When I set up the CadillacPoker.com tournament structure, I envisioned a maximum size of 54 players. I never thought a home game would ever get to that size, so I never had to think much about beyond the hypothetical planning stages. When I redesigned the CadillacPoker.com poker chips, I made sure to order enough for a 60 person, re-buy/add-on tournament -- just in case the unthinkable happened.

This month, the unthinkable happened. I was more than maxed out at 59 players. This tournament size not only tested my planning abilities, but it also tested the parking limits in a residential neighborhood, the space in my house, the efficiency of running my tournament, and my blind structure. If any of these things were out of whack, the tournament could become a nightmare.

When I set up the CadillacPoker.com tournament structure, I envisioned a maximum size of 54 players.  I never thought a home game would ever get to that size, so I never had to think much about beyond the hypothetical planning stages.  When I redesigned the CadillacPoker.com poker chips, I made sure to order enough for a 60 person, re-buy/add-on tournament -- just in case the unthinkable happened. 

This month, the unthinkable happened. I was effectively maxed out at 53 players. This tournament size not only tested my planning abilities, but it also tested the parking limits in a residential neighborhood, the space in my house, the efficiency of running my tournament, and my blind structure. If any of these things were out of whack, the tournament could become a nightmare.

Somehow I know when the tournament is going to be big, and when it's going to be a struggle. This month, I seemed to know it would be a decent sized tournament. By Friday evening, I had 23 sign-ups -- which is quite a few for 24 hours before. I also was hearing a bit of a "buzz" -- the discussion I hear about anticipation of the tournament -- that a bunch of people were going to show up. By game time, we had 36 players (five tables), and $6450 in the prize pool.

Unlike the tournament, the cash game was very profitable for me. After the I busted out, we had enough players for the cash game. We played a mixture of Stud, Omaha Hi/Lo, Holdem, Razz, and Pot Limit Omaha Hi/Lo (PLO8). After a while, everybody seemed to settle in on PLO8, and that's what we played for the last few hours of the night. In hindsight, I think that was a huge mistake for everybody...except for me.

Somehow I know when the tournament is going to be big, and when it's going to be a struggle. This month, I seemed to immediately know it would be a struggle. For one thing, there was no "buzz" -- the discussion I hear about anticipation of the tournament. Then as I started to make the phone call to round up players, it seemed like MANY of my regulars were out of town. In spite of it all, we still managed to get 31 players, and $5000 into the prize pool.

Running a good tournament is fickle sometimes. My normal tournament date is the first Saturday of the month. However, I've had to have it on the second Saturday for the past four months because of other schedule conflicts -- and this causes me to lose many of my regular players. I was expecting a big crowd -- probably around 40 players. But with only an hour before the tournament start, only 25 players had committed, while many others had cancelled. Yet as strange as it may sound, 41 people showed up by game time.