PKR.Com to Sign New Poker Star

On 17 November, next-gen poker room PKR.com is set to unveil the latest addition to Team PKR Pro, the site’s stable of sponsored professional poker players. One of the year’s most high profile signings, the new arrival is among the best poker players in the world, and will represent PKR in the biggest events across the globe.

Since Team PKR Pro was created in 2009, 13 players have flown the flag for the next-generation online poker site, each plucked from the wealth of homegrown talent which has emerged from PKR.com’s tables. The current crop of six Team PKR pro stars includes EPT champion Vladimir ‘Beyne’ Geshkenbein and WSOP Europe bracelet holder Scott Shelley alongside rising stars Sofia ‘welllbet’ Lovgren, James ‘james666′ Sudworth, Sascha ‘locodice’ Walter and Marc ‘Waswini’ Bariller, a Frenchman who parlayed freeroll winnings into a successful online career. Former Team PKR Pros include GUKPT winner Andrew ‘golfpro699′ Teng and Adrien ‘zlatan35′ Allain who, after winning APT Macau as a $5 PKR qualifier, has recently gone on to claim a WPT Amneville title.

With current and former members drawn from the UK, Ireland, France, Germany, Sweden, Norway, Russia, Team PKR Pro has a long history of unearthing new talent from PKR’s international player base, valuing not only poker ability but the community spirit with which PKR is so strongly associated. Aside from their participation in major live tournaments, Team PKR Pros create free-to-access poker strategy and lifestyle content for the PKR.com website, provide commentary on the Poker Channel’s PKR TV show and contribute to the PKR Forums.

PKR.com offers exclusive packages to the Wpt Ireland

The WPT hits Irish shores for the very first time in January 2012 and official sponsor PKR.com are offering online players two different routes through which to win a unique $5,000 WPT Experience package.

The weekly ‘PKR.com WPT Experience Final’ takes place on the site each Monday at 19:15 GMT, with direct buy-in costing $270. However players can choose to try their hand at a variety of daily satellite stages with buy-ins starting from $2.90 to qualify for each weekly final – in which one in twenty will win a poker package. Alongside this runs ‘PKR.com WPT Dublin Nights’. This is a nightly $22 buy-in speed tournament where players earn added chips – in each tournament they play for a one-off variable stack freeroll, taking place on Sunday, 18 December. The top finishers in the freeroll will also bag a $5,000 PKR.com WPT package.

The PKR.com WPT Ireland Experience

Each player winning a package can look forward to an experience they will never forget as PKR.com pull out all of the stops. As well as a €2,500 seat to play the PKR.com WPT Ireland Main Event, players will also grab invites to cool VIP PKR.com hosted parties and social events like Jameson whiskey tasting, a Guinness factory tour, traditional Irish pub night and a Ken Doherty hosted pool night plus cash towards expenses.

The PKR.com WPT Ireland will be held at the luxurious Citywest Hotel in Dublin, running from Thursday, 5 January through to Sunday, 8 January 2012 and is the first major poker games event of 2012.

Step Tournaments at Winner Poker

Conquer the Steps and win great prizes at Winner oker. The Steps Tournaments consist of 10-player Sit ‘N’ Gos with different buy-in levels.

Defeat the competition in Step 7 and win a token to the Sunday $200,000 Gtd.

How does it work?

Enter Step 1 for only $0.16. If you are victorious you will advance to Step 2. Continue all the way to Step 7 to win the main prize.

If you don’t advance to the next Step you can still win another shot at the same level or to the level below.

For only $0.16, rise all the way to the top, from Step 1 to Step 7, and win a token to the $200,000 Gtd. ($215 value).

Should you want to take a shortcut you can buy-in directly at any level of your choice.

Check the Sit ‘N’ Go tab in the software for more details.

Unibet Open Riga 2011

The Unibet Open 2011 heads to Riga for its grand finale December 1-4 – and that’s snow joke! The Latvian capital is known for its party possibilities and with Unibet coming to town, that’s not going to change as we head to the Baltic state for the first time, with snow and festivities guaranteed.

The tournament will be held at Riga’s glamorous Royal Casino in the heart of the city, but even if you’re unlucky enough to bust out early, there’s plenty to see and do in the area – the Freedom Monument, the vibrant Christmas Market and the National Opera House are all within easy walking distance. And if opera’s not your thing, we’re certain that you’ll find something more to your taste in one of the many bars and clubs that fill much of the Old Town…

With Christmas right around the corner, we’re giving our players an early gift – the tournament in Riga will have NO CAP on player numbers. Most of the Unibet Opens so far have sold out at just over 400 players, but this time we could be looking at our biggest ever prize pool.

So see your poker year out in style with a trip to the winter wonderland that is Riga as the Unibet Open 2011 season comes to a thrilling close.

Gold Rush Halloween Special

After a huge success in September, Unibet is continuing with their spookily good Gold Rush promotion this month, where players can earn CASH BACK simply by earning a minimum amount of daily target points on a minimum number of days within the month.

The higher the number of points you earn per day, for 5, 10, 15, 20 or 25 days within the month, the greater the reward will be. For example, if you earn a minimum of 35 VIP points on 5 different days your reward will be an invite to a €2K freeroll. If you earn a minimum of 350 points per day on 20 days you will receive a cash reward of €70. One prize per player – see below!

Additionally, players who register for Gold Rush before the 14th October and they’re guaranteed an exclusive invite to our “€2,000 Halloween Special” tournament at 18:00 CET on the 31st October!

To qualify for the rewards players need to make sure they “Opt in” to this promotion by registering for their Gold Rush Tournament.

Private Tournaments at PKR Poker

Club PKR Silver level or above? Then create your own exclusive private tournament for you and your friends.
Whether you want to play deep, blast through a quick speed game or even try your hand at Omaha with just your friends, we have every single option covered.

Hop onto the tournament request page and set-up the kind of game you would like by choosing the game type, buy-in, starting chips, blinds per level and seats per table. Once that’s done just select the date and time you wish to play along with an exclusive tournament password and you are good to go. Only those you give the password to will then be able to register and play.

Please note you will need to allow at least 10 days notice before the tournament date and your private tournament will appear in the lobby at least five days before the scheduled start time.

Eva Longoria Charity Poker Tournament

Desperate Housewives star Eva Longoria is celebrating her annual Celebrity Casino night on October 29th. The event, presented by Xbox LIVE, will take place in San Antonio, Texas, and benefit Eva’s Heroes.

Eva’s Heroes, founded by actress Eva Longoria, is an organization dedicated to enriching the lives of those intellectual special needs by providing an inclusive setting built on four tenets- interact, grow, learn and love. Based in San Antonio, TX, the organization helps teens and young adults with special needs to integrate and flourish in society.

Guests can play blackjack, roulette, craps, live and take part in silent auctions and a Texas hold’em poker tournament. Expected are poker brat Phil Hellmuth, poker host Leann Tweeden, and NBA player Malik Rose.

Tickets for the event cost $200 and an additional entry fee of $200.

Nic Szeremeta challenges orthodox thinking in October’s Bluff Europe

Nic Szeremeta has always been willing to shake things up in the poker world. In 1999 he created Late Night Poker for Channel 4, the first poker show to use the hole card cam, and helped to kick-start the poker boom in the UK. But now it’s Szeremeta’s mission to point out to all the card rooms and casinos that spread strip-deck poker, live and online, that they’ve been shipping the pots in the wrong direction for years. This is because, in accordance with the immutable laws of mathematics, a flush should beat quads.

The Independent newspaper’s poker columnist sets out his argument in the new issue of Bluff Europe, out Monday 3rd October. “According to the principles upon which hand rankings are based, a flush should beat four-of-a-kind. The reason is that a flush occurs less frequently (can be made in fewer ways) than four-of-a-kind in a 32 card deck.

“This is not advanced maths; it is an easy sum,” says Nic. “As it’s more difficult to make a flush than to make four-of-a-kind (around 10% more difficult), it therefore follows that the holder of a flush against quads should have the pot pushed in his or her direction.”

Nic calls on regulators to change the rules: “Even more money is going to be pushed in the wrong direction unless both the Internet card rooms and the brick and mortar casinos who offer ace to 7 games change their hand rankings,” he says.

For the full explanation, check out the latest issue of Bluff Europe Magazine. Nic also outlines his theories in a video interview at www.bluffeurope.com.

Scottish Poker Championships come to Edinburgh

The prestigious Scottish Poker Championships returns to the Gala Maybury Casino, Edinburgh, from Thursday, 6th to Sunday, 9th October and, with an estimated prize pool of £100,000, promises to be the biggest poker tournament in Scotland this year.

The festival kicks off with a £20 Multi-Buy NLHE super satellite to the main event. The main event itself gets underway on Saturday, 8th October; a £500 + £50 NLH freezeout, with a 12,500 starting stack and 30-minute levels. Prior to the main event, a £110 side competition with 7,500 chips and a half-hour clock will run on the Friday evening. Satellites for the festival are running every Thursday Night at 8pm with two seats to the Main Event Guaranteed and are also available at galapoker.co.uk.

Pokertronic at the G2E Fair in Las Vegas

Pokertronic will be at the G2E to present several new innovations starting with the RFID poker table – a powerful stand-alone solution for the visualisation of poker games.

The functionality of the RFID poker table is easy to describe. Flat RFID transmitter chips are embedded in the unique Cartamundi plastic cards. These modified cards can be shuffled, dealt and bend just like conventional playing cards so you can’t tell the difference. The RFID cards transmit their encrypted card value (e.g., ace of spades) to the RFID reader that is fixed in wood. The maximum transmission range of a card is 10 cm (4 inches). Casinos in Europe and the United States have given the technology in the Pokertronic RFID poker table a seal of approval due to the high level of security it provides.

The “Media-o-matic” module-based hardware/software solution is another highlight that will be presented. This full-fledged media server features inhouse, modular software that has been continuously improved over a period of three years based on customer feedback and insights gleaned from numerous TV productions and casino poker tournaments. This software was designed from the outset to be operated via touchscreen.

The poker graphics module generates animated poker graphics in real time and produces an overview printout in PDF format for each hand. This comes in very “handy” in post production. In addition, the recorder module can store data in various formats such as Quicktime, Flash or KeyFill Chromakey video and audio. The live streaming module is popular as it features delayed transmission to the internet with live chip counts, additional game statistics and the option to include or exclude holecards.

“We can proudly say we have amassed a wealth of experience in implementing poker TV productions and poker livestreams as our teams have produced events in more than 15 countries. We are able to provide both complete packages and partial services with a focus on professional support and full technical service for production companies, poker event organisers and casinos. Our excellent track record helped us earn the privilege of being the exclusive provider of the new live streaming concept, with our partners WinMedia from Ireland, for the entire WPT Season X 2011/2012. “We offer premium service with German thoroughness. In terms of quality, we are the German car of poker TV productions”, says Uwe Kerscher, CEO of Pokertronic.