On Thursday, December 11th at 2:00pm, the Palace Station Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas will host a charity seminar benefiting the Adopt-A-Rescue-Pet non-profit volunteer organization. The $150 seminar is being hosted by one of the top poker minds and authors in the world, David Sklansky. The poker personality wrote the hallmark poker book “Theory of Poker,” which can be found on the bookshelves of many players.
The Theory of Poker was published in 1994 and includes an overview of “theories and concepts” for Five Card Draw, Seven Card Stud, Texas Hold’em, Lowball Draw, and Razz, according to Amazon.com. On that site, the book retails for $19.77 and has well over 100 comments in total from satisfied poker players. Sklansky is the owner of three World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelets, the first of which came when he took down a Mixed Doubles Limit Seven Card Stud event in 1982. The win in the $800 buy-in tournament earned him $8,800. His partner in that event was Dani Kelly.
Sklansky took down a $1,000 buy-in Limit Draw High tournament, also in 1982, for $15,500. The next year, he took down his final bracelet in a $1,000 Limit Omaha tournament for $25,500. He had two cashes during the 2008 WSOP, one in Stud and one in Triple Draw. He is as well-respected and well-recognized as it gets in the poker world. Terri Evanowski, the charity tournament’s organizer, told Poker News Daily, “I knew David Sklansky would draw a lot of people.”
Evanowski expects Sklansky to “play it by ear” in terms of content, but added that he would talk about whatever attendees wanted to discuss. Also appearing at the Palace Station Hotel and Casino is Lee Markholt, who won the World Poker Tour’s (WPT) Season VI World Poker Challenge, which took place in March. He banked nearly $500,000 for his efforts in that tournament. At that final table were David “The Dragon” Pham and Bryan Devonshire. Markholt’s poker resume also includes a win on the Professional Poker Tour.
Another guest speaker at the Adopt-A-Rescue-Pet fundraiser will be PokerStars sponsored pro Vanessa Rousso, who goes by the name “Lady Maverick” online. She finished second in the site’s World Championship of Online Poker (WCOOP) Main Event for over $700,000. The year before, she finished seventh in the WPT’s World Championship, held annually at the Bellagio in April, for $263,625.
Evanowski commented on what speakers will be discussing at the seminar: “Barry Tanenbaum will speak about Limit poker. Mark Gregorich is going to do Omaha. Markholt is going to discuss the differences between cash games and tournaments and how to switch off between the two.” The final two members of the speaking crew at the Sklansky-headlined event are Roy “The Oracle” Winston and Mark Newhouse.
Adopt-A-Rescue-Pet was founded in 1999. The organization strives to rescue animals from kill shelters and “assist rescuers of animals with needed funds to cover medical, boarding, care, and needs of animals which would otherwise be euthanized for lack of service available to them.” Evanowski stated that the shelter the organization targets claims that it is “low-kill.” However, she warned that the shelter is actually higher-kill and “euthanizes a pet every day.” Information is available on the website for anyone interested in adopting a pet from the Las Vegas-based organization. Adopt-A-Rescue-Pet has saved more than 4,000 dogs over the past two years.
Evanowski said she is hoping for 200 players in attendance. The seminar, which is scheduled to take place in the Traxx Lounge, is expected to last three hours. For more information, interested parties can call (702) 635-6703 to register for the event. Evanowski has three dogs of her own from the rescue shelter out of four in total.
