Poker News - Complete Poker Coverage at PokerListings.com

durrrr Challenge: Dwan Adds on $314k

2010-02-09 11:30:00

The previous Challenge session went down on the 29^th of last month, Dwan making $209k, giving him a lead of $1 million.

Last night, Dwan and opponent Patrik Antonius played a total of 883 hands of the usual $200/$400 Pot-Limit Omaha.

Antonius, who has lost over $1.7 million this year, managed to win the largest pot of the match worth $150k. Unfortunately, Antonius also lost the second and third largest pots, putting the Finnish Full Tilt Pro down $314k for the session.

On top of stretching his lead over Antonius, Dwan also took another $120k playing 7-Game, his combined profit ($430k) putting him up $85k on the year.

With the 883 hands added to the official count, the durrrr Challenge has now seen 32,795 of the required 50,000.

Assuming they play two sessions a month, each at 883 hands, the challenge will be completed around November of 2010, giving us a winner before the end of the year.

durrrr Challenge by the numbers:

355,000,000: Cost of the Apollo 11 mission in 1969
268,728,143: Total amount wagered
1,392,760: Amount durrrr is ahead
150,778: Biggest pot of the latest session
32,795: Hands played overall
7,405: Amount of rake made by Full Tilt from the Challenge
805: Cost of a 4-seat model T Ford in 1909
104: Hours played in the challenge
66: Percentage of challenge completed
35: Average cost of an ounce of gold in 1970

Below are the three largest pots from the latest Challenge match. You can see more hands by heading to MarketPulse.

Antonius spikes a 3-outer.

A bad time for Antonius to bluff.

A setup hand.

Visit PokerListings.com

Unabomber Replaces Brunson in PartyPoker Premier League

2010-02-09 11:00:00

The PartyPoker.com World Open V champion was asked to come on board when the legendary Brunson bowed out due to dental surgery.

"This is the most money I have ever wagered against the toughest field I have ever faced," said Laak. "Collectively my opponents have over $45 million in tournament winnings. This will be the best ride ever. Full stop."

The Premier League will take place at the M Resort Spa Casino in Las Vegas Feb. 12-18 with defending champion J.C. Tran, Yevgeniy Timoshenko, Roland de Wolfe, Luke Schwartz, Phil Hellmuth, Daniel Negreanu, Vanessa Rousso, David Benyamine and Tony G all taking part in the $100k buy-in event.

PartyPoker also ran qualifiers to find a total of 16 players who are all in Las Vegas to play in a Premier League Poker play-off for a spot in the Premier League main event. Plus, one of the 16 qualifiers will be chosen by PartyPoker to receive a $100,000 Team Party contract.

Both the play-off and the main event will be filmed for TV.

Tran won the PartyPoker.com Premier League III and its $300,000 first prize defeating a final table that included Tom "durrrr" Dwan, Juha Helppi, Tony G, Roland de Wolfe and Peter Eastgate.

This is the first year the Premier League will play out in Las Vegas and the Forbes Four Star M Resort is excited to play host.

"Premier League Poker has been incredibly successful," said Joseph A. Magliarditi, Executive Vice President and COO, M Resort. "The event is uniquely set-up and attracts some of the top players in world. We're looking forward to hosting it this year."

With 92,000 square feet of gaming, 390 guest rooms and suites, nine restaurants and five destination bars, more than 60,000 square feet of meeting and conference space, a state-of-the-art spa and fitness centre and a 100,000 square foot events piazza, Eddie Hearn, Director of event organizer Matchroom Sport, believes M is the perfect destination for the Premier League.

"When we decided to take the Premier League to Las Vegas we needed a venue to match this prestigious event," he said. "The M Resort is a stunning location and the perfect place for the players to relax whilst they are amongst the heat of battle in what has become the world's biggest televised poker spectacle."

Visit PokerListings.com

Lee Named Foxwoods Spokesperson

2010-02-09 09:30:00

Lee, who has $1.4 million in career tournament earnings, is a Massachusetts resident, a Harvard University and Babson College graduate and finished 13th in the 2005 World Series of Poker Main Event, representing the top finish for a New Englander in WSOP history.

Lee's history with Foxwoods goes back to when it opened in 1992. The southeastern Connecticut casino was the first place he played in a poker tournament, participated in a main event, and won a tournament.

"If there is such a thing as home-court advantage in poker, for me it's at Foxwoods," Lee said. "I'm proud and humbled that Foxwoods would choose me to be their official spokesperson among the millions of poker players in the world."

Since turning pro, Lee has hosted shows on television, radio and the Internet and worked as a columnist, commentator and author.

He is currently co-host of ESPN.com's weekly online poker show ESPN Inside Deal and is a poker columnist for the Boston Herald, ESPN.com and several other media outlets.

He has released two books, The Final Table, Volume I and Volume II, which are compilations of his columns. He is also an instructor for the WSOP Academy and a poker commentator for the WSOP and New England's Eastern Poker Tour.

Lee will wear the Foxwoods logo at live tournaments and his Boston-area radio show, The Bernard Lee Poker Show, is now officially presented by Foxwoods Resort Casino.

"We're thrilled to add Bernard Lee to the Foxwoods team," said Mashantucket Pequot Gaming Enterprises president Michael Speller. "Bernard is such a compelling figure on the poker landscape, and we're certain that his expertise and talent will bring even more excitement and energy to the poker experience at Foxwoods."

Foxwoods is a charter member of the World Poker Tour and home to a WPT-branded poker room with 98 tables open around the clock.

To learn more about Foxwoods, visit www.foxwoods.com. For more information about Bernard Lee, click through to www.bernardleepoker.com.

Visit PokerListings.com

Antonius Grabs Back $577k

2010-02-08 12:00:00

Antonius's first match started in the early morning hours Sunday on his personal $500/$1,000 Pot-Limit Omaha table against world1969.

Rumored to be Johnny "World" Hennigan, world1969 lasted only 16 hands against Antonius before losing a $212k pot and leaving the match down $191k.

Antonius then turned his attention to 7-Game, where he made an additional $385,000. With $1.4 million in losses, Antonius is now the second biggest loser on the year, less than $2,000 ahead of Brian Townsend.

Tom "durrrr" Dwan played two big-money sessions yesterday as well. The first, at $100/$200 PLO against Townsend, ended after 76 hands and Townsend had lost $133k, the majority of his $164k total loss on the day.

Dwan tried to continue his run-good at 7-Game only to lose $141k, finishing the day down $7,723.

Phil Ivey also showed up for a short session, playing 123 hands of PLO and 190 hands of 7-Game. After losing half of his PLO profits in the mixed games, Ivey finished the day up $36k.

In the meantime, Alexander "PostflopAction" Kostritsyn continued to crush the 7-Game tables, making $332k in a 905 hand session Sunday. This puts the Russian pro up to over $2 million in earnings on the year.

At press time, Kostritsyn sits in second place for the year's top earner, $500k behind Cole South.

Some of the other big names to get in a few hands yesterday included Gus Hansen (-$189k), Ashton "theASHMAN103" Griffin ($78k), Hac "trex313" Dang (-$67k) and Phil "OMGClayAiken" Galfond ($16k).

Below are three of the largest pots of the day. Head to MarketPulse to see more.

The mighty ducks.

And they say Omaha's an action game.

Townsend spikes a perfect turn.

Visit PokerListings.com

The Sunday Scoop: THE_D_RY Deep in Brawl

2010-02-08 11:00:00

As usual PokerStars led the way with a Sunday Million that drew 9,031 to create a prize pool of $1.8 million.

U.S. online player palurdo annihilated the field and, after making a heads-up deal with golferen50, took down the tournament for a $248,791 score.

Steve “Ilini213” Barshak, who won a $50k guaranteed on PokerStars for $18,700 in December, made an even bigger score yesterday when he outlasted all 1,013 entries in the PokerStars Sunday 500 to win $88,536.

Meanwhile, on Full Tilt there was a small overlay in the Sunday $750k Guaranteed, much to the delight of the 3,542 players that entered. Online player pokerNIRVana5 took the title for $111,037.

Full Tilt’s other major tournament – The Sunday Brawl – saw an established poker pro make the final table.

Danny “THE_D_RY” Ryan finished in fourth place to earn $42,121. Ryan has an impressive tournament record that includes big live scores at EPT Dortmund and EPT Copenhagen in 2008.

Ryan has also claimed victories in most of the Sunday majors including the PokerStars Sunday Million and the Full Tilt $750k Guaranteed. He’ll have to wait another day to add the Sunday Brawl to that list, however, as DedoDeGorila was the ultimate winner yesterday.

Finally, in the UB $200k Guaranteed, Jason “JP OSU” Potter finished runner up to YANKEE47. YANKEE officially earned $44,920 while Potter took $26,900, although there was some sort of chop.

Visit PokerListings.com

Madsen Books Borgata Win

2010-02-08 09:00:00

The 24-year-old Full Tilt Pro outlasted field of 766 and a final table with several well known pros to book the win and bank the $625,006 first-place prize.

"It feels good," Madsen told Borgata bloggers. "It takes a while for it to set in, but in a few days I'll look back on it. It was a really good tournament."

The final table in the $3,000 event began at the Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa with New York pro Matt Matros saying goodbye 10th losing a race with pocket sixes to Nick Kamen's big slick.

Soon, Chan Pelton ran ace-ten into Madsen eights and failed to improve, bowing out 9th.

Ross Mallor was the next to go, running king-queen into Al Grimes' ace-ten before David Fox joined him on the rail after Grimes made two pair to crack his ace-seven.

All of Grimes' work was for naught, however, as he dropped out sixth pushing with a turned straight draw into Madsen's trips and bricking the river.

Kamen then ran ace-eight into Barkley Hamilton's kings before Hamilton himself fell, losing a massive set-over-set pot versus Madsen.

Tom Marchese then took third when he lost a race with pocket nines against Madsen's ace-queen.

But despite picking off the last two players, Madsen began heads-up with two-time WSOP final tablist Sirous Jamshidi about even in chips.

Within an hour he had built a 2:1 chip lead before Jamshidi pushed with queen high, Madsen called with king-high and the title was his.

"I've had success in the past," Madsen said. "But it feels good to get these big wins and to continue to prove myself in the poker world."

Visit PokerListings.com

Poker News in Brief: Feb. 1-7, 2010

2010-02-07 09:00:00

Full Tilt, PokerStars and UB all awarded millions of dollars last Sunday, and throughout the week Cole South, Brian Townsend and Patrik Antonius took turns winning hundred thousand dollar pots in the high stakes cash games.

There were a few stories that didn’t make the front page of PokerListings.com, however, and as part of our Poker News in Brief feature we’ve compiled a list below.

This week we’ll take a look at Isabelle Mercier’s latest promotion, two poker sites switching networks, UB teaming up with an MMA promoter and more.

No Mercy Cash Games on BetClic

It’s been months since Isabelle “No Mercy” Mercier signed with BetClic, but the room is offering its first major promotion involving the famous French-Canadian.

All this month Mercier will host her own “No Mercy” cash game table on BetClic with stakes ranging from €.12/€.25 No-Limit all the way up to €2/€4 No-Limit.

BetClic will also offer No Mercy Magic Hands where any player that makes a straight flush on the Mercier tables is entered into a special Sit ‘N’ Go with up to €2,000 up for grabs.

The No Mercy cash game tables can be found under the private tab of the BetClic lobby.

To learn more go to the BetClic website.

SportsBook.com, PlayersOnly.com Move to Merge Network

PlayersOnly.com and SportsBook.com are leaving the Cake Poker network in favor of the Merge Poker Network.

Jezette Enterprises, which owns both sites, made the announcement on Wednesday citing the chance to give players a better platform on which to play.

“This is an industry changing deal and we are delighted to have an agreement with Jazette Enterprises,” said Anthony Taylor, CEO of Merge Gaming.

The migration, which is scheduled to occur by mid-April, 2010, will see Jezette move all its brands onto the Merge Gaming Network.

PlayersOnly.com and SportsBook.com will join sites such as Carbon Poker, Poker Nordica and ACED on the Merge Gaming Network.

Meanwhile the Cake Poker network recently added a number of new rooms including the signature room of Phil Laak – Unabomberpoker.com.

Honeybone Finds Gold in Auckland

Established Kiwi poker pro James Honeybone won the SkyCity Auckland Anniversary Championships this weekend.

He outlasted 121 players including poker pros Dan Sing and Martin Cardno to win the NZ$36,030 prize for first place.

Honeybone finished fifth at APPT Korea in 2007 and also made an $84,970 score at the Ongame Network Poker Classic in Barcelona in 2005.

The win in Auckland catapulted Honeybone into ninth place on the all-time New Zealand tournament money list with $161,806.

TSN, PokerStars Launch TSN Poker Club

Canadian sports broadcaster TSN has teamed with PokerStars.net to create a custom built poker environment for poker players.

"Poker's popularity in Canada continues to grow and the TSN Poker Club gives poker players of all levels a chance to get into the action and win exclusive prizes," says Geoff Fardy, Canada Country Manager, PokerStars.net.

The club will allow members to enter a series of free-to-play tournaments with prizes like poker tables and snowboards, all while learning the game of poker.

PokerStars.net and TSN will launch the club with three daily tournaments from now until July 31.

UB Teams Up with MMA Promoter

UB has entered into an exclusive sponsorship deal with the Bellator Fighting Championships.

The agreement will see UB logos in upcoming Bellator fights while UB will advertise for the fighting brand in its poker client lobby.

"We’re super excited to tie the new UB logo to Bellator—the hottest MMA success story of 2009—and are proud to partner with them in their sophomore year," said Paul Leggett, chief operations officer of Tokwiro, the owner/operator of UB.net.

The Bellator Fighting Championship began last year with headline bouts involving MMA stars Hector Lombard, Eddie Alvarez and Joe Soto.

Visit PokerListings.com

Weekly Freerolls: Over $39k in Cash

2010-02-06 12:00:00

The following freerolls are open to all PokerListings.com players. Qualify in the specified qualification period, then take your seat to win a boatload of free cash.

If you're not a PL.com registered player on any of the following sites, click on the site's name in the list to sign up. Getting your free seat in the tournament can be just as simple as that.

Titan Poker

The next $5,000 Monthly freeroll is almost here, buy in with just 25 points.

Date: Feb. 7
Value: $5,000
Qualify with: 25 points

Pacific Poker

Just two days left to earn your seat in February's montly freeroll.

Date: Feb. 7
Value: $1,000
Qualify with: 100 points
Qualify between: Jan. 1-31

Full Tilt

A makeup freeroll for the missed Saturday $1,500's. This $4,500 event replaces the standard $1,500 freeroll.

Date: Feb. 13
Value: $4,500
Qualify with: 100 points
Qualify between: Jan. 07-12

Party Poker

With your final two days to earn your points and qualify, be sure to have collected 100 points in January for your seat in the next $2,000 Party Poker freeroll.

Date: Feb. 13
Value: $2,000
Qualify with: 100 points
Qualify between: Jan. 1-31

PokerStars

The next massive freeroll from PokerStars comes as a $25k event awarding $24k worth of "turbo takedown tickets" plus $1k cash for the final table. Collect 100 points in January as a PokerListings player to earn your seat.

Date: Feb. 21
Value: $25,000
Qualify with: 100 points
Qualify between: Jan. 1-31

bwin Poker

Monthly freerolls for all PokerListings players on the site. Just 50 pts to qualify.

Date: Feb. 21
Value: $2,000
Qualify with: 25 points

Qualify between: Dec. 1- Mar. 19

Visit PokerListings.com

Urindanger Loses $681k to PostflopAction

2010-02-05 12:00:00

At 11 p.m. ET Wednesday night, Dang and Kostritsyn sat heads-up at $300/$600 Pot-Limit Omaha, where they remained for 1,248 hands until 2 a.m. Thursday morning. Kostritsyn left the match up over $245k.

Both Dang and Kostritsyn put in a few hands on Thursday afternoon, Dang making $147k, Kostritsyn losing $41k.

But at 5 p.m. yesterday, the two players sat for a re-match, this time at $200/$400 PLO. After almost five hours and 2,038 hands, Kostritsyn logged off up over $436k, up $681k on Dang in less than 24 hours.

Dang stuck around until 7 a.m. this morning chasing his losses, but his winning sessions were small and losing sessions large. By the time Dang called it quits he had accrued another $184k in losses, losing a total of $718k.

Meanwhile, Patrik Antonius suffered through a day of swings Thusrsday, but thanks to beating Brian Townsend for the second largest pot of the day (worth $200k), the Finn came out up $257k.

Townsend, who has been on a losing streak ever since his 30-day pro-status suspension, sat for 1,393 hands of PLO spread across ten tables. Townsend ended up losing money at eight of those tables, losing both the largest pots of the day in the process. Townsend finished the day down $377k.

Fellow CardRunners pro Brian Hastings had a relatively stress free day sitting at seven tables, turning a profit on six of them and losing just $9,501 on the seventh. In just 392 hands, Hastings earned an impressive $302k.

Below are the three largest pots from yesterday's action. To see more hands and stats, head to MarketPulse.

No waiting: nuts on the turn..

Another top-two down in flames for Townsend.

The turn gave Dang three more outs, but no suckout.

Visit PokerListings.com

High Stakes Poker 6 Set For Valentine's Day Premier

2010-02-05 11:00:00

The sixth season of the popular show will premier on the Network Sunday Feb. 14, featuring a familiar line-up of renowned poker champions, cash game specialists and promising up-and-comers.

Producers are also promising a brand-new look and feel for the show that puts viewers in the thick of the poker action.

Poker player and former European Poker Tour presenter Kara Scott will join Gabe Kaplan as co-host this season, but not before GSN airs an eight-hour "I LOVE POKER" marathon featuring highlights from past seasons of the show prior to the premier Sunday.

In addition to the usual cash-game action, Scott will report from the High Stakes Poker suite this season, interviewing players about strategy, table dynamics and giving viewers first-hand feedback after significant hands.

Featuring $200,000 minimum buy-in, the new season is promising the toughest line-up ever, including pros Patrik Antonius, David Benyamine, Doyle Brunson, Tom "durrrr" Dwan, Eli Elezra, Antonio Esfandiari, Barry Greenstein, Phil Hellmuth, Andreas Hoivold, Phil Ivey, Mike Matusow, Daniel Negreanu, Dennis Phillips and Lex Veldhuis.

The premier episode will air Feb. 14 at 8:00 p.m. ET and subsequent episodes will air Sundays at 8 p.m. ET with encore airings at 11 p.m. ET and 2 a.m. ET on GSN.

Visit PokerListings.com

Last Chance for PartyPoker LAPC Seats

2010-02-05 10:00:00

The packages are worth $14,000 and include the $10,000 buy-in, seven nights' accommodation and $2,500 spending money.

However, if a PartyPoker online qualifier wins the tournament, there will be a massive $1 million payout with $500,000 going to the winner and $500,000 shared amongst all other PartyPoker qualifiers.

Qualifiers start from $3 and there are daily freerolls into the sub-qualifiers running until Sunday Feb. 7.

The final main $700+$50 LAPC weekly qualifier takes place this Sunday at 2:15 p.m. ET, where one $14,000 package will be awarded for every 20 players and at least two packages guaranteed.

"The PartyPoker packages are amazingly appealing to anybody who wants to attend the LA Poker Classic," said PartyPoker ambassador and WPT commentator Mike Sexton. "The $1 million payout if an online qualifier takes down the Main Event offers superb extra value. Imagine if you bust out really early and then one of your fellow qualifiers went on to win, you'd still go home with your share of $500,000."

Last Week, PartyPoker qualifier Tyron Krost won the 2010 Aussie Millions.

The LAPC takes place at the Commerce Casino, Feb. 26- Mar. 4.

Last year's the main event was won by Cornel Cimpan and in 2008, Phil Ivey won his first WPT title by taking home the crown.

For more information on how to qualify online check out PartyPoker.

Visit PokerListings.com

Pacific Poker Awarding 88 WSOP Seats

2010-02-05 09:00:00

The promotion focuses on rewarding casual poker players in addition to the usual hardcore grinders.

As part of the emphasis on recreational players, Pacific Poker will be giving seats to players who are most active on social media sites YouTube.com, Twitter and Facebook.

The WSOP qualifying schedule on Pacific Poker also includes a special female-only tournament and a bounty tournament with several celebrity players including 2009 WSOP last woman standing Leo Margets and former international cricketer Shane Warne.

One WSOP seat will also be awarded to the player who refers the most friends to Pacific Poker.

Finally the site will reward its more serious players with races related to number of tournaments played, amount of rake generated, status points generated and casino points generated.

The promotion will run Feb. 8 to May 8 and in an effort further entice casual players, Pacific Poker is currently offering $8 free to the first 50,000 that register for the promotion.

Pacific Poker awards $15,000 WSOP prize packages that include a seat in the Main Event, travel, accommodations and expenses.

To learn more about the promotion visit the Pacific Poker web site.

Visit PokerListings.com

South Makes $1.1 Million in a Day

2010-02-04 12:00:00

South's massive run started Tuesday evening at $300/$600 Pot-Limit Omaha, where he sat with Phil Ivey heads-up for 208 hands, earning $152k in the process.

Ivey went on to grind back his losses on the 6-max tables, making $190k, mostly from unknown player rumprammer, who lost $500k during his 709 hand stint at the tables.

After defeating Ivey, and a few hands with Hansen and rumprammer, South sat heads up with Antonius in the early morning hours Wednesday.

By the end of this match, South had punished the struggling Full Tilt pro for around $350k, mostly thanks to winning the largest pot of the match worth $307k.

After an eight hour break (presumably to sleep), South returned to the $300/$600 tables to play Sahamies heads-up, who has been running white hot since the start of 2010.

South struggled from the start of the heads-up match, and in a chat between South, Sahamies and PostflopAction, a clearly frustrated South claimed to be stuck "like a mill" in the four hours he'd been playing.

But almost immediately after making the comment, the cards began to fall South's way, putting him on yet another heater. In the midst of this heater, South took down all four of largest pots in the match, the smallest of which was worth over $380k.

The largest pot of the session saw the money go all in on the flop, with South holding the nut flush against Sahamies' top set. The board failed to pair awarding South $634,777, the largest pot of the year so far.

When the dust settled, Sahamies found himself stuck for over $750k.

In the end, South earned over $1.1 million on the day, possibly a new personal record.

Below are the three largest pots of the South/Ziigmund battle. To see more hands, including South's $307k pot versus Antonius, head to MarketPulse.

The new biggest pot of 2010.

Ziigs draing dead on the turn.

South's aces hold'.

Visit PokerListings.com

Cake Poker Grabs WSOP Bracelet

2010-02-04 11:00:00

The online poker room put in the winning bid of $4,006 on eBay to secure a gold WSOP bracelet up for auction that was originally won by T.J. Cloutier in 2005.

“This was actually done basically on a whim,” explained Cake Poker card room manager Lee Jones. “We talked about it and thought, ‘Wow this is kind of amazing. We could find something cool to do with it.’”

When Cake Poker bid on the bracelet they weren’t aware it belonged Cloutier and Jones confirmed they will return it to him when they are finished with it.

Although Jones and the group at Cake Poker are still deciding what exactly they will do with the bracelet, they’re already throwing around ideas involving photo shoots with the bracelet and taking turns wearing it to home games.

Jones did mention they will treat the bracelet with respect.

“We’re still not sure exactly what we are going to do with it but we certainly understand a bracelet’s place and we’re not going to do anything inappropriate with it,” he said.

Cake Poker has been active lately with redesigned software, a new blog and a larger presence at tournaments like the recent Aussie Millions.

“We’re getting more mainstream players on Cake so we’ve tried to amp up our satellite offerings,” said Jones.

One Cake Poker qualifier, Steven “ringboy69” Silva, finished in 31^st place earning $27,689 at this year’s Aussie Millions.

Cake Poker is now running qualifiers for the Irish Open and Jones mentioned he’s expecting an even bigger Cake presence there.

For more information on Cake Poker visit the website here.

Visit PokerListings.com

UB Pros Challenge Each Other

2010-02-04 09:00:00

The UB.com Pro Freeroll Challenge is set to pit Team UB pros against one another to see who can draw the most players to a $2k freeroll.

The challenge will consist of six freerolls spread out over the next year. Each will be hosted by a Team UB pro who will be asked to sweeten the $2,000 prize pool by adding a lifestyle or once-in-a-lifetime experience.

The pro that draws the most players to his or her freeroll won't just be taking home bragging rights either. The winner will be declared king or queen of the UB.com Pro Freeroll Challenge and receive $2,500 from UB for a night on the town in Las Vegas.

Plus, the Team UB pro who attracts the lowest number of players will be forced to play concierge, doing anything the winner asks to facilitate the night.

UB is also adding an additional $500 to the Pro Freeroll Challenge prize, which the winner may use to tip the losing Team UB pro at his or her discretion.

Once it's all through, the winning Team UB pro will chronicle his or her experience on the UB Blog.

Joe Sebok will be the first Team UB pro to step up to the plate by hosting the first freeroll Feb. 17 and offering the winner a chance to go skydiving with him in Las Vegas.

Should the winner of Sebok's Leap of Faith freeroll prefer to remain grounded, UB is promising to substitute the skydiving experience for something just as exciting.

In addition to Sebok, Team UB consists of Phil Hellmuth, Annie Duke, Brandon Cantu, Liv Boeree, Michael Binger, Tiffany Michelle and a host of other top pros.

For more information check out UB.

Visit PokerListings.com

LAPC Stars Twitter Drive

2010-02-03 09:30:00

The LAPC Classic Twitter account, which features tournament updates, results and scheduling reminders, currently has close to 600 followers.

Now, organizers are promising that if the account can reach 750 followers by 12 p.m. Thursday Feb. 4 at 11:59 a.m. PT, they will give away a seat to its $250,000 guaranteed tournament this weekend.

All of the LAPC's Twitter followers will be entered into a random draw for the $220 seat, which can be used on one of the events two starting days, Friday Feb. 5 and Saturday Feb. 6. But only if it reaches 750 followers by the deadline.

The LAPC began Jan. 20 at Commerce Casino in the Los Angeles area and features more than 30 more tournaments before it wraps up at the beginning of March, including a $10k H.O.R.S.E. event, $10k Heads-Up event, $25,100 High Roller event and the $10k World Poker Tour L.A. Poker Classic Championship event.

Click the following link to find the LAPC Twitter account.

Visit PokerListings.com

Townsend Drops $581k at 7-Game

2010-02-02 12:00:00

Townsend's day consisted of 377 hands at 7-Game where he earned the crown as the day's biggest loser after accumulating $581,674 in losses.

Cole South, who has been on an epic hot-streak for the last two weeks, shared the fate of his fellow CardRunners pro, losing over $304k at the same tables.

The biggest winners from the mixed-game tables included David Oppenheim ($289k), Slick Puppy ($144k) and Tom "durrrr" Dwan ($139k).

Dwan split his day between 7-Game and PLO, involving himself in the fourth largest PLO pot of the day, losing $139k to Patrik Antonius after missing his draws against Antonius's top set of kings.

Dwan finished the day up $104k.

Antonius, who has been losing consistently for most of 2010, pulled off a massive $417k win playing PLO, but lost $121k back to the tables at 7-Game. In total, Antonius moved $296k closer to breaking even for the year.

Gus Hansen, who has been having an incredible year, took a serious hit playing PLO. After managing to lose all six of the largest pots he played, Hansen finished his night down $321k.

Also at the tables were Ilari "Ziigmund" Sahamies, who earned $148k, Rumprammer with a profit of $184k and Di "Urindanger" Dang, who finised up $117k.

Below are the three largest PLO pots of the day. To see more, head to MarketPulse.

One hell of a flop for that hand.

Everything about this hand is just gross.

Flopped straight holds.

Visit PokerListings.com

PKR Snags International Gaming Award

2010-02-02 10:30:00

"It is a wonderful achievement for us to be named Online Poker Operator of the Year," said PKR CEO Malcolm Graham. "We are absolutely delighted to be honored by the International Gaming Awards in this way."

The award recognizes the online poker room that made the most headway in the real-money poker sector during 2009. Operators are judged according to originality, growth and scale, usability, payment processing and marketing. Special consideration is also given to the most innovative operators and those with a unique and or outstanding brand setting it aside from the competition.

PKR's unique blend of advanced 3D graphics, immersive game play and enhanced community focus through its new integrated social media platform helped it beat out nominees PokerStars, Full Tilt, PartyPoker, Betfair, Ladbrokes, Unibet, Sportingbet, Victor Chandler and 888.com.

The annual International Gaming Awards were hosted in London's Millennium Gloucester Hotel & Conference Centre Jan. 25. Nominations were made across a range of gaming categories with judges selected from leading industry professionals, journalists, analysts and representatives of the Awards' main sponsors.

Visit PokerListings.com

Harman Makes Kidney Disease Research Pledge

2010-02-02 08:30:00

Harman, who suffers from kidney disease herself and has had two transplants, has taken the Poker Players International "All-In for a Cure" pledge and will donate one percent of her earnings to The NephCure Foundation, which funds research into the debilitating kidney diseases Nephrotic Syndrome and Focal Segmental Glomerulosclerosis (FSGS).

"Kidney disease is extremely difficult," said Harman. "It is invisible and it affects kids and adults alike. NephCure is trying to find an answer and I'm here to help by joining 'All-in for a Cure.'"

NephCure has dedicated over $6 million to research of FSGS and Nephrotic Syndrome, two conditions that affect the tiny filtering mechanisms in the kidney.

Former NBA star Alonzo Mourning suffered from FSGS before receiving a kidney transplant. The cause for these diseases is unknown and there is no cure.

"Having (Harman) involved in this program is a tremendous benefit to everyone and I expect it to lead to more players coming on board," said PPI's Marketing and Player Development Leader Eric Siegel, whose son suffers from Nephrotic Syndrome.

"She understands the responsibility to give back. By doing so hopefully we can find a cure for this horrible disease that affects thousands of people."

Known for playing in some of the world's biggest cash games, Harman has more than $2.3 million in career tournament earnings, including two WSOP wins and two World Poker Tour final tables.

A number of other players, including 2009 PokerStars EPT London High Roller winner Matt Glantz, have also taken the pledge.

For more information on the organization and how to make a donation, click through to NephCure's website.

Visit PokerListings.com

Lacey Jones Joins the CPT

2010-02-01 15:00:00

Professional poker player and presenter Lacey Jones is set to become the new face of the CPT and will be featured prominently on the tour’s new online video network - Canadian Poker Player Television.

"I truly love Canadians and am so happy to be a part of the Canadian Poker Tour", said Jones.

Female participation in the CPT has been on the decline over the last two years and tour-owner HeadsUp Entertainment is hoping that their new host will help bring women back out to the tables.

"Here is a girl that loves hockey, loves Canadian beer and is an amazing poker player to top it off,” said CPT President Kelly Kellner.

"We believe that by having Lacey attend many of our events and the fact that she is about to move to Vancouver, the partnership couldn't be stronger."

Jones will also be featured on the cover of an upcoming issue of Canadian Poker Player Magazine.

Originally hired by a poker company to do modeling work, Jones proved to be more than a pretty face at the poker table and has since made cashes at the WSOP and Borgata Poker Open. Online poker room Absolute Poker took notice and signed her as a full-fledged pro.

Jones' first event as the face of the CPT will be the upcoming Winter Freezeout to be held at Cash Casino in Calgary from Feb. 24-28.

Visit PokerListings.com

South Crushes Action-Filled Weekend

2010-02-01 12:00:00

Perhaps due to the massive swings at $500/$1,000 induced by Isildur1 at the end of 2009, the majority of online high-stakes in 2010 seems to be playing out at $300/$600.

Despite the lower stakes the swings in 2010 have been anything but tame.

Over the weekend many the biggest names in online poker took to the felt in a series of high-octane sessions, with some surprising final results.

South was the biggest story over the weekend winning $640,610 from the PLO tables. His latest score makes him just one of five players to have earned over $1 million in 2010. South currently sits in second place at $1.5 million.

Last year's biggest winner, Patrik Antonius, took a staggering $612k hit, bringing him down to over $1.7 million in losses for 2010.

To put this number into perspective the second biggest loser this year is Richard Ashby who's down $803k, less than half the amount of Antonius.

Last year's biggest loser, Gus Hansen, crushed the 7-Game tables making $430k. His weekend win puts Hansen back on top as the year's biggest winner up over $1.7 million.

Tom "durrrr" Dwan continues to struggle at the tables, losing over $330k (including his sessions from earlier this morning). On the year, Dwan currently sits down around $400k.

Ilari "Ziigmund" Sahamies continues to crush the PLO tables, but was unable to stay afloat at 7-Game, resulting in a small loss of around $30k over the weekend.

Below are three of the largest pots from the weekend. For more online pot re-plays, head to MaketPulse.

Ziigmund spikes the turn.

Three Pair, FTW.

Straight vs. traight.

Visit PokerListings.com

Huge Sunday for Online Poker

2010-02-01 10:30:00

Online tournament leader PokerStars led the charge with a massive $2 million-guaranteed Sunday Million Special Edition tournament.

The room smashed its guarantee drawing a record-setting 19,377 players to the $215 buy-in tournament creating a prize pool of $3.8 million.

Surprisingly there was no chop at the final table and online player OX45AL took down the whole $550,011 first place prize.

Meanwhile Full Tilt doubled its $750,000 guaranteed tournament up to $1.5 million yesterday. A total of 7,578 players combined to create a prize pool of $1.51 million.

There were no big-name players at the final table, although Eric Froehlich did come in 22^nd place, just missing out on the serious cash.

In the end Full Tilt player BankofSweden made a heads-up deal with extassyman, which saw both players take home over $200k. BankofSweden went on to win the tournament but that only earned him $2,000 more than extassyman.

Finally UB was buzzing with the main event of UBOC 4. The event, which was hosted by Phil Hellmuth, drew 1,307 to create a prize pool of roughly $1.3 million.

The UB event provided the most star-studded final table of the day with Team UB pro Michael Binger finishing in fifth place and WSOP regular Lauren “SUPERMODL” Kling (pictured above) losing heads-up to DOUBLEDAVE22 thanks to a brutal suckout.

DOUBLEDAVE22 took home $279,044 for first while Kling had to settle for $163,244 in second.

To view the complete Sunday results for PokerStars click here, Full Tilt here and UB here.

Visit PokerListings.com

Poker News in Brief: Jan. 25-31, 2010

2010-01-31 10:30:00

With all that poker news coming from the WPT, EPT and Aussie Millions it was almost inevitable that some stories wouldn’t make it to the front page of PokerListings.com.

Fortunately, as part of our ongoing Poker News in Brief Feature, we’ve compiled a list of smaller stories below.

This week we’ll take a look at Doyle Brunson joining an elite lineup, vietcong01 winning his second Sunday Million, Michael Phelps hitting the felt at Borgata and more.

Brunson Fills Out Premier League Lineup

Doyle Brunson is the final poker player to grab a spot in the elite PartyPoker.com Premier League IV.

“I’m very happy to have the challenge of playing against all these great players,” said Brunson.

Brunson will join Daniel Negreanu, Vanessa Rousso, David Benyamine, Phil Hellmuth, J.C. Tran, Yevgeniy Timoshenko, Roland de Wolfe, Luke Schwartz and Tony G at the Premier League IV.

There are two remaining seats with one of them going to an online qualifier and the other going to the winner of a mini Premier League playoff between Team Party members.

The Premier League IV is set to take place Feb. 12-18 in Las Vegas.

vietcong01 Wins Second PokerStars Sunday Million

Juan Antonio Maceiras Barros, known online as vietcong01, outlasted 8,699 players to win the PokerStars Sunday Million and $255,954 cash last Sunday.

It wasn’t the easiest final table either as Ben “benba” Lamb, who finished 14^th in the 2009 WSOP Main Event, was one of the chip leaders heading into the final nine. Lamb finished in sixth place.

Barros, who first won the Sunday Million in 2007, joins Jesper Hougaaard as the only players to ever win multiple Sunday Million titles.

Barros came very close to performing the feat at the final table of a Sunday Million in March, but eventually bombed out in sixth.

Bodog Recruiting Female Pros

Bodog Poker is looking for female players to sponsor in various poker tournaments around the world.

The announcement comes just a couple weeks after the online room did not opt to re-sign Justin Bonomo to its pro team.

The site also let Jean-Robert Bellande walk several months earlier leaving David Williams and Evelyn Ng as the only members of Team Bodog.

Bodog is requesting that all applicants send a recent a photograph and a short biography in an email with the subject: Female Pro Submission.

To learn more check out the Bodog website here.

Phelps Goes to Borgata

Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps made another splash in the poker world this week at the Borgata Winter Open.

Phelps played the double elimination heads-up event and beat noted pros Paul Wasicka and Adam Gerber before being eliminated by Basilios Diakokomninos.

During the Summer Olympics in Beijing, Phelps mentioned one of his favorite hobbies was playing online poker and in 2008 he made the final table of a $1,500 No-Limit Hold’em event at Caesars.

PartyPoker Encourages Players to Hit or Run

PartyPoker started a new promotion this week, which gives players a chance to hit or run.

“Simply collect 20 PartyPoints and we’ll give you $1 to bet on our special Hit or Run heads-up game,” said a PartyPoker spokesperson.

“Win and we’ll double your money. You can then choose to hit for another hand and the chance to double your cash or take the money and run. Lose at any point though and the game is over.”

It’s possible to hit up to 10 times per game making each one worth $1,024. If a player collects enough points they could potentially play 10 games a day, which would give them $10,240.

To learn more or sign up for a PartyPoker account click here.

Visit PokerListings.com

Weekly Freerolls: 11,000 Reasons to Play

2010-01-30 12:00:00

The following freerolls are open to all PokerListings.com players. Qualify in the specified qualification period, then take your seat to win a boatload of free cash.

If you're not a PL.com registered player on any of the following sites, click on the site's name in the list to sign up. Getting your free seat in the tournament can be just as simple as that.

William Hill Poker

William Hill Poker offers a monthly $2,500 freeroll for PokerListings players. You need to collect just 100 points this month to qualify

Date: Feb. 4
Value: $2,500
Qualify with: 100 points in January

Full Tilt

Full Tilt offers weekly freerolls to all PokerListings players. Qualify with 100 points earned the week before the event to grab your seat.

Date: Feb. 6
Value: $1,500
Qualify with: 100 points
Qualify between: Jan. 31- Feb. 5

Titan Poker

The next $5,000 Monthly freeroll is almost here, buy in with just 25 points.

Date: Feb. 7
Value: $5,000
Qualify with: 25 points

Pacific Poker

Just two days left to earn your seat in February's montly freeroll.

Date: Feb. 7
Value: $1,000
Qualify with: 100 points
Qualify between: Jan. 1-31

Party Poker

With your final two days to earn your points and qualify, be sure to have collected 100 points in January for your seat in the next $2,000 Party Poker freeroll.

Date: Feb. 13
Value: $2,000
Qualify with: 100 points
Qualify between: Jan. 1-31

PokerStars

Date: Feb. 21
Value: $25,000
Qualify with: 100 points
Qualify between: Jan. 1-31

Visit PokerListings.com

Sydney PartyPoker Qualifier Wins Aussie Millions

2010-01-30 08:30:00

23-year-old Tyron Krost won a $640 online satellite to get into the main event at the Crown Casino and walked away AUD$2 million richer after besting a field of 746 this week.

"It feels like a dream and I don't want to wake up," he said moments after the win. "$2 million, it's amazing."

After a fairly lengthy feeling-out process, fellow Aussie Steven Shelley was the first player to get his walking papers from the final eight Saturday, running sevens into Krost's jacks.

But it wasn't long before he was joined on the rail by online superstar and 2007 World Series of Poker Europe champ Annette Obrestad.

The Betfair pro got into a flip for her stack with ace-jack against the PartyPoker qualifier's sevens and would have liked the straight draw she picked up on the flop if that same flop didn't give Krost a set.

The turn and river bricked out and Obrestad was sent back to Norway seventh.

Strangely, pocket sevens were involved in the next elimination as well, with Reno, Nevada's Steve Friedlander running them into Aussie Kostas Varoxis' big slick.

A king on the flop and another on the turn did the lone American at the final table in and play went five handed.

It stayed five-handed for quite a while until Canadian Peter Jetten appeared to implode, shipping it in with K♦ 5♦ against Krost's tens on a move and failing to improve.

Once the massive chip leader, Sorel Mizzi's downfall began soon after when he doubled up Frederik Jensen and before the Betfair Poker pro knew what had hit him, Krost had suddenly moved into the lead.

A few desperations shoves from Varoxis were next on the agenda, and although the first couple worked, his luck eventually ran out when he couldn't beat Jensen's deuces with A♥ 6♣.

Mizzi's downfall ended three-handed when he ran pocket sevens into Krost's ace-king and could not hold, leaving the two PartyPoker qualifiers to battle it out heads up.

Krost began heads up with better than 2:1 chip lead over Jensen and the Aussie began applying pressure on the Dane right from the outset, pounding him into submission before getting him all in dominated to book the win.

A humble Krost seemed to have the all big hands when he needed them throughout the final, beating some of the best young players in the game while following up Stewart Scott's 2009 win to become only the second Aussie to keep the title on home soil in Aussie Millions history.

"I just ran really well and got really lucky," he said. "I had a lot of big hands."

Visit PokerListings.com

Ivey Loses $320k to Ziigmund

2010-01-29 15:30:00

Ivey has been somewhat of a ghost online in 2010 having played only 974 hands, while players such as Di "Urindanger" Dang have already booked over 34,000.

In his latest session Ivey played just 254 hands before throwing in the towel. He started at $300/$600 PLO against both Ilari "Ziigmund" Sahamies and Patrik Antonius.

Ivey only stuck around for 97 hands, earning $36k for his efforts.

About halfway into his session Ivey and Sahamies agreed to play heads-up on Ivey's personal $500/$1,000 table - the Ivey Thunderdome. This match lasted for 157 hands, ending with Sahamies winning $321k.

Ivey's $284k loss leaves him up just $32k on the year.

After losing $275k playing 7-Game, Sahamies finished the day with only $113k. This win continues his hot-streak, pushing his year's results to over $1.7 million.

Antonius continues to struggle at the tables, last night losing over $467k. Nearly half of those losses ($209k) went to Tom "durrrr" Dwan in the latest session of the durrrr Challenge.

Despite winning the largest pot of the night, worth almost $500k, Antonius lost $174k to Sahamies heads-up and an additional $83k in his PLO session with Sahamies and Ivey.

When added to his results for the year, Antonius is now the first player to be stuck over $1 million in 2010.

Below you can find the largest pots of the night, or you can head to MarketPulse to see the rest.

Ziigmund's semi bluff did not work out.

Two Pair, FTW.

Out-kicked on the five.

Visit PokerListings.com

durrrr Challenge: Dwan Reaches $1 Million

2010-01-29 11:30:00

Although it had been over a month since the durrrr Challenge was active, the pair managed to log 2,112 hands against each other.

If Dwan and Antonius continue to play roughly 2,000 hands a month it’s likely there will finally be a conclusion to the Challenge before the end of 2010.

The first session of the year actually occurred late Wednesday night with the pair putting in 1,230 hands.

Despite the large number of hands Antonius was only able to make back $6k, leaving him close to $900k short of even.

The more exciting session of the Challenge happened very early this morning, and although it was only 882 hands long, Dwan managed to walk away with $209k.

The session was action packed with both players taking hundred thousand dollar swings.

At 1:31 a.m. ET Antonius won the second largest pot of the night worth $192,800. Just one minute later at 1:32 a.m. ET Dwan took down an almost identical pot on another table, his worth $192,830.

By the time the guys called it quits, Dwan's $209k profit pushed his total lead in the challenge to $1,077,932. Although there are still over 18,000 hands left to be played, Antonius is going to need to catch a heater before long to put himself back in the running.

durrrr Challenge by the numbers:

260,476,997: Total amount wagered
1,077,932: Amount durrrr is ahead
1,000,000: Net worth needed to own fancy Dijon Ketchups
192,830: Biggest pot of the session
31,912: Hands played overall
7,212: Amount of rake made by Full Tilt from the Challenge
101: Hours played in the challenge
99: Problems Jay-Z claims to have
63: Percentage of challenge completed

Below are the three largest pots from the Challenge match. You can see more hands by heading to MarketPulse.

Just one of Dwan's many outs came through.

In Antonius's defence, he was hoping for a heart...

Dwan was in a world of hurt right from the flop.

Visit PokerListings.com

Young Stars Lead Aussie Millions Final

2010-01-29 02:00:00

Betfair Poker pro Sorel Mizzi will come in to the final eight with a massive chip lead and all the confidence that comes with it following a day where it appeared he could do no wrong on the felt.

"Confident is definitely the one word to describe how I'm feeling right now," the 23-year-old Canadian said. "Everything is just going my way. I'm getting hands, I'm making the correct reads. I feel like I'm playing the most perfect poker I know how.

"I might not be playing perfectly, but it's the best that I know how to play and things are working out for me right now."

Using the screen names Imper1um and zangbezan24, Mizzi is one of the most feared tournament players in online poker history.

While he has also amassed more than $1.6 million in career earnings in live tournaments, a major title has escaped his clutches to date, making this shot at Aussie Millions glory even more desirable to him.

"How badly do I want this?" he asked. "On a scale from zero to ten, it's a ten."

Mizzi holds close to half of the chips in play with eight players remaining, but said he has no plans to bully the table tomorrow.

"I'm just going to adjust to the situations when I see what they are," he said. "I don't really know my strategy going into tomorrow, but I'm really good at just feeling things out. Hopefully I feel things right and hopefully I keep hitting the cards I was hitting today."

In Mizzi's way stands fellow Betfair Poker pro and 2007 World Series of Poker Europe champ Annette Obrestad.

Considering she currently sits fifth in chips, Obrestad is being cautiously optimistic about her chances.

"I can't say I'm too confident, considering Sorel has six times the amount of chips I do," she said.

No less than an online poker legend, Obrestad, otherwise known as Annette_15, is hoping the experience of playing on a big stage in the past will pay off in Australia Saturday.

"I think it helps a lot because I'm not really nervous when I play," she said. "For me it's just another game of poker, just for a lot more money."

She's also banking on the deep structure here at the Aussie Millions allowing her to remain patient despite her stack size.

"I think people are going to be way too aggressive and try to outplay each other," the 21-year-old Norwegian said. "I don't really see the point in that because with my image, people think I'm nuts anyway, so I'll just wait for a hand and probably get it in good."

Also posing a major threat to Mizzi's lead is 24-year-old fellow Canadian Peter "Apathy" Jetten.

With a European Poker Tour High Roller and two World Series of Poker final tables on his resume, including a runner up finish in the 2008 WSOP $10k Pot-Limit Omaha, Jetten is another player hoping experience will help him get over the hump Down Under.

"I think that experience just helps so much, if not in my play then at least in making me more comfortable," he said. "The PLO event eluding me heads-up hurt a lot. It's really nice to be back with a shot at winning again and I want to win this one very badly."

Rounding out the final eight are PartyPoker qualifier's Tyron Krost and Fred Jensen, both of whom have a couple of small WSOP cashes on their sheets.

Plus Aussie Hold'em Poker group qualifier Steven Shelly, fellow local Kosta Varoxis and Reno Nevada's Steve Friedlander.

To follow all the action until the AUD$2 million first-place prize and 2010 Aussie Millions title is handed out, tune in to PokerListings' Live Updates beginning at 2 p.m. Melbourne time Saturday.

Visit PokerListings.com

UBOC 4 Main Event Hits Sunday

2010-01-29 01:00:00

Every day from now until Sunday, UB will run a five seat guaranteed tournament at 9:50 p.m. ET for $109.

The top five finishers are guaranteed to win a seat into the $1,000 buy-in UBOC 4 main event.

Arguably the best option for qualifying, however, will be the massive 100 seat guaranteed tournament UB has scheduled for Sunday at 12:30 p.m. ET, just a few hours before the main event kicks off. That satellite will also carry a $109 buy-in.

The UBOC 4 main event will be hosted by 11-time WSOP bracelet winner and Team UB member Phil Hellmuth.

"This has got to be not only my favorite UBOC so far, but my favorite online tournament series ever," said Hellmuth.

"There's another $1 million event coming up on Sunday with plenty of satellites to get you into it, and if it's anything like last Sunday's big $1 million Guarantee that ended up having a $1.5 million prize pool, it's going to be huge."

The UBOC 4 main event will begin at 4:30 p.m. ET on Sunday. For more information or to sign up for an account check the UB website.

Visit PokerListings.com

PokerStars Announces 2010 Nordic Poker Awards

2010-01-28 17:00:00

The Nordic Poker Awards, previously the Scandinavian Poker Awards, will celebrate the best players from Finland, Norway, Denmark and Sweden on Feb. 15 – the day before EPT Copenhagen begins.

This year there are 30 nominees from across the four Nordic countries.

Some of the notable players to be nominated include Peter Eastgate, Patrik Antonius, Ville Wahlbeck, Dag Martin Mikkelsen, Ilari Sahamies, Jens Kyllonen and Erik Sagstrom.

The categories for 2010 include Best Live Tournament Player, Best Performance, Best Online Player and Rookie of the Year.

Award winners will be chosen by a public vote.

All EPT players are invited to the awards ceremony, which will be held at Park Café in Copenhagen at 8 p.m.

Check the PokerStars website for the complete list of nominees.

Visit PokerListings.com

Ziigmund Breaks $1.5 Million Mark

2010-01-28 11:30:00

Sahamies is now up over $1.6 million for the year with the majority of the profit coming from the last eight days.

Despite his reputation as a wild gambler, Sahamies has not logged a losing day on the online tables since Jan. 20.

His session yesterday began at $100/$200 Pot-Limit Omaha where he lost $14k against regular opponents Cole South, Tom "durrrr" Dwan and Gus Hansen.

After an hour and 108 hands, Sahamies made the move to $300/$600 PLO heads-up against South. In just 28 minutes (55 hands) Sahamies took over $252k.

After an eight hour break, Sahamies returned to $300/$600 PLO to play Patrik Antonius heads-up, but once again only stayed for about 20 minutes and 59 hands.

In the short match Sahamies took $53k from Antonius bringing him up to $296k on the day.

Dwan, who has struggled at the tables since his $5 million dollar string of losses in late 2009, sat for over 2,000 hands, but only managed to finish the day up $27k.

Antonius still seems to be having trouble finding his footing this year, which is a stark contrast to his domination in 2009.

The Team Full Tilt pro played three matches of heads-up PLO losing $54k to Sahamies, $78k to South and winning a modest $5k from Dwan.

In total Antonius adds over $126k to his losses in 2010.

Despite losing over $134k, and finishing as the day's top loser, South remains one of the year's most profitable players, up over $1 million.

Below you can see three of the largest hands from the previous sessions, or head to MarketPulse for hundreds more.

From nuts to nothing in just one card.

Dwan spikes a five-outer.

A tight runner-runner.

Visit PokerListings.com

Corkins Cashes in with Second WPT Title

2010-01-28 11:00:00

He outlasted all 208 entries and beat up-and-comer Jonathan Kantor heads-up to claim the first place prize of $739,486 at the Beau Rivage in Biloxi, Mississippi.

Corkins, who won his first WPT title at the World Poker Finals in 2003, now finds himself as one of the 12 players that have won two WPT titles. It’s an elite group that includes players like Erick Lindgren, Howard Lederer and Barry Greenstein.

“It’s wonderful,” said Corkins about his win. “It’s been so frustrating coming in second twice, third once and sixth at another final table.”

Corkins cruised to three-handed play but after losing a series of hands became the short-stack. He had to get extremely lucky to win an all-in situation with A-J versus Jerry Vanstrydonck’s pocket kings.

He went on to bust Vanstrydonck and take back the chip lead, carrying it into heads-up play against Kantor. It took Corkins just 19 hands to end the match.

With his victory Corkins also topped 4,000 WPT points, which puts him in a very select group of players that includes just Gus Hansen, Phil Ivey and Daniel Negreanu. Corkins now has over $5 million in lifetime tournament earnings.

The WPT will now head to sunny L.A. for both the WPT Celebrity Invitational on Feb. 20-21 and the L.A.P.C., which takes place Feb. 26-March 4.

The complete final table results from the Southern Poker Championship are as follows:

1. Hoyt Corkins - $739,486
2. Jonathan Kantor - $366,643
3. Jerry Vanstrydonck - $196,829
4. Jared Jaffee - $135,079
5. James Reed - $106,134
6. Tyler Smith - $86,837

Visit PokerListings.com

Obrestad Avoiding Aussie Millions Déjà Vu

2010-01-28 00:00:00

Among the chip leaders with 21 people left in the 2009 Aussie Millions, holding ace-ten, she pushed all in for around 350k over Canadian Zach Fellows' raise, expecting him to fold all but premium cards.

However, Fellows made the rather loose call with just pocket fives.

The fives held and an angry Obrestad had a few choice words for Fellows before running nines into jacks to bow out 21^st.

"It was a terrible call," she said. "It was really frustrating."

Thursday, a year later, she finds herself deep-stacked late in the 2010 Aussie Millions again and hoping this won't be a case of déjà vu.

"I hope not," she laughed. "I want to do well in every tournament I play. It doesn't really matter which one it is, but because I got deep here last year and I was so close to final tabling, I want to know what that feeling is like."

The Norwegian-born Betfair Poker pro says there's really no secret to why she's deep in the Aussie Millions main event in back-to-back years.

The tournament just sets up well for her game.

"I think the structure is just really good," she said. "And I've been running good too."

It certainly doesn't hurt that the 2007 World Series of Poker Europe main event champ has cultivated an image as a tremendously loose-aggressive player. Apparently no one ever puts her on a hand.

"They never think I have anything, no matter how I play a hand," she explained. "Even when I have the nuts and that's the only hand I could possibly have, they still don't believe me.

"It's really annoying at times, because I like to play a lot of pots. So getting involved without a hand is not a good idea. But why would I? They never believe me anyway. I don't have to. So I'm trying to tighten up a little and take advantage."

Like most of the new generation of Internet whiz kids taking over the poker world these days, Obrestad was weaned on No-Limit Hold'em.

But drawn in by its alluring action, she recently expanded her repertoire to include Pot-Limit Omaha and actually took down the $1k PLO prelim in Australia just days before the start of the main event.

"I was really excited," she said. "I've been playing a lot online. That's usually what I play if I play online these days, so I feel like I've been really improving my game.

"You can play a lot of pots. You can play really aggressively and you can bluff a lot in that game. There's a lot of action. I like it."

But for now, she's got a little Hold'em and the remainder of the Aussie Millions to contend with.

"I really want to do well here this year," she said. "And put last year in the past."

To follow Obrestad's progress and the rest of the 2010 Aussie Millions main event, tune in to PokerListings' Live Updates through the Jan. 30 final table.

Visit PokerListings.com

Poker Site Haiti Donations Top $2m

2010-01-27 17:30:00

Currently PokerStars players have donated $670,000 with five days left to participate while Full Tilt is up to $307,721 and still taking donations.

Both rooms will match the amount their players donate meaning more than $1.9 million from just those two rooms alone will be going toward relief efforts in Haiti.

The smaller rooms are getting in on the cause as well with Absolute Poker and UB Poker hosting a $5 rebuy event that drew 717 players last week.

Cake Poker and RedKings Poker will also be taking donations in their lobbies all this week. Bodog founder Calvin Ayre has committed to matching up to $1 million of the donations made to the cause.

The Poker Players Alliance publicly commended the online rooms' efforts.

“Like the rest of the world, the poker community is eager to do anything it can to aid Haiti in the wake of the devastating earthquake,” said PPA chairman Alfonse D’Amato.

“I applaud PokerStars, Full Tilt Poker and Cake Poker for providing poker players across the globe an easy way to make a contribution.”

The PPA estimated that over 50,000 players had donated with proceeds going to organizations like the Red Cross, Doctors Without Borders or UNICEF.

Haitians are still dealing with the catastrophic effects of a 7.0 magnitude earthquake that hit Jan. 12. More than 150,000 people have been reported dead and millions are homeless.

Players can still make donations with most of the major online poker rooms until Jan. 31.

Visit PokerListings.com

Patrik Antonius Dumps $826k

2010-01-27 12:00:00

Antonius' session started at $300/$600 Pot-Limit Omaha against Tom "durrrr" Dwan and Ilari "Ziigmund" Sahamies.

Dwan, who had been at the table for 30 minutes prior to Antonius taking a seat, left just a few hands after Antonius's arrival.

Just 20 minutes later, Dwan's spot at the table was taken by Cole South, setting the cast for the remainder of the session.

Despite his best efforts, and multiple re-loads, Antonius seemed doomed to end up on the short end of the stick, dumping over $800k in just two and a half hours.

Fellow Finn Sahamies took the largest chunk of profit from Antonius, thanks in part to winning the biggest pot of the session – worth just over $281k. In total, Sahamies won just over $436k.

Including another $252k profit mostly from a heads-up session against South and a $14k loss on another table earlier this morning, Sahamies earned a massive $674k for the day, making him the most profitable player on the year with over $1.5 million.

After making over $257k from Antonius and an additional $118k from $100/$200 PLO, it was looking like a big session for South until he sat down at $300/$600 PLO to play Sahamies heads-up again. The $252 loss left him with just over $165k profit on the day.

Dwan, who has been busy playing live poker at the Aussie Millions, added $164k to his comeback by playing a mix of PLO and No-Limit Hold'em. This latest profit leaves Dwan down only $240k on the year.

Below you can see the three largest pots from the day, or you can head to MarketPulse to see the rest.

It was the wrong club for Antonius.

A big turn for South.

Sick setup flop.

Visit PokerListings.com

Corkins Guns for Second WPT Title

2010-01-27 10:30:00

Corkins will attempt to join an elite group of players who have won two WPT titles when the final table plays out from the Beau Rivage in Biloxi Mississippi.

“It is a big deal,” said Corkins. “I want to get first or second because that would give me 4,000 WPT points and only Daniel Negreanu, Gus Hansen and Phil Ivey are in that club.”

It’s been a long time coming for Corkins, who won his first WPT title at the World Poker Finals at Foxwoods in 2003. Since then Corkins has cashed 12 times on the WPT and made four final tables.

To make his way into the WPT record books, Corkins will have to beat a relatively unknown but skilled final table that includes Tyler Smith, Jonathan Kantor, Jerry Vanstrydonck, James Reed and Jared Jaffee.

Both Jaffee and Kantor recorded wins in the Southern Poker Championships’ preliminary events and Smith has over $300,000 in life-time tournament earnings.

A trio of notable poker pros fell just short of the final table. WSOPC winner Andy Philachack came in seventh, bubbling the final table, WPT Ladies Night winner J.J. Liu came in eighth and Jason Mercier horse Dan O'Brien came in ninth place.

The final table begins at 4 p.m. CT. Here are the current chip counts:

Hoyt Corkins – 2.06 million
Tyler Smith – 1.1 million
Jerry Vanstrydonck – 1 million
Jonathan Kantor – 894,000
Jared Jaffee – 762,000
James Reed – 377,000

Visit PokerListings.com

Mizzi Finds Aussie Millions Magic in Melbourne

2010-01-27 00:00:00

And after a final table appearance at a 2009 Aussie Millions prelim and a deep run all the way to 16^th in the main event last year, who can blame him?

"I hit a lot of sets in Australia," he joked. "But seriously, I have a really good feel for the table dynamic here. There's something about Australia. Maybe it's the air here that just helps me get in the zone a lot easier.

"Right now I'm playing the best poker I've ever played. Most of my reads are right on and feel like I have a good idea of where people are."

Wednesday, the 23-year-old Canadian found himself among the chip leaders on Day 2 of the 2010 Aussie Millions main event and appeared primed for yet another deep run.

"For some reason, every time I'm in Australia, I'm really focused," he said. "Maybe it's because I travel 25 hours to get here, so I might as well sit down and just focus on the task at hand."

Playing under the screen names Imper1um and zangbezan24, the Betfair Poker pro is nothing short of an online poker legend.

And while the live results have followed, including more than $1.6 million in career earnings over just the past four years, something is still missing from his resume.

Among several deep cashes, Mizzi finished third in the 2007 Irish Open, second in the 2008 World Series of Poker Europe's £5k Pot-Limit Omaha and second again in the 2009 WSOP's $5k PLO.

However, a major poker title still eludes him.

"If you look at my results I have a lot of finishes from 10^th to 30^th and it's funny, because online, that's usually where I dominate," he said. "When 10-30 people are left, I go in for the kill. But live, I've just been running really bad at the end of tournaments.

"It really bothers me that I've never won a major tournament. I've actually only won just one live tournament, a side event at Bellagio. It was nice, it was a $3k buy-in with 160 players, but, you know, it's not a big deal. You don't get that much satisfaction out of winning something like that."

The good side of coming so close, so many times is that Mizzi has stayed focused on his ultimate goal of winning a major title. But that certainly doesn't make him want it any less.

"I see lot of people that win a couple of tournaments and they lose that desire," he said. "I don't want to end up like that and having these close finishes just gives me more thirst and gets me more focused on achieving my goals.

"In the end, though, a title is very important to me. I really want to get that monkey off my shoulder. Hopefully I'll win a big event this year, maybe even this one."

To follow Mizzi's progress and comprehensive coverage of the entire 2010 Aussie Millions main event, tune into PokerListings' Live Updates through the Jan. 30 final table.

Visit PokerListings.com

Cake Network Explodes with Unabomber Poker

2010-01-26 18:00:00

With his trademark sweatshirt and sunglasses Laak is one of the most recognizable poker players in the world but has rarely had a major poker room sponsorship deal.

He mentioned he was thrilled to start Unabomber Poker.

“We knew we wanted to launch the sickest poker site possible," stated Laak.

"By joining a network that focuses on player rewards and accepts players world-wide we knew we would be starting out on the right track. I love getting involved from the ground up.”

Laak burst onto the poker scene by winning the WPT Celebrity Invitational in 2004 and has since made big scores at the WSOP, WPT and Poker After Dark.

The Irish-American most recently outlasted Luke “Full Flush” Schwartz, Mike Sexton and Andy Black to win the PartyPoker.com World Open V for $250,000.

Laak will blog regularly on the Unabomber Poker website.

“The addition for of Unabomber Poker to the Cake Network is cause for great excitement,” said a Cake Network spokesperson. “Phil’s enthusiasm for the game is infectious and brings great energy to the network.”

Cake Poker also launched seven other partner sites including 7Win Poker, Redback Poker, Amsterdams Poker, Safari Poker, Dime Line Sports, Rags2Riches and Burro Poker.

Visit PokerListings.com

UB Poker Event Tops Record Books

2010-01-26 15:30:00

The Deepstack No-Limit Hold’em Six-Max tournament drew 628 players, creating a prize pool of $1.57 million – the richest in UB’s 10-year history.

Online player SEBBAU was the biggest winner taking down the tournament and the $330,900 that came attached to first place.

Celebrated UB player DOOSHDOTCOM1 also made an appearance at the final table but ended up finishing in fifth for $86,350.

"Despite going out just before the money in UBOC 8, the tournament still left me with an incredible feeling as we ended up building the richest prize pool in the history of UB," said Joe Sebok.

"I think it sets the tone for what I think will be the best UBOC ever for our players. 2010 is just the beginning of great things to come for UB and our community."

Team UB was out in full force with Phil Hellmuth, Sebok and Liv Boeree all playing the tournament.

Boeree was the only UB pro to cash, coming in 42^nd place for $6,280.

UBOC 4 continues all week with the $1 million-guaranteed $1,050 buy-in main event scheduled for this Sunday.

Click here to learn more about the UBOC schedule or sign up for an account.

Visit PokerListings.com

The Other Hachem: Life In Joe's Shadow

2010-01-26 00:00:00

Yet thanks to a huge year on the PokerStars Australia New Zealand Poker Tour, where he cashed in four of five events on the way to winning Player of the Year honors, Hachem's brother Tony seems to have found a way out from under it.

“People would say I was just Joe’s brother, that I can’t play,” Tony said. “But now I’ve made a number of final tables and cashes. In my mind, poker is all about consistency and I think I’ve proved I have that.

“People say that it’s tough playing in Joe’s shadow, but I try to be positive about it and use it to my advantage. I was given an opportunity, I took it by the horns and I’m running with it.”

There’s always been a lot more to Tony Hachem than just being the brother of the 2005 World Series of Poker Main Event champion.

He cashed in the 2007 WSOP Main Event, made a final table at the Venetian Deep Stack Extravaganza in Las Vegas that same year and found a career best score of NZ$54,000 when he finished runner-up at the 2008 New Zealand Poker Championship.

Plus, PokerStars has always seen him as a marketable character with great networking skills, a socialite with celebrities Down Under and a popular figure amongst the ever growing community of poker players in the region.

As a result, Tony was sponsored by PokerStars for a number of tournaments, a move that immediately garnered its fair share of criticism regardless of Tony's track record.

“People have said to me, ‘What does it take to be a PokerStars pro? Can I just change my name to Hachem,’” explained Joe.

“I’ve heard it all before and a lot worse,” added Tony. “It’s like, ‘You are Joe’s brother, so you got a sponsorship,’ but that’s not how it is.

“All I can say is when people are given opportunities, they either let them pass or they make the most of them and I made sure I made the most of this one.”

Wearing the PokerStars patch, Tony made 15^th at ANZPT Adelaide for AUD$5,870, 17^th at ANZPT Sydney for AUD$8,874, 16^th at the ANZPT’s 2009 Melbourne Texas Hold'em Championship for AUD$5,450, and 18^th ANZPT Queenstown for NZ$3,015.

As a result, 43-year-old Joe couldn’t be more proud of his 36-year-old little brother.

“He was just consistent and honestly pretty unfortunate not to have a major score,” Joe said. “The thing is, I’m really happy he did something in his own right. He deserves it.”

Tony’s name is rarely written, by the mainstream or poker press, without mention of Joe.

But the ever-humble younger Hachem grew up idolizing his big brother and says he doesn’t mind.

“Honestly, being Joe’s brother isn’t a bad thing,” he said. “He’s always going to be my brother.

“The game of poker is growing around the world and Joe is a big part of that, here and abroad. I guess people are just going to have to get used to the idea that Joe’s got a younger brother who loves the game, loves interacting with the people and can play a little too.”

While he had the sponsorship before, the spoils of winning the ANZPT Player of the Year title includes a cheque for AUD$60,000 and a spot on the Team PokerStars Australia roster.

What that means is Tony will be playing in the second season of the ANZPT kicking off in Adelaide next month, several stops on the upcoming fourth season of the PokerStars Asia Pacific Poker Tour and the 2010 Aussie Millions, where he has already made 11^th in a prelim for AUD$9,144 and started play on the final day one flight of the main event Tuesday, just a few tables over from Joe.

“There are some things in poker that I want to achieve this year,” added Tony. “I really want to win a tournament or at least maintain the consistency I had last year and I think the Aussie Millions will be a good start.”

To follow the progress of the Hachem brothers, and the entire 2010 Aussie Millions main event, tune in to PokerListings’ Live Updates through January 30.

Visit PokerListings.com

McDonald, Eastgate Fall Short at EPT Deauville

2010-01-25 16:30:00

Cody, a 21-year-old poker pro from Rochdale, U.K., outlasted a field of 768 players to claim the first-place prize of €847,000.

Organizers had plenty of compelling story lines with McDonald looking to become the first two-time EPT winner and Eastgate trying to win his first major tournament since taking down the 2008 WSOP Main Event.

Eastgate, a member of Team PokerStars Pro, entered the eight-player final table as the short-stack and couldn’t get anything going.

It didn't take long before Eastgate found himself on the rail in 8th place after his pocket tens were bested by K-9.

The Danish pro has never won an EPT title although he came close in London this year eventually finishing second to Aaron Gustavson.

McDonald entered the day with an average stack and made it considerably farther than Eastgate getting all the way to three-handed play.

Unfortunately for McDonald he ran into trouble at that point and finally lost a flip for his tournament life. The young Canadian pro claimed €295,000 for his efforts.

McDonald won EPT Dortmund in 2008 and very nearly won it again in 2009 but eventually finished in fifth place.

Despite the fact it was Cody's first time competing at the EPT, it took him less than an hour to beat heads-up opponent Teodor Caraba.

It was a disappointing event for French poker fans who saw a number of their most well-known players fall painfully short of the final table.

Most notably coming up shy was Team PokerStars Pro Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier, who finished in ninth place after running into pocket aces with ace-queen, effectively becoming the final-table bubble boy.

Winamax Pro and actress Alexia Portal finished in 10^th place after losing a coin flip for her tournament life.

Meanwhile French poker legend Bruno Fittoussi, who finished as the runner-up in the 2007 WSOP H.O.R.S.E. event, bombed out of EPT Deauville in 14^th place.

With Deauville complete the EPT will travel to Copenhagen next for the Scandinavian Open, scheduled to take place Feb. 16-21.

Visit PokerListings.com

Dwan Kick Starts a Comeback

2010-01-25 11:30:00

Dwan’s night started at $100/$200 Pot-Limit Omaha where he sat with a cast of familiar names, such as Ashton “theASHMAN103” Griffin, Cole South, Brian Townsend, Matatuk and Di “Urindanger” Dang.

After 482 hands at the table and over 4 hours of play, Dwan closed down the game with $155k profit. Not quite ready to call it a night, Dwan moved on to $500/$1,000 Cap No-Limit Hold’em, where he lost over $10k in just 37 hands.

Dwan’s profit brings him up to only $420k in losses on the year.

The biggest winner on the night was Griffin who sat at the $100/$200 PLO for 627 hands, taking away $156k for his effort.

This brings Griffin’s results for the year up to $327k.

Dang only played about half as many hands on PLO as Griffin, but still managed to leave the game with a profit of over $40k. Added to profit earned earlier in the day (playing $100/$200 Cap PLO), Dang’s total profit comes to almost $100k.

This $100k profit pushes Dang to just over $1 million earnings on the year, only $252k behind Gus Hansen in first place.

The biggest loser of the day was a relatively unknown French player by the name of Matatuk. After trying to beat the star-studded $100/$200 PLO, Matatuk logged off for the night with over $207k in losses.

Despite winning the second largest pot of the day (worth $113k), South still came away from the tables down over $109k, bringing his profit on the year down to around $800k.

Townsend, who lost the largest pot of the day to Dwan, continues to struggle in 2010, losing over $55k on the day, bringing his total losses to $350k on the year.

Below are the three largest pots of the day. To see more pots, including Matatuk’s largest loss of the day, head to MarketPulse.

A much needed win for Dwan.

South chunks on 13 outs.

Dwan was 81% to win after the flop.

Visit PokerListings.com

Titan Steps Up with Haiti Event

2010-01-25 10:30:00

Titan Poker will host the $10 buy-in event on Jan. 31 with all proceeds going to Red Cross relief efforts in Haiti.

Titan will match the total amount of buy-ins made in the event.

In addition, online poker players will be able to buy in directly to “no play” tournaments where their funds will be donated directly to the Red Cross without actually playing in the tournament.

On Jan. 12 a 7.0 magnitude earthquake hit Haiti and while the exact death toll is still not known, over 150,000 people have been reported dead. It's been estimated that over two million people have been made homeless by the earthquake.

The “no play” tournaments are already available in the Titan Poker lobby under the “Aid for Haiti” tab.

Visit PokerListings.com

Ivey Tops All Time Money List

2010-01-25 04:00:00

“It’s exciting,” said the Team Full Tilt Pro. “I’ve been after that for a while now, so it feels good to get there.”

While Ivey was less than satisfied with losing heads-up to day trader Dan Shak for the title in Melbourne, his AUD$600,000 score, worth $544,219.50 in U.S. dollars according to the latest published exchange rates, pushed his career earnings up to $12,804,433 and into the top spot on the all-time list.

First place was held by Daniel Negreanu, who moved up to approximately $12,432,367 in career earnings and into the top spot this past September in similar fashion, when he finished runner-up to Barry Shulman at the World Series of Poker Europe main event.

Always all about business, Ivey said he doesn’t plan to spend very much time dwelling on the accomplishment.

“I don’t think I’ll celebrate too much,” he said. “I’m just going to go to dinner, maybe have a glass of wine or two and play some poker later.”

That poker game happens to be the Aussie Millions Million Dollar Cash Game, expected to feature some of the game’s top talent.

But for Ivey, it’s just another day at the office.

“It’s just another poker game,” he said.”I’m just going to play and try to win some hands.”

Knowing he’s now officially the top money earner in tournament poker history doesn’t appear to have had much of an effect on the steely Ivey’s day to day life either.

“I don’t really think, ‘oh I’m the best in the world,’” he said. “I just try to perform the best that I can day in and day out.”

By virtue of his second place finish in the Aussie Millions $100k Challenge Monday, Phil Ivey is now tournament poker’s all-time leading money winner.

“It’s exciting,” said the Team Full Tilt Pro. “I’ve been after that for a while now, so it feels good to get there.”

While Ivey was less than satisfied with losing heads-up to day trader Dan Shak for the title in Melbourne, his AUD$600,000 score, worth $544,219.50 in U.S. Dollars according to Monday’s published exchange rates, pushed his career earnings up to $12,804,433 and into the top spot on the all-time list.

First place was held by Daniel Negreanu, who moved up to $12,432,367 in career earnings and into the top spot this past September in similar fashion, when he finished runner-up to Barry Shulman at the World Series of Poker Europe main event.

Always all about business, Ivey said he doesn’t plan to spend very much time dwelling on the accomplishment.

“I don’t think I’ll celebrate too much,” he said. “I’m just going to go to dinner, maybe have a glass of wine or two and play some poker later.”

That poker game happens to be the Aussie Millions Million Dollar Cash Game, expected to feature some of the game’s top talent.

But for Ivey, it’s just another day at the office.

“It’s just another poker game,” he said.”I’m just going to play and try to win some hands.”

Knowing he’s now officially the top money earner in tournament poker history doesn’t appear it will have much of an effect on the steely Ivey’s day to day life either.

“I don’t really think, ‘oh I’m the best in the world,’” he said. “I just try to perform the best that I can day in and day out.”

Visit PokerListings.com

Shak Shocks Ivey, Wins $100k Crown

2010-01-25 03:00:00

“I try, in life, just in general, to keep the highs not too high and the lows not too low,” he said moments after defeating poker legend Phil Ivey heads up to take the title. “But believe me, I’m extremely excited.

“This is something I’ve been working towards for such a long time and I may not show the excitement, but inside I’m extremely excited. I’m not going to jump up and down, but inside I probably already am.”

A total of 24 players ponied up the $100k buy-in to enter the world’s most expensive poker tournament and the field played down to a final table of eight in Melbourne Saturday.

When they returned to crown a winner Monday, a short stacked Howard Lederer was the first to exit, running ace-ten into Tony G’s aces.

Start-of-day chip leader Jonathan "xMONSTERxDONGx" Karamalikis was actually the next player out. The young Aussie online legend doubled up a few of the shorter stacks before eventually running ace-ten into Shak’s nines and failing to improve.

Barry Greenstein then had his kings cracked by Tony Bloom’s jacks and the Team PokerStars Pro bubbled the money a few hands later when Bloom’s own kings held against his queen-ten.

Tony G was the next to go, getting his buy-in back when his tens lost a race with Shak’s ace-king and it wasn’t long before 2009 $100k Challenge runner-up Bloom got it in dominated by Ivey and bowed out fourth cashing for AUD$200,000.

Local cash game pro Bill Jordanou hit the rail third, collecting AUD$300,000 when he got it in with top two against Ivey’s overpair, but Ivey turned a set and rivered a flush.

Heads up started with Ivey and Shak about even, but the day trader took the veteran pro to task, building a 3:1 chip lead through a series of aggressive pre and post flop plays.

Eventually Ivey got it in with ace-ten against ace-seven, but Shak flopped a seven to suck out and while the Team Full Tilt Pro and 2009 November Niner was forced to settle for the AUD$600,000 second-place prize, pushing him up to the top spot on poker’s all-time leading money winners list, Shak booked the AUD$1.2 million win.

“I think I played well the whole heads-up match,” Shak explained. “The last hand I got lucky, there is no doubt about that, but up until that last hand I feel like I played very well.

“These guys are the best in the world, but I’d rather play with good players. I always seem to play better with good players because they are more predictable. With Phil, there’s nothing you can really say. Today I got the better cards, obviously he is the better player.”

While Shak has been recording cashes on the high-stakes tournament poker scene since 2004, including a fourth-place finish in this very event last year, his biggest score before Monday’s win was a victory in the inaugural Ante Up for Africa charity event at the 2007 World Series of Poker.

Recently divorced from wife Beth, Shak said he felt like his game is much improved and went about proving it in Australia Monday.

“I’ve been working hard on my game and I’ve had some life changes that have given me more time to concentrate on my game,” he said. “I think I’ve taken my game to a new level and I feel like I’m really playing better.”

Visit PokerListings.com

Scott Starts Aussie Millions Defense

2010-01-25 00:00:00

But being AUD$2 million wealthier isn’t the only thing that’s different for Scott. In fact, his life has changed almost completely.

“Coming to a place like Crown or any casino in Australia, pretty much everybody recognizes me,” he told PokerListings as he began the defense of his Aussie Millions title Monday. “I get asked for autographs, which is pretty cool.”

Scott said walking into Crown to take a run at back-to-back titles also feels a lot different than it did walking into the poker room an unknown in 2009.

“It’s completely different obviously,” he said. “Now you’ve got posters of me everywhere and stuff. I get to wear the bracelet this time and I come in as a totally new guy. I’m a poker professional this time. I mean, I’ve been playing for a long time, but now I really feel like I’m part of the whole tournament.”

Since winning the title, Scott has also picked up a sponsorship contract with PartyPoker and has been representing the brand at big-time tournaments all over the globe over the past 12 months, including booking a six-figure score when he made the final table of a $5k prelim at the WPT Championship in Las Vegas this past April.

Add that experience to the win in Melbourne last year and he feels like he’s coming into the 2010 Aussie Millions more prepared than ever.

“I’ve gathered a lot of experience this year playing around the world in a lot of big tournaments and that’s valuable coming into a tournament like this,” he said. “It’s a huge stage again, but I’ve been through it so many times this year, the nerves are gone and you are just here to play and do your best.

“That’s all you can ask for, is to just do your best, and I think I’m going to do that this year.”

But while doing his best is all anyone can ask of Scott, there’s no doubt he’s here do more than just show up.

“I’m not here to fuck spiders,” he said. “I’m here for one thing. I’m here for the bracelet and I’m totally focused on that.”

That said, Scott said he understands a tournament like the Aussie Millions can’t be won on Day 1 and he’s prepared to play patiently.

“When you play Day 1, you just focus on getting through Day 1, one thing at a time,” he said. “The ultimate goal is obviously to ship it again, but for now I’m just trying to stay out a trouble and see if I can build a stack by the end of the day.”

To follow Stewart Scott’s title defense and all the action from the 2010 Aussie Millions, tune into PokerListings’ Live Updates throughout the week.

Visit PokerListings.com

Poker News in Brief Jan. 18-24, 2010

2010-01-24 13:30:00

The 2010 Aussie Millions main event kicked Sunday with hundreds of players looking to strike Australian gold.

You can read all about the tournament in our news section or live tournaments area, but as part of our ongoing Poker News in Brief feature we’re going to take a look at a few lesser-known poker stories below.

This week we’ll look at Annette Obrestad crushing an Aussie Millions prelim, David Singer falling fourth on the Heartland Poker Tour, Phil Galfond doing some TV work and more.

Obrestad Wins Aussie Millions Pot-Limit Omaha Event

Annette Obrestad wasted no time getting busy at the 2010 Aussie Millions.

The former World Series of Poker Europe Main Event winner won the $1,000(AUD) buy-in Pot-Limit Omaha event for $40,000(AUD) this week.

Obrestad outlasted 159 players including a couple of veteran rounders in Emad Tahtouh and Tony Bloom.

Although Obrestad continues to find success online, the win in the Aussie Millions was actually her first live victory since winning the WSOPE.

Obrestad did, however, finish second at EPT Dublin in 2007 for €297,800.

This year, Obrestad will make her first appearance at the WSOP after finally turning 21 this past September.

Alec Torelli Moves to Victory Poker

Online star Alec “traheho” Torelli has parted ways with Doyles Room to sign a sponsorship deal with the up-and-coming Victory Poker.

Torelli was hand-picked by Doyle Brunson this summer to be a member of the Brunson 10.

The team has never come close to approaching 10 players, however, and currently Chris “Moorman1” Moorman, Zachary Clark, Amit Makhija and Dani “anksy” Stern are its only members.

Victory Poker has yet to be released, but it will be a part of the Everleaf Gaming network, which includes Red Cherry Poker and Poker Royale.

Torelli will join a Victory Poker team that is rumored to include Antonio Esfandiari, Brian Rast and Paul Wasicka.

Rousing Final to HPT Vegas

The blue-collar Heartland Poker Tour ventured into Vegas for the second time this week and the final table did not disappoint.

It included a bona fide pro in Full Tilt’s David Singer, an HPT veteran in Theodore Kearly and an inspirational story in unemployed Cambodian refugee Kimbo Ung.

Ung managed to outlast all five opponents at the final table and take down a first place prize of $125,901.

Singer finished fourth for $29,377, which brings his lifetime tournament winnings up to just over $4.3 million.

The event, which drew 433 players, was an overwhelming success according to organizers.

“We didn’t how the Vegas market would respond to our brand,” said HPT President Todd Anderson. “It turns out we blew the roof off.”

PKR TV Showcases Phil Galfond

Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond does not have a major poker room sponsor, but will be doing some work for PKR TV.

Galfond will be doing commentary on some of the best ring game action on PKR.com and footage from the special “Galfond TV Cash Game,” which saw some of the elite PKR players take him on.

“We are thrilled to have Phil in the studio to become a PKR TV commentator,” said PKR marketing manager Erika Schwartz. “It will be fantastic for our players to get someone of his reputation watching the action and giving some advice on their play.”

PKR TV and the Galfond TV Cash Game will be broadcast on The Poker Channel in 13 countries across Europe. Air dates have yet to be confirmed.

Police Raid South Carolina Poker Game

Police busted yet another poker game in South Carolina last week.

Officers confiscated more than $64,000 in cash, chips and tables from a Greenville County home.

Twenty-seven people were charged for unlawful betting after a citizen’s tip led deputies to the house.

The raid is nothing new for the region. In 2007, a game was busted in neighboring North Carolina that included noted poker pros Mike Gracz and Chris Bell.

Visit PokerListings.com

Boatman Aims For Third Aussie Millions Final

2010-01-24 00:00:00

“I look forward to this tournament more than any other,” Boatman told PokerListings. “Results or no, it’s a great place to come. But, of course, there is something about having done well in a tournament before. You get that extra bit of confidence and it’s easier to visualize doing well again.”

Boatman managed a 10th place finish at the 2003 Aussie Millions when his aces were heartbreakingly cracked by eventual champion Peter Costa.

Then last year, he came into the final table as a short stack and battled his way back before eventually bowing out eighth when he went card dead.

In fact, the Aussie Millions has been a big part of the 53-year-old Boatman’s $1,484,350 in career earnings, although he has a bit of difficulty explaining why.

“It’s hard to say,” Boatman said. “It’s a great structure and I’m very comfortable here. Plus, there is a very good mix of players in the tournament and it seems to suit me. You just keep playing your game and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t.”

The London native has been cashing consistently in top tournaments around the globe since as far back as 1998.

However, 2008 was a down year for Boatman as he earned just $43,567 – the lowest totals of his career.

Rather than fold up the tent, Boatman came back in 2009 with the biggest year he’s ever recorded, totaling $211,649.

“I only realized the other day that was the case,” The Full Tilt Pro explained. “Basically, I got into a lot of good positions last year, but in my typical way, never really converted any of them. I feel my game is really good, but in the late stages when you need to get big hands and have them stand up, that’s the part of my game I seem to need to work on.

“I’m happy that I keep putting myself in these positions and I’m happy that Full Tilt still has the confidence to keep putting me in there. As long as they have confidence in me, I’m happy to keep living this life. You’ll never hear me complaining about beats.”

But Boatman, who set a record back in 2002 by making three consecutive World Series of Poker final tables, is focused on making a third final Down Under this year and getting over the hump this time around.

“I’d love to really show that I’ve got the end game,” he said. “I feel that I have. I have won tournaments, just never the really big ones.

“It would be very special. I think I would be the first person to make the final three times if I did it and it would be nice to have an achievement like that.”

To see if Boatman can do it, and follow comprehensive coverage of the entire 2010 Aussie Millions main event, tune in to PokerListings’ Live Updates all week.

Visit PokerListings.com

Weekly Freerolls: Last Chance for $25k

2010-01-23 11:30:00

PokerListings' players have until the end of January to qualify for the giant freeroll, which will play out Feb. 21.

The following freerolls are open to all PokerListings.com players. Qualify in the specified qualification period, then take your seat to win a fistful of free cash.

If you're not a PL.com registered player on any of the following sites, click on the site's name in the list to sign up. Getting your free seat in the tournament can be just as simple as that.

Betfair Poker

Alright, so it’s not a freeroll, but it’s a guaranteed $3,000 prize pool for $1. Chances are there will be a huge overlay, so don’t miss out on this one.

Date: Jan. 24
Value: $1,500
Qualify with: $1

Pacific Poker

For new depositing players only. Exclusive $500 freeroll to any new PokerListings players who deposit and play at Pacific Poker.

Date: Jan. 26
Value: $500
Qualify with: Deposit and play

Full Tilt

Full Tilt offers weekly freerolls to all PokerListings players. Qualify with 100 points earned the week before the event to grab your seat.

Date: Jan. 33
Value: $1,500
Qualify with: 100 points
Qualify between: Jan. 24-29

William Hill Poker

William Hill Poker offers a monthly $2,500 freeroll for PokerListings players. You need to collect just 100 points this month to qualify

Date: Feb. 4
Value: $2,500
Qualify with: 100 points in January

PokerStars

The next massive freeroll from PokerStars comes as a $25k event awarding $24k worth of “turbo takedown tickets” plus $1k cash for the final table. Collect 100 points in January as a PokerListings player to earn your seat.

Date: Feb. 21
Value: $25,000
Qualify with: 100 points
Qualify between: Jan. 1-31

Visit PokerListings.com

Hachem Hunts Aussie Millions Glory

2010-01-22 22:30:00

But make no mistake about it, when the main event begins Sunday, 2005 World Series of Poker Main Event champion Joe Hachem would rather keep the Aussie Millions for himself.

“I look forward to it ever year,” the Team PokerStars Pro and Crown Casino Ambassador told PokerListings. “But it’s like a love-hate relationship. I’d love to win it and I’ve been close three or four years now, but I just haven’t been able to get there. Maybe it’s because I would love to win it so much.”

An Australian poker icon and worldwide superstar, Hachem’s $10,856,216 in career live tournament earnings puts him sixth on poker’s all-time leading money winners list.

Of course, he has the WSOP main event bracelet and his December 2006 win at the World Poker Tour’s Five Diamond World Poker Classic gave Hachem a WPT title, making him one of only five players to have both.

But earning a third jewel in his very own triple crown is what Hachem truly desires.

“That would really seal the deal for me,” he said. “I mean, I’d love to win an EPT, but to win the Aussie Millions; it would be unbelievable.”

In fact, the Lebanese-born, Melbourne-raised Hachem wants to win on his home soil so badly, he can almost taste it.

“I have to make a final table there, I just do, and if I do, I promise you if I make the final table there, I will win it,” he said.

A chiropractor in Melbourne for more than a decade before a rare blood disorder affecting his hands forced him to give up his career, Hachem actually started taking poker seriously playing tournaments at Crown a decade ago.

The Aussie Millions itself began when the Crown Australian Poker Championship moved to January in 2001 with just 40 entrants putting up the AUD$5,000 buy-in.

The event, along with the game of poker in Australia, has grown infinitely since, attracting a truly international field and peaking in 2008 when 780 players ponied up the now AUD$10,000 buy-in.

His 2005 WSOP win was a major catalyst for the poker boom in Australia, but Hachem believes the game itself has always been a perfect fit for Aussie culture.

“I think Australians really have that competitive nature and poker, especially tournament poker, it brings that out in you,” he said.

In 2009, the Aussie Millions title was kept on home soil for the first time when Adelaide chef-turned-poker player Stewart Scott beat a field of 681.

This year, with poker as popular as ever Down Under, organizers are estimating the field could reach as many as 800 players.

To follow all the action, tune into PokerListings’ Live Updates beginning at 12:30 p.m. Melbourne time Sunday.

Visit PokerListings.com

PartyPoker Offering WPT Invitational Seats

2010-01-22 15:00:00

The World Poker Tour Celebrity Invitational is set to take place Feb. 20-21 in L.A. and PartyPoker will give away a total of 15 packages worth $3,000 each in a qualifying final on Jan. 31.

“This tournament will be filled with Hollywood stars and poker gods,” said a PartyPoker spokesman.

“The event is invitation only and PartyPoker.com can get you on the exclusive guest list. To win a package for the WPT Celebrity Invitational all you need to do is use PartyPoints to enter the daily qualifiers.”

PartyPoker is running two daily qualifiers, one of which costs 10 PartyPoints and sees the top three players qualify for the final. The second will cost you 25 PartyPoints with the top 15 advancing to the final.

Now in its fourth year the WPT Celebrity Invitational has seen celebrities like Paris Hilton, Michael Vartan, Don Cheadle, Jon Hamm, Ray Romano, Mena Suvari, Jason Alexander and Brad Garrett trade the red carpet for the felt at the Commerce Casino.

The WPT is guaranteeing a prize pool of $200,000 for this year’s Invitational with an extra $25,000 seat in the WPT World Championship in April going to the winner.

This year the tournament will offer $200 rebuys in the first two levels with all proceeds from the rebuy period going towards the Chrysalis organization, a group that assists economically disadvantaged and homeless individuals.

Visit PokerListings.com

Ziigmund Makes $143k in 53 Minutes

2010-01-22 11:30:00

Technically Sahamies played two sessions yesterday. The first, at a six-max $300/$600 Pot-Limit Omaha table, lasted for only five hands.

In those five hands Sahamies managed to make over $77k against Cole South and rezzydezzy1.

After getting stacked on his third hand at the table rezzydezzy1 left leaving Sahamies and South alone to play heads up. Rather than play on the six-max table, the two high-stakes professionals moved their match to a heads up table of the same stake.

This session lasted for 49 minutes: 141 hands. Again it was Sahamies who took home the profit, making over $66k to put his total on the day up to $143k.

After a breaking for the night, South woke up this morning to play some $100/$200 Cap Pot-Limit Omaha. Unfortunately he was unable to turn a profit on this session either, posting a $35k loss.

Including his losses from last night, South is stuck for a total of $110k.

Mostly thanks to his quick loss to Sahamies at PLO, rezzydezy1 booked an $84k loss on the day over 648 hands.

Below you can find the three largest pots of the previous sessions, or you can head to MarketPulse to see some more.

Gross.

Ziigs pulls down another.

Just the nuts.

Visit PokerListings.com

Titan Sending Last Man Standing to WSOP

2010-01-22 09:00:00

The concept behind Last Man Standing is simple: Starting Feb. 1 make 7,500 Titan Points a day on the site’s cash tables and tournaments and you are in the running.

If you fail to make the required amount of points you are out of the competition.

The promotion will continue until only one player is able to outlast all his competition and officially become the Last Man Standing.

The winner will receive a $13,000 package to the 2010 WSOP Main Event including the $10,000 buy-in and $3,000 for for travel, accomodations and expenses.

Additional cash prizes will be awarded to other players based on their VIP level with some prizes available exclusively to lower level players. One of the categories includes a $5,000 first place prize.

In order to participate in the Last Man Standing promotion, players have to download the Titan Poker software and register an account before Feb. 1.

Visit PokerListings.com

ElkY Goes Home Again

2010-01-21 19:00:00

In fact, with 61 % of the field coming from within the country, including one of the best tournament players on the planet, one might even say French poker is on the rise.

“Deauville is a very good tournament to play, so I'm happy to be here,” said Team PokerStars Pro Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier. “It's always very special to be back here in France. I rarely get the chance to play poker here, so it's important and means a lot to me.”

While tournament entry numbers are on a downswing in North America, the 768 entries in Deauville are better than 100 more than 2008, pushing the prize pool up to €3,686,400.

When the event is all said and done, a total of 104 spots will get paid, including €847,000 for first – the only number Grospellier seems focussed on.

“My motivation is very strong to do good here in Deauville,” he said. “I really want to win and play well here in France.”

Although it paled in comparison to the $3,686,476 in live tournament earnings he garnered in 2008, last year was still a banner one for Grospellier.

He followed up his 2008 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure main event win with a victory in the PCA’s $25k High Roller event.

Plus, adding a third-place finish at the $25k World Poker Tour Championship in Las Vegas to his 2008 WPT Festa Al Lago win helped him take home Season 7 WPT Player of the Year honors.

Now, returning to Deauville after a third-place finish in the €20,000 High Roller event in 2008, Grospellier has his sights set on some new goals.

“There are always reasons to get pumped,” Grospellier said. “I spoke with (fellow Team PokerStars France Pro) Arnaud Mattern about who will be the next one to win a second EPT or the first one to win a bracelet. I really want to win one.

“I also want to get my first place back in the EPT ranking since (Luca) Pagano has got it now. Even if he has deserved it, I really want to win it back. So that's a lot of challenges for this year.”

While he has both an EPT and WPT title, a World Series of Poker Bracelet still eludes Grospellier, however, pushing that to number one on his list of goals for 2010.

“Clearly the WSOP is the main thing missing now,” he said. “Of course, you can't control everything, but I'm certainly going to do my best to win one.”

For now though, Grospellier has a massive field on home soil to contend with, heading into Day 2 in Deauville among the 400-odd survivors from two day on heats.

"I want to have really good results here," he added.

- With files from Fred Guillemot

Visit PokerListings.com

South Wins First Monster Pot of 2010

2010-01-21 11:00:00

Starting at around noon yesterday a handful of players including Sahamies, South, LarsLuzak and Richard Ashby, took seats at $300/$600 Pot-Limit Omaha, beginning one of the first true high-stakes sessions of the year.

South played around 1,100 hands on the day, netting a total profit of over $290k.

Despite losing the massive $601k pot to South, Sahamies still managed to grind a $186k profit on the day while playing only 431 hands.

Hac “trex313” Dang also had a big day, earning over $341k in his 392 hand session. Dang’s largest pot of the day was a $192k loss to South. Fortunately, Dang had won a $132k pot from South just eight minutes earlier.

Di “Urindanger” Dang (Hac Dang’s brother) bounced around playing almost a dozen small sessions throughout the day. Urindanger put together enough small wins to finish the day with a $140k profit.

On the losing end for the day came Full Tilt pro Richard Ashby who lost on almost every table he sat at, netting over $421k in losses across 660 hands of PLO.

Tom "durrrr" Dwan had a big day playing 2,622 hands across multiple games and limits. His day included sessions in PLO, No-Limit Hold'em (all mostly at $100/$200) and even 1,591 hands of $1,000/$2,000 Fixed-Limit Hold'em. In the end Dwan suffered a loss of over $348k.

LarsLuzak, who continues his struggles from last year, lost $96k on the digital felt in just 293 hands.

Below you can watch replays of the three largest PLO pots of the day, including the $601k pot from South. To see more replays, head to MarketPulse.

Gamble Gamble.

South thought he had too many outs to fold.

South's set holds.

Visit PokerListings.com

PartyPoker Adds Tony G

2010-01-21 09:00:00

Famed loudmouth Tony G will bring his abrasive style of poker to a team that already includes Mike Sexton, Ian Frazer, Bodo Sbrzesny, Remy Biechel, Stewart Scott, Felipe “Mojave” Ramos and the recently signed Kara Scott.

Tony G will make his PartyPoker debut at the upcoming 2010 Aussie Millions.

“I cannot wait to start playing for Team Party on the circuit,” said Tony G. “I’ve always loved Party and what better way to kick off than at the Aussie Millions. I am also really excited about the Premier League in February - it is the best event in poker in my eyes.”

Tony G has been one of the hottest players in the Premier League’s recent events with a second and third place finish.

As part of the deal with PartyPoker, Tony G’s signature poker site TonyGPoker.com, will be moved to the PartyPoker-owned Noble Poker. The transfer should be relatively painless as both sites are on the iPoker network.

“We are delighted to welcome Tony to Team Party,” said a PartyGaming spokesman. “Tony is undoubtedly one of poker’s biggest characters in the game – a personal deal for him made huge sense. We are also happy to have acquired the assets of TonyGPoker.com and look forward to welcoming his players aboard."

Born as Antanas Guoga in Lithania, Tony G moved to Melbourne, Australia, when he was 11 and began playing poker at the age of 18.

Tony G quickly built a reputation for aggressive play and trash talk at the tables. In 2003, Tony G made the final table of the WPT Euro Finals of Poker in Paris, which established him as an upcoming player to watch.

Since then Tony G has accumulated nearly $4 million in tournament earnings with large scores at the Asian Poker Tour, WPT, WSOP and PartyPoker World Open.

In 2007 Tony G won the Moscow Million for $205,000 and donated the entire first place prize to Russian orphanages.

Visit PokerListings.com

Baldwin Lights Up University with Donation

2010-01-20 16:00:00

Baldwin, who graduated in 2006 from the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, is donating $200,000 to the school to outfit Prucha Field with new lights.

The upgrade will allow UW-Whitewater to host the upcoming 2010 Midwest regional competition of the Division III baseball national championship tournament.

The donation is particularly fitting considering the last time UW-Whitewater hosted the Division III baseball national championship Baldwin was the school’s starting right-fielder and team captain.

“It feels awesome to be in a position to help UW-Whitewater host the regional again,” Baldwin said.

“UW-Whitewater has an amazing baseball program and hopefully the team will be playing in this year’s regional in front of a hometown crowd.”

After graduating from UW-Whitewater, Baldwin relocated to Las Vegas in 2008 and quickly established himself as one of the poker world’s up and coming stars.

In 2009 Baldwin won his first WSOP bracelet in a $1,500 No-Limit Hold’em event for $521,991 and then placed third in the $10,000 Pot-Limit Hold’em event for $259,534.

In total Baldwin won more than $1.5 million for the year including online events, which was enough to secure him Card Player Magazine’s Player of the Year honors.

At the end of the year Baldwin also scored a sponsorship deal with online poker room UB.com.

UW-Whitewater Athletics Director Paul Plinske was proud of Baldwin’s success over the years.

“Eric was instrumental in leading UW-Whitewater to its first national title in baseball,” he said. “His recent gift will ensure more great things on the horizon for the Warhawks. He has definitely left his mark on our campus and we are very grateful to him for leaving us his legacy.”

Visit PokerListings.com

Full Tilt Launches Rush Poker

2010-01-20 11:30:00

The premise to Rush Poker is non-stop action. In the game players are put into a large player pool but face a different table of opponents in every hand they play.

If a player is dealt a sub-optimal hand, they also have access to a “Quick Fold” button which instantly transports them to a new table and then automatically folds their hand on the old table when action gets to them.

“Rush Poker is the greatest innovation since poker started on the internet,” said Team Full Tilt Pro Chris Ferguson.

The frenzied pace gives players the ability to play more hands than ever before.

It’s unlikely to get a read on a particular player, however, as it’s rare to play a big hand against the same player more than once a session.

Full Tilt is currently offering Rush Poker in No-Limit Hold'em and Pot-Limit Omaha at stakes $.05/$.10 to $.50/$1. At the time this article was published there were over 5,000 players on the Rush Poker tables.

You can find Rush Poker in the main menu in the Full Tilt lobby. To learn more about Rush Poker or sign up for a Full Tilt account click here.

You can also check out PokerListings’ strategy writer Dan Skolovy’s thoughts on Rush Poker here.

Visit PokerListings.com

Schwartz Joins Premier League IV Lineup

2010-01-20 09:00:00

“I can’t wait to get to Vegas and crush the field in the PartyPoker.com Premier League,” said Schwartz.

Schwartz will join the already announced Phil Hellmuth, J.C. Tran, Yevgeniy Timoshenko and Roland De Wolfe in the $100,000 buy-in tournament. This is the first time the shootout-style event has been held in Vegas.

Despite the number of skilled poker players, Schwartz likes his chances in the event.

“For sure there are some big names playing but I have to be a huge favorite,” he said. “They need to know that I’m coming with my sharky hat and it’s gonna be a whole week of soul owning from Full Flush.

Schwartz made a name for himself playing online as Full Flush on Full Tilt Poker and beating some of the best online players, including Tom “durrrr” Dwan and Phil “OMGClayAiken” Galfond for over a million.

He was perhaps most well-known for his tirades where he would refer to Dwan as “durrrr-balls” and the entire online high stakes community as “OMGweNerds” in the chatbox.

He made the final table of another well-known PartyPoker tournament last year – the World Open V – but was eventually ousted in fourth when his A-T failed against Austrian qualifier Jan Veit’s K-J.

According to PartyPoker officials they were reluctant to add the controversial young player.

“We did a lot of soul searching rather than soul owning before deciding to invite Luke into the Premier League,” said a PartyPoker spokesperson. “The fact is that he is a great player and he will certainly ignite the line-up and we haven’t even completed it yet.”

More players will be announced to the Premier League IV in the coming weeks.

Visit PokerListings.com

Gus Hansen Reaches $1.3 Million

2010-01-19 14:00:00

After realizing he couldn’t beat the best online players in the world at Pot-Limit Omaha or No-Limit Hold’em, Gus Hansen started 2010 by moving to 7-Game, hoping his years of mixed-game experience would be enough to give him back an edge.

It appears to be working after yet another winning session for the Danish pro. His latest $560k came yesterday with $169k of it from C-PLO and the remaining $391k from 7-Game.

Hansen wasn’t the only player to have a big day though. Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies took top honors on 7-Game, crushing the tables for over $513k, well ahead of Cole South who made $302k at the same time.

Di “Urindanger” Dang earned over $313k exclusively from C-PLO, but played a massive 6,202 hands to do it.

The biggest loser on the day is a relatively unknown player named PixKim. Although it hasn’t been 100% confirmed it appears PixKim is a Finnish pro by the name of Jari Komulainen. Through a combination of C-PLO and 7-Game PixKim managed to lose over $609k.

Two other players with notable losses on the day include Brian Hastings ($285k) and Tom “durrrr” Dwan ($245k).

Here are the three largest C-PLO pots of the day. You can see more of the action over on MarketPulse.

Flush, the hard way.

Somehow the Jacks hold.

Ace Queen good?.

Visit PokerListings.com

‘Play for Haiti’ at UB and Absolute Poker

2010-01-19 11:00:00

Absolute Poker and UB, which are both owned by Tokwiro Enterprises, will host the event this Wednesday, Jan. 20, at 20:30 ET.

The tournament buy-in will be $5 with a turbo rebuy format and Tokwiro will match 100% of the cash that is raised through the tournament.

"Along with the rest of the world, we've watched the headlines and news unfold with growing horror as the magnitude of the devastation in Haiti has been revealed," said Paul Leggett, Tokwiro's CEO.

"We believe we have a duty to do what we can to help raise funds and awareness for the plight of the people of Haiti, and our 'Play for Haiti' tournament is one small way we can work with our players to contribute."

Concerned players won’t walk away empty-handed as UB and Absolute Poker have added over $10,000 in prizes including a $2,500+$100 entry into Ultimate Bet Online Championship Event 8 for first place.

All the money from the tournament will go towards the Red Cross Disaster Relief Fund.

The event can be found under ‘Play for Haiti’ in the special tournaments lobby on both UB and Absolute Poker.

Visit PokerListings.com

Full Tilt to Double Guaranteed Prizepools

2010-01-19 09:00:00

As part of the $25 Million Double Guarantees Week, Full Tilt will double the money offered in each of its guaranteed prizepool tournaments for one week.

The promo includes tournaments like the Sunday Brawl, which will be bumped up to $800,000 guaranteed and the Sunday Mulligan, which will offer $400,000 in guaranteed cash.

Full Tilt’s biggest tournament – the Sunday $750,000 guaranteed – will be upgraded to $1.5 million guaranteed for the promotion.

Full Tilt representatives are already speculating it will be the biggest Sunday ever for the site in terms of cash awarded.

Other notable tournaments affected by the $25 Million Double Guarantees Week include the $1k Monday, which will offer $600k guaranteed, the Daily Dollar, which will double to $20k guaranteed and the $200k Double Deuce, which will be boosted up to $400k guaranteed.

For more information check the Full Tilt website.

Visit PokerListings.com

Hansen and Ziigmund Play it Safe

2010-01-18 13:00:00

Unlike the $500/$1,000 Pot-Limit Omaha and No-Limit Hold’em sessions throughout 2009, this year has been filled with mostly 7-Game and Cap PLO.

With 7-Game including both PLO and NLHE, it is possible to have massive pots worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, but the majority of hands dealt at these tables are in Limit games, where it’s difficult to lose even close to $100k in a single hand.

Cap PLO functions just like regular PLO with one big exception. Each limit has a Cap amount. Once the amount you’ve bet in the hand equals the Cap, you are treated as if you’re all in, regardless of how many chips you have left.

This allows players to limit the amount of money they can risk in a single hand, reducing swings and curbing any excessive gamble.

Early this morning, Gus Hansen proved to be the king of the Cap game, making over $180k in 682 hands spread across six sessions (half $100/$200 C-PLO, half $200/$400 C-PLO).

Plus, at the time of publication, Hansen has been seated at a 6-max $200/$400 C-PLO for 31 hands, up another $109k.

Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies, who last year convinced his opponents to manually turn the $500/$1,000 PLO tables into $3,000/$9,000, shared 334 hands of C-PLO with Hansen, but only managed to make $17k for his efforts.

Below are three of the largest pots from this morning, keep your browser posted to MarketPulse to stay on top of the ongoing C-PLO action.

I'll take ByTheBy's hand on the flop.

If you try to guess who's going to win on the flop, you'd be wrong..

UgotaPot.

Visit PokerListings.com

WSOPC Heads Back to Tunica

2010-01-18 12:00:00

The fifth stop of the WSOPC 2009-2010 season at Harrah's Tunica in Tunica, Mississippi begins Jan. 20 with the first of 19 ring events.

Included in the series are a $200+30 Ladies No Limit Hold'em event, a $200+30 Seniors No Limit Hold'em event and the annual $5,000+150 Harrah's Tunica Main Event Championship.

In last year’s main event, Kai Landry outlasted a field that included pros Gavin Smith, Kathy Liebert and PokerListings’ blogger Matt Stout, who finished third.

Landry won $183,974 and the $10,000 buy-in to the 2009 World Series of Poker Main Event.

With four more ring events added, Harrah’s is predicting this year’s Tunica circuit stop will be its biggest and most exciting to date.

"Harrah's Tunica has always been one of the biggest and brightest stops on the circuit," said tournament director, Jimmy Sommerfeld. "Last year, we had all of the tables going throughout the day."

Harrah's Tunica is currently offering special WSOP room rates to players participating in the event.

The main event begins Feb. 8 and runs through Feb. 10.

Visit PokerListings.com

Dover Man Wins Largest-Ever Bad Beat Jackpot

2010-01-18 09:00:00

56-year-old Steve Gedney was awarded $276,979 of the $553,958 jackpot when his quad threes were beaten by an ace on the river giving Bridgwater, New Jersey’s Chris Dobrzanski four aces.

Dobrzanski took home $138,489 and the remaining seven players at the table were each awarded $19,784.

There was roughly $400 in the pot.

"This is an unforgettable day for everyone at Caesars, especially our loyal players and dedicated poker team," said Joe Domenico, Senior Vice President and General Manager of Caesars Atlantic City. "The energy building in our poker room over these past months has been incredible and to see it culminate in this record setting jackpot couldn't be more rewarding.”

The progressive bad beat jackpot at Caesars Atlantic City is paid when four-of-a-kind is beaten. Like most, the prize is split among all players sitting at the table with 50% going to the losing hand, 25% to the winning hand, and 25% equally divided amongst the remaining players at the table.

The previous record for the largest-ever live bad beat jackpot was $361,244, also set at Caesars Atlantic City.

The largest bad beat jackpot of all time is $1.2 million, recorded online on Carbon Poker in February 2009.

Visit PokerListings.com

Poker News in Brief: Jan. 11-17, 2010

2010-01-17 09:00:00

But there was plenty of poker news that didn’t make the front page of PokerListings.com, and as part of our ongoing Poker News in Brief feature, we’ve compiled a list below.

This week we’ll take a look at Gavin Smith crushing Canadian tournaments, the HPT going to Vegas, a dominant online player quitting poker and more:

Two Final Tables for Smith at Fallsview

Canadian Gavin Smith was dominant at the 2010 Fallsview Poker Classic in Niagara Falls this week.

Fresh off a plane from the Bahamas, Smith outlasted 275 players to win $188,743 in the $2,500 event and then three days later finished fourth in the $5,000 main event.

Smith has historically done very well at tournaments in Canada. In 2008, he finished second at the Fallsview-hosted WPT North American Poker Championship for $542,129. He also made the final table of the 2008 Canadian Open Poker Championship in Calgary the same year.

Heartland Poker Tour Heads to Vegas

The Heartland Poker Tour kicked off its sixth season at Red Rock Resort and Casino in Las Vegas this week.

It was just the second time the lower buy-in poker tour has made a stop in Las Vegas, as it usually sticks to venues in Midwest. In the past, the tour has hosted tournaments in Indiana, Colorado, Minnesota, New York, Michigan and Iowa.

The $1,100 buy-in event drew poker pros Dennis Phillips, Layne Flack, John Vorhaus and Tiffany Michelle.

The final table of the tournament is scheduled to play out later today.

Jonas "Nebuchad" Danielsson Quits Poker

Online grinder Jonas “Nebuchad” Danielsson, perhaps most well-known for making a verbal slip at the 2008 Scandinavian Poker Awards, has apparently decided to leave poker for the time being.

Danielsson made the announcement on his blog where he wrote that his passion for poker was gone and he was looking forward to experiencing new things. He did not mention how long his self-imposed retirement would last.

The young Swedish pro started playing poker full time in 2005 and in roughly five years of playing made over $3 million in profit.

Danielsson won Online Player of the Year at the Scandinavian Poker Awards in 2008, but was better remembered for accidentally referring to King Nebuchadnezzar as the first king to “deal with the Jewish problem” when explaining the origin of his screen name to host Daniel Negreanu.

English is not Danielson’s first language and he explained afterwards he was deeply sorry about the miscommunication.

Tennis Star John Isner Plays Poker

Apparently Boris Becker isn’t the only tennis celebrity that enjoys playing a little poker.

The New Zealand Herald reported this week that American John Isner can often be found at the poker table when he’s not playing tennis.

The 6’9 giant was making headlines all week in Auckland at the Heineken Open and even pulled off an upset against top seeded Spanish player Tommy Robredo.

Isner joins the aforementioned Becker as well as former tennis world #1 Yvegeny Kafelnikov as tennis players who are also poker enthusiasts.

Borgata Announces 2010 Winter Poker Open

The Borgata in Atlantic City released a schedule for its fifth annual Borgata Winter Poker Open this week.

The tournament series will take place Jan. 20-Feb. 5 with 16 events in a wide range of poker variants including No-Limit Hold’em, Pot-Limit Omaha, Seven-Card Stud and more.

The $3,500 buy-in main event is scheduled for Jan. 31-Feb. 5 and it will offer a guaranteed prize pool of $2 million.

The Borgata Winter Open used to be a part of the World Poker Tour and in the past crowned champions like Michael Mizrachi, Gavin Griffin and John Hennigan.

Visit the Borgata website for the complete schedule.

Visit PokerListings.com

Weekly Freerolls: $30k Coming Your Way

2010-01-16 06:00:00

The following freerolls are open to all PokerListings.com players. Qualify in the specified qualification period, then take your seat to win a fistful of free cash.

If you're not a PL.com registered player on any of the following sites, click on the site's name in the list to sign up. Getting your free seat in the tournament can be just as simple as that.

Bwin Poker

Earn 50 points and take your seat in bwin’s $2,000 monthly freeroll.

Date: Jan. 17
Value: $2,000
Qualify with: 50 points

Pacific Poker

For new depositing players only. Exclusive $500 freeroll to any new PokerListings players who deposit and play at Pacific Poker.

Date: Jan. 19
Value: $500
Qualify with: Deposit and play

Full Tilt

Full Tilt offers weekly freerolls to all PokerListings players. Qualify with 100 points earned the week before the event to grab your seat.

Date: Jan. 23
Value: $1,500
Qualify with: 100 points
Qualify between: Jan. 17-22

Betfair Poker

Alright, so it’s not a freeroll, but it’s a guaranteed $3,000 prize pool for $1. Chances are there will be a huge overlay, so don’t miss out on this one.

Date: Jan. 24
Value: $1,500
Qualify with: $1

PokerStars

The next massive freeroll from PokerStars comes as a $25k event awarding $24k worth of “turbo takedown tickets” plus $1k cash for the final table. Collect 100 points in December as a PokerListings player to earn your seat.

Date: Feb. 21
Value: $25,000
Qualify with: 100 points
Qualify between: Jan. 1-31

Visit PokerListings.com

Tom Dwan, Gus Hansen on Top

2010-01-15 15:00:00

Now, just two weeks into 2010, the two biggest losers have made their way to the top of the winner’s list.

After another session of nose-bleed stakes 7-Game on Full Tilt last night, Dwan had earned himself almost $400k in profit, enough to put him into second place for the year’s biggest winners with almost $530k.

Hansen ground his way into being the second most profitable player of the night, earning over $383k for his efforts. This profit puts Hansen in first place overall for the year with $726k.

Richard Ashby came out of the session as the largest loser, down over $457k in his 2,315 hand session.

Despite playing more hands than any other player to make the lists, Cole South became the night’s second largest loser with over $264k in losses.

Fortunately for both Ashby and South, profits made earlier in the year help keep these players from getting too far sunk into the red.

One player who has struggled out of the gate has been Chau “La Key U” Giang.

Giang, known for his regular appearances in Bobby’s room, has been somewhat of a consistent loser since the beginning of the year. Adding the $136k he lost last night, Giang tops the biggest losers list with over $590k worth of losses on the year.

With the PCA through, and the weekend just getting under way, the high-stakes action is set to erupt on Full Tilt. Keep yourself posted to MarketPulse to stay on top of all the action.

Visit PokerListings.com

Titan Poker Launches World Challenge

2010-01-15 13:00:00

Starting this month players on Titan Poker will compete in a series of country-specific and regional online poker tournament leagues in an effort to represent their country and challenge the world.

Players will be ranked based on their results over an 18-week span and the top poker players in each league will advance to a final round of eight scheduled tournaments.

The culmination of the promotion will see five players selected to represent Titan Poker in Vegas with $13,000 packages to the 2010 WSOP Main Event, which cover travel and accommodations.

Titan Poker is gearing the competition to both novices and poker regulars alike as each have a chance to scoop a coveted WSOP seat.

To learn more about the promotion or check the latest results on the World Challenge leaderboard go to Titan Poker’s website.

Visit PokerListings.com

Begleiter Hosts Poker Benefit for Troops

2010-01-15 10:00:00

The Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund Charity Poker Tournament will take place at the Intrepid Sea, Air, & Space Museum in New York on Jan. 27.

“I feel very strongly about supporting the brave men and women who sacrifice for our nation,” said Begleiter. “This is a heartfelt cause that truly affects all of us as Americans.”

Drawing on his connections in the poker world Begleiter will have several high-profile poker players on hand including Dennis Phillips, Kevin Schaffel, Eric Buchman and Victor Ramdin.

The winner of the charity event will receive a $10,000 seat into the 2010 WSOP Main Event.

The buy-in is $750 although those looking to support the cause can pay $250 for spectator entry and take part in the cocktail reception, dinner and entertainment.

All proceeds will go towards the construction of the National Intrepid Center of Excellence, a state-of-the-art facility for treating wounded soldiers suffering from traumatic brain injury.

The Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund assists both service men and women who have been injured in the line of duty and dependents of U.S. military members that lost their lives in Iraq or Afghanistan.

To learn more or register for the charity event go the Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund’s website.

Visit PokerListings.com

Reynolds Wraps Up PCA High Roller Win

2010-01-14 18:30:00

A poker player since he was just 16-years-old, William Reynolds is no stranger to success, having come fourth at EPT San Remo last season for €377,000.

He’s also had six figure wins online, but the $576,240 first-place prize he took down in the Bahamas Thursday marks his biggest score to date.

“It was the most roller coaster of a ride I’ve ever been on,” Reynolds said moments after the win. “I was all in so many times at the end of Day 3 it looked I was going to be the final table bubble. I ended up doubling up four times in a row and making it to the final table, chipping up, winning some key hands and taking it down.”

In just the first few hands of the final table, short-stacked Dmitry Stelmak pushed all in with K♠ T♠ and got looked up by Tobias Reinkemeier on A♠ T♣.

The domination held and Stelmak bowed out eighth collecting $66,885.

Reynolds then sent Canadian high-stakes pro Matt Marafioti to the rail, winning a race with ace-king over Marafioti’s sevens. Marafioti took $87,465 for seventh.

Will Molson then took a massive chip lead doubling through Reinkemeier as the blinds rose to dangerous levels for the five other finalists remaining.

Reinkemeier fell next, running eights into Reynolds’ kings to finish sixth, cashing for $108,045.

Before long, 2009 World Series of Poker Ladies Champion Lisa Hamilton’s said goodbye, bowing out fifth when she lost a race with jacks to Molson’s A♣ Q♥.

A queen on the turn did her in and the ladies champ was forced to settle for $133,770 in fifth place money.

A short-stacked Michiel Brummelhuis then shipped it with Q♠ 9♥ only to run into Reynolds’ aces and hit the rail fourth for $154,350.

EPT London High Roller fourth place finisher Adolfo Vaeza took third this time around when he got it in with a straight draw against Reynold’s top pair and failed to get there.

As he headed to the cage to grab $218,150, Molson and Reynolds went heads up.

Reynolds held the lead from the outset, and despite doubling up Molson once to give away the chip lead, kept up the pressure until the title was his.

Molson, who finished second in this very event last year to Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier, was forced to take runner-up money again, this time cashing for $322,075 as Reynolds grabbed all title and the glory.

Typical of a $25k event, the PCA High Roller saw 84 of poker’s best square off for the title this week and Reynolds said it was no cake walk.

“It was a tough tournament and it feels awesome to take it down,” he said. “I can’t count the amount of times I was all in. I was short stacked and it looked like I was going to be back in my hotel room and down on the beach the next day and instead I chipped back up won some pots and went all the way to the top.”

For a comprehensive recap of the entire PCA High Roller event, click through to PokerListings’ Live Updates.

Visit PokerListings.com

Kara Scott Joins PartyPoker

2010-01-14 15:00:00

The Canadian will join Mike Sexton, Remy Biechel, Ian Frazer, Felipe “Mojave” Ramos, Stewart Scott and Bodo Sbrzesny as a full-fledged member of Team Party.

“I’ve had such a positive experience in poker and have been incredibly lucky as well,” she said. “Being asked to be a part of Team Party is a real rush and I’m so honored. I just hope I can do them proud.”

Although she was born in Alberta, Canada, Scott rose to fame in England where she became one of the main hosts of the award-winning show Poker Night Live.

She went on to host the popular PokerStars European Poker Tour and most recently provided the commentary on the latest season of High Stakes Poker on GSN, which is set to air later this year.

While she will play tournaments patched by PartyPoker, Scott will continue her television work as well.

“They understand that while I absolutely love playing poker and am really stoked about playing more big live events and working on improving my game, my actual job is TV presenting,” she explained. “It was really gratifying that they feel I’ll bring value to their team as both a player and a TV presenter.”

Ironically, it was a PartyPoker event that gave Scott one of her first big breaks when it came to actually playing the game.

“When I started playing poker a few years ago I was lucky to get asked to be on a couple of Party Poker’s UK TV tournaments and had my first big cash, and win, with their Sports Stars Challenge III,” she said. “It seemed like a natural progression for me to get involved with them now, particularly as I’ll be spending a lot of time in Canada.”

After winning the Sports Star Challenge III, Scott went on to make deep runs at the WSOP Main Event in back to back years. She finished 104^th for $41,816 in 2008 and 238^th for $32,963 in 2009.

In 2009, she also had her biggest score ever at the Irish Open where she outlasted 798 players before eventually falling to Christer Johansson heads-up. She earned €312,600 for second place.

In her relatively short span of playing high buy-in events, Scott has won $557,902, which places her 24^th on the all-time women’s tournament money list.

“Kara is a great signing and we are really looking forward to working with her,” said a PartyPoker spokesman.

“She has historic links with PartyPoker.com after taking down the Sports Stars Challenge III and we have been super impressed by her progress since then. As well as being a great presenter, Kara is also a fantastic player with great results and the potential to go even further. We are excited about this new relationship.”

As part of the deal, Scott will play tournaments around the world and act as a presenter for the Premier League when it moves to Vegas for the first time in February. She will also represent PartyPoker at a number of Canadian Poker Tour events.

Visit PokerListings.com

Antonius, Dwan, Ivey and Hastings Crush 7-Game

2010-01-14 12:00:00

With players including Tom “durrrr” Dwan sticking around for over 2,500 hands, and several others winning and losing over half a million, last night’s 7-Game action began to resemble the regular nose-bleed action seen in late 2009.

Taking top honors after over 2,200 hands, Patrik Antonius won an impressive $844k, bringing himself back to $79k in the red after a shaky start on the year.

Dwan, who went on one of the largest downswings of his career at the end of 2009, posted a $503k win, bringing himself $131k into the black this year.

While the majority of the $500k came from his 2,500 hand 7-Game session, Dwan also sat for over 1,000 hands of heads-up $100/$200 No-Limit Hold’em against URnotINdanger2.

Although his identity is currently unknown, speculation is URnotINdanger2 is the same player who frequented the high-stakes games in 2009 under the alias UrNOTindanger.

At the end of the heads-up session, Dwan made a marginal $33k from the unknown player.

In his first online session of the new-year, Phil Ivey also took a seat at 7-Game. He played just 464 hands, but managed to make over $357k profit in that time.

Also making over $350k was Brian Hastings. After his windfall session at the end of 2009, earning $4.2 million from Isildur1, Hastings continues to grind his way to the top of the earners list, currently sitting in second place with over $428k profit on the year.

Brian Townsend, who has six days remaining in his red-name suspension from Full Tilt, was the night’s biggest loser, dropping over $608k in his 1,100 hands. This loss puts Townsend at the top of the year’s losers list with almost $470k in losses.

The night’s second largest donator was the 7-Game catalyst himself, Gus Hansen. His $550k loss drops him from first to fifth on year’s top winners list, now sitting at $343k profit on the year.

Also posting a $500k loss on the night was Andrew “Browndog19” Brown. Brown, who is working towards making himself a household name for online high-stakes in 2010, currently sits as the year’s fourth biggest loser, down $364k.

With action heating up, and almost all of the game’s biggest names back on the virtual felt, we could be gearing up for an action filled weekend. Stay tuned to MarketPulse to keep abreast of all the action.

Below are the largest three heads-up pots between Dwan and URnotINdanger2.

Two-Pair's good.

I guess he's glad he called the flop.

A little bit of a setup.

Although his identity is currently unknown, it’s likely URnotINdanger2 is the same player who frequented the high-stakes games in 2009 under the alias UrNOTindanger.

Visit PokerListings.com

Poker Industry Steps Up For Haiti

2010-01-14 11:00:00

Tens of thousands of people are feared dead and up to three million affected by a massive 7.0-magnitude earthquake which struck the Caribbean island Tuesday.

Now, PokerStars is offering its players the chance to donate to humanitarian efforts there.

Players can donate by making a transfer to the "Haiti Fund" account through the Transfer Funds tool on PokerStars or by entering one of the dummy "Haiti Earthquake Relief" tournaments on the site.

Tournament amounts range from $1 to $1,000 and all donations will be matched by PokerStars and donated to the Red Cross.

As of press time, thousands have already donated.

Meanwhile, Full Tilt pro Mike McDonald says Full Tilt Poker is stepping up to do the same.

The site will immediately begin running “Aid For Haiti” tournaments through Sunday, featuring a range of buy-ins.

Plus, it is offering a number of “Aid For Haiti no-play” tournaments Sunday and setting up an “Aid For Haiti” user account to receive direct money transfers.

Like PokerStars, Full Tilt has pledged to match all donations and send the money to various charities working in Haiti.

Visit PokerListings.com

Hellmuth Added to Premier League

2010-01-14 09:30:00

“I am looking forward to playing in the Premier League and starting the new decade off on the right note,” said Hellmuth. “After being points leader in the Premier League in 2006, 2007 and 2008 I was relegated, and it is time to step up and claim a title.”

The event is set to take place in Las Vegas Feb. 12-18 with 12 players vying for piece of a $1.5 million prize pool.

Last year J.C. Tran won the coveted title and $300,000 first-place prize defeating a final table that included Tom “durrrr” Dwan, Juha Helppi, Tony G, Roland de Wolfe and 2008 WSOP Main Event champion Peter Eastgate.

This year, 11 top pros will be joined by one PartyPoker qualifier in the field.

A total of 16 qualifiers will fly out to Las Vegas to play in a Premier League Poker play-off to earn the $100,000 buy-in.

Both the play-off and the main event will be filmed for TV and one of the 16 qualifiers will be also chosen by PartyPoker to receive a $100,000 Team Party sponsorship contract.

Country specific qualifiers are still available on PartyPoker.

Visit PokerListings.com

PCA $25k As Tough As It Gets

2010-01-13 20:30:00

“It’s a really tough field, there aren’t many weak spots at all, but that’s what you are going to get from a $25k buy-in,” said Joe Cada, who followed up his 2009 World Series of Poker Main Event with an 11^th place finish at the PCA $25k Wednesday.

“In the Main Event you’ve got a lot of people wanting to play just because it’s the Main Event, the hype of it, the TV coverage and there are so many satellites. It’s the biggest tournament of the year and there are so many people just playing it to play in it.”

2009 WSOP Ladies No Limit Hold’em World Champion Lisa Hamilton, who retains a chance to win the High Roller heading into the final eight Thursday, said comparing the 1,060 person field in her WSOP Ladies Championship win to the 84 top pros in the PCA $25k is like comparing apples and oranges.

“It’s a different story,” she said. “It’s a totally different story. It’s such a different story that I can’t even comment on it, because it wouldn’t be nice.”

Consensus seems to be that a small field filled with some of the best players on the planet can be even tougher to wade through than the almost 6,500 who entered the Main Event this year, simply based on the lack of dead money.

“Here no one is just going to give you their chips,” said Cada. “So it’s a little different strategy.

“You have to adjust to your table and how everyone is playing and how they perceive how you are playing. There are a few different variables going on with better players. You can think more analytically, think about what they’re thinking, what is the best way to represent a bluff or the best way to represent a hand, whereas against a bad player, in the Main Event, you might just play more straightforward.”

Despite the quality of the field, Hamilton, who plays more high stakes cash games than tournaments, is joined in the final eight by a group of seven other players who are also less than household names.

However, German Tobias Reinkemeier, who has cashed in all five EPT’s he's played so far this season, Canadian Matt “ADZ124” Marafioti, who plays high stakes cash online and went deep at both WPT Legends and the WSOP $40k this summer, and Canadian Will Molson, who made runner up here last year, are all considered great players.

As are Uruguay’s Adolfo Vaeza, who made fourth at the EPT London High Roller, the USA’s William Reynolds, who final tabled EPT San Remo, Dutchman Michiel Brummelhuis, an online MTT regular and WCOOP title holder and Russian Dmitry Stelmak, who took down a $3k WPT prelim at Bellagio last year.

To follow all the action until a PCA High Roller champion is crowned, tune into PokerListings’ Live Updates beginning at 12 p.m. ET Thursday.

Visit PokerListings.com

Gus Hansen Leans on Patrik Antonius

2010-01-13 11:00:00

Since the start of 2010 the 7-Game tables have been running most nights, but the action has been modest.

After 12 days of January, Di “Urindanger” Dang held the top spot for the year’s most profitable player with $430k.

But it wasn’t until Gus Hansen turned his sights to Patrik Antonius last night that we saw any sort of impressive numbers being posted. By midnight Hansen had beaten Antonius out of over $500k, moving himself above Dang with almost $900k profit on the year.

This loss put Antonius well in the lead for the year’s biggest loser, with over $923k in losses already.

However, Antonius did get some back early this morning playing Andrew “Browndog19” Brown at heads-up $200/$400 PLO.

Brown’s session actually began sitting across from 2009’s fourth most profitable player, Ashton “theASHMAN103” Griffin. Griffin only stuck around for 98 hands, long enough to grind over $58k worth of profit.

After he departed, Antonius took the seat, and does what he does best. Thanks in part to winning the largest pot of the session, worth $180k, Antonius finished playing heads-up after 169 hands with over $179k of Brown’s money.

Below are the three largest pots from the heads-up session between Antonius and Brown. You can see the rest of the largest pots by clicking over to our MarketPulse section.

A sick two-outer on the turn.

My guess: flush vs. full.

They could have anything, but it smells like a bluff.

Visit PokerListings.com

Poker Channel Airing PCA Live

2010-01-13 09:30:00

The Poker Channel Europe has decided to air live coverage of the final events at the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure over the next two days.

The World Cup of Poker final will air tonight (Jan. 13) and the final of the $25k High Roller will air on Thursday Jan. 14.

Coverage of both events will start at 9 p.m. GMT and continue for up to 8 hours until the events finish.

The Poker Channel reaches over 18 million homes in 25 European countries.

“We're delighted to bring live poker back to the Poker Channel with some of the most prestigious events in the poker calendar,” Poker Channel Managing Director Chris White. “We were the first channel to show a full live poker event on TV - the British Poker Open – back in 2005. We know our European viewers want more live TV coverage so we're working with world-class production teams and sponsors to offer this on a regular basis."

Full broadcast details can be found on The Poker Channel’s website.

Comprehensive coverage of the $25k High Roller event can also be found on PokerListings' Live Updates.

Visit PokerListings.com

Rousso: Results Speak

2010-01-12 15:00:00

Especially when you consider she taught roughly one-third of the field how to play.

In the end, Rousso bested the field of 91, including 33 women from around the world who qualified for the event on PokerStars, winning the $1k buy-in and a spot in a special Ladies Boot Camp offering onsite tutoring from Rousso and the High Heels Poker Academy.

But Rousso said booking the $24,000-win in the ladies-only field was still no cake walk.

“There were a couple of pros who played,” she told PokerListings. “J.J. Lui was in there, Annette Obrestad. There was a bunch of good players.

“Obviously you have to run well in any tournament you play in. But I didn’t make any mistakes that I know of, I played well and I’m happy with the way I played. Starting the year off with a victory is really cool.”

A victory in the PCA Ladies Event is really just a bit of icing on the cake that was the past 12 months for Rousso.

The 27-year-old upped her career earnings to over $3.5 million in 2009, was featured in a two-page spread in the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition, and signed on as the newest spokeswoman for GoDaddy.com.

In addition to her runner-up finish at the NBC Heads-Up Championship, Rousso also booked her biggest career win, taking down the PokerStars European Poker Tour High Roller Event in Monte Carlo for $940,000 this past April.

Once the whipping-girl for online forum posters who believed she was more marketing tool than poker player, Rousso is now letting her results prove the doubters wrong.

“What I learned early on in poker is that results speak,” she said. “It doesn’t really matter what you say about how good you are, or how you talk about strategy. All that matters is your results at the end of the day.

“Early on in my career I just had to put my head down and plow forward making the best decisions I could and hopefully, as I believed, I had an edge over the fields that I was playing in and my results would speak for themselves.

“Now that I’m at the point in my career where I have $3.5 million in earnings, if you count my results live and online, I think my results are beginning to speak for themselves. I’ve only been playing for four and a half years, and I just hope over the next six years or so, my results will continue to speak for themselves.

“Then, after a solid performance of ten years in professional poker, you can establish yourself.”

And as far as her detractors are concerned, Rousso says she isn’t even paying attention these days.

“It doesn’t really matter what anybody says,” she said. “It matters what people in your circle, people you care about, what they think about you. And of course, what matters at the end of the day is your actions, what you do with the gifts you are given as a person. It’s not just about getting good results at the poker table. It’s also about what you do with your success.

“Once you achieve monetary success it’s about what do you do with that to be a better person. So I just try to make good decisions both on and off the poker table. I use my results on the poker table to help open doors off the poker table and hopefully help me make an impact on this world during the time that I’m here.”

Visit PokerListings.com

Everest's Live The Dream Winners Announced

2010-01-12 11:00:00

Over 50,000 players participated in the Live the Dream online qualifications from Sept. to Dec. 2009 with two hundred making the cut to take part in the final live event at the Palais Auersperg Jan 9-10.

The 200 finalists were then judged through a series of tests evaluating their live and online poker skills and brand ambassador qualities.

Points were awarded for online poker skills, live poker ability, ambassador quality and a popular vote.

The ten winners chosen include Fabien "SchumyFab" Perrot, Leonard "leoledingo" Truche and Julien "Garrincho54" Claudepierre from France, Ronny "Spadesman" Pickard and Tobias "Tobestar11" Wagner from Germany, Koen "koendb" de Bakker from The Netherlands, Javier "elflacokanu" Martinez from Spain, Sigurd "TheBigViking" Eskeland from Norway, Thomas "DannyMcCoy" Froslev from Denmark and Viktoria "SexyGirl" Szlasi from Hungary, the only female winner.

The ten Live The Dream winners will now represent Everest Poker at the biggest tournaments in the world over the next 12 months including the 2010 World Series of Poker Main Event.

Each will receive over $30,000 in travel expenses and buy-in packages totaling $100,000.

Visit PokerListings.com

Leatherass Dumps Stox to Drag The Bar

2010-01-12 09:30:00

Poker training site DragTheBar.com announced Tuesday Schmidt has joined the company as its lead instructor.

“Dusty is one of the top mid-to-high-stakes players in the world, period,” said DragTheBar.com CEO Hunter Bick. “But as good a player as he is, he’s an even better instructor. It’s unusual to find someone who can do both.”

Schmidt spent three years as lead instructor with StoxPoker, which merged with CardRunners in 2008.

He resigned the post last week citing “irreconcilable differences” with the sites.

“I couldn’t be more excited about coming to DragTheBar.com,” Schmidt said. “I was feeling as though I was getting away from my teaching roots a little bit and this allows me to do what I love and do best. The relationship just feels really, really good. They support my interests, and in turn I’m looking forward to watching this site become the finest in the world in very short order. I can’t wait to get involved with their members and watch them improve as poker players.”

Bick, who founded DragTheBar.com in June with partners Phil Nagy and Korey Gillis, said Schmidt will blog, make instructional videos and participate in member forums on the site.

“Dusty is a huge asset,” Bick said. “Just a few years ago he was playing low stakes, so he knows where those players are coming from and he can help them accelerate their learning process. Our members will benefit greatly by having such an incredible instructor at their disposal.”

Schmidt, 28, has played nearly 7 million hands online over the past five-years winning more than $3 million.

In 2007, he achieved Poker Stars’ SuperNova Elite status in just eight months playing high-stakes cash games exclusively.

Prior to his start in poker, Schmidt was a top-ranked golfer, but gave up the game and turned to poker at age 23 when he suffered a heart attack.

Visit PokerListings.com

Gimbel Crowned Youngest PCA Champ in History

2010-01-11 18:30:00

“It feels amazing,” the Jupiter, Florida resident said moments after the win. “This is what I’ve dreamed of. I’ve always wanted to win a big major tournament and luckily I accomplished it on one of my very first ones.”

There was action from the outset in Monday’s final eight with Ryan “g0lfa” D’Angelo giving up the chip lead when he lost a massive race holding jacks against Gimbel’s A♠ K♠.

Ty Reiman then leapfrogged Gimbel, sending 26-year-old Chicago, Illinois online pro Tom Koral to the rail in eighth when his aces held against Koral’s queens.

21-year-old New Yorker Zac Goldberg was the next to go when his pocket tens failed to hold against Aage Ravn’s A♠ Q♠.

But Ravn failed to capitalize on the University of Arizona student’s misfortune, busting sixth when the Norwegian online qualifier re-shipped with A♣ Q♣ facing a Ben Zamani push.

Gimbel went all in behind with jacks, and although Zamani flopped a set of eights to win the hand and triple up, Gimbel’s jacks held to scoop the side-pot and rail Ravn.

Zamani then ran A♦ J♦ into Barry Shulman’s A♠ K♥ and looked to be out fifth before a diamond on the flop, turn and river spared him.

Left as the short stack after the hand, Shulman doubled through Gimbel to stay alive and it was actually start-of-day-chip-leader D’Angelo who exited fifth.

The double WCOOP winner shoved with jacks against a Zamani raise and Reiman re-raise and after Zamani folded, Reiman made the call with A♠ K♥.

A king on the river sent the 24-year-old New Yorker out and suddenly Reiman had built a massive chip lead that looked insurmountable.

Play moved down to three-handed when Zamani put his tournament life on the line with A♥ T♦ against Gimbel’s 8♥ 8♣.

Gimbel flopped a set and although the 23-year-old Floridian online pro turned some outs, the river blanked to end his hopes.

Heads-up began when 2009 World Series of Poker Europe champ Barry Shulman took third place, running Q♣ T♠ into Gimbel’s A♥ 9♦ and failing to improve.

And although Reiman actually held an 11-million-chip lead with 45 million in play to start, it wasn’t long before Gimbel moved in front, catching cards and getting Reiman to pay him off.

Gimbel won every key pot heads-up until he had built a 4:1 chip lead and before long, Reiman shoved with eights and he made the call with tens.

Gimbel flopped a set and despite the fact Reiman turned one of his own, the river blanked to give Gimbel the title.

“I felt my opponents were really good,” said Gimbel, whose previous poker accoplishments include a PokerStars Sunday Million final table appearance and a win in the 2009 Florida State Poker Championships. “A lot of these players were really good, but I had a lot of confidence in myself coming into today and it really showed.

“I used to wrestle in high school and my coach always said 'envision something and it’ll come true.' Not that it’ll come true, but it’ll happen.”

After six long days of poker in the Caribbean, the last man standing from a record field of 1,529 is now hoping to make a few things happen with the massive $2.2 million first-place prize.

“I’m going through all the stuff I can buy right now,” Gimbel said. “A new car, maybe a nice apartment or a house.”

To read a full recap of Gimbel’s historic win and the entire 2010 PCA, click through to PokerListings’ Live Updates.

Visit PokerListings.com

UB, Absolute Revamp Leaderboard

2010-01-11 13:00:00

The new system will reward players with bankrolls of all sizes and the overall multi-table tournament leaderboard will award more Aruba Poker Classic and World Series of Poker seats than ever before.

“We’ve revamped our leaderboard system to make it more accessible for all players, so that everyone has a fairer chance to win in a big way,” explained Annie Duke, UB.com’s cardroom consultant.

“UB and Absolute Poker continue to be a top choice for the world’s best poker players and a magnet for a growing number of young, emerging poker guns.”

The 2010 overall tournament leaderboard winner will receive a prize package that includes a $10,000 WSOP seat, a $5,500 entry into the Aruba Poker Classic plus $4,500 in tournament dollars.

The top 50 players on the MTT leaderboard will be invited to participate in an exclusive tournament giving first through third place a full $8,500 Aruba Poker Classic package and fourth and fifth place a $5,500 main event entry.

CEREUS also took the time to announce that online player PISCATO77 had secured the 2009 title after 12 months of hard work.

The 51-year-old Wyoming resident received $10,000 for his efforts.

“I have cashed at a few live tourneys including the WSOP and WPT, but my proudest accomplishment to date is the 2009 UB yearly leaderboard,” he said.

“I love the camaraderie amongst the UB players, their tournament structure is the best on the web, and I’ll be back at the UB tables trying for back-to-back tournament leaderboard wins in 2010.”

Visit PokerListings.com

Caesars Hosts MBA Poker Championship

2010-01-11 11:00:00

MBA students from across the country will descend upon the Caesars poker room Jan. 15-17 for a chance to win thousands and test their poker skills and school spirit against MBAs from top schools.

"This is an important networking and recruiting event for the MBA candidates and our recruiting team," said Brad Warga, vice president of talent acquisition, Harrah's Entertainment. "MBA poker players tend to think quickly on their feet and be quite quantitatively apt -- two attributes highly coveted by businesses."

In 2009, the prize pool totaled over $65,000 with over 600 MBA students and alumni from some of the United States’ best universities taking part.

This year's MBA tournament will again donate a portion of the proceeds to the Alzheimer's Association and Cleveland Clinic. In its first four years, the event has raised $33,000 for the Alzheimer's Association.

For additional information about the tournament or to register, visit the event’s website.

Visit PokerListings.com

Estonia Moves to Legalize Online Poker

2010-01-11 09:00:00

Starting this year citizens of the small Northern European country will be able to legally play online poker on the nation-based Olympic Casino group platform, which was developed by industry giant Playtech.

“We are truly glad of this opportunity to start our partnership with Olympic as the leading casino entertainment provider in Central and Eastern Europe,” said Mor Weizer, executive manager of Playtech.

In 2011, the laws will change again, allowing international operators into the country as long as they are able to satisfy requirements set by the Estonian government.

A former economic leader, Estonia was one of the hardest hit countries by the world-wide recession in the late 2000s.

Last year retail sales plummeted and the government is hoping that regulating and taxing the online gambling industry will help stimulate the economy.

Visit PokerListings.com

Online Rounders Dominate PCA Final

2010-01-10 18:30:00

The chip leader going in will be the same man who led the final 24, Ryan “g0lfa” D’Angelo.

An online pro for the past six years, D’Angelo has two PokerStars World Championship of Online Poker titles on his resume, but his live experience also includes a third-place finish at a World Series of Poker $2k event in 2008.

Considering the more than 750 online qualifiers at the event and the wealth of online players in the field, D’Angelo said the 2010 PCA has played a lot more like an online MTT than your typical live tournament.

“In a lot of other tournaments you can’t get away with raise sizes like you would online,” he said. “Here it plays pretty much like an online tournament. A lot of three-betting and cold four-betting. I really haven’t taken part in that though. I guess I’m not as crazy as some of these younger Internet kids here who just spit fire and get in there with nothing.”

Thanks to the flopped queen he used to crack EPT Founder John Duthie’s aces and rake a ten-million-chip pot, another online pro will come into Monday’s final eight second in chips.

Morton, Illinois’ Ty Reiman has almost $1 million in online earnings and actually won the first live tournament he ever played at the Heartland Poker Tour’s Turning Stone $1k in 2007.

Like D’Angelo, he feels the PCA has played much like an online tournament so far.

“I really don’t feel like it’s that different from any other online tournament,” he said. “Maybe it’s just because that queen hasn’t really set in yet.”

Fellow U.S. online regulars Tom Koral, Harrison Gimbel, Benjamin Zamani and Zachary Goldberg join PokerStars qualifier Aage Floenes Ravn from Norway in rounding out the final eight.

But it’s 2009 WSOPE champ and CardPlayer publisher Barry Shulman who will come into the final table third in chips and on the hottest streak of his poker career.

The suddenly resurgent Shulman won a WSOP bracelet in 2001 before most of these players had even heard of poker.

Now, despite being the least experienced player when it comes to the online style, he appears to have adapted.

“Historically I play better against better players,” he explained. “(The WSOPE) was the toughest field I’ve ever played with. It was impossible to find people just dumping off chips. Here is a whole different story, because it’s such an aggressive situation.

“My own play was actually the same, but this was different because they just play so differently. There is so much action versus what I saw in London.”

The action could slow down when the final table begins, however, as the online players adapt a strategy similar to playing Sit & Go’s.

“I tend to play final tables like a Sit & Go,” said D’Angelo. “I just like to see what everyone is doing, try and feel everybody out and play a solid game. Once the blinds get higher that’s when we start moving chips.”

“The table is really good,” added Reiman. “There are a lot of online players who I’ve played with. I’m just going to try and play my game, not get into too many big pots and let the smaller stacks dwindle out. Then, once we’re four-handed or five handed, we go to battle.”

To follow all the action and see who takes down the 2010 PCA and its $2.2 million first-place prize, tune in to PokerListings’ Live Updates beginning at 12 p.m ET Monday.

Visit PokerListings.com

Poker Draws A-Listers to PCA

2010-01-10 12:30:00

The game of poker did.

“I’m not going to quit my day job, but I really love poker and I think I’m getting better at it,” said guitar legend Slash, who joined a host of big name celebrities, sports stars and Team PokerStars Pros playing in the amfAR and PokerStars charity event at the PCA this week.

“It’s just such an amazing game. So many different things can happen. With all the different people involved and all the different possibilities with the cards, it’s just a fantastic game.”

R&B star Kelly Rowland just picked up poker, but spent the entire day before her performance at an exclusive PokerStars party held at Atlantis Saturday night playing the game.

“I’m getting more and more used to it,” she said. “And I’ll tell you one thing, after playing last night, I definitely want to have a girls’ night when I get back home.

“I’m going to watch these pros like hawks so I can go back to Houston and take my friends' money.”

Model and actress Joanna Krupa appeared on the PokerStars Million Dollar Challenge this season and was named the TV hostess for the new PokerStars North American Poker Tour this week.

She also anted up for AIDS research and is apparently really taking to the game.

“It’s so funny because it’s so unexpected, you never know what’s going to happen,” she said. “You might have the most amazing cards and still lose the hand or you might have crappy cards and still win. It’s definitely interesting, challenging and fun.

“I’m waiting for the time I’m actually going to play in a tournament with Joe (Cada) and Daniel (Negreanu). It’ll be fun and maybe I’ll learn their tricks of the trade and become a pro one day.”

'I’m going to watch these pros like hawks so I can go back to Houston and take my friends' money.'

2008 Playboy Playmate of the Year Jayde Nicole played in the main event at the PCA, sharing the felt with 2009 WSOP Main Event champ Joe Cada on Day 1.

She said she started playing about four months ago and found the competition in the Bahamas a little daunting.

“It was very nerve racking at the beginning,” she said. “But I love poker. It’s fun, especially for me because there aren’t a lot of girls in poker and there aren’t a lot of Playboy models in poker, so I get a funny reaction from people. The truth is I really like meeting all the boys.”

Both Nicole and Krupa said the poker pros they’ve met this week have been quick to offer a few tips, but Slash’s experience has been quite different.

“They don’t talk to me,” he laughed. “But it’s OK. We have a couple of home games that are mostly rock people and I’ve cleaned up there a couple of times already.”

However, the men aren’t being ignored completely as Carlos Bernard, from TV’s 24, said he was lucky enough to have the opportunity to pick a few PokerStars pros brains this week.

“I’m not hustling anybody right now,” he said. “So it’s been good to play with the pros and learn a few tricks.”

<div class="image-container image-portrait-size-medium image-position"><a class="lightbox" href="/assets/photos/IMG6201.JPG"><img width="180" height="320" class="image-position image-portrait-size-medium" src="/assets/photos/_resampled/CroppedImage180320-IMG6201.JPG" alt="Kelly Rowland" /></a><div class="image-osd image-osd-compact"><div class="image-osd-content">'I’m going to watch these pros like hawks so I can go back to Houston and take my friend’s money.'</div><div class="image-osd-background"> </div></div></div>

Visit PokerListings.com

Poker News in Brief: Jan. 4-10, 2010

2010-01-10 10:00:00

The 2010 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure drew a record 1,529 players to generate a $14.8 million prize pool – the seventh biggest in poker history.

Plus, there was some poker news that happened outside of the Bahamas and we’re breaking it down for you below in our ongoing Poker News in Brief feature.

This week we’ll look at a new poker film coming to DVD, Pennsylvania legalizing live poker and table games, Belgium moving to nationalize online poker and Bodog making a big brag.

Legal Poker for Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania legalized poker, blackjack and other table games at Casinos this week in an attempt to generate extra revenue for the State.

Previously, casinos in Pennsylvania had been restricted to slot machines only.

It will be six months before games start being dealt in Pennsylvania, but the State stands to make millions in licensing fees.

Several neighboring states are taking notice and Indiana is considering allowing riverboat gambling in Lake Michigan and the Ohio River. Back in November, Ohio voters passed a law that will see four casinos constructed in four cities.

The Pennsylvania law change could have a potentially negative effect on neighboring Atlantic City if Pennsylvania residents opt to gamble closer to home.

Poker Film “Shark City” to See DVD Release

Indie poker flick Shark City is scheduled to be released on DVD on Feb. 16 though Morningstar Entertainment and Stardust Pictures.

The film stars Vivica A. Fox, Carlo Rota, Jefferson Brown and David J. Phillips and it centers around around the story of two friends who get mixed up with the daughter of a gangster. The two attempt to con a group of gangsters through a poker game and the plan goes awry.

High stakes poker, both live and online, is central to the theme of the film.

Shark City won the John Muir award at the Yosemite Film Festival.

To learn more go to the film’s website.

Belgium Attempts to “Nationalize” Online Poker

Belgium appears to be the latest country that is trying to restrict its citizens to only playing on local online poker rooms.

A recent story in Belgian newspaper Da Standaard claims the government has plans to demand Internet Service Providers block any foreign online poker sites.

This could potentially have huge ramifications for sites like PokerStars, Full Tilt or PartyPoker as they would have to set up regional offices in the country to continue operations.

The changes are scheduled to become law before the end of the year.

Meanwhile, the European Commission is reportedly not pleased with Belgium’s decision claiming it goes against the free trade agreement made by members of the European Union.

Despite the European Commission’s objections, Italy currently restricts its online poker market to rooms that have a presence in the country.

Study Shows Bodog Best Brand

Bodog may not have the most players, but according to a recent independent study it carries the strongest brand recognition.

The report was conducted by gaming consultant Josh Apiafi using Google to understand the brand strength of the top 10 online poker websites including PokerStars, William Hill, 888.com, Bet365, Betfair, bwin, Ladbrokes, Paddy Power, PartyPoker and Bodog.

“We had a hunch since I first rolled out the Bodog brand and business model that we are considered interesting,” said Bodog founder Calvin Ayre. “But that’s only part of the story – we also stand for having fun and that’s what all people want, especially ones that like to gamble."

The survey was conducted by looking at the number of Google alerts generated daily during December. Apiafi recorded every time a document was published that contained a mention of the brands listed above.

In the end, Bodog narrowly edged PokerStars by a score of 510 to 493.

Huge Growth for HeadsUp Entertainment

HeadsUp Entertainment, a poker media company out of Canada, posted its most recent quarterly statement this week and the company showed massive expansion in 2009.

The company sanctioned 362 events under its Canadian Poker Tour (CPT) brand this year, up from the 71 since it acquired the tour in 2008. HeadsUp Entertainment is aiming to host more than 560 events in 2010.

Also in 2009, HeadsUp Entertainment helped produce the CPT Finals in the Dominican Republic and Canadian Open Poker Championships in Calgary for television. The Canadian Open Poker Championship drew big-name poker players like Gavin Smith, Jennifer Tilly and Huck Seed.

HeadsUp Entertainment also currently runs www.canadianpokertour.tv and Canadian Poker Magazine.

Visit PokerListings.com

Amir Vahedi Dies

2010-01-10 09:00:00

Born in Tehran, Iran, Vahedi was a former Iranian soldier who moved to the United States as a political refugee.

After owning several businesses in the U.S., Vahedi took on poker as a full-time profession, rising to prominence in 2003 when he won his first and only World Series of Poker bracelet and finished sixth in the Main Event.

Vahedi’s career tournament earnings totaled more than $3.3 million and he once famously tutored actor Ben Affleck when Affleck caught the poker bug.

He was named No-Limit Texas Hold'em Player of the Year in 2001 and had nine No-Limit final table appearances in 2003 alone.

However, the Sherman Oaks, California resident was perhaps most famous for constantly chomping on an unlit cigar at the poker table.

Visit PokerListings.com

2010 PCA: Island Vibe Perfect for Poker

2010-01-09 16:30:00

“I don’t know what it is,” said the 35-year-old software analyst turned poker pro from Stockton, California. “I guess I really like this place.”

After finishing runner-up to Team PokerStars Pro Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier at the 2008 PCA, Khan went deep at Atlantis again last year, making 21^st place.

This year, he managed another strong finish, busting out 37^th on Day 4 Saturday.

“The fact that I’ve been here before and gone through such a big field, I feel that it helps me,” he explained. “It helps me remain calm and patient.”

Calm and patient is the exact same vibe Floridian poker pro Robert Mizrachi said he feels while playing in the Caribbean, and the results have followed.

Mizrachi managed a fourth place finish at the 2007 PCA and in late 2009, he finished runner-up at Ultimate Bet Aruba Poker Classic.

“I guess it’s more relaxing,” he said of playing on the islands. “You’ve got nothing on your mind and it’s easy to focus on poker.”

Just 24 players remain in the hunt for the title and $2.2 million first-place prize headed into Day 5 Sunday and Mizrachi is still deep-stacked and in the hunt.

The 1,529 entrants this year have made the 2010 PCA the largest tournament ever held outside the United States.

Like Aruba, the PCA sees more people win their seats online than the average big buy-in tournament.

In fact, with a total of 756 online qualifiers, almost half of the field won their way into the 2010 PCA on the virtual felt.

A fact Mizrachi said sets up well for his game.

“They are actually very aggressive players and I just know how to pick my spots against them,” he said. “I guess I play better against more aggressive players. My style of play is very effective against 18-21-year-old Internet players. With their style of play, I just know how to beat them.

“I play sometimes more aggressive than them, and other times I just try to trap them - Mixing it up works very well.”

No matter how calm and relaxed the island vibe is, wading your way through such a massive field is no easy task, even for a man who seems to do it every year.

“It’s a huge tournament so you are dodging land mines every day,” said Khan. “I really don’t know what it is for me here. I guess it’s a matter of running good and playing good.”

Joining Mizrachi among the leaders heading into Day 5 are two-time PokerStars World Championship of Online Poker event winner Ryan D’Angelo, Team PokerStars Pro and EPT founder John Duthie and WSOPE main event champion and CardPlayer publisher Barry Shulman.

To catch all the island poker action at the 2010 PCA as the remaining 24 play down to a final table of eight Sunday, tune in to PokerListings’ Live Updates.

Visit PokerListings.com

Weekly Freerolls: PokerStars $30k Today

2010-01-09 10:30:00

Check the list below for upcoming freeroll events, or head to the main Freerolls page for full details on all freerolls coming to your favorite poker room.

The following freerolls are open to all PokerListings.com players. Qualify in the specified qualification period, then take your seat to win a fistful of free cash.

If you're not a PokerListings registered player on any of the following sites, click on the site's name in the list to sign up. Getting your free seat in the tournament can be just as simple as that.

Sportsbook Poker

Sportsbook Poker is holding their next $2k freeroll for PokerListings players, just 200 points to qualify.

Date: Jan. 10
Value: $2,000
Qualify with: 200 points.

Pacific Poker

For new depositing players only. Exclusive $500 freeroll to any new PokerListings players who deposit and play at Pacific Poker.

Date: Jan. 12
Value: $500
Qualify with: Deposit and play

Full Tilt

Full Tilt offers weekly freerolls to all PokerListings players. Qualify with 100 points earned the week before the event to grab your seat.

Date: Jan. 17
Value: $1,500
Qualify with: 100 points
Qualify between: Jan. 10–16

Bwin Poker

Earn 50 points and take your seat in bwin’s $2,000 montly freeroll.

Date: Jan. 17
Value: $2,000
Qualify with: 50 points

PokerStars

Date: Feb. 21
Value: $25,000
Qualify with: 100 points
Qualify between: Jan. 1-31

Have you Qualified?

PokerStars

Another massive $30k freeroll is on the way from PokerStars. Collect 300 points in December as a PokerListings player to earn your seat.

Date: Jan. 9
Value: $30,000
Qualify with: 300 points
Qualify between: Dec. 1-31

Visit PokerListings.com

Brit Bansi Brings PCA Heat

2010-01-08 18:00:00

But James Akenhead, who made both the WSOP and WSOPE main event finals before winning the Full Tilt Poker Million last year, is a fellow member of The Hit Squad and one of Bansi's best friends.

“I think when one of us does really well, it kind of makes us all want to do well,” Bansi said of fellow Hit Squad members Akenhead, Chaz Chattha, Sunny Chattha and Karl Mahrenholz.

“You always want to do well anyway, but when one of us does, it kind of motivates you. We’re quite competitive amongst each other. We’re always trying to push each other to go to the next stage.”

Bansi burst onto the big-time poker scene back in 2006, winning a bracelet at the WSOP that summer.

He narrowly missed two more WSOP final table appearances the very next year, but the Full Tilt Pro was back at it again in 2009, finishing seventh in a $1,500 Six-Handed event before his third-place finish at the WSOPE main event brought him £360,887 – His biggest score to date.

Bansi won his way into the PCA main event through a $530 super satellite in the Bahamas this week and said he’s definitely riding a wave of confidence from all his recent success.

“I think it’s that and also just running good helps,” he said. “Really it’s a combination of things. I’m not playing every day at the moment, whereas I used to like a year ago. When you are learning the game, you play every day and all you think about is poker, but it’s not been like that for me the last year or so.

“I’ve just been doing other things and that kind of helps me play a tournament. I’m a bit more focused and a bit more hungry.”

Like Akenhead at the WSOP Main Event final, Bansi was forced to share the felt with the most feared player in poker throughout Day 3 at the PCA Friday.

But despite doubling up Phil Ivey early, he stayed aggressive throughout, stuck to his game and held onto his massive stack.

“It’s tough,” he said. “We’re both in a lot of pots. But I haven’t gone out of my way to do anything differently. Although when I’m in a pot with him it’s a different story than playing against an online qualifier. I can say that.”

Now that the field is in the money, with three days remaining in the event, Bansi said he may tone down the aggression slightly.

“The bubble has burst, so maybe people are going to start moving in a lot more now,” he said. “Maybe it’ll be a little better to play a bit more snug and not play as many pots. Although I can say things like that and when it comes to actually playing, it’ll be a bit of a different story.”

To follow Bansi’s progress and all the action from the 2010 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure, tune into PokerListings’ Live Updates.

Visit PokerListings.com

The Luckiest Man Alive

2010-01-08 13:00:00

But his reasons extend beyond the fact he beat Daniel Negreanu heads-up in the season finale of the PokerStars Million Dollar Challenge on Fox to win $1 million.

In fact, that’s just the icing on the cake.

A former Detective Sergeant with the New York Police Department, Kosowski was on the job on Sept. 11, 2001 when the World Trade Center’s twin towers came down.

These days he considers himself lucky just to be alive.

“There’s no way I should have survived that day,” he told PokerListings from Nassau, Bahamas this week where he came to play in the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure. “You are talking about one lucky guy. That’s the way I look at it. I’m blessed.”

The sheer force created when the South Tower came down knocked Kosowski ten feet in the air. He went missing for the next three hours.

But despite suffering numerous injuries, he picked himself up off the ground and continued to work at Ground Zero for the next three weeks.

“We knew it was going to be a bad day, a lot of identification of bodies and that kind of stuff,” he said. “But we never thought the buildings would come down.”

Suffering from Induced Asthma and various other injuries, he was forced to give up his job with the NYPD in 2004.

By 2005, online poker had become his favorite pastime.

Kosowski sat with his wife one evening watching a World Series of Poker broadcast featuring Negreanu. When he explained his desire to play against the best of the best at the WSOP, she implored him to take the game more seriously, read more books and play live more often.

She also bought him tickets to see Tony Bennett perform in Atlantic City as an anniversary gift.

On that trip, he managed to chop his first real live tournament and within days of returning home, Kosowski had a prophetic dream.

“I had a dream that I played Daniel face to face and I beat him,” he said. “I woke up and I told my wife right there I’m going to play him face to face and I’m going to beat him.

“My wife was going to take me to a psychiatrist. She thought I was losing it.”

Kosowski started playing exclusively on PokerStars in 2006 and last year, when freerolls began running for a spot in the PokerStars Million Dollar Challenge, he jumped at the chance to make his dream come true.

He won an opportunity to audition for the show and was eventually flown out to Los Angeles as an alternate.

In yet another stroke of luck, he got on the set, managed to win the elimination match and before he knew it, he was playing Negreanu heads-up with $1 million on the line.

“I just put my mind to it, got some good cards and I rolled over everybody at the table,” he explained. “Then when it came to Daniel, I just out-powered him in the final match. I got lucky and I beat him.”

With a million dollar bankroll now at his disposal, Kosowski says he has a new dream.

“My dream is to play in the World Series of Poker and I think I’m going to do that this year,” he said.

Lucky to have survived one of the greatest tragedies in American history only to go on and win $1 million on what is now the highest rated poker TV show of all time, the odds on a deep finish this summer have to be through the roof.

But Kosowski doesn’t seem to mind.

“I’m a lucky guy,” he said with a smile. “I really feel blessed.”

Visit PokerListings.com

WSOPE To Air On ESPN2

2010-01-08 09:30:00

Cable network ESPN2 will unveil its coverage with back-to-back one-hour episodes beginning at 11 p.m. ET Jan. 31 featuring action from the inaugural Caesars Cup.

Filmed live at the Casino at the Empire in London, England, the Caesars Cup features some of the biggest names in the game including Daniel Negreanu, Doyle Brunson, Phil Ivey, Phil Hellmuth, Gus Hansen, Annette Obrestad, Peter Eastgate and Patrik Antonius, playing in a unique Team Europe vs. Team Americas format.

WSOPE Main Event action begins airing Feb. 7 at 10 p.m. ET with poker’s elite battling it out for the bracelet and $1.3 million first-place prize.

Lon McEachern and Norman Chad will reprise their familiar roles as hosts for the show and will be joined on each WSOP Europe telecast by sideline reporter Kara Scott.

New WSOPE episodes will air on ESPN2 through the end of Februrary.

Visit PokerListings.com

L.A. Kings Host Poker Tournament

2010-01-08 09:00:00

Taking place at Nokia Plaza the L.A. Kings Alumni 2010 Tournament will feature former Kings Marty McSorley, Ian Turnbull, Daryl Evans, Glen Murray, Brad Norton, Pete Demers and all-time leading scorer Luc Robitaille.

The tournament kicks off at 4 p.m. and anyone can buy in for $200 and rub shoulders with some of the NHL’s greatest players.

When you buy in you also receive two premier level tickets to Kings vs. St. Louis Blues on Jan. 9, a $25 Food Voucher for ESPN Zone and $50 free play from San Manuel Indian Bingo and Casino, which is sponsoring the tournament.

Meanwhile, the top prizes in the tournament include two tickets to a Kings game, dinner for two in the San Manuel Club, VIP passes for the game, post-game meet and greet with the team and a team autographed jersey.

It’s not the first time a poker tournament has been held featuring NHL players.

This summer the World Series of Poker hosted the NHL Charity Shootout which included a number of current NHL superstars including Alexander Ovechkin, Roberto Loungo, Mike Richards and Scotty Hartnell.

Visit PokerListings.com

Big Field Poker at the PCA

2010-01-07 17:00:00

But according to at least one player who has weaved his way through some big numbers before, big-field poker requires big strategy changes.

“There’s a different approach because it’s a longer tournament,” said Jeff Madsen, who managed to best a similar-sized field of 1,579 to win his first of two World Series of Poker bracelets in 2006.

“The style of just trying to double early and get chips really fast isn’t as effective. You may have chips early, but you still have to get through a few more days. You have to be more patient. You want to survive and get much deeper before you start playing huge pots and taking big risks. Otherwise you are never going to see a Day 3.”

Kevin Saul, who managed an eighth-place finish at the 2009 PCA, says you might be aware of it but you simply can’t think about the massive field size when you sit down at any tournament table.

“You only sit with eight people at a time, so for me, it’s just normal poker until the field dwindles,” he said. “I just care about my chip stack and what everyone has at my table. I don’t really worry about what’s going on in the tournament as a whole.”

The PCA presents a different picture from the average big-field event, considering roughly half of the 1,500-plus players have qualified online. Saul says he certainly adjusts his strategy to account for that.

“You can follow the real satellite qualifiers,” he explained. “I mean, I won a satellite, but I would have bought in anyway. Then you have the other people who wouldn’t have bought in. They probably satellited into a satellite and took a few steps to get there and you spot them and try to apply pressure to them.”

Madsen says he does the same thing.

“These guys are good, but a lot of them don’t have much live-tournament experience and they’re used to playing a lot of hands and playing really fast,” he said. “In that respect I’ll probably play a little tighter. They may be looking to push me around or play bigger pots, because online players tend to do that, so I’ll usually just play a little tighter and wait for things to come to me more.

“Especially because I don’t know these players and I don’t really know their style, I’ll take a little time to get to know the players at my table first.”

In the end, Madsen says even the biggest fields get pared down to size and you simply have to play your game and stick to your reads.

“You really can’t look at the whole tournament from the beginning or else it’s overwhelming,” the Full Tilt pro said. “You have to take it one hand at a time. No matter how big the field is, in a couple of days, it’s still going to get down to the money. So yeah, you take it one hand at a time and try not to think about how many people are in the tournament right from the start.”

To see how Madsen and Saul fare against the massive field this time around, and follow all the action from the 2010 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure, tune in to PokerListings’ Live Updates.

Visit PokerListings.com

PCA Payouts Flattened

2010-01-07 16:00:00

When Canadian Poorya Nazari beat a field of 1,347 to take first at the 2009 PCA, he walked away $3 million. This year, the player who manages to best a field of 1,529 will take just $2.2 million.

The difference is that while 199 made the money in 2009, a total of 224 will this year.

And while the first payout level was just $2,500 above the $10,000 buy-in last year, it is $5k above it now.

“More players are getting paid and the players are getting paid better,” said PokerStars live poker specialist, player liaison and event host Neil Johnson. “It’s a much more significant return on your investment and it’s better for the poker economy as a whole. We get more players paid better.”

According to Johnson, the $3 million Nazari is credited with winning can be a bit misleading.

Last year PokerStars guaranteed the $3 million first-place prize and had to adjust the rest of the prize pool to compensate.

That meant a $1.9 million gap between first and third place money and inevitably, a chop was agreed upon when play went three-handed.

“I don’t care how much money you have, you are not flipping for that,” Johnson said. “We all know they are going to chop it at the top anyway, so all of PokerStars payouts are a little flatter at the top now.”

The bottom line is that 15% of the field is now getting paid rather than the one-time standard of 10%.

And while those at the bottom of the payout structure will do better than they have in the past, the money is coming straight from the top.

A fact not all the players are happy about.

“It’s terrible, I hate it,” said Team PokerStars Pro Daniel Negreanu. “We all are going to work harder and outlast more players and get less money. It’s a terrible idea.”

WPT title holder and recent PokerStars Sunday Million winner Mark Newhouse thought he would be playing paying for a much bigger first-place prize when he flew over the Bahamas this year.

Like Negreanu, he’s disappointed.

“I think it’s stupid. We were all expecting almost $4 million and they come out with this,” he said. “It’s a bad idea. You would think that they would want it to get bigger not smaller. It’s better for poker for first prize to get bigger.”

However, Team PokerStars Pro Barry Greenstein said while the payout structure may hurt the eventual winner, it’s better for the field as a whole.

“I think the flatter payouts are a better thing,” he said. “The winner, sure he’s going to want more money, but if you think about it, what’s better for PokerStars? They’re an online gaming site and they would benefit more from putting the money back into the community.

“Also, in a tournament like this where there are so many online qualifiers for which a minimum cash would be a big deal; it’s a good thing. It creates better stories and it’s different here than say at Bellagio where everyone puts up their own $10k. In that instance steeper payouts might make more sense, but for this tournament, I think they did the right thing.”

In the end, the final four players will all make over $1 million and Johnson said he’s heard more positive opinions from the players than negative.

As a result, he believes even the players who run really deep in the event will walk away happy.

“The final two tables are all making six figures,” he said. “I can’t imagine anybody being unhappy with that.”

To find out who will get a piece of the $14,831,300 prize pool and follow all the 2010 PCA action, tune in to PokerListings’ Live Updates.

- With Files From Ed Sevillano

Visit PokerListings.com

Brits Flock to Online Poker in Bad Weather

2010-01-07 14:30:00

London is currently experiencing some of its worst weather in years and much of the U.K. remains gripped by snow and freezing conditions.

However, Betfair Poker has reported a 20% increase in U.K. player activity on the site since the bad weather rolled in and the site is crediting the conditions for its recent popularity.

With much of the population forced to stay home from work and several sporting events cancelled, Betfair says players are flocking to the virtual felt.

Fellow U.K.-based operator William Hill Poker has also reported surging traffic over the last week.

As a result, Betfair has even gone so far as to call the bad weather the “Snow Show” and is offering a few value-added tournaments.

Players will see a $1,000 “Big Freeze” freeroll in the lobby along with a $1 buy-in $200-added “Snowball Fight" and a $5 buy-in $200-added “Ice Ice Baby” event.

The boost in traffic may not last much longer as forecasters are predicting temperatures in the U.K. will start to rise above freezing early next week.

Visit PokerListings.com

High-Stakes in 2010: A Slow Start

2010-01-07 11:00:00

After making over $8.9 million to earn the title as the year’s top earner, Patrik Antonius has been taking a break from the online high-stakes world. How long of a break he plans to take is unknown, but chances are you’ll see him back at the tables sooner rather than later.

As of this morning, Richard Ashby sits as the largest online earner of the year so far with just over $221k.

But in a virtual tie for first sits Brian Hastings with $220k. Hastings, who made an astounding $4.2 million in a single session against Isildur1 near the end of last year, could very well become one of the most prolific online players in 2010 considering the roll he's starting with.

Just like in 2009, Gus Hansen started off his year in the black, having earned almost $160k since New Year's Eve.

It won’t be surprising to see Hansen attempt to add to his profits while splashing around at the nose-bleed 7-Game tables over the next couple of months.

The two more players to have earned over $100k on the year are Di “Urindanger” Dang and geoff7878.

Topping the list as the year’s largest loser is Andrew “Browndog19” Brown with almost $300k in losses. In second place sits a relatively unknown player named bixiu, down $262k.

Other notable players to make the top 10 list for losses include Rafi “howisitfeellike” Amit (-$157k), Ilari “Ziigmund” Sahamies (-$107k), DIN_FRU; rumored to be Erik Sagstrom (-$94k), Eli Elezra (-$82k) and Cole South (-$78k).

With both Phil Ivey and Tom Dwan down in the Caribbean for the PCA, it might be a few more days before we see any real baller action online.

Below you can find three of the largest hands of the year, to see more hands from this year and last, head to MarketPulse.

The nuts are good.

A little something for everyone.

The turn only looked like a good card.

Visit PokerListings.com

$17 Million On the Line in Upcoming FTOPS XV

2010-01-07 09:00:00

Set to run Feb. 10-Feb. 21, the series will offer $17 million in guaranteed prize pools with events in a number of poker variants including No-Limit Hold’em, Pot-Limit Omaha, Omaha Hi-Lo, Razz, H.O.R.S.E., 7-Game and Seven-Card Stud.

Notable events include the two-day $2 million guaranteed No-Limit Hold’em tournament on Feb. 20 and the $2.5 million FTOPS XV main event on Feb. 21.

Full Tilt will also offer Knockout, Turbo, Rebuy, Heads-Up and Cashout events in No-Limit Hold’em.

Hosts for the events have yet to be announced.

Players who can’t afford the FTOPS buy-ins will have the opportunity to take part in MiniFTOPS XV, which takes place just one month later from March 10-March 21.

Every FTOPS event will have a MiniFTOPS equivalent at 1/10^th the buy-in. MiniFTOPS XV will offer a prize pool of $6 million.

Full Tilt started the FTOPS in 2006 with a combined prize pool of $1 million. Since then the online series has blossomed into one of the busiest in the world with hundreds of winners crowned and main events with multi-million dollar prize pools.

The last FTOPS proved to be a memorable one as David Pham, Greg “FBT” Mueller and Chris “Genius28” Lee all won titles while online player zhivago2 outlasted 5,470 players in the main event to win $418,839.

For more information or to sign up check out Full Tilt here.

Visit PokerListings.com