On Friday, the seventh installment of the PokerStars World Championship of Online Poker kicked off on the world’s largest online poker site. The first event was a $215 buy-in tournament that featured six-handed play. The high-octane tournament attracted a whopping 7,217 players, creating a prize pool of over $1.4 million. The event was one of two that was played on Friday night.
At the end of the day, shane147 took home a WCOOP bracelet in Event 1, which is given to the winner of each tournament in the series. The victor also pocketed $212,179, or 1,060 times his buy-in. Rounding out the final table in the tournament were pffwhatever (second for $148,670), SilverSocks (third for $106,089), – DoV – (fourth for $76,500), CURDOG1KCK (fifth for $49,075), and scarface_79 (sixth for $23,686).
The final table of Event 1 was an international spectacle. Players from the United Kingdom, Austria, The Netherlands, France, and the United States made up the top six finishers. In addition, players from Canada finished ninth and tenth, Swedes finished 12th and 13th, and a Greek finished 14th. Other countries represented among those who cashed included Norway, Denmark, Russia, Cyprus, Hungary, Italy, Argentina, Finland, Poland, Australia, and Brazil.
The second event of the 2008 WCOOP was a Pot Limit Five Card Draw tournament that also had six players per table. The event generated 156 entrants, each forking out $215 to enter. As a result, the tournament generated a prize pool of $204,800. American ImBillMcNeal won the unique variety of poker, cashing for $34,201. Fellow Americans wedlowjones and nathalie111 also made the final table of six players. French PokerStars player Isidor3 reached the last six players standing, as did a German, Yamzit, and a Russian, xoxol73. The top five players parlayed their $215 buy-in into over $10,000. The top 156 spots paid out.
On Saturday, two more events kicked off on PokerStars. A $215 buy-in, $300,000 Guaranteed Limit Hold’em tournament generated an actual prize pool of $451,600. There were 2,258 entrants at press time. It’s one of two Limit Hold’em events on the docket in the 2008 WCOOP. Also beginning today were a $215 2-7 Triple Draw event that attracted 734 players at the time of writing. Registrations do not close when the tournament begins.
The highest-stakes tournament that will take place over the weekend is a $10,300 High-Roller No Limit Hold’em event. It’s one of two $10,300 buy-in events on the slate and will be one of the richest tournaments ever offered online. It sets the stage for the Main Event, which features a $5,200 buy-in and a $10 million guaranteed prize pool.
Here is the full slate of events for Sunday:
WCOOP Event 5
14:30 ET
$10,300 High-Roller No Limit Hold’em
$2,000,000 Guaranteed
WCOOP Event 6
16:30 ET
$530 No Limit Hold’em Two-Day Tournament
$3,000,000 Guaranteed
PokerStars just released its fully-downloadable software for Mac computers. Previously, the Mac-compatible version of the online poker room was in beta mode. The new software does not use third-party add-ons and was released on Friday, in time for Event 1 of the WCOOP. Visit PokerStars for the Mac download.