The field may have been smaller than usual due to the old year exiting and the new one arriving, but the online poker action was still brisk and the winnings were spectacular, showing once again that it takes more than political shenanigans to keep a good game down.
Mansion boosted their tournament cash (see earlier reports) as did Party Poker and Poker Stars, with the latter launching a special $1 000 buy-in competition that attracted a few big names using online *handles* and gave the winner a larger than usual pay check.
Poker Stars‘ weekly Sunday Million attracted a field of 1 083, creditable but well below its normal big numbers due probably to the high buy-in. The prize pool of $1 083 000 resulted in just over 150 players making the cash bubble, and the eventual winner, dim-tix – pulled down a cool $232 845 after some solid poker action. 2nd placed crazyButcher won $128 119 and even the first man out on the final table took home $12 500.
Full Tilt Poker offered a $250 000 Guarantee that attracted 1 432 players, generating a prize pool to $286 400, from which 216 finalists benefited. At the death it was Zufunft979 and robby966794 who faced off in the heads up, with Zufunft taking the winner’s purse of $53 843 and some change, and the runner up banking $33 365.
Mansion generously added $20 000 to its Sunday prizepool as an element in its added-value promo month. The buy-in of $200 + 15 pulled in 143 players, competing for a prize pool of almost $50 000. The heads up between olivert and Sunyata resulted in the former player walking off with $14 580 in winnings.
Ultimate Bet‘s $200 + 15 buy-in produced a prizepool of $87 400 with 437 players in the field, of whom 50 ended up in the money.
Appropriately nicknamed TwoFistedLou confronted RProps in the heads up, playing with skill and aggression to dominate and take home the winning check of $21 850.
Party Poker‘s $200 000 Guaranteed tournament pulled in 653 players, of which just on a hundred cashed out. With a total prize pool of almost $270 000 there was plenty of action culminating in the final clash of lausfloh and SamDiam0nd, fighting for the significant $47 000 winner’s check. In the end it was lausfloh who prevailed in a close-run contest.
More evidence of online poker’s robust state of health was apparent across the Internet this week as is showcased by the following representative selection of offers found in a quick surf across the major portals:
Poker Stars was offering 150 percent new player bonuses, exclusive deposit bonuses and $2 500 monthly freerolls, whilst Mansion was touting a new 100 percent maxed at $1 000 and of course their $100K daily tournaments (see previous reports)
Full Tilt Poker players could pick up matchplay bonuses maxed at $600, and Absolute Poker had a similar offer maxed at $750. Pacific Poker was a little less generous with a 60 percent sign-up bonus offering up to a maximum of $100, whilst Ultimate Bet took the middle path with a matchplay capped at $650 for their Ultimate Blackjack Tour.
Lower down the scale, TonyG Poker players could get a freebie $75 in addition to a 200 percent first deposit bonus, although the capping wasn’t clear in the ads. Surprisingly, Party Poker was not really competitive with its 20 percent first deposit bonus capped at $100.