A Day In The Life: Activision Blizzard Esports Leagues' Pete Vlastelica

"A Day in the Life" is a new feature in SBD examining the daily habits of interesting personalities in sports business. This week, Activision Blizzard Esports Leagues CEO PETE VLASTELICA discusses the Overwatch League’s inaugural season and why Tuesday is always a "Hard Day's Night" on the piano.

5:45am: I usually wake up at 5:44 like a minute before my alarm goes off. My wife, HILARY, and two daughters, VERA and HELENA, are still sleeping. I get up and make an espresso. I’m sort of an espresso snob. So I make that, feed the dog and then I sit down with my espresso and go through whatever has happened in the last eight hours on my phone with my email, Instagram, Slack and Twitter. When I’m done with that I makes some eggs. I always make two eggs, scrambled, with some fresh herbs from the back yard.

7:00: Three days a week (Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday) I head to the gym for an hour to work out. On the other days I’ll wake up the girls and help them get ready for school and spend a little time with them. Depending on what I’m doing that day, I’ll choose a different car to drive. If I’m driving long distance, I take my new F150. I’ve got a classic '72 Bronco that I restored that I like to use when I don’t have to get on the freeway. Most days, I take a classic Porsche -- a ‘92 Targa.

8:00: I head to my office in Santa Monica where meetings and calls begin. Those can be with team owners or potential owners or media partners or recruiters or candidates. I have a lot of external calls and internal meetings as well focused on league operations, sponsorship events, PR, finance, consumer product develop or with our game developers.

12:00pm: I have four offices I need to be in every day. We have my Santa Monica office. We have an office in Irvine where Blizzard is based, which is an hour to two hours depending on traffic. Then our Blizzard Arena is in Burbank, which is a half-hour to an hour from Santa Monica. Then the fourth office is in N.Y. I spend a lot of time on the road going between Santa Monica, Irvine and Burbank. A lot of times, I’m in Santa Monica in the morning and then I get in the car to go to Burbank. While I’m in the car I’m on phone calls or listening to audiobooks, podcasts or HOWARD STERN.

4:00: Right now we have Overwatch League matches at Blizzard Arena every Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. On many days, I’ll end up in Burbank for the 4:00, 6:00 and 8:00 matches to check in with the team that works down there full time or to host partners in our skybox. I usually don’t stay at the arena all night. I’ll usually get in my car and put the stream on my phone and listen to it over the Bluetooth in my car on the way home.

6:00: After the arena or on a day that I don’t go to the arena, a lot of times I’ll check in with a friend or a colleague from the industry for a dinner or drinks. I hang out at the Soho House in Malibu where I’m a member. Or at Father’s Office, which is a great burger and beer place in Santa Monica, and I hang out at Cassia in Santa Monica.

7:00: I do my best to spend as much time during the week with the girls before they go to bed and hang out with my wife. On a night that I’ll go get drinks, I’ll try to get home at 7:00 or 7:30, and I’ll get an hour or two with the girls. On a night where I’m not going out, I’ll go home at 6:00 and be there by 6:30.

7:30: Every Tuesday I take piano lessons at home. I’ve got a guy who is teaching me BEATLES songs on the piano.

9:00: More often than not, after Vera and Helena go to bed, I’ll just put on some music. We have a pretty musical household. I’ll play music, and Hilary and I will sit on the couch next to each other and catch up on our days.

10:00: I’m usually in bed by 10:00. I get seven and a half to eight hours of sleep and I fall asleep the second my head hits the pillow.

Know someone who should be featured in "A Day in the Life"? Shoot us an email at jcarpenter@sportsbusinessdaily.com.