Event #5, a $200 + $20 Deepstack Freezeout started at 11 AM, featuring a 30,000 chip starting stack and 20 minute levels. Although the weather was not the best today, 113 players made the trip to Playground to enjoy a Sunday afternoon of tournament poker. There was a guaranteed prize pool of $15,000 that ended up swelling to $21,922! There were many local grinders mixed in with out of town players competing for a top prize of $5,252. The day played out slowly, with many players grinding similar sized stacks. Cameron Wilson from Kitchener, Ont., had started to run away from the pack in the later stages. Mike Saragossi then started to build a monster stack heading into the final table. Ahmad Baalbaki was playing patiently, nursing a below average sized stack as we were down to the last 3 tables. he never gave up hope and was able to […]
Poker
Blouin-Verroeulst wins the Playground 200
Stephane Blouin-Verroeulst has won the Playground 200 in the February 2019 Playground Power Weekend, defeating David Bolduc Hamel in a tough heads up battle between two players that were clearly playing at the top of their game. Stephane had started the heads up match with a slight lead, and this was maintained through the initial level of 2-way play until the break – he had about a 3:2 chip lead. Sometimes a little more, sometimes a little less. However during the break, he seems to have found a new focus, and within 10 minutes of play (perhaps even a little less), Stephane was up to a 5:1 advantage and the writing was on the wall. The final hand of the tournament came when Stephane called in the small blind, and then snapped off David’s shove from the bb. Stephane: David: Community cards: Just like that, Stephane became the Playground 200 […]
Denyse “Omaha Queen” Mignault wins the $90 Freeze
The heads up action was set up to be quick, with Yannick Bourque Patry having a huge lead on Denyse Mignault. Both players were obviously starting to show signs of fatigue, and the end seemed near. Right off the bat, Denyse doubled up in the first hand, armed with pocket Kings and 520,000 chips. After this quick hand, she managed to go all in 6 of the next 8 hands. Yannick seemed unable to get his hands on any decent cards at all. The blinds went up to 30K/60K and the pace intensified even more. Yannick stayed stone-faced and impassive throughout the match up, and tried as much as he could to prevent his chips from bleeding into Denyse’s stack. But it was a loosing battle. After 5 or 6 hands Denyse was now chip leader and was showing no signs of easing off the pedal. Every time Yannick raised […]
A Jackpot on a $5/$5 PLO Table
Early Friday evening got a boost when the Omaha Bad Beat Jackpot was won on table 13. This is one of the “usual” PLO tables, and is often the site of some of Playground’s largest games – and when you add a Jackpot to that, it adds up to a lot of happy PLO players! There were seven players at the normally 8-handed table when the fateful hand occurred, and before cards were event dealt Hafedh B had juiced things a little bit by adding a $10 straddle after the blinds. Charles B then opened with a raise to $35 and there were two callers. Three players to the flop. Flop: Action checked around, and the turn came … There would be no more checking in this hand… Hafedh opened with a $75 bet, and Charles made the call. The third player in the hand to this point chose to […]
Plessis-Belair wins Event #3
During heads-up play, the players decided to make another small deal; instead of $400 going to 1st place, they agreed to re-adjust and leave $300 for 1st and $100 for 2nd. The two players battled back and forth for an orbit or two, and finally they were both all-in: Jonathan had and Normand had . Jonathan was happy to smash the flop, hitting 2 pair, but as seasoned tournament poker players know, in most all-in situations, there seems to always be a sweat. He was not happy to see the spade draw and wanted the dealer to keep it clean. The on the turn was a brick, but the on the river made a flush for Normand, and, all of the sudden, we had our champion. Event #3 Champion: Normand Plessis Belair, $1,715 Last hand of play 2nd place: Jonathan English, $1,500
A champion is crowned in the 8-Max Re-entry
An epic heads-up battle took place between Jean-Pascal Gauthier and Anish Sood to close out the action in Event #1 in the February 2019 Playground Power Weekend. Along the way, the two remaining players looked at the ICM chop numbers, but in the end, they decided to just play on. Anish was dominating up until the last hand before break, but with only 10 seconds to go before the break was to start, an important hand was dealt. Anish was on the button and looked down at and shoved. Jean-Pascal woke up with and, as expected, snap called! The Queens held and Jean-Pascal received a nice double-up, adding almost 300k to his stack. Returning from their last break, chips moved back and forth until Anish went all in with Big Slick. Jean-Pascal called, holding a hand that was clearly dominated: King high, 8 kicker. The dealer fanned out a King-high […]
MILLIONS North America: The Official Schedule
The marquee event of the year, MILLIONS North America, is nearly upon us! The series runs from May 13 to May 26 and hosts ten events, putting over $8,000,000 in value up for grabs. MILLIONS brings three tournaments with seven-figure prize pool guarantees: the Montreal Open, the MILLIONS North America, and the High Roller. These tournaments are complemented by seven side events and lots of satellites to provide options for players of all bankrolls. This year’s Main Event offers a $5,000,000 guaranteed prize pool and presents some important differences from previous editions. First, the tournament structure has been revised: there are now only two starting flights, which follow a next-day re-entry format. This means that players can fire, at most, two bullets at this premier event – 1 for each Day 1. Second, the buy-in has been increased to $10,300. We have introduced a series of STEP Satellites through which […]
The Secondary BBJ was hit Tuesday morning
This morning was bright and sunny, though a little chilly, but there’s nothing like a Jackpot to make a chilly day a little warmer and a sunny day a little brighter! The action that brought about the Secondary Jackpot was on table 4, which at the time was a $1/$2 table. Preflop, the action was limped around to Shawn S in the small blind, who raised to $16. There were two callers: Stephane S (utg+1) and Ryan W (cutoff). The dealer laid out the flop. Flop: Shawn led out for $20 and both of the other players made the call. Turn: Shawn led out once again, this time for $85. Stephane raised to $200 and Ryan came over the top with an all in raise to $374. The action was back on Shawn, who announced that he had to check his horoscope for advice – and made the call. Stephane […]
The Power Weekend starts this Sunday… online!
The February Power Weekend kicks off at Playground next Wednesday, but on partypoker, the action starts this Sunday with an online Day 1 in the $100,000 guaranteed Playground 200. The buy-in for this event is $200 + $20, but you may start your journey online for a fraction of the price. This Sunday, February 17 at 2:00PM, play the $20 + $2 direct satellite to the Playground 200 Day 1 Online, and win your seat for the target event which starts 2 hours later, at 4:00PM. For just $22, you can treat yourself to a great Sunday of online poker that could lead you to Day 2 at Playground and some massive prizes! The Power Weekend also presents a path to the MILLIONS North America Main Event, with three STEP 1s, one STEP 2, and one STEP 3 with 10 seats guaranteed to the greatest tournament in Playground’s history! Finally, […]
Did you get your MILLIONS Main Event seat yet?
The next Playground Power Weekend takes off on Wednesday, February 20. The mini-series presents a complete roster of STEP Satellites to the $10,300 MILLIONS North America Main Event, the ideal opportunity to play in a major $10K buy-in event. Here’s why: STEP 2, STEP 3, and MILLIONS seats won through a satellite are not transferable, which means that qualifiers will represent a huge portion of the MILLIONS Main Event field. In-the-money action is bound to see a lot of these qualifiers sweat for a monster share of the $5,000,000 guaranteed prize pool… one of them could be you! Let’s take a look at the February Power Weekend STEP schedule, your next opportunity to earn a ticket for the big dance: Wednesday February 20 – $80 + $10 STEP 1 10 STEP 2 Seats Guaranteed Thursday February 21 – $80 + $10 STEP 1 10 STEP 2 Seats Guaranteed Friday February […]
A Free MILLIONS UK Main Event Seat
partypoker LIVE wants you to play the £10,300 MILLIONS United Kingdom at Dusk Till Dawn Casino Nottingham in January 2020… for free! What you need to do is play all five MILLIONS Main Events in 2019, and you get yourself a free seat at the MILLIONS UK Main Event next year! Keep in mind, there are many ways to enter these tournaments. Whether you win a seat through a direct satellite, use your PP LIVE Dollars, or buy in with cold hard cash, your Main Event participation counts for the promotion. The partypoker LIVE 2019 MILLIONS tour has five stops: MILLIONS South America at the world-famous Copacabana Palace Hotel in Rio, Brazil, March 15 to March 24. MILLIONS North America at Playground, Canada’s premier poker destination in Montreal, May 13 to May 26. MILLIONS Europe at King’s Casino in the charming village of Rozvadov, Czech Republic, August 10 to August […]
The World Cup of Cards: A Winter Storm
Yesterday, Playground closed the books on the 2019 World Cup of Cards. The festival’s huge success is largely due to our players, who came out in droves, despite some of the worst weather we had in years, to compete in the WCC. The sheer number of participants was astounding; $2,476,956 were paid out in cash prizes of all sizes! We also want to thank our partners, WPTDeepStacks, Grand Prix Canada, and Card Player Poker Tour, with whom we worked to build the three marquee events of the series. WPTDeepStacks The WPTDeepStacks was the festival’s Main Event and the biggest buy-in of all 26 events. Players got in for $1,650 (or roughly 10% of that if they won a seat through one of the event’s satellites), and competed for a $998,130 prize pool. Day 2 finished with exactly 9 players, as the format demanded. All 9 finalists came back the following […]