Travel Report: LAPT9 Panama, Day 1b -- Do What You Do

The second Day 1 flight of the Latin American Poker Tour Panama Main Event went smoothly yesterday. Having fun with Will O’Connor, my blogging partner-in-crime at this one.

I was joking with him about my idea that “once I get out of blogging, I’m going to start coaching blogging,” something that Remko Rinkema and were laughing about back in Monaco recently.

I shared with Will my tweet to Remko approximating coach-speak for bloggers:

“Get out there… blog. Blog! Do what you do. Keep countin’! And stay cool even when it heats up!”

(There’s a relevant image illustrating the tweet and explaining that last line, if you click through to see it.)

After enduring a much-too-long wait for lunch at the sports bar early in the afternoon, Will and I managed to run well at the dinner break and get a quick, good meal at Fenecia. He had the risotto (which he reviews highly) while I had sushi (the spider roll), also good.

Forgot to mention yesterday how a friendly player from Argentina, Arthur “Cacho” Korn, came up to say hello and let me know he was a Hard-Boiled Poker reader. Neat to find that out, and fun as always to think about how small a world it really is.

Yesterday’s turnout ended up bringing the total field up to 553 entries, which I think is probably a good number all things considered. The Spring Championship of Online Poker is a focus for many players right now -- in fact some of those playing in this event are focused on SCOOPs as well (as shown above). There’s also the WSOP right on the horizon, for which many players are resting up.

In fact, of all the places the LAPT goes, Panama is the longest trip for the South American players, and so that’s always going to affect how many can come. More Central Americans can get to it, though, and a few more U.S. players, too, than usually make it down to Chile or Uruguay or Brazil.

Cutting it short to get back downstairs to Day 2. Check the PokerStars blog for more evidence of us doing what we do.

Photo: courtesy Carlos MontiPokerStars blog.