Poker Guru Blog

Have you ever dreamed of becoming an astronaut or had the feeling just to get out of this world (without using drugs)? Well, Virgin has an aswer for you. Virgin, known for having its hands in many industries, such as Virgin Music, Virgin Poker, Virgin Money, Virgin Racing (they have their own car in the F1, the main sponsor being Full Tilt Poker), Virgin Blue Airlines, now embarks on a new exploration into space with Virgin Galactic.

Virgin Galactic has just recently released its first public space shuttle, given the extraordinary space exploration name ’SpaceShipTwo’.

Click here for larger image

Passengers will not only be able to see Earth from a different perspective, but will also experience weightlessness at a cruising speed of 4200 kilometers per hour. The SpaceShipTwo has room for two pilots and a total of 6 passengers.

The MyPokerCard is a prepaid gold MasterCard created by CashPlus specifically for the UK poker player. This new card which requires no credit checks offers applicants an easy way to manage their poker bankroll.

The MyPokerCard also offers its holders complete privacy, with no need to link it to their bank account. Being a prepaid card, card holders can top up their poker account by cash in over 12,500 participating stores located over the UK. The card can also be used for online purchases, paying bills and is the first debit card to be on offer in the UK with purchase protection.

Of course the card can also be used worldwide wherever you see the MasterCard acceptance mark, so it is easy to spend your winnings the next time you are on holiday.

Romain Jerome only needed one month after the eruption of the Icelandic volcano to put his own design into a wristwatch. The Eyjafjallajökull-DNA is a completely absurd piece, the dial and its decorations are made of real ash and rocks retrieved from the erupting volcano and in case you doubt the authenticity of the rocks, a certificate is supplied with each watch sold, ensuring ‘quality’. The hands symbolize airplanes avoiding the lava storm, and as always, there are no numbers to guide us with the time.

With its lava bubble indent and all the harsh and gloomy-looking material, this watch is not a Rolex, rather a monster on steroids. This is where it begs the question: Who the hell is going to buy this?

The 2010 World Series Of Poker is here, and on 20th of June at 16:30 ET, PokerStars will be holding a WSOP Mega Satellite to the Main Event which will give away 200 packages guaranteed. PokerStars is the wold's biggest online poker room, so we can be sure, that this tourney will generate a lot of attention to draw in the fish.

Although Phil Hellmuth certainly dominated the poker world scene from the eighties until the beginning of the 21st century, his popularity these days lacks that of a truly respected poker professional. With the combination of his claims to be the best in the world and his constant childish behavior, he has become increasingly difficult to bear and tolerate.

So when it comes to a chance to see Phil Hellmuth fall flat on his face you can rest assure that there will be no lack of spectators lining-up to poke fun at him. This was the case in a recently non aired episode of the popular PokerStars show ‘The Big Game’.

In the episode which is still waiting to be aired on TV, it shows how the poker amateur Ernest Wiggins (the Loose Cannon) had a lucky strike in his hand to humiliate Phil Hellmuth by crushing him.

The public has spoken and the votes are in for the top nominated players who will take part in the 2010 WSOP Tournament of Champions (TOC). In a recent public announcement the WSOP have released the top 20 vote-getters for 2010.

Lynn Gilmartin from PokerNews announces the 20 nominated players in this video: 

Ziigmund known as a party animal doesn't let his reputation down in the latest Finnish rap videoclip,  which also features Power Poker. The videoclip named Pojat On Poikii featuring Elastinen & Spekti was published yesterday by Rähinä Records and was made by Uniikikki, a well known Finnish rap band. As per usual the rap video features hot girls, fancy cars and a ton of cash.

"The video tells the story of how the guys go out to spend the night with Ziigmund. First it's all champagne and pretty ladies until things finally get out of hand. It's completely over the top with all the hip hop cliches included! It's just a funny story, we're not out to offend anyone," Uniikki explains.

The four and a half minute video was shot at the Burleski Club, in a penthouse and on the night streets of Helsinki.

"We filmed rap-video two weeks ago and Its out now...Its really cool I think and everybody is happy now....Power Poker was producer/sponsor etc etc...Rapper is Uniikki feat.Spekti and Elastinen and Im some fcking host or special guest or some like that..Those guys are top rappers in Finland...Filming was super funny and there it is..its fcking hot....warning for girls dont squirting and get 20 orgasm in a row," says Ziigmund in his latest blog post.

In a recent post, we looked at the arrest by the German police of the thieves and mastermind behind the EPT Berlin robbery. With all suspects now in custody, the trial of four young men has begun yesterday in Berlin State Court. The 31-year old person who was behind the whole operation and masterminded the raid, has been charged separately and is set to go on trial later this year.

The scene of the robbery at EPT Berlin

Three out of the four accused suspects have reportedly broken their silence admitting to their involvement in the crime, but have still not given up the location of the stolen money.

The players that attended a suburban Dallas poker game got more than they expected when a robber bust in resulting in a gun battle leading to the death of two people.

According to Fox 4 and Mesquite Police, the robber (whose identity has not yet been released) broke into the apartment of the 5900 block in Northwest drive just after midnight yesterday. The 35 year old host Tracy Moore was then shot and killed, after getting into a scuffle trying stop the intruder.

It was then another card player Jerome Johnson, fearing for his safety and of the others, pulled out a licensed concealed weapon and shot the robber dead. As of yet no charges have been laid on Jerome and police believe that it was cause for reasonable self-defense. But the case will be reviewed by a grand jury to decide if Jerome will face any charges.

Pokerati, the popular poker blog posted a recent article containing some photos, about personalized number plates from poker players' cars. Of course they all contained poker related terms showing the car owners' love of the game. One of the plates is from Scotty Nguyen's car. I think you can guess which one.

Check out the photos posted on Pokerati.

Sammy Farha  the Lebanon poker professional, is considered one of the best Omaha players of our time. The 51-year-old who now lives in Houston, Texas demonstrated his dominance this week by winning the $10,000 Omaha High-Low Split Eight or Better Championship (Event #25) and taking home his third WSOP Omaha bracelet.

In the final table it came down to a heads-up match between Sammy and James “Flushy” Dempsey. But despite James attempts to outwit Sammy, in the end it was Sammy who was stronger, knocking out James, to take the number one spot and the $488,237 dollar first place prize.

Sammy Farha, the Omaha legend

After being arrested in Chile on 3rd of June 2010, the Dutch poker player didn’t take too long to confess to the murder of the 21-year-old Stephany Flores. With the confession now behind him, Van der Sloot who knows he is likely to receive extensive prison time and is apprehensive about remaining in the Peruvian jail, named Miguel Castro. 

According to a 2009 U.S Department of State Human Rights Report conducted on this prison they found the following:

• This maximum security prison as of last year had 44,800 inmates (2,794 women) locked up in Peru
• Its conditions are described as 'harsh'
• The prison is considered to be overcrowded and have very poor sanitation.
• Epidemic levels of HIV/AIDS and also tuberculosis

The Dutchman, who is terrified of what will happen to him serving his sentence in the Peruvian jail, is now trying to work out a deal with authorities. In the proposition, Van der Sloot has suggested to reveal the body location of Natalee Holloway (who he was also suspected of murdering after her disappearance in 2005) if he can serve the remainder of his sentence in an Aruban jail.

The well anticipated PokerStars Big Game made its debut around US this past Monday on American Fox Sports TV channel. The Big Game is a high stakes cash game show where five professional poker players go up against the so-called 'Loose Cannon'. The Loose Cannon has the opportunity to keep anything he wins above the initial $100k buy-in given.

Week 1 - Episode 1 of The Big Game featured Daniel Negreanu, Phil Hellmuth, Doyle Brunson, Phil Laak and Tony G. The Loose Cannon role was taken by Ernest Wiggins, who is a 35 year-old businessman from Washington, D.C.

For those who are unable to get near a TV or don’t have FOX carrying the “Big Game” no need to worry, you can catch up on all the action on PokerStars.tv. 

It seems that Twitter is one of the main communication interfaces of this year's WSOP, because of its ability to reach so many people for quick status updates. But when Victory Poker pro Dan Bilzerian posted a tweet quoting a line from the box office hit movie Gran Torino, he wasn’t expecting the reaction he received.

In the controversial tweet recently posted by Bilzerian, he quoted the line used by Clint Eastwood saying, “A Mexican, a Jew and a colored fellow walk into a bar… The bartender looks up and says… Get the **** out of here”. Unaware to Bilzerian his quote wasn’t taken that light-hearted by many. This was especially the case for the poker reporter Joy Miller, who expressed her outrage to Bilzerian in a hostel way.

Dan Bilzerian's later posted about the situation in a thread on the TwoPlusTwo Forum:
“She told the CEO from victory poker that neither myself or any of the 20 sponsored pros would get any ESPN coverage until I gave a formal apology. I explained to her that it was a quote from a movie. She flipped out and started swearing and screaming at me about using the word colored. She sent me a bunch of angry texts, yelled at the CEO, and you can hear the voicemail she left swearing and yelling at me in the link below. I explained to her that the NAACP stands for the National Association for Advancement of Colored People, and if had a problem with the use of the world colored, she should seek an apology from them as well.”

Joy Miller claimes to work for ESPN, but sources close to ESPN denied her claims.

YouTube was then used to publicizes the message Dan received from Joy on his phone: “I don’t give a **** if the quote was from a movie. I asked you to apologize because you said ‘colored’ and I just don’t get what you don’t get about that. I don’t even want an apology anymore. Good luck to you.”

Annette Obrestad is causing quite a commotion with her early comments made in a recent interview with ESPN. The 21 year old Norwegian poker pro raised eyebrows when she made the controversial comments that “Girls Suck at Poker” and furthermore went on to attack Doyle Brunson by saying all Doyle Brunson has is a huge ego and that she would easily outwit him.

Doyle Brunson, the 76 year old poker legend

Not been intimidated by Annette, the 76 year old poker legend has struck back at the remarks, in a witty form, owning Annette on his Twitter page just recently. In response to the remarks Brunson tweeted the following: “Must be a bad tme of the month for Annette whats her name. By the way, I’m at Bobby’s Room almost every day if she really wants to play.” Brunson being a gentleman he is, also quickly responded to his rather crude comment, apologizing “to women everywhere about ‘time of the month’ comment".

Considering Brunson has 50 years more experience behind him, I think Annette is kidding herself if she really thinks she is a better player. Furthermore I believe this is more of a publicity stunt just to get her name out there.