Hot on the heels of wrapping up its Season Eight tournament schedule with its Grand Final in Monte Carlo, the European Poker Tour has announced their Season Nine schedule of events. For those that have been longtime fans of the EPT, however, it will be a significant change of course for the tournament series.
After featuring thirteen tournaments over the 2011-12 Season Eight schedule (a record for the EPT), the organization will be scaling back their calendar for the upcoming Season Nine. “We looked at every EPT season up until now and asked ourselves how we could make the tour even better for the players,” EPT President Edgar Stuchly stated during the announcement. “In the end, every change comes down to making this a better tour for the people who make this tour what it is: our players.”
The biggest change is that there will now only be eight events on the EPT calendar, a total number of tournaments that hasn’t been seen since the Season Three schedule. The EPT is keeping several of its higher profile events, such as Barcelona, Spain, San Remo, Italy, Berlin, Germany and London, the United Kingdom, eliminating such stops as Copenhagen, Denmark (which had been a part of the tour since its inception), Tallinn, Estonia (the first stop on the EPT schedule over the past two seasons) and their inaugural stops from Season Eight in Loutraki, Greece and Campione, Italy.
The changes are a part of a plan by the EPT to expand their tours beyond just the Main Events that they traditionally feature. Instead of going with the one-off events, the eight stops on the schedule for the EPT in 2012-13 will be a full blown poker festival, featuring several preliminary events over a roughly ten day period that will lead up to the EPT Main Event.
As a part of the new scheduling, the EPT is also looking to offer more high-end tournaments. The EPT will introduce a new €10,000 Championship Series, which will start off with a Heads Up tournament in Barcelona. Other potential parts of that championship series are expected to include a Pot Limit Omaha championship and an Eight Game tournament. This is along with their usual “High Roller” offerings, which will start with a €50,000 televised tournament at the Barcelona stop.
In addition to offering more of a traditional poker tournament festival, the reduced tournament schedule will allow the EPT to work closely with their counterparts in each of the countries, such as the Estrella Poker Tour in Spain and the United Kingdom & Ireland Poker Tour in the U. K. At these tournaments with their regional cohorts, there will be lower buy in events during the EPT stops that will be a part of those regional schedules.
Season Nine of the EPT begins in Barcelona from August 15-25, with the €5000 Main Event scheduled to start on August 19. The crème of European poker will then head on to what has become a major poker tournament destination, San Remo, Italy, from October 3-11. The EPT San Remo should be able to draw another huge throng of players as it comes just after the conclusion of the World Series of Poker Europe in Cannes, France.
After some time off, the EPT kicks back into action from December 5-15 in Prague, the Czech Republic. After the Christmas and New Year’s festivities have been completed, the EPT will head off the Old Continent for the sunny beaches of Paradise Island, the Bahamas, and the 2013 PokerStars Caribbean Adventure from January 6-15. The final four stops of the tour for Season Nine will be in Deauville, France (January 30-February 9), London (March 6-16), Berlin (April 24-May 4) and the traditional Grand Final in Monte Carlo (May 6-15).
The “less is more” approach should not only please the players but allow more of a “destination” style of poker for the EPT. Although the eight announced tournaments are the only confirmed dates for Season Nine, tour organizers have stated that they may make additions along the way.
For more details on the upcoming Season Nine schedule for the EPT, or any other questions about the tour, visit EPT.com to learn more.
