WSOP 2010 The Final Countdown -- For The Love Of Laak

As the November Nine prepare to take to the felt, bringing to an end the WSOP 2010, Rebecca McAdam relives her favourite memories from this year’s Series.

For the first week or so I was in Vegas, I hopped back and forth between the Rio and the Bellagio as we kept an eye on Phil Laak and his Endurance Challenge. Laak was hoping to set a new Guinness World Record by playing poker non-stop for 80 hours.

We made a few videos on this that you can check out on Card Player TV and see Laak’s gradual descent into delirium. At first the stakes were $10-$20 and Laak was buying in for $4,000 but at one point when I came to see him he had $100,000 in front of him. He also had a dietician on hand, ready-made meals, profit and loss graphs, and lots of supporters including Jennifer Tilly.

We were there when the champagne bottles were popped and the usually quiet poker room was filled with cheering as Laak beat the old record. At this point I think we all realised he was the kind of person who liked to test the limits and that he wasn’t going to give up lightly. The Unabomber didn’t call it a day until he had beat the previous record by 37 hours ⎯ that’s a 115-hour-long poker session!

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