For those of you that are not close to Las Vegas and can’t afford the trip to Nevada and the minimum $1,500 buy-ins for the World Series of Poker tournament schedule, there’s good news for you. In 2005 Harrah’s unveiled a brand new series of events, the WSOP Circuit Events, and the schedule has grown to its largest in 2009. These events appear at many of the Indian or Harrah’s casinos around the country including:
- Horseshoe Southern Indiana (completed)
- Horseshoe Hammond Indiana (completed)
- Harvey’s Lake Tahoe (completed)
- Harrah’s Atlantic City (completed)
- Harrah’s Tunica (completed)
- Horseshoe Council Bluffs (completed)
- Caesars Atlantic City (completed)
- Harrah’s Rincon San Diego (completed)
- Caesars Palace Las Vegas (April 11 – April 29)
- Harrah’s New Orleans (May 08 – May 20)
For many on the East Coast the Atlantic City events represent a fantastic opportunity to take down a WSOP event. The circuit event at Harrah’s Rincon in San Diego is one of the more popular circuit events due to San Diego’s large county population of 2+ million citizens, as well as drawing players from both Los Angeles and Orange Counties (another 11+ million people). Since San Diego is a popular tourist destination some of the biggest names will be out during the March 19th-29th event series.
Those unfamiliar with the events will find the buy-ins and structure of the events to be highly attractive towards better play rather than the “push ‘n’ pray” structure that a lot of local casinos invent for tournament players. Event types include the following:
- No Limit Hold’em
- Limit Hold’em
- 6 Handed No Limit Hold’em
- Pot Limit Hold’em
- Omaha Hi/Lo
- Stud Hi/Lo
- Pot Limit Omaha w/ Rebuys
- H.O.R.S.E.
- Ladies No Limit Hold’em
- No Limit Hold’em w/ Rebuys
- No Limit Hold’em Circuit Championship Event
The event buy-ins range from $125 all the way to the $5,150 Circuit Championship Event. Most of the No Limit Hold’em tournaments have buy-ins for either $200+30 or $300+40 making them affordable to everyday poker players amid this economic climate. On top of this affordable buy-in price list, the tournament structure has drawn rave reviews from poker industry analysts and players alike.
“I couldn’t be happier with the tournament schedule and structures,” commented Southern California live game tournament player Melissa Peterkin. “I’m definitely making it out to Rincon for the circuit series and will probably try to schedule a trip to Vegas for the event at Caesars too.”
Specifically the tournament structure at the Rincon San Diego events look like they are set up to allow better play to win out over mathematically correct shoves to fight steep blinds:
- For events starting at noon, players are given $10,000 in starting chips. Blinds start at 25-50 and increase every 40 minutes.
- Blinds increase to: 25-50, 50-100, 100-200, 100-200 (25 ante), 150-300 (25 ante), 200-400 (50 ante), and so on through the tournament.
- Breaks are given after every 3 blind levels for 10 minutes, and the tournament director has the option of awarding a dinner break and his or her discretion.
The big event of the series is the Circuit Championship Event which usually draws out some of poker’s top and most recognizable professionals. This event is structured differently than the others:
- Buy-in is $5,000 + $150
- Players start with $20,000 in starting chips
- Each level will last 60 minutes
- Blind interval structure remains the same as other tournaments
- First day of play will end when down to 27 players remaining
- Second day of play will end when final table is determined
- Third day of play will end when winner is determined
- The first place finisher will receive a buy-in to the World Series of Poker Main Event and $1,000 in expense money in addition to the first place money.
Often casinos participating in the circuit events hold Mega Satellite tournaments to the Circuit Championship Event a day or two before the event takes place. Satellite times typically start at noon, 3pm, 8pm and 9pm and should be inquired about with the tournament director of the casino.
“Typically we do see some big names come to our Circuit Championship tournament. This year we’ve added some of the lower tiered tournaments to make sure poker players of all budgets can make it out for our event,” commented Harrah’s spokesperson Nolan Dalla.