Poker Marathon Challenge: 100 Hours in 7 Days

I’m stealing the blog post of fellow Team Online member Roy ‘GodlikeRoy’ Bhasin who tried this early November this year. Read all about his challenge at http://www.godlikeroy.com

I’ve decided to have myself a little poker marathon next week. The details are simple: 100 hours of poker in 7 days. It’s not totally insane and probably lots of people have done this before. I’m not taking bets against me completing it or anything like that – it’s just a little experiment/challenge.

Why am I doing this?

• December has always been the month in which I played the most poker, often finishing a milestone or SNE. There was always a special feeling when playing in December and by doing this challenge I hope to get back that feeling since this year I haven’t played as much as I would have hoped.
• I already planned to take a break from work around Christmas and New Year but it felt like a good idea to take an extra week to play some poker, so why not a poker marathon?
• Part of the December Festival promotion on PokerStars are the $700k Milestone hands. It’s always fun to playing during these Milestone hands and most of the time this also means softer games. The Milestone hands start the same day as I will be starting my marathon so that’s another reason to play a lot of poker.
• Only for players in the Netherlands there is a VPP Challenge in which I would have loved to compete. Unfortunately I had way to much work to finish before my holiday started but during my Marathon I will try to get myself in the top 20 and earn some extra money this way.
• For fun. I miss playing lots of poker so I’m definitely doing it for fun as well, if I’m actually winning some money I bet it’s even more fun 😉

Thing I want to do throughout the week

• Get a minimum of 6 hours sleep a night, but no more than 8 hours.
• Eating healthy and refrain from overeating. When you put in so many hours it’s easy to eat only snacks and overeat yourself during the small breaks between playing poker.
• Keep my back healthy. I don’t have a standing desk setup like Roy but if I notice my back suffers too much I will take a break. If my back keeps being an issue I will quit the challenge.
• Stay focused and limit distractions: Facebook, Twitter and What’s app. Banning it however would be a step to far 😉
• Play at least 50,000 hands. That’s only 500 an hour and should be relatively easy, I except that during the morning not many tables will run and I will use that as a sort of warm-up. During the evening I expect myself to 10-12 table most of the time, I’m not planning to 20-24 table besides during the end of the Milestone promotion.
• Hopefully maintain a small winrate pre rake-back although I don’t expect this to be big due to me being out of shape. Winning money post rake-back is obviously the minimum 🙂

What preparations will I make for the week?

• Make sure there is plenty of food in the house so I won’t need to do any groceries during the week.
• Minimize distractions. I’ve cleared out my calendar and have almost nothing scheduled for the whole week. Aside from one dentist appointment I can wholly focus on the challenge. Not going out during the weekend will probably be the hardest part 🙂
• Have my poker setup ready, something which I have already prepared so it seems like I’m ready to go.
• Ensure that I start off on the right foot. Sleep well the night before and be fully rested.

What else?

• I’ll be starting my marathon Monday the 16th after breakfast and the clock starts ticking after I’ve played my first hand of poker.
• You can follow the progress via twitter (@Tzen1)
• I won’t be posting any blogs about the challenge (I have no time for it) but I did already prepare two blog posts about my 5 years as a poker professional which I will publish during my challenge.
• I will write a wrap-up on Monday or Tuesday after the challenge and two more blogs about my 5 years as a poker professional so there will be plenty to read at www.tzen1.com over the coming 2 weeks!