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How to Pack for Playing the WSOP + VDSE

by Katie Dozier |  Published: May 25, '12

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Now that I’ve sold out my package, I’m super excited for the WSOP this year! I’m playing all the $1k + $1500 NLHE tournaments, plus many of the Venetian Deep Stack Extravaganza. Altogether, I have 25 tournaments scheduled between 5/28 – 7/4, so I’m setting out for a real grind!

Smart packing is something that can make a grinder’s (or a Grindette’s ;) ) life a lot easier.

Grinding Packing List:

• A huge bottle of water: Inevitably the cocktail service will have moments when you’re super thirsty and it seems to be taking forever to get a waitress to your table.

• Snacks: Unless you’re really obsessed with beef jerky, you may want to bring what you like to eat on the run from home. I try to keep my snacks relatively healthy to avoid a sugar crash, and enable me to play my best.

• A lot of singles: Having a stack of ones is handy for tipping, and avoiding the annoyance of having to make change later.

• Mini Toothbrush and toothpaste, gum: Because going to Chinatown on your dinner break won’t leave your breath minty fresh!

• Chapstick/Lip balm: The climate in Vegas is super dry, and most people have to moisturize a lot here.

• Toiletries, change of clothes: In case I play until super late and crash with one of my friends on the strip (I live in Summerlin). Ty friends! :)

• Glasses, wipes for glasses, preservative-free eye drops: I wear contacts, but sometimes my eyes have had enough, and I have to change into glasses. Also helps if one of your contacts falls out—as mine did once during a WPT prelim!

• Hand Sanitizer + lotion: As necessary as hand sanitizer is during the WSOP, it can be rough on hands, so I make sure to have lotion.

• iPad, Phone, MP3 player, headphones, + all chargers: I don’t use my tablet while playing, but it’s handy to have in case I bust and want to take a reading break for a bit before jumping into the cash tables. Listening to music with comfortable headphones helps me focus. Chargers are extremely important to carry, because my battery always dies at some point.

• A physical copy of your schedule: In case you forgot those chargers we already discussed.

• Notebooks + pen: For recording hands, staking investments, to do lists, etc.

• Lucky Mementos: While I’m not superstitious, I think having little uplifting things around can help your mental game. For me, I’ll be keeping with me a very sweet note my Mom wrote me to wish me good luck. Also, I like having pictures of my friends and family on my phone, to scroll through.

Good luck to everyone this summer!

Katie “hotjenny314” Dozier is a lead coach for Team Moshman and one of the Grindettes. An accomplished super-turbo and MTT player, she makes videos for Drag The Bar and PokerStrategy . Dozier, co-authored Pro Poker Strategy: The Top Skills and The Superuser. She posts more frequent updates on Twitter.

 
Any views or opinions expressed in this blog are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of the ownership or management of CardPlayer.com.
 
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