EPT12 Barcelona, Day 1: Barceloner

After heading over to the Casino Barcelona around dinner time yesterday, I ended up sticking around until late -- after two a.m., in fact -- in order to see through to completion the first trophy event of the EPT Barcelona series, the Neymar Jr Charity Home Game.

Steve O’Dwyer happened over just before registration closed for the tournament, was encouraged to play by Team PokerStars SportStar Fatima Moreira de Melo, and ended up taking down the sucker to win a seat into the EPT Main Event that starts this weekend. Halfway through the final table (where O’Dwyer knocked out all but one of the others), he estimated he’d knocked out about 15 players along the way -- not a bad clip for a 59-player event.

After several hours of sleep and a largish breakfast at the hotel, I’m back over at the casino readying for a more standard long day of work. Today things pick up in earnest for the 71-event series, with eight different tourneys going on including the start of the €1K Estrellas Main Event. Last year they had a ridiculous 2,560 entries for that one -- the first big buy-in event of the EPT season -- so we’ll see how many come out for the three starting days this time.

I’m kind of on my own, blogging-wise, here at the start of the series, with the rest of the PokerStars blog team arriving later in the week along with all the PokerNews guys and a bunch of others once the EPT Main and them high rollers roll around. I’m not really alone, though, as plenty of seats in the media room have already been filled. My buddy Carlos Monti, the LAPT photographer, is here already, too, and the two of us enjoyed each other’s company as we worked late into the night.

I guess despite all of the camaraderie during the long workdays on these trips, there’s a lot of time spent on my own, too, when traveling and the hours spent in the hotel room. That I already miss Vera and all of our four-legged friends on the farm doesn’t help too much with that, either. But I do pretty well with the alone time, all things considered.

One day is in the books, and another dozen are left to go. Check over at the PokerStars blog today for more from your soloist scribbler.