From winners to endorsement deals, it was a busy week for news in the realm of poker. We’ll start our look at the headlines with the WSOP Europe Main Event as the details of that extravaganza have been revealed.
WSOP Europe Main Event Announced
The World Series Of Poker Europe Main Event has been announced. It’ll take place from November 4 to November 10 at King’s Casino in the Czech Republic. While the main event is the culmination of the festivities, the event itself begins on October 19, which kicks off 11 bracelet events. There is now a guaranteed prize pool of $5.99 million for the Main Event with the winner taking home at least $1.19 million. The first gold bracelet event will be the Monster Stack No Limit Hold’em event that has a buy-in of about $1,300 and there is also a High Roller event that will have a maximum of 111 players and has a buy-in of about $133,000.
Some of the biggest names in poker will be there, such as Phil Hellmuth, Fedor Holz, Antonio Esfandiari and Tony G., among many others. In fact, the demand by the players has been so consistent that Leon Tsoukernik, the owner of the King’s Casino, has decided not to play in the event to free up a spot for someone else to get in. He is giving his deposit to One Drop, a non-profit organization that is focused on clean water (and has ties to poker). The event should be quite the showdown of poker powers.
Fedor Holz Signs On With PartyPoker
Speaking of the aforementioned Holz, he has just signed a sponsorship deal with PartyPoker, which has already locked up the likes of Boris Becker, Padraig Parkinson and Sam Trickett. Holz, who hails from Germany, has won about $23 million from tournaments in the last four years. He won the High Roller event at the World Series of Poker last year, taking home $5 million for first place. His endorsement deal with PartyPoker means that he’ll wear their brand when he appears at tournaments.
Holz was standoffish at first when it came to signing with a poker room but he is friends with Patrick Leonard, who is also working PartyPoker and that warmed him up to the idea. Holz looks like he could even be a bit of a brand ambassador as he wants to improve their customer service as well as their software. Keep an eye on how this partnership works out as PartyPoker will be out to pick up more pros to wear their logo.
Gallagher Wins LIVE Grand Prix Killarney Main Event
Thomas Gallagher of Ireland beat the field of 906 players at the PartyPoker LIVE Grand Prix Killarney Main Event, collecting a healthy $43,004 along with the trophy. The event, which featured a buy-in of $407, was settled when Gallagher made a three-way deal with Ronan Sweeney and Yue Wang as they were the last three standing at the final table. The entire final table was comprised of players from Ireland.
It was Sweeney who took home the most money with $46,019 overall, also collecting the Golden Chip prize that was worth $11,986. Wang still managed to take home $37,011 for his efforts as everyone went home happy after making a deal that was based on chip counts. Gallagher won the event with pocket twos while Sweeney had an ace-king, which is how he ended up with the trophy.