First of all thanks to Blonde for allowing me to post this.
Well I finally got around to it - I am going to attempt a world record. I have mentioned it in the past to a few people and been met with mixed reactions ranging from support to disbelief and mocking, however despite that, I am still going to do it. It is something I have intended to do since Flushy unfortunately failed in his attempt do it several years ago. It is also something I am deadly serious about, so I will be looking for as much support as possible from everyone- especially as I will be hopefully also raising lots of money for 2 hardworking charities that are local to myself: St Barnabas Hospice and Louth and District Hospice.
I will be attempting to create an endurance record for heads-up poker, which will also break the record for the longest time an individual has continuously played poker -which currently stands at 72hr 2 min and was set by Larry Olmsted (USA). (10-13th June 2004). I will be doing this by playing as many opponents as possible on a continuing basis and the record will be based on hours of continuous play of heads up poker. Guinness have accepted the claim (number 221852) and supplied all their guidelines and stipulations for the attempt, which as you can imagine are complex and far ranging.
The record attempt will be held at the Library Bar on the university campus in Lincoln and will commence at 8pm on Sunday 14th September. I am aiming to do over 100 hours which will hopefully take me to midnight on the Thursday.
I have a dedicated website for this attempt
www.pokerplayingmarathon.com on which the whole attempt will be video streamed live. Also on the site people can donate to the two charities. There will be ‘bucket’ collections at the venue during the whole of the attempt, but also I am looking to raise a large proportion of the money by playing and beating other opponents.
All the games will be for cash (ranging from £10-£100 buy-ins) between a challenger and myself. Players wishing to challenge me, put forward their money which will be matched by myself, if I win the game all of the winnings, will be going to charity. If the opponent wins the game - in order to maximise the funds raised for charities, I am intending for them to receive donated equivalent cash value prizes.
I am not looking for any personal financial gain from this, as all of the money raised will be split between the 2 charities. You will see from the website a great deal of work has gone into this already, but all of it has been from willing (unpaid) volunteers. The media and IT assistance (cameras etc) is coming directly from the university, the venue is hosting the event free of charge and the only expenditure that has been incurred - which was for the domain and web hosting, has been paid for by my myself.
So how can you help? I am looking for support in two ways, donations and physical turn out.
Donations can be in two ways, cash donations to fund my buy-ins and secondly prize donations that can be given in place of cash if/when the opponents beat me.
I am very confident of achieving a main sponsor to cover all of my buy-ins (I will update details of which when confirmed), so I am mainly seeking a range of different prizes, varying in value from £20 upwards.
The other way you can help is by actually turning up at the event, throughout the attempt it is required that I have 1 steward, 1 practicing nurse/doctor and 2 official witnesses present, as well as the dealers, IT support and of course someone to play against! Full details of which can be found on the site.
Thanks again to all and I hope to see as many of you as possible in September.
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