On today’s Daily Deal, Jen Harman hosts a charity fundraiser, there’s controversy about the next contender in the Durrrr Challenge, a founding instructor leaves Cardrunners, and great news for poker players around the world.
Hello, I’m Sean Gibson and welcome to the Daily Deal by Poker News Daily, brought to you by PokerSource.com.
Full Tilt Pro Jennifer Harman will present the second annual Throw Down Poker Championship on May eighth. The event will span several casinos, and feature a unique ten-player team format along with standard tourney play. Prizes include a $10,000 entry to the 2010 World Series of Poker Main Event. More than three hundred participants and forty poker pros and celebrities are confirmed, including new WPT champion David Williams and poker beauties Lacey Jones and Trishelle Cannatella. Proceeds from the Throw Down Championship will go to one of Harman’s dearest causes: the National Kidney Foundation.
Online poker prodigy Tom Dwan – best known as “Durrrr” – told Bluff magazine that CardRunners instructor Brian Townsend was the next contender for his Million Dollar Challenge. The poker world was already looking forward to huge online sessions between Dwan and Townsend, when Dwan surprised everyone with a recent post on TwoPlusTwo, saying: “Long story, but he’s not next. I’ll blog after seshy.” There have been no new entries on Dwan’s blog since April 15. We’ll keep you posted as the story develops. When we return, big changes at Cardrunners and some fantastic news for poker players.
In a stunning announcement on his blog yesterday, Cole “CTS” South revealed that he will no longer be a teacher or stakeholder at Cardrunners, citing personal reasons and life priorities. His post said, in part:
“In the past year I have (…) found myself spread too thin. Leaving CardRunners has been an incredibly tough decision for me, but it will allow me to focus on playing poker and completing my degree.”
South is a junior majoring in economics at Georgetown University in D.C. Cardrunners is set to launch a new version today.
Exactly one year to the day after it was founded, the International Federation of Poker accomplished a major goal yesterday when poker was officially accepted as a “mind sport” by the International Mind Sports Association.
The next step is securing membership of SportAccord, a global organization of a hundred and fifty sports federations, which might help eventually get poker into the Olympic Games. Poker will now join Chess and Bridge as part of IMSA’s World Mind Sports Games, to be held in the UK in two thousand twelve alongside the London Olympics. The IFP will also be launching poker’s first annual World Championships next year.
Thanks for joining me on The Daily Deal by Poker News Daily, brought to you by PokerSource.com. Don’t forget to visit PokerNewsDaily.com and be sure to follow us at Twitter.com/PokerNewsDaily for the latest in poker news. I’m Sean Gibson…have a great poker weekend and may the flop be with you!