Major Tournaments

There are few major poker events. The two most important tournament series are the World Poker Tour and the World Series of Poker. The main events of both tournaments are held in different locations in the most famous poker city of the world, Las Vegas, Nevada. The World Series of Poker Europe is the most famous poker tournament in Europe, which was established in 2007.

Beside the main events, there are some open tournaments during the year in different casinos all over the world. The buy-ins for one of these tournaments is between $5,000 and $25,000.
Other important tournaments are Late Night Poker, Poker Superstars and the actual world biggest tournament, the Aussie Millions, officially announced as The Crown Australian Poker Champion. Not less than 780 players attended the event in 2008. In the same year, the prize money was 1.65 million AUD. A very famous game is the World’s Most Expensive Buy-in Poker Tournament. The buy-in is $100,000 per player and each player has 30 seconds to play his hands. On the first occasion in 2006, only ten players participate in this very special game.

Famous Players

During the last years, the winners of the poker main events have become very, very famous superstars. Since the number of participants was increasing drastically, the prize money was exploding accordingly. A professional poker player can earn a lot of money on some of the tournaments.

The first winner of the World Series of Poker in 1970 was Johnny Moss. In this tournament the winner was determined by a vote of a jury. In the last years, there were some players with outstanding poker skills who managed to win important events after winning an online qualification tournament. Chris Moneymaker is maybe the most famous example for such a special player. His seat to the main event he won by a $39 satellite tournament. Afterwards he won the whole tournament. In the heads-up he played a classic bluff which changes the momentum of the game. It was his first live poker event he ever joined. In 2004, Greg Raymer became the World Series of Poker Champion, he got his seat from a $165 online satellite tournament. The youngest player ever who won a WSOP bracelet was the Norwegian poker player Annette Obrestad, she started her online career at the age of fifteen. She demonstrated her outstanding poker skills by winning several online tournaments. One day before her 19th birthday, she won the World Series of Poker Europe Main Event. Until 2010, she is not allowed to participate in any Poker Game in Las Vegas, Nevada, because she is younger than 21.

The World Poker Tour Walk of Fame was created to honour the best players in the World Poker Tour. The first members were Doyle Brunson, Gus Hansen and James Garner. All of them are poker superstars. While Hansen is a relatively young player, the other two are famous old school poker players.