Apart from the WSOP, the big buy-in live tournament circuit is and always was dominated by two acronyms: WPT and EPT.
In today’s poker infographic we take a closer look at the world’s two biggest traveling poker tours to see which one is truly the greatest.
We’ve got head-to-head comparisons up top and a running timeline as you scroll down the image.
After Days 1A, 1B and 1C of the 2012 Aussie Millions Main Event were completed, around half of the 659 starting field returned to compete on Day 2 of the $10,000 event. By the end of the day 75 players remained, which was then cut further to just 26 players by the end of Day 3.
As Day 3 got underway at the Crown Casino in Melbourne, three players faced the indignity of falling short of the 72 man tournament bubble worth $15,000.
Just one week from now marks the beginning of one of the years biggest tournaments, the 2012 Aussie Millions. Based at Crown Casino in Melbourne Aussie Millions features not only a prestigious $10,000 buy-in Main Event, but a multitude of compelling side events. Action kicks off on Thursday the 12th, with opening event offering a $1,100 deep stack tournament, with three available flights on separate days.
Out with the old and in with the new, or at least that appears to be the direction interim England Head Coach Stuart Lancaster is going in as he announces 15 changes to the current England Rugby Squad. Amoung the new players getting their fist call for Queen and country are Saracens centres Brad Barritt and Owen Farrell, Northampton Saints duo Lee Dickson and Calum Clark, and Scarlets’ No.8 Ben Morgan.
Rules state that ten changes are allowed in a Rugby World Cup year over and above international retirements (Lewis Moody, Jonny Wilkinson, Steve Thompson) and long-term injuries (Andrew Sheridan and Richard Wigglesworth) and Lancaster has used every last one of them.
The England squad will meet for their pre-RBS 6 Nations training camp on Monday, January 23 where no doubt they will all start to get used to each other.
Lancaster said: Lots of players have been putting their hands up and there were some tough calls to make. H
In our many years of poker observation we’ve learned never to make flat-out statements about poker skill – and that goes doubly for crossover sports stars like Sergio Garcia.
The Spanish professional golfer is among the 188 players left in the 2012 PCA main event with a stack of 104,500 in chips, though, which is tilting the scales subtly in favor of at least the possibility of Garcia’s poker prowess.
So while it’s unquestionably true Sergio Garcia is good at golf, the most we’ll say is that he be good at poker.
If you want evidence, consider that one year ago Garcia also played in the PCA main event but lasted just a few short levels on his Day 1 heat.
This year he’s managed to advance to Day 3 in the same tournament.
That’s three times as far at least, indicating to us that he’s at least three times as good as he was in 2011.
He hasn’t increased his speed much, according to a few reports from his table, but we’ll give him a pass on that as that’s how he plays golf too.
“Any time you try do something at a high level it’s going to be tough and there are going to be some similarities,” Sergio told us when we spoke to him a year ago.
“There’s a huge mental game in both and it’s important to have mental strength,” he said.
While it is true that Sergio Garcia has no real poker results per se, he did win a televised celebrity event sponsored by PokerStars in Spain.
Check out Garcia here deftly folding A-7 when his opponent had pocket aces. Spanish fluency not man
