Phil Laak Sets Sights on Poker Endurance Record

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More goofiness from one of the best sources for it in the pokerverse, as Phil Laak announced plans to shot-take for the Guinness Record for Poker Endurance.

We’re pretty sure that coming from 99% of the poker pro population, this would seem like a naked (and likely boring) PR grab. With Laak (and possibly Huck Seed), however, you get the feeling that he’s genuinely interested in taking the shot purely to see if he can do it – just for the fun of it, if you will.

Not that he won’t take the PR the stunt will generate for UnabomberPoker, mind you.

Regardless of his motivations, here’s the breakdown: To become the new World Record Holder for Poker Endurance, Laak will have to best the total time of Paul Zimbler, the current record holder. Zimbler set the current mark of 74 hours, 20 minutes and 21 seconds at the 2009 WSOPE, and he looked quite a bit worse for the wear after having done so. Video:

Laak will be attempting the feat under similar, albiet Americanized, circumstances. He’ll make his run during the 2010 WSOP on June 2, starting at noon. He won’t be at the Rio – Laak’s attempt will instead be hosted on The Strip by the Bellagio.

Laak’s start time may be delayed if he makes a deep run in the $50k buy in Player’s Championship.

With the date fast approaching, Laak is apparently deep into a rigorous training schedule of his own devising. It’s typical Laak. Excerpt:

For what it’s worth. This training did not come from some secret military training manual or anything. I came up with all of this on my own. It may sound like a crack pot sort of training regimen but to be honest… every time I look at it, it seems genius. Maybe it is in some sort of weird top secret military manual and we just have never seen it. Titled… “How to beat the need for sleep on weird navy recon spy missions” or something like that.

Read the entire blog post.

Honestly, we were pretty underwhelmed by Zimbler’s attempt last year – it seemed like a really lengthy, complicated way to raise money for charity at a poker tournament (Ante up For Africa seems like a better model) and what was worse, it wasn’t remotely entertaining. Many who viewed it at PTP just felt the footage was borderline disturbing – you mostly just felt bad for Zimbler, which doesn’t make for captivating viewing.

We’re willing to bet, however, that Laak will be a different story. He’s entertaining when he’s on a full night’s rest, and should therefore be able to produce a reasonable highlight reel of wacky quips and awkward interactions once sleep-deprived to make the event worth following (or at least checking out once’s it’s all said and done).

Related: excerpt from an episode of I Bet You, a show where Laak and Esfandiari engage in ridiculous behavior in pursuit of winning wagers:

The whole endeavor will be chronicled on Twitter (@realphillaak).

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