In this week’s poker news round-up we remind you that Doug Polk won the One Drop High Roller, Marcel Luske signed for partypoker, and give you an insight into the habits and routines of Unibet’s Dave Lappin.
It’s that time of the year again.
All the noise comes from the World Series of Poker (WSOP), so that’s where we’ll point our ear trumpet.
You are going to have to wait for the Main Event to feast your eyes on an individual prize as large as the one Doug Polk won this week. The self-proclaimed man who Beasts Everything did just that to take down the $111,111 buy-in One Drop High Roller for $3,686,865.
And it’s not just Polk who will benefit from that windfall. The entrepreneur has promised to give 2% of his net WSOP winnings to a lucky person chosen at random after completing a variety of tasks a Chimp could complete, including following him on Twitter.
Polk defeated Bertrand ‘ElkY’ Grospellier in heads-up action to take the biggest title of his career. ElkY has now had a deep run in each of his previous four major tournaments, so don’t be surprised when you start hearing the French national anthem bellowing around the Rio by summer’s end.
And ElkY isn’t the only PokerStars Team Pro enjoying a spot of success in Vegas.
When Igor Kurganov joined PokerStars in February, it seemed like a beautiful, bold, bird had voluntarily caged itself. I was concerned that as part of his contract his authenticity would have been secretly buried like toxic waste as he had to tow the party line.
I was wrong.
PokerStars, who themselves are no stranger when it comes to reducing suffering in the world, partnered with Kurganov’s philanthropic pearl: Raising for Effective Giving (REG) during the Spring Championship of Online Poker (SCOOP), and his liaison with the Red Spade has led to his first WSOP bracelet.
And what a way to win it.
If love is your thing, when you make a WSOP final table there is only one person you want on the rail preparing to jump into the winner’s photo. But Kurganov went one further when his left ventricle, Liv Boeree, joined him in the poker pit for the $10,000 Tag Team Championship, and they bloody won it, donating 50% of their purse to effective charities in the process.
It was one of those moment’s that you’ll still talk about many years down the road by which time someone has climbed into your mind and took a white paintbrush to your eyes giving you this odd blank look.
Victory for the lovebirds thwarted Daniel Negreanu’s attempts to win his seventh bracelet when his team finished third in the same event. Negreanu didn’t have to wait too long for his second opportunity, mind you. The Canadian entered Event #9: $10,000 Omaha Hi-Lo 8 or Better riding his poker brain like a well-honed racehorse. It was another close shave, losing to Abe Mosseri, heads-up for the title, and those three empty bracelet boxes remain empty.
Mosseri’s victory was his second career bracelet, making him the fourth of his kind to take the honours in the first nine events. We have already heralded the beast-like Polk (3 bracelets), and the other two were Jesse Martin and Upeshka De Silva who both earned their second bracelets in the $2,500 Mixed Triple Draw Lowball, and $3,000 No-Limit Hold’em Shootout.
Those winning their first bracelets were Joseph Mitchell ($333 buy-in Online event), and Benjamin Zamani ($1,500 buy-in Omaha Hi-Lo 8 or Better). Zamani is the current World Poker Tour (WPT) Player of the Year, so the Poker Gods have been kind to that young man recently.
Online Poker News
Things turn as quiet as a surgeon preparing to cauterise an artery in the online poker world when the WSOP is on, but partypoker kept my fingers working this week.
The online poker room put on another masterclass of a live event when the King’s Casino in Rozvadov hosted the Partypoker MILLION Germany. Partypoker Ambassadors graced the final tables of both the €1,100 Main Event and the €2,200 High Roller. Anatoly Filatov took the High Roller crown, but Natalie Beviglieri finished sixth in the Main Event with Michael Mrakes taking down the €200,000 first prize. And the partypoker stable grew by one this week when Marcel Luske joined the team ahead of the WSOP to represent the online poker room in the Netherlands.
There wasn’t any groundbreaking news emanating from the corridors of 888Poker and PokerStars, but I did manage to publish a few interviews from representatives of both establishments.
PokerStars & BetStars Stephen Hendry on Snooker, Gambling & Food.
Sofia Lovgren on her Interest in Asia Including the Macau Cash Games
Bruno Politano on the Importance of Mindset and Spirituality
Kara Scott on 888Poker, Work-Life Balance, and When to Press the Mute Button
And I also took the wrapping off a new column where I will provide you with the habits and routines of the people who call this game of poker a career. The first episode begins with Unibet’s Dave Lappin.
Time ladies & gentlemen, someone has just called the clock.
