Tag: poker

888poker’s Live Tournament Series, Super Stack announces UK schedule

Last Updated on

888 Poker888poker is proud to announce the final UK 2011 Super Stack schedule with new Birmingham events added!

The successful series that offers live deep stack tournaments with prize pool’s usually exceeding £20,000 an event, has finalized the 2011 schedule with 6 more UK tournaments. Tournaments are available in Central London and now in Birmingham at Circus Casino. Buy-in for the events are £165 with a 20K starting chipstack and 40 minute blinds.

Tournament Schedule:
–          July 30/31 – London
–          August 27/28 – Birmingham
–          October 1/2 – London
–          October 29/30 – Birmingham
–          December 3/4 – London
–          December 16/18 – Birmingham (GRAND FINAL)

Qualifying for the events is easy. 888poker.com offers hourly $1+.10 feeder tournaments and weekly 10 seat guarantee qualifiers for $10+$.50 at 7:30pm BST. (Monday for London qualifier and Thursdays for Birmingham qualifier). 888poker players and LPC members can also buy direct entry on 888poker.com or live at each venue

2011 WSOP Event 3 Recap

Last Updated on

In the first non-Hold’em event of this year’s WSOP, a $1,500 Omaha Hi-Lo Split-8 or better tournament, we saw the largest field in an Omaha tournament ever assembled. 925 players showed up to play, greater than 100 players more than showed up for this event last year. This created a massive $1.2 million prizepool for the prize pool, one of the largest we will probably see in the non-Hold’em events this summer. 90 players earned cash in this tournament, the most players ever paid out in an Omaha 8/b tournament.

A min-cash netted the players just less than $3,000, as former November Niner Jeff Shulman found out. Other top pros, including Ted Lawson, Barry Greenstein, Erik Seidel (wait, he didn’t win?), Allen Cunningham, and Lex Veldhuis also profited from this tournament, but failed to make their way to the ever-important final table.

The final table was both entertaining and hard fought, with all players vying for the bracelet. Russian Vladimir Shchemelev, who put together a very hot run early in last year’s WSOP, was there, as was Costa Rican poker godfather Humberto Brenes, bringing his shark along with him. However, neither of them earned the bracelet this time, busting out in 8th and 6th place respectively.

The heads-up battle would be between two virtual unknowns in the poker world, Kostas ‘Gus’ Kalathakis and Francesco ‘Cheeck’ Barbaro. They were fighting for the ever-important bracelet and $262,283.

Honestly, and no offense to Gus, it wasn’t much of a fight. They entered heads-up play with Cheech 4,100,000 chips to Gus’s 150,000. However, they got it all in the middle in just the second hand of heads-up play, and Kalathakis doubled up to 300,000, trying to put a run together. His run, sadly, would not last much longer, as Barbaro’s commanding lead proved insurmountable, sending Gus home with a $161,675 consolation prize.

This tournament marks Barbaro’s first bracelet at the World Series. Who knows, will he find another along the way?

 

2011 WSOP Event 2 Recap

Last Updated on

WSOPBringing out one of the best fields we will see in this year’s WSOP, the $25,000 Heads-Up No Limit Hold’em Championship was bound to be hotly contested throughout the event. In a tournament that pitted distinguished pros against one another in match after match, including Tom ‘durrrr’ Dwan, Vanessa Rousso, Daniel Negreanu, Gus Hansen, among many other popular players, we knew this bracelet would be one to cherish.

These events are not only about the bracelets, though. In an event that brought out only 128 players willing to pay the steep $25k, the prize pool swelled quickly. Min-Cashing in 16th place still earned you just north of $67,000. The winner, however, would take home a much better boost to the bankroll, netting $851,192, more than 25% of the $3 million prizepool.

By the time the event reached the quarter finals, many top names made their way to the rail, but all of those left had a poker pedigree that could not be argued with. Eric Froelich, Gus Hansen, Yevgeniy Timoshenko, and Jake Cody all have had their share of success on the felt, all of whom have had major tournament victories in the past. These semifinal matchups, with Froelich playing Timoshenko and Cody trying to take down the Great Dane (who won a similar event in Europe last year), were hotly contested, though both Timoshenko and Cody seemed in control of their respective matches the whole time. Eventually, Cody sent Hansen on his merry way (to one of the high-stakes cash games, no doubt) and Timoshenko outlasted E-Fro on his way to the finals.

Timoshenko blazed out to an early lead and seemed ready to steamroll Cody. However, Cody battled back, both by making pro-caliber plays and, as is necessary to win a tournament, hitting some cards at the right time. Eventually, Cody prevailed, winning his first WSOP bracelet and the first place cash prize.

It is still early in this year’s WSOP, but Cody put himself in a good position to make a run for Player of the Year. A couple more deep runs and he may sneak his way into a household name. One thing is true: he now has the bankroll to do so.

 

2011 WSOP Event #3 Info

Last Updated on

WSOPThe first non-Hold’em event of this year’s WSOP, a $1,500 Omaha 8 or Better tournament, kicked off 2 days ago, with 925 players forking over the cash for their shot at a WSOP bracelet.

This year, despite all predictions to the contrary, has broken all previous attendance records, with 925 players registered and playing, over 100 more than last year, and barely breaking the 2009 record of 918. Still, an impressive turnout in light of the recent online developments.

Just over 200 players returned yesterday for a day 2 to battle for their share of the $1.2 million prize pool created in this event. The winner of the event will get a lion’s share of the profits, at $262,283, as well as the coveted bracelet, with anyone making the top three taking home six figures.

Some big names in the poker world still remain in contention, including Sorel Mizzi, Barry Greenstein, and Humberto Brenes. However, leading the way is Francesco Barbaro, trying to seal his chances at the cash and bracelet.

2011 WSOP Event #2 Info

Last Updated on

WSOPThe largest Heads-Up event in WSOP history, this $25,000 Heads-Up No Limit Hold’em Championship has brought out some of the best and brightest in the poker world. With 128 entrants showing up, making a nice, round bracket, the prize pool is just over $3 million.

Paying just 16 players, a min-cash in this event takes home just north of $67,000. Not bad for a couple of days work left.

Nosebleed Heads-Up player Tom ‘durrrr’ Dwan went deep in this event, and with the final sixteen left, had to appear as a favorite. However, he could not outfox the Great Dane, Gus Hansen, in the round of 16, and now can only watch from the rail.

Eric Froelich and Yevgeniy Timoshenko will face off to win their half of the bracket, playing the winner of Jake Cody and Gus Hansen in the final. The losers in the semifinals will each take home almost $284,000, with the runner up $525,000 and the winner gets the bracelet and a nice $851,192.

The semifinals and finals will be played later today, with a champion having the bracelet on their wrist to go out on the town this weekend. Stay tuned for updates!

2011 WSOP Event #1 Info

Last Updated on

WSOPEvent #1 of the 2011 World Series of Poker is, as it has been tradition for a while now, the $500 Casino Employees No-Limit Hold’em event. This year saw a record 850 employees register and play this lead-off event, creating a prizepool of $382,500.

Those who made the final table were guaranteed almost $5,000, ten times their initial buyin.

The winner,  Sean Drake, however, has received some possible life changing money for one who works the grind in a casino, taking home $82,292. A great win for one who is used to seeing winners (and far more losers) while he works his shift at the casino.

 

888 Poker Introduces A Por Ella Bounty Event

Last Updated on

888 Poker has introduced a new event in which players have the chance to take on the Last Woman Standing in the 2009 World Series of Poker Main Event, Leo Margets. Hailing from Spain, the 888 Poker pro finished 27th in a field of 6,000 players to claim a $352,000 payday and now you have the chance to claim a $1,000 on her head every Thursday at 888 Poker’s A Por Ella bounty tournament.

Starting every Thursday at 20:00 GMT, A Por Ella costs only $10 + $1 to enter, with a $1,000 bounty on playername “LEO” on the first Thursday of every month and a $250 bounty on the rest of the Thursdays in any given month. The winner of each A Por Ella event and the winner of the bounty on LEO will both win bonus prizes of a free seat in the following week’s A Por Ella event. In addition, for that event 888 Poker will place a $50 bounty on each of those players’ heads, giving the rest of the players something extra to vie for.

Each A Por Ella event is capped at 500 players. If LEO doesn’t show to an event, her bounty will be split among the players at that event’s final table. If the previous week’s tournament or bounty winner doesn’t show to an event, the bonus bounty on their heads will be dissolved entirely.

You can find the A Por Ella tournament listed under the Multi-Table tab in your 888 Poker lobby.

Tiltware – Full Tilt Poker Response to Phil Ivey

Last Updated on

Late Tuesday night Phil Ivey took to his Facebook account and his personal website to announce that he was leaving Full Tilt Poker and suing them. He also said he would not play in this year’s WSOP in solidarity of the player’s who have money stuck on Full Tilt Poker and cannot not play in this year’s WSOP. Late Wednesday night Tiltware – Full Tilt Poker issued the following response which to us seems to have been written by someone who was very angry….

“Contrary to his sanctimonious public statements, Phil Ivey’s meritless lawsuit is about helping just one player – himself. In an effort to further enrich himself at the expense of others, Mr. Ivey appears to have timed his lawsuit to thwart pending deals with several parties that would put money back in players’ pockets. In fact, Mr. Ivey has been invited — and has declined — to take actions that could assist the company in these efforts, including paying back a large sum of money he owes the site. Tiltware doubts Mr. Ivey’s frivolous and self-serving lawsuit will ever get to court. But if it does, the company looks forward to presenting facts demonstrating that Mr. Ivey is putting his own narrow financial interests ahead of the players he professes to help.”

There is much more to this who saga and we will continue to work every angle in the hopes of finding out exactly what is going on. Much that has been reported is opinions and speculation on Ivey’s finances and contract with Full Tilt Poker.

The Poker Stars Majors Are Moving: Double Guarantees & Satellites To Celebrate

Last Updated on

Now that the U.S. won’t be contributing the majority of the player pool to the Poker Stars Sunday Majors tournaments, the site is moving the times of those events to be more appealing to the new majority player base: the UK and Europe. As of this Sunday, June 5, 2011, all Sunday Majors tournaments – that’s the PokerStars Sunday Warm-Up, Sunday Rebuy, Sunday Storm, Sunday Million, Sunday 500, Sunday Second Chance and Sunday Supersonic events – will be pushed ahead two hours.

That means instead of starting at 1 pm ET, the Sunday Warm-Up will start at 11 am ET. And instead of starting at 4:30 pm ET, the Sunday Million will start at 2:30 pm ET. And so on. (The only Sunday Majors event not to get rescheduled as part of these changes, incidentally, is the Sunday Kick-Off, which will retain its usual 8 pm ET time slot.)

To add a little incentive to show up for this big weekend of major changes, Poker Stars is doubling the guaranteed prize pools for each of these events. Added all together, what you get is a nearly five million dollar weekend. But the double guarantees will be for June 5 only.

PokerStars will also be running satellite tournaments into each of these tournaments all week long leading up the June 5 festivities. To help players practice getting to the tables at the right new times, PokerStars has scheduled each event’s daily satellite at the same hour as the newly scheduled time slot for its respective Sunday Majors event.

Merge Poker Network to Halt New US Player Signups

Last Updated on

The Merge Poker Network will temporarily stop accepting NEW US players in a day or 2 in order to catch up on a backlog of customer service requests but more importantly on poker transactions. As it stands now customer service has a 2 week backlog and cashouts are much worse. They simply were not prepared for the influx of players they’ve received since Black Friday and are feeling growing pains. If they don’t catch up soon they will end up angering all their players. This is for NEW Players Only, for all existing players it will be business as usual.

The only part of this story that we have not yet been able to confirm is if this is for all Merge Skins or just those that use the Merge cashier and customer support. We’ll update this post as soon as we get confirmation.

We’ve been told that the temporary ban on new US players will last about a month but from past experience in dealing with the Merge Network we’re guessing it will last through the end of the summer. What they will be trying to do is add more processing options as well as hire more customer support personnel to handle the extra traffic.

This move was brought on by internal rumblings among Merge Poker skin operators regarding the current processing problems. With the loss of QuickTender / UseMyWallet the main option became credit cards. the success rate for successful credit card transactions is roughly 20% which is just unacceptable. It is rumored that for Carbon Poker the success rate is closer to 70% which leads us to believe that the Merge Network was putting their site Carbon Poker ahead of all others. This lack of transparency will only lead to more problems and is most likely the main reason this is happening.

UPDATE: This is now in affect. We’ll let you know when they reopen to new US poker players.