I'm playing a GUKPT next month and I was planning to prepare with a couple of large whiskies. Is that wrong?
Just mix whatever it is with RedBull, I was more surprised at the length of the days in large tournaments than anything else.
My first big tournament was the WPT Paris in 2004, I think, to which I won an online satellite much to the surprise of everyone playing said satellite. Hours of low-limit cash games online weren't the best prep for a long-clock event - the deep stack and slow pace were real eye-openers. I had two hours' sleep the night before, I was so nervous, and on getting to the Aviation Club drank three double espressos, was immediately violently sick in what I think was the men's restroom, and spent the first four levels trying not to throw up on Howard Lederer. The positive side of this was that while you're concentrating on feeling nauseous, you aren't in the least intimidated by the scarier players at the table.
The best thing about these events is the time you get to just obsessively watch the other players, trying to catalogue their play like a little mental poker tracker. And you have so many chips your options take a very long time to be whittled down into 'push or fold.' I eventually snuck into Day Two which was a far better result than anyone could have predicted.
To recap: Try to sleep beforehand - if I'd had any Nytol I would have taken two at 9pm the day before
Don't load up on caffeine on an empty stomach
Try to make it into the correct restroom
Watch everybody at your table all the time, even through the boring foldy first level