My Plans for Tunica

I'll be in Tunica, MS from Jan 10 - 14 for the WSOP Circuit Event and the WPT World Poker Open.

While I'm getting excited about going, I'm treating it as just another set of poker sessions. It really is no different than any other session except I'll have more playing time in a condensed period.

An adjustment I will be making this time is that I won't let myself sink into just playing my cards if I go through a cold period. I'll be focusing on playing the players and the situations, just like any other session. My game is at a new level now and I'm confident in my abilities to adjust to different table dynamics better in a robust live setting.

The only difference between this and other sessions is that I'll need to manage my energy and sleep differently. While I plan on having longer than normal sessions, I will also make sure I'm getting enough sleep and eating well.

The other difference in this trip is that I will have the opportunity to meet one of my goals for this year, which is to cash in a WSOP Circuit or WPT Event in 2007 (2007 goal post coming soon). How I expect having this goal to change my play is simply that I will bring my A game to each session. I'm not going to focus on the outcomes and allow that to affect my play. I don't even need to cash in a main event this year. It can be a $200 event or whatever. But this will help me break the seal and just be a nice stepping stone. I've been to a couple of these events and have only played in about 5-6 tournaments so far; I bubbled a $200 second chance tournament last time. I'm confident that I can make a final table, if not win one of these events, but it's not like I have the opportunity to let variance play itself out, so I'm just starting with a goal of cashing for now.

As far as what I'm going to play in, I'm just going to treat the trip like a long poker session and try to maximize profitability, while at the same time, trying to satellite my way into the $500 and $1K events. Unlike last time, I'm not going to play in a $1K event unless I satellite in. Once I make enough in satellites, I'm going to go ahead and buy-into an event and treat the satellites as sit-n-go's. I probably won't play cash games much, but if I do, it will be the 1/2 game at the Gold Strike.

I'll try to keep up with trip reports while I'm there. Wish me luck.