Archive for October, 2007.
October 31, 2007
Another semester has nearly passed at the University of Minnesota, which would typically mean yet another cold front is on the horizon for students looking for poker action around the Twin Cities. But this year seems to go against the norm, as poker games have become abundant on and off campus, not to mention the addition of a new campus-sponsored poker club. With midterms and finals just around the corner, students at the University of Minnesota are seeing an end to an impressive semester of poker.
Though the close of the fall semester brings about an end to many semester-long campus poker events across the country, the students at the University of Minnesota have just witnessed the creation of
Mansion
Campus Poker Night, the first campus poker organization for the university. The CPN will begin hosting weekly meetings in the form of tournaments on Friday nights starting in November which will be held in the Electrical Engineering/CSI building. The tournaments are free and are open to any students wishing to participate. Each tournament will run for two hours or more with prizes being poker-related items such as poker chip sets, decks of cards, and poker books. The CPN hopes that the tournaments will focus more on learning strategy and helping students develop a better understanding for the game, rather than being a competitive, intimidating setting.
Prior to the CPN, the only school-sponsored poker action University of Minnesota students could take part in was the Gopher After Dark program, a casino night for students which focused more on the beginner’s side of things. The CPN hopes that students will find their meetings as an alternative most suited to their poker tastes. For now the majority of the Campus Poker Night meetings will be NL Hold’em tournaments, but Kristian Lovato, president of the CPN, looks forward to branching out and including some mixed events in the future, ranging from H.O.R.S.E. all the way to Deuce-to-Seven Lowball and 5-Card Draw. While these events may be a ways off, Lovato wants to see the group help students build their arsenal of poker knowledge, something mixed events will certainly accomplish.
Outside of the CPN, students throughout the Twin Cities and St. Paul campuses have many poker options available to them, some of which are new this year and already seeing great success. The Sportsman Bar and Grill holds two free tournaments on Sundays and Mondays, with the first session starting at 7pm and the second at 10pm. The tournaments are free to enter, though you must be at least 21 years old to be admitted. These tournaments mostly serve as a great time for friends to get together, drink, and play poker, but they do offer up bar tabs as prizes for the top finishers.
Students should also make sure to check out www.twincitiespoker.com for regularly scheduled events and tournaments. The site features schedules for weekly tournaments at bars located around the Twin Cities, plus forums where players can find ring games and tournaments and discuss events. The site has a massive amount of information on freerolls, so if you’re a student just trying to find a fun, cheap way to play or learn, this site has an event for you.
Students wishing to stay around the campus instead of venturing further into the city will find mostly fun, light games in dorm rooms and off-campus residences. There are regular, easy-to-find $5 tournaments across campus while some students hold ring games off campus with stacks a bit steeper. But be warned, the $5 tournaments are typically short games, where students are more interested in socializing and drinking than they are at turning a good profit, so if you’re looking to build up your bankroll, you may have to leave the comforts of home and head to Canterbury Park in Shakopee.
While the trip from campus may stretch over 30 minutes, Canterbury Park makes it well worth your while with regular cash games, NL Hold Em tournaments, and sit-’n'-gos. Canterbury Park houses a poker room with no less than 34 poker tables, spreading regular games of Hold’em, 7-Card Stud, 7-Card Stud Hi/Lo, and Omaha Hi/Lo. Stakes vary from as small as $2/4 to as big as $30/60. If you’re looking for ring-game action with great chances to increase your bankroll, look no further. Tournament buy-ins vary from as low as $50 for a NL Hold’em Shootout to as high as $200 for the Wednesday night tournaments. Texas Hold’em, Omaha, and 7-Card Stud all also feature bad-beat jackpots, with just $1 dropped from the first $15 of each pot. But possibly the best attraction of Canterbury Park for students is the age restriction for the card room. Players must be only 18 or older to play, making it a prime destination for students.
Students at the University of Minnesota have seen an explosion in poker throughout the area this year. With campus gatherings such as Campus Poker Night, as well as the local card room in Canterbury Park, students are never without a great poker game, whether on or off campus. Although the first semester of the year is almost over, these options certainly give poker-playing students something to look forward to upon returning next semester.
October 31, 2007
NEW YORK — (PRESS RELEASE) — The three month long Casting Call campaign courtesy of Bodog Fight and trendsetting lifestyle magazine Complex has come to a conclusion as brunette beauty Irina Kuteyeva slightly edged out the Season 8 winner of America’s Next Top Model, Jaslene Gonzales, with a majority of the nearly 40,000 online votes made.
To congratulate Irina on winning the Bodog Fight and Complex Magazine model search, the two companies played host to a packed house at one of NYC’s premier nightlife destinations, Tenjune nightclub. The tastemaker V.I.P. crowd was provided with hard-hitting visuals of Bodog Fight throughout the night along with the seamless mixing of internationally renowned party starters DJ Pump and DJ Kiss.
In addition to the party held in her honor, Casting Call winner Irina’s award will include being featured in a spread for an upcoming issue of Complex Magazine, complete with provocative Bodog Fight attire.
“We work with a number of publications, but Complex Magazine’s content and demographic is definitely one which speaks directly to everything the Bodog brand stands for - style, edge and exclusivity. Beyond that synergy, coming from the highly brand-focused Bodog, I definitely respect the brand development and recognition Mark Ecko has achieved across the many properties of Ecko Enterprises,” said Bodog Founder Calvin Ayre. Bodog, now the largest digital entertainment company in its space, will continue to focus on unique and innovative cross-branding opportunities with international expansion already in progress.
For more details and photos on the Bodog Fight and Complex Magazine Casting Call wrap party, visit the Bodog Fight blog and Bodog Entertainment blog, Bodog Beat.
October 31, 2007
(PRESS RELEASE) — Titan Poker, the largest poker room on the iPoker Network, will send a delegation of its best online poker players from across the globe to participate in the upcoming European Poker Tour tournament in Prague.
The European Poker Tour tournament will be staged at the Hilton Prague Hotel in the Czech Republic from the 10th to the 14th of December, 2007.
Titan Poker is staging weekly Super Satellite tournaments awarding each winning player with a $9,000 EPT Prague package. Players receive buy-in to the Main Event at the European Poker Tour tournament, flights, accommodation and spending money.
Titan Poker regularly awards its players with seats at the world’s most well-known poker tournaments. Titan Poker players have played at the World Series of Poker in Las Vegas, international tournaments of the World Poker Tour, and at various European Poker Tour events.
A delegation of fifteen Titan Poker players is currently in the poker action at the Australia Open / Poker News Cup being staged in Melbourne, Australia.
In December, Titan Poker will also be staging the European Championship of Online Poker 2007, which is set to be this year’s biggest online poker event with more than $2,500,000 in Guaranteed Prizes.
October 31, 2007
MIAMI, Florida — (PRESS RELEASE) — UltimateBet today announced the launch of the UltimateBet.com Online Championship, an online poker series featuring the biggest names and a multi-million dollar prize pool.
“Our groundbreaking UltimateBet.com Online Championship is back and this year’s battle promises to be infinitely fiercer,” stated UltimateBet spokesperson George MacLean.
The popular online poker site has upped the ante in the second annual UltimateBet.com Online Championship. The 10-day series features an unprecedented 13 events with a collective prize pool of $2,000,000 - double the amount at stake in 2006’s inaugural event.
The UltimateBet.com Online Championship, dubbed UBOC by the online poker site, kicks off on December 7th with a $100,000 Guaranteed Texas Hold’em poker tournament.
Phil Hellmuth, Annie Duke and a host of other UltimateBet pros are slated to deliver insightful commentary as they call each one of the 13 poker games sandwiched between December 7th and 16th.
The series wraps up with a $1000 50 No Limit Texas Hold’em featuring a $750,000 prize pool. UltimateBet plans to broadcast the final table of the December 16th poker event online.
What’s more, in addition to $2,000,000 in guaranteed cash, UltimateBet has added a $100,000 Leader Board competition to the mix.
Satellites for all 13 UBOC events are now open. Online poker players can qualify to play for as little as $5.50.
October 30, 2007
Over 130 online poker players have assembled in Melbourne over the past week, and played their hearts out at the PokerNews Cup. Over 15 different countries were represented among the players, who enjoyed a week of activities and poker – most of them paying zero for the entire experience.
Things got underway last Thursday with the Team PokerNews welcome party at the Crown Casino. Every group of players you passed at the party, you heard poker being discussed in a different language. The players were chomping at the bit and ready to play some poker.
Event number one kicked off with a bang, as 554 players saddled up for the very
Duplicate Poker
first PokerNews Cup event ever. Steve Charles wound up outlasting the field, coming back from having less than one big blind at the final table to take down the win.
The players were treated to a day tour of one of Australia’s oldest wineries, the De Bortoli Winery, as part of their Team PokerNews winner’s packages. Winners toured the facility, learning a fair bit about winemaking while tasting the fruits of the vineyard and talking poker into the night.
Shaking off the wine rust, the winners were up early the next morning for a cruise up the Yarra River. The boat lazily drifted up the river as the players started the prior night’s party all over again. As the boat floated back into the dock, most of the players made it an early night, with the Main Event looming the next day.
The PokerNews Cup Main Event drew 428 players, creating a $1.1M prize pool. Players fidgeted up and down the aisles as the start drew near, some of them playing in their first ever ‘big buy-in’ poker tournament. Some lucky and good poker player was going to take home a $300,000 first prize.
Of the 130 players that won packages, about 100 of them qualified completely for free. For most of them, this was the first trip they had ever won for poker and many of the players nervously took their seats as play began.
Achim Grimm, a player from Cologne, Germany, had this to say about his PokerNews Cup experience: “I came to Australia, and didn’t know what I could do at the table. I’ve only been playing poker online for about eleven months and I wanted to represent myself well. I played in the $230, the $550, and the Main Event. I feel I played really well in the events. I won the package on a freeroll at Everest Poker, so my cost for the whole trip was only my entries into the preliminary events; everything else was included. It was a great experience.”
Theirry Jamar, a player from Pua, France, who qualified for the PokerNews Cup for free on Full Tilt, agrees. “It was great. The hotel was first class, the tournament staff was excellent, and overall it was a very nice experience.”
When the dust settled, it was Dory Zayner that took down the title and won AU $300,000. As for the Team PokerNews representatives, Jordan Lamberg, who qualified for free on Duplicate Poker, turned his $0 investment into a $47,900 payday.
The PokerNews Cup was a smashing success. Ready for another? Keep checking back with PokerNews.com for an announcement on the next PokerNews Cup Event. The experience is one to remember, and you can’t beat the price.