He’s got the look, the lingo, and the attitude down pat. One member of the Camp’s youthful contingent, Dave Gregory, wears a Full Tilt hat and Moneymaker-style shades. They all hope that TJ Cloutier, tournament pro Rick Fuller, Bernard Lee (who finished 13th in the 2005 main event), and online specialist Nick Brancato will put them in position to tear up the tournament circuit. BOOT UPĪttendees here range from a middle-aged executive whose wife paid his tuition, to a hard-bitten gambler who thinks he understands everything there is to know about the game, to a smattering of guys in their early 20s who play actively online.
Welcome to WPT Boot Camp, an intense group tutorial, put on by the folks at World Poker Tour. Instead, I proceed to a staid conference room where breakfast has been laid out and 60 or so people expect to get $ 1,895 worth of tournament hold’em advice over the next day-and-a- half. Normally, I’d be making a beeline for the joint’s sprawl of poker tables, hoping to take advantage of the tired and lame who are chasing last night’s losses. It is a Saturday morning at Foxwoods Resort Casino.
