. The cool thing about it is that 20 percent of the field will win seats into the $1k main event. 20 percent? Hmm … I can do that. And then at that point, it’s just another tournament, conceivably against a lot of folks who may just be a little too excited about being in Vegas to win. (Heartland chartered four jets to fly qualifiers in for this event from elsewhere around the country.) And the typical 1st prize payout on the Heartland Poker Tour is anywhere from $80k to $150k … nice! While not exactly life-changing money, for a guy whose biggest cash thus far has been $11k, a six-figure payout of any sort … or even five figures for that matter, would certainly be year-changing money.

So wish me luck … and follow me on Twitter as I seek to survive today, and take it down this weekend.

For more details on HPT-Red Rock, click here. Tons of satellites running, their first ever celebrity-charity event, a funky party to go with it … and a television crew.

Oh, that’s a whole-nother story … and testament to the grind-it-out success of the Heartland Poker Tour. Look how much TV coverage they’ve finagled and see how different that is from the typical poker model on FSN.