Main Event Schedule for the normal guy

[55Darryl]

It's obvious that WSOP (Harrah's) is doing the best they can, I think. But how in the heck can the Average Joe take 9-11 days off from work to attend and play in the $10,000 event?


RazzO

[Grunch]

Leave of absence.

[Botchman]

This the ME the biggest event in poker....if you have any love for the game at all you can easily find 9-11 days to go to vegas and have a blast...come on now...Never heard of a Vacation???

[ace_in_the_hole]

There is no way to shorten it, unless they cap it at 2k runners or make it a 24 hour marathon.

[bsheck]

Or a turbo. 15 minute levels!

[MicroBob]

A very high percentage of the 'average guys' are only going to need 1 day in LV.

It's pretty ridiculous to assume you will be making it to the final 27 or so players and will need 11 days imo.

[LearnedfromTV]

I actually think they've set it up perfectly, with the way the weekends are worked in. Take a one week vacation, plan to stay win or lose and enjoy yourself, and if you happen to make it past the second weekend, you're in the top 150 of the WSOP, work can deal. My situation is that I'm basically out of paid vacation days (counting upcoming honeymoon) after the first week, but I'll happily take unpaid vacation if I have to.

Given the current space restrictions, they have to extend it if they want to accomodate the field. Bigger field is better for everyone.

[MicroBob]

Correct.

The only other alternatives I can think of are:
- Not allow so many players
- Turn the main-event into a turbo
- Make everyone play 20 hours a day


Otherwise, I'm not sure what exactly anyone could want them to do.


When I was out there I met a number of people who seemed to have 'regular' jobs who had taken 1 or 2 weeks off to play various prelim and side-game stuff.
Asked one guy I was friendly with in a prelim event if he was playing the main-event and he said, "Nah, I've been here almost 3 weeks already and I've got to get back to work."


So there are SOME people who are able to do it.

[dietpepsimachine]

They could theoretically have a second tourney room and maybe only have 2 or 3 day ones. Also i beleive there is one off day scheduled so i beleive they could cram it down to a week.
i agree with OP that 10 days is a bit too long. but i suppose if you make it past a week you can work out something for the last 3 days.

[MicroBob]

to have that many players on their day 1 would require more than just an extra room.

They would also need to bring in THAT many more tables and dealers (and floor, etc).
I just don't think that option is very realistic.

Also, getting rid of one fo the day-offs won't make that big a difference for those with scheduling issues.

But it can make a HUGE difference in fairness at the event (in terms of fatigue).

My impression is that most people think the day-off makes things far more fair for everyone.

[dietpepsimachine]

i beleive players from day 3 (no off days in tourney) actually faired the best last yr. (in terms of making the final 3 tables - but is a very small sample).

There is plenty of room at Rio for more tables. But i suppose event 1 is the only other event where they would get any use out of it. So, i guess this is the only way to do it.

my guess is 6500 players?

[FCBLComish]

[ QUOTE ]
i beleive players from day 3 (no off days in tourney) actually faired the best last yr. (in terms of making the final 3 tables - but is a very small sample).

There is plenty of room at Rio for more tables. But i suppose event 1 is the only other event where they would get any use out of it. So, i guess this is the only way to do it.

my guess is 6500 players?

[/ QUOTE ]

Actually event 1 is the Casino Employees event, and I hope it does not sell out before I get there /images/graemlins/smile.gif

[zoobird]

I may be missing something obvious, but why can't day 1 take place at multiple casinos, so they can collapse it down into one day?

[warsaw]

Thats actually not a bad idea.

[DDH]

COnsidering ho wmuch of the strip Harrah's own now, it might not be. Technology is such now that communicating between the rooms shouldn't be too difficult.

Initially, I agreed with you and thought "This sucks, there's no way I'm going to take off 10 days to play in this damn thing." Then, after I qualified through Stars and essentially received a free 9-night vacation, my thoughts were "Man, I am so happy this thing is 10 days. I wish they would extend so I could get even more time off from work."

And as far as Average Joes not being able to take off from work in order to attend... I bet I can find 8,000 people who will disagree. /images/graemlins/grin.gif

[Ironman]

Why would anyone from the casino want to shorten the event.

An extra 5,000 gamblers (some of which have very large bankrolls) in their casino for an extra 3 or 4 days is very profitable to them.

Ironman Dave

[DVaut1]

[ QUOTE ]
A very high percentage of the 'average guys' are only going to need 1 day in LV.

[/ QUOTE ]

[zoobird]

True, although I think I read somewhere that they've capped the entries this year at 8,000...so if that fills up and people can't enter the tournament because of space limitations, that's costing them money too. And that's not even considering the people who might have entered but decided not to because of the extra days of 'Day 1' competition.

[Dominic]

take a week off from work. If you make it past the first 7 days of the ME, chances are you won't need that job anymore.

[Wubbie075]

Plan ahead...

I'm not going this year, but I am gonna take a real shot at it next year... I get 3 weeks vacation, but I only took 2 weeks this year so I can carry over a week to next year... I'll have plenty of days to take, both ahead of time for regular time off, and during the event... but, summer is also our dead period to taking a huge block of time isn't really an issue for me... plus, everyone in my office knows I play poker so if I made it far they'd be pretty excited for me anyway... (now I just need to qualify lol)

obviously a lot depends on your job and your company... but if you expect to be going to the WSOP, with a little forthought and planning you should have enough vaca days to cover it...

[People_Mover]

I booked my hotel for 7 days and told work I'm going on vacation. If I cash deep, I'm not coming home /images/graemlins/grin.gif

[Wetdog]

I haven't qualified yet, but no doubt /images/graemlins/grin.gif will. If I last longer than a week, It would be at worst neutral EV financially. Actually I have 25 days PTO every year, so it would just be a matter of late notification of needing more than the scheduled time.

As far as the RIO having enough room to hold more than 2000 players, maybe a couple hundred but not a couple thousand. At least not in that room.

[Yuv]

Turn it into a turbo, turn it into a turbo! 10k turbo tourny to become the world champion. That will be soooooo much fun /images/graemlins/smile.gif

[ QUOTE ]
Actually I have 25 days PTO every year

[/ QUOTE ]

I think we might have the same job.

[ QUOTE ]
Turn it into a turbo, turn it into a turbo! 10k turbo tourny to become the world champion. That will be soooooo much fun /images/graemlins/smile.gif

[/ QUOTE ]

Are you like.. ever NOT drunk?

[BarronVangorToth]

[ QUOTE ]
I may be missing something obvious, but why can't day 1 take place at multiple casinos, so they can collapse it down into one day?

[/ QUOTE ]

Good in theory; problematic in reality.

[MicroBob]

[ QUOTE ]
I may be missing something obvious, but why can't day 1 take place at multiple casinos, so they can collapse it down into one day?

[/ QUOTE ]


I don't see how this would be any different than having it all at that same casino.

the Rio surely has enough big rooms to accomodate all of this if they wanted to.
But they would be bringing in all these tables and dealers for just 1 day.

Where would all these dealers and tourney-directors come from? Just create them all out of thin-air?


I don't see how having different day 1 heats at 4 different casinos would help any more than having the 4 different day 1 heats in 3 or 4 different big rooms at the Rio.