WSOP Event 1

The 10K PL Holdem attracted 352 entrants, so I was a little under with my guess, but I think I can claim I was in the right ballpark …just….3 figures

36 places get paid, with the top places paying as follows

1 $ 794,112  
2 $ 488,048   
3 $ 306,064  
4 $ 248,160   
5 $ 198,528  
6 $ 157,168  
7 $ 124,080  
8 $ 99,264  
9 $ 74,448

70 players remain after day 1, led by Eli Elezra

Eli Elezra   302900   
Amit Makhija   251100   
Nenad Medic   240200   
Patrik Antonius   236300   
Justin Newton   233000   
Mike Sowers   216700   
Anthony Licastro   211000   
Nikolay Evdakov   206200   
David Bach   204100   
Vivek Rajkumar   194000   
Chuck Pacheco   191600   
Tuan Le   190000   
Phil Laak   169000

The 2008 World Series of Poker is only a matter of hours away now.   It kicks of at 12pm (Vegas) on Friday 30th May with Event 1, a $10,000 buy-in World Championship of Pot Limit Holdem

 Expect the real big numbers to emerge on Saturday 31st though, as the $1500 NL Holdem event of Event 2, is bound to be a huge attraction.  I expect many players to skip Event 1 in favour of this event.   Lets make it interesting with a prediction.  How about 800 entrants for Event 1, and 3000 for Event 2.  

We’ll see you just how far off I am.  No doubt a very long way!

338 Players entered this week’s $1050 Buy-in Super Tuesday on PokerStars

After 7 hours and 14 minutes, psuNYY51 emerged as the winner

1st psuNYY51 $74,360
2nd Mattssons $51,038
3rd iamhiv $34,814
4th gv2fly $27,040
5th Mr. Tim Caum $20,280
6th Silent Ocean $15,886

Another solid display by lilholdem954, who cashed $2535 in 26th

David Singer beat whitelime (real name Emil Patel) in the final of the $25K buy-in Heads-up championship on Full Tilt.   A very impressive 64 players took part, with Singer winning $560,000

The last hand saw a shortstacked whitelime pushing his 10-3, and getting a call from Singers pocket 8’s, with the snowmen holding up.

Singer’s full list of victims on the way to victory were OMGClayAiken , Brandon Adams, Buck99, Mastrblastr, Brian Hastings and whitelime

whitelime took-out the following players on the way to his $320,000 for 2nd place: Phil Ivey, Taylor Caby, Nordberg, Ansky451, and Andy Bloch

This week’s PokerStars Sunday Million was taken down by rythman.  They did a 3-way chop while tapatapa (hmmmmm tapas) was leading.  rythman stepped it up a gear to come back from behind and take it down.

There were 6745 entrants, leading to a total prizepool of $1.35 million

1. rythman (Sweden) $137,253.56
2. tapatapa (Brazil) $139,725.80
3. KtheKing (Brazil) $90,758.04
4. Hasuwisp (Canada) $56,658.00
5. EvilLondon.(Sweden) $43,302.90
6. jojo1983 (United Kingdom) $31,027.00
7. deepak1 (Denmark) $22,258.50
8. jorgeezy (United States) $13,490.00
9. browsef (United States) $8,363.80

Notable finish by DuckU in 36th

Lets not forget the poor non-holdem guys, and give them a mention for once.  PokerStars do a very good weekly horse tournament at $215 buy-in.  It normally attracts a ballpark between 150-200 entrants.

This week there were 156 entrants, and AceQuad from St.Cloud bagged the win.  Is St.Cloud a real place.  I dont know.  But it sure sounds idyllic.  Either way, the gods were sure behind the man from St.Cloud today.

1. AceQuad (United States) $8,424.00
2. n1ce_paper (United Kingdom) $5,584.80
3. IWillGeThere (United States) $3,806.40
4. hellhound (United States) $2,714.40
5. GoldStrike (Costa Rica) $2,090.40
6. GATAHBLOOD (United States) $1,622.40
7. thorladen (United States) $1,279.20
8. highland (United States) $936.00

The $5K buy-in winner-takes-all freezeout on PokerStars attracted just 13 entrants this week.  After just 3 hours and 39 mins of play Isaac Baron (aka westmenloAA) took it down

1st westmenloAA $65,000
2nd Tulkaz
3rd MrSmokey1
4th takechip

westmenloAA is a widely respected player, and I think can fully be expected to go deep in some events in the upcoming WSOP in Las Vegas

Full Tilt are shadowing the whole WSOP with their own Mini Series of Poker (MSOP)

From May 30th until July 5th, the MSOP will let you play the same day’s tournaments that will be running at the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas, with a buy-in anywhere from $10 to $500.  That is basically 1/100th of the normal cost for each event.  Eg the WSOP 50K is the MSOP $500 buy-in, and a normal $1500 WSOP event, is $15 MSOP Event.

Each event winner, as well as obviously a chunk of cash, will also gets a limited edition Full Tilt Poker Champion’s Watch.

There is also a MSOP Leaderboard (best overall performance in the MSOP) with a prize of a $10K seat at the 2009 Main Event in Las Vegas.

Mini Series Of Poker Schedule
Event Date Time (ET) Game Guarantee
1 May 30th 15:20 $100 + $9 PL Hold’em $20,000
2 May 31th 15:20 $15 + $1.50 NL Hold ‘em $15,000
3 June 2nd 15:20 $15 + $1.50 PL Hold’em $4,000
4 June 2nd 20:20 $50 + $5 Mixed Hold’em $10,000
5 June 3rd 15:20 $10 + $1 NL Hold ‘em Rebuy $8,000
6 June 3rd 20:20 $15 + $1.50 Omaha Hi/Lo $3,000
7 June 4th 15:20 $20 + $2 NL Hold ‘em $10,000
8 June 4th 20:20 $100 + $9 Mixed Hold’em $20,000
9 June 5th 15:20 $15 + $1.50 NL Hold ‘em 6max $7,500
10 June 5th 20:20 $25 + $2.50 OE $2,500
11 June 6th 15:30 $50 + $5 NL Hold ‘em Shootout $25,000
12 June 6th 20:20 $15 + $1.50 Limit Hold ‘em $3,000
13 June 7th 15:20 $25 + $2.50 NL Hold ‘em $10,000
14 June 7th 20:20 $100 + $9 Stud $10,000
15 June 8th 15:20 $10 + $1 NL Hold ‘em $5,000
16 June 8th 20:20 $20 + $2 Omaha Hi/Lo $4,000
17 June 9th 15:20 $15 + $1.50 NL Hold ‘em Shootout $7,500
18 June 9th 20:20 $50 + $5 Razz $5,000
19 June 10th 15:20 $15 + $1.50 PL Omaha $3,000
20 June 10th 20:20 $20 + $2 Limit Hold ‘em $4,000
21 June 11th 15:30 $50 + $5 NL Hold ‘em $25,000
22 June 11th 20:20 $30 + $3 HORSE $5,000
23 June 12th 15:20 $20 + $2 NL Hold ‘em $7,500
24 June 12th 20:20 $25 + $2.50 HA $3,000
25 June 13th 15:20 $100 + $9 NL Hold ‘em Heads-Up $10,000
26 June 13th 20:20 $15 + $1.50 Razz $2,000
27 June 14th 15:20 $15 + $1.50 NL Hold ‘em $7,500
28 June 14th 20:20 $50 + $5 PL Omaha Rebuy $15,000
29 June 15th 15:20 $30 + $3 NL Hold ‘em $15,000
30 June 15th 20:20 $100 + $9 Limit Hold ‘em $15,000
31 June 16th 15:20 $25 + $2.50 NL Hold ‘em 6max $10,000
32 June 17th 15:20 $15 + $1.50 NL Hold ‘em $6,000
33 June 17th 20:20 $50 + $5 Stud Hi/Lo $5,000
34 June 18th 15:20 $15 + $1.50 PL Omaha Rebuy $5,000
35 June 18th 20:20 $15 + $1.50 Stud $2,000
36 June 19th 15:20 $15 + $1.50 NL Hold ‘em $7,500
37 June 19th 20:20 $100 + $9 Omaha Hi/Lo $15,000
38 June 20th 15:20 $20 + $2 PL Hold’em $5,000
39 June 21st 15:20 $15 + $1.50 NL Hold ‘em $7,500
40 June 22nd 21:30 $500 + $35 HORSE $50,000
41 June 22nd 20:20 $15 + $1.50 Mixed Hold’em $5,000
42 June 23rd 15:20 $10 + $1 NL Hold ‘em $3,000
43 June 24th 15:20 $15 + $1.50 PL Omaha/8 $3,000
44 June 25th 15:20 $10 + $1 NL Hold ‘em Rebuy $5,000
45 June 25th 20:20 $25 + $2.50 Razz $3,000
46 June 26th 15:30 $50 + $5 NL Hold ‘em 6max $25,000
47 June 26th 20:20 $15 + $1.50 Stud/8 $2,000
48 June 27th 15:20 $20 + $2 NL Hold ‘em $6,000
49 June 28th 15:20 $15 + $1.50 NL Hold ‘em $5,000
50 June 29th 15:20 $100 + $9 PL Omaha $20,000
51 June 29th 20:20 $15 + $1.50 HORSE $3,000
52 June 30th 15:20 $15 + $1.50 NL Hold ‘em $5,000
53 July 1st 15:20 $15 + $1.50 Limit Shootout $3,000
54 July 5th 18:00 $100 + $9 NL Hold ‘em $250,000

334 Players paid the $1050 buy-in this week for the Super Tuesday on PokerStars

After 7 hours 27 mins of play, LICO01 from Sao Paulo emerged as the winner

1st LICO01 $73,480
2nd mattg1983 $50,434
3rd JTD DOG $34,402
4th Apowers1967 $26,720
5th THAY3R $20,040

A nice score for online pro mattg1983 in 2nd place, taking his total winnings on PokerStars to $760,065 ($196,534 of which is profit)

After 12 days, 24 events, more than 38,000 players, and a total prize pool worth a small matter of $15,378,400, the FTOPS VIII has drawn to a close. 

The final event (the main event) was taken down by cheesemonster, who went one better than his 2nd place in FTOPS IV

A notable mention also to WCOOP bracelet holder Jason Strasser (strassa2) who final tabled, finishing in 9th

1 cheesemonster $410,780.00
2 MarMoss $249,375.00
3 SLmelonman $161,500.00
4 frostey $125,875.00
5 Dwarf $95,000.00
6 R3dL0bster $71,250.00
7 kiwid10 $54,625.00
8 awriver $41,562.50
9 strassa2 $30,875.00
10 vjm1101 $22,562.50
11 TINA3012 $22,562.50
12 Pringleman $22,562.50
13 xianggangdao $16,625.00
14 SkyBalln333 $16,625.00
15 Gator93 $16,625.00
16 TheAsianVampire $11,756.25
17 Jaysick88 $11,756.25
18 Big Dann $11,756.25

If you are getting withdrawal symptoms already, fear not FTOPS IX will be along in 3 months time.  Looking forward to that already.