Happy and Motivated at the PCA

So I’m in the Bahamas and my bag got lost on the plane. Meh, so what! I don’t care. It happens, I’m so thankful to Delta that they brought my bag to the hotel. My keys couldn’t be cut for my room and it took an hour to get in. Meh, so what! It happens! They guy behind the desk was a really nice man and we had fun talking about his family, life, politics, and the environment. It’s all good! I’m a happy boy! I have followed all my rules tonight and will get plenty of sleep for the tournament tomorrow. I decided to play Day 1A and I’m ready to play. It will be a long day, with 8 one hour levels on day 1. On day 2 and further you are looking at 75 minute levels. Tomorrow we start wth 30,000 in chips and will play: 50-100
75-150
100-200
150-300
150-300 (25)
200-400 (50)
300-600 (75)
400-800 (100) It’s a good structure to start off. I prefer 250-500 instead of 75-150, but it’s still a solid structure and I’m excited to play. I have my I-POD loaded with some great new music that I downloaded and hope to be patient on day one. If I bust out of this event I will likely play in the $5000 buy in 8-game mix. I love mixed game events! I’ll also be playing in the High Roller Event and I think players are really going to enjoy what we did with the structure. We are starting the blinds at 150-300 and leaving them there for four levels with 50,000 in chips. Rather than starting at 50-100, starting out higher and leaving it there actually creates a tournament with much more MEANINGFUL play.
This format will be a hit with high stakes player. Guys who will pony up 25K to play a tournament don’t want to be bothered with the meaningless early level, so those levels are just replaced with meaningful levels. I’m not suggesting ALL tournaments should start this way, but for a high roller event, I think it’s clearly and absolutely the best way to go.
We had a meeting today with all of our Team Pros today from across the world so we could get to know each other a little better. The team has grown and we know have 82 pros on the team from various parts of the world, whether it be Latin America, Europe, or the U.S. If you are here, you’ll see the Official Magazine of the PokerStars 2010 Caribbean Adventure. It is the nicest, glossiest, event magazine you’ll ever find and has ALL of the important details in it from the schedule of events to structure sheets and rules for each of the 50 events that will take place. For poker fans, at the back there are pictures of all the Team Pros in it if you are looking for autographs as a souvenir. In fact, on the back page there is an autograph page with all of us on it and you can actually win a FREE package to the Latin American Poker Tour Event in Chile, March 19-23, 2010. If you are the person who gets the most autographs you will win the package. In the event of a tie, a random draw of the qualifying entries will determine the winner. If you are here, pick up a magazine at the welcome desk. It’s got loads of info in there that you’ll want to have. Seriously. So that’s that. This happy boy is going to sleep and is looking forward to a good run tomorrow. Wish me luck! ]]>