Dennis Phillips has said that he wants the endurance to also count as a factor in the poker tournaments. In making the 2008 World Series of Poker Main Event final table, Team PokerStars Pro Dennis Phillips had to endure eight 16-hour days on the felt.
He believes anything that requires that kind of endurance has to be considered a sport.
“It’s competition, it does take a skill level and you have to practice to improve, so yeah, I do consider poker a sport,” he said. “If you are at the World Series of Poker, and you are going to play eight days, 16 hours a day, every day, you do have to be physically prepared for it. You have to eat right, sleep right, and get mentally prepared just like any sport.”