Card Rush is a very simple promotion. For every 15 Party Points a player earns, PartyPoker will award one Card Rush card. Players can then check their accounts to “scratch off” the cards to reveal their prizes. Every card will award some sort of prize. Players can collect up to 50 cards per day, though if that maximum is not reached, any Party Points earned towards the next card will carry over to the next day.

Each Card Rush card will contain one of the following prizes:

Party Points – 10, 20, 50, 100, 150, 250, 750, 5,000, or 25,000
Cash – $1, $2, $3, $5, $10, $50, $250, or $5,000
Freeroll Entry – $2,000 (prize pool), $3,000, $5,000, $7,500, $10,000, $15,000, or $20,000
Card Rush Race Points – 1, 3, 5, 10, or 20

The Card Rush Race Points listed above can only be earned via Card Rush cards. Every point collected will count towards the Card Rush Race leader board standings, where players can win more cash prizes. The player who finishes the promotion with the most points will bank $9,000.  The top ten finishers will all win four-figure amounts, on down to $100 for 151st through 200th place. Additionally, the players who finish in every 20th place from 220th through 2000th, called “hot spots,” will win $50.

The freeroll schedule is as follows:

$2,000 Card Rush Freeroll – March 2nd at 13:00 ET
$3,000 Card Rush Freeroll – March 4th at 13:00 ET
$5,000 Card Rush Freeroll – March 3rd at 13:00 ET
$7,500 Card Rush Freeroll – March 5th at 14:30 ET
$10,000 Card Rush Freeroll – March 3rd at 14:30 ET
$15,000 Card Rush Freeroll – March 2nd at 14:30 ET
$20,000 Card Rush Freeroll – March 4th at 13:00 ET

Unfortunately, if a player wins multiple entries to the same freeroll, no substitute prize will be awarded in place of the extra seats.

As already noted, the Card Rush promotion will run through the end of February, though it is limited to 1.8 million prize cards, so it could end earlier. Additionally, as a small bonus, PartyPoker will award every player their first card after only 5 Party Points, rather than 15.

PartyPoker just completed its January promotion, the VIP Rake Race, exclusive to Palladium and Palladium Elite players. Thousands of dollars in cash prizes were awarded to the top Party Points earners in each loyalty group every week of the month.

PartyPoker is currently ranked as the second largest online poker room in the world in terms of cash game traffic, according to PokerScout.com. It sits in the middle of the clear top three, way behind PokerStars, which has a seven day average of 26,000 cash game players, and the iPoker Network, with 4,000. PartyPoker is just ahead of iPoker with 4,550 cash game players.

Card Rush is a very simple promotion. For every 15 Party Points a player earns, PartyPoker will award one Card Rush card. Players can then check their accounts to “scratch off” the cards to reveal their prizes. Every card will award some sort of prize. Players can collect up to 50 cards per day, though if that maximum is not reached, any Party Points earned towards the next card will carry over to the next day.

Each Card Rush card will contain one of the following prizes:

Party Points – 10, 20, 50, 100, 150, 250, 750, 5,000, or 25,000
Cash – $1, $2, $3, $5, $10, $50, $250, or $5,000
Freeroll Entry – $2,000 (prize pool), $3,000, $5,000, $7,500, $10,000, $15,000, or $20,000
Card Rush Race Points – 1, 3, 5, 10, or 20

The Card Rush Race Points listed above can only be earned via Card Rush cards. Every point collected will count towards the Card Rush Race leader board standings, where players can win more cash prizes. The player who finishes the promotion with the most points will bank $9,000.  The top ten finishers will all win four-figure amounts, on down to $100 for 151st through 200th place. Additionally, the players who finish in every 20th place from 220th through 2000th, called “hot spots,” will win $50.

The freeroll schedule is as follows:

$2,000 Card Rush Freeroll – March 2nd at 13:00 ET
$3,000 Card Rush Freeroll – March 4th at 13:00 ET
$5,000 Card Rush Freeroll – March 3rd at 13:00 ET
$7,500 Card Rush Freeroll – March 5th at 14:30 ET
$10,000 Card Rush Freeroll – March 3rd at 14:30 ET
$15,000 Card Rush Freeroll – March 2nd at 14:30 ET
$20,000 Card Rush Freeroll – March 4th at 13:00 ET

Unfortunately, if a player wins multiple entries to the same freeroll, no substitute prize will be awarded in place of the extra seats.

As already noted, the Card Rush promotion will run through the end of February, though it is limited to 1.8 million prize cards, so it could end earlier. Additionally, as a small bonus, PartyPoker will award every player their first card after only 5 Party Points, rather than 15.

PartyPoker just completed its January promotion, the VIP Rake Race, exclusive to Palladium and Palladium Elite players. Thousands of dollars in cash prizes were awarded to the top Party Points earners in each loyalty group every week of the month.

PartyPoker is currently ranked as the second largest online poker room in the world in terms of cash game traffic, according to PokerScout.com. It sits in the middle of the clear top three, way behind PokerStars, which has a seven day average of 26,000 cash game players, and the iPoker Network, with 4,000. PartyPoker is just ahead of iPoker with 4,550 cash game players.

LONDON, January 13, 2012 — Popular European poker site Everest Poker is counting down the hours to its last online Direct Entry for the Pokerstars.com EPT Deauville on January 16 at 19:00 GMT. Now is the last chance to win a seat in Europe’s premier poker tournament that features a predicted prize pool of well over €4,000,000. The tournament in Deauville will be played from January 31st to February 6th. This is the last shot at the big time!
Everest Poker is giving away $10,000 prize packages that include $7,500 towards the tournament buy-in and $2,500 cash to cover travel and related expenses for two people.* It has never been easier to get a seat at a truly world-class poker tournament.

Last chance to qualify online
For a buy-in of just $215 players get a shot to play for millions in Deauville. In the final Deauville Direct Entry $10,000 are guaranteed!

Deauville 2012 Direct Entry
- Monday, January 16 at 19:00 GMT
- In the LIVE tab of the scheduled tournaments section on EverestPoker.com

*The exact amount is subject to conversion rate.

More Info: http://www.everestpoker.com/en/promotions/live/deauville2012

LONDON, January 13, 2012 — Popular European poker site Everest Poker is counting down the hours to its last online Direct Entry for the Pokerstars.com EPT Deauville on January 16 at 19:00 GMT. Now is the last chance to win a seat in Europe’s premier poker tournament that features a predicted prize pool of well over €4,000,000. The tournament in Deauville will be played from January 31st to February 6th. This is the last shot at the big time!
Everest Poker is giving away $10,000 prize packages that include $7,500 towards the tournament buy-in and $2,500 cash to cover travel and related expenses for two people.* It has never been easier to get a seat at a truly world-class poker tournament.

Last chance to qualify online
For a buy-in of just $215 players get a shot to play for millions in Deauville. In the final Deauville Direct Entry $10,000 are guaranteed!

Deauville 2012 Direct Entry
- Monday, January 16 at 19:00 GMT
- In the LIVE tab of the scheduled tournaments section on EverestPoker.com

*The exact amount is subject to conversion rate.

More Info: http://www.everestpoker.com/en/promotions/live/deauville2012

And with the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure in full swing in the Bahamas, many of the biggest names in the game were taking time off from live poker to play online from the Atlantis Hotel and Casino.

Shemandez Wins Sunday Million

The Sunday Million’s second incarnation of 2012 attracted 7,710 players. That’s up 5 percent from one week before and helped generate a total prize pool of $1,542,000.

According to the official payouts $231,300 was earmarked for the winner but thanks to a three-way deal, eventual champion shemandez from Russia took home $178,192.

When the deal was struck Mackkapackka of Australia was chip leader and took the biggest part of the deal, good for $178,079. The players left $20,000 on the table which ended up in shemandez’s pocket at game’s end with $160,298 going to third-place finisher dave798111, also from Australia.

Check out the full final table payouts from this week’s Sunday Million:

* reflects the results of a three-way deal with $20,000 left on the table for first

Three-Way Deal Decides Sunday Warm-Up

Adam "Roothlus" Levy almost made the final table of this week's Sunday Warm-Up.

 

Just like yesterday’s Sunday Million, the $215 buy-in Sunday warm-up was eventually decided by a three-way chop.

BAGSBAGSBAGSBAGS of Switzerland took the lion’s share of that deal, pocketing $91,043 and defeating crazylandd from Russia heads-up.

American pro Adam “Roothlus” Levy just missed the final table, finishing 11th for what must have been a disappointing $4,342.

Here are the full final table payouts for the Sunday Warm-Up, adjusted to reflect the three-way deal:

Russia Takes Sunday 500

768 players coughed up the $530 buy-in to build a $384,000 prize pool in this week’s Sunday 500 on PokerStars.

After almost exactly 11 hours it was Russian player 3max alone in the winner’s circle with $69,120 to show for his effort. He defeated Guezmere of Israel heads-up who received $49,920.

Former MMA fighter and pro poker player Rami “arbianight” Boukai finished sixth for $15,513.

Here are the full final table payouts for this week’s Sunday 500:

Read on for the highlights in this week’s edition of the Sunday Scoop.

PokerStars Sunday Million ($1M Gtd)

The Sunday Million on PokerStars broke its guarantee again this week with 7,296 players kicking in their $215 buy-in for a shot at the more than $218,000 first-place prize.

In the end the biggest payouts were decided by a deal, whereby the final seven players chopped up the prize money and left $20,000 on the table for the eventual winner.

Well-known online pro and recent addition to Team PokerStars Online Shane “Shaniac” Schleger pocketed $84,000 and finished seventh, while Ifold2ndnuts from the Netherlands went on to win and take home $116,104.

The biggest take went to FMorbiducci of Chile who earned $147,602 and ended up finishing second.

Here are the full final table payouts adjusted to reflect the seven-way deal:

*Numbers based on a seven-way chop agreement

PokerStars Sunday Warm-Up ($500k Gtd)

3,100 players were able to rouse themselves early enough to participate in this week’s $215 Warm-Up, building a $620,000 prize pool and putting $97,340 on the table for first .

After roughly ten hours of play the UK’s jenbizzle came out on top, defeating lehai80 from Russia heads-up, who received $72,540 for second.

Making deep runs but falling short of the final table were a few familiar names. Bryn Kenney cruised to 13th before going broke, and Juan Antonio Maceiras “vietcong01” Barros, who won a Sunday Million in 2010, finished 14th.

Bryn Kenney narrowly missed the Warm-Up's final table this week.

 

Team PokerStars Pro Johnny Lodden was eliminated in 23rd when he open-shoved J♥ T♥ and got snapped off by Bryn Kenney who picked up pocket kings.

Here are the full final table results:

PokerStars Sunday 500 ($250k Gtd)

This week’s $530 buy-in Sunday major attracted 712 players and broke its guarantee with a $356,000 prize pool.

dsnka of the Czech Republic emerged victorious, pocketing $51,443 as part of a three-way deal with elitelive who was playing from Barbados, and WushuTM of Austria.

dsnka’s real identity is not known to us but this player has been extremely active on all major sites, also playing under the name LuckyDuy and earning just under $1 million according to PocketFives.

Just a few weeks ago he finished third in the PokerStars Sunday Warm-Up for $60,720.

Just missing out on this final table was Team PokerStars Online pro Mickey “mement_mori” Petersen who finished tenth.

Here are the full final table results adjusted to reflect the three-way deal:

Bottom line, all money paid by the players will go directly to the prize pool and every single MTT at all stakes will be part of the promotion.

The promotion starts exactly on the stroke of midnight on New Year’s Day and will run for the entire month of January.

Party Poker is currently neck-and-neck with the iPoker Network for the second-highest traffic in the online poker world.

Peaking at around 4,200 players at the cash-game tables per day on average, Party Poker has seen about a 6% increase in traffic month-on-month since November.

For more details on the new Party Poker software and to access our exclusive Party Poker sign-up code, visit the Party Poker review.

The tour came out of the gate at a gallop when 3,001 players bought into this season’s first event, a $350 re-buy tournament that built a staggering $873,291 prize pool. Wisconsin native Aaron Bieck earned $124,438 for taking down that event.

And bigger fields mean stiffer competition for the WSOP Circuit National Championship seats that are awarded at each tour stop. Seats go to the winner of each stop’s main event, as well as the player who accumulates the most points throughout the stop’s 12 gold ring events.

The National Championship is a televised tournament that will feature a $1 million prize pool and will award an official WSOP gold bracelet to the winner. Last season’s Championship was won by Sam Barnhardt who earned $300,000 for the victory.

Also heating up is this year’s WSOP Circuit Player of the Year race. Last season’s POY Mark “Pegasus” Smith is looking to go back-to-back and currently sits second in the race to David Nicholson, a poker pro from Biloxi, Mississippi.

Mark Smith holds the record for the most WSOPC gold rings at five.

The WSOP Circuit will kick off the New Year in California at LA’s famous Bicycle Casino, the first time the tour has ever visited that venue. From there the tour heads to the Midwest and will touch down at the Choctaw Casino in Durant, Oklahoma for the second consecutive year.

Keep an eye on PokerListings.com’s Poker News section for updates from the 2011-2012 WSOP Circuit.

Photo credit: Erik Harkins, IMPDI

We would say that this is unprecedented, but we said that in July when PartyPoker ran a similar promotion during the summer.  The poker room did not offer up many details this time, simply saying, “…100% of your money will go straight into the prize pool, with no fees to pay across the whole multi-table tournament schedule. Play for more cash, at no extra cost.”

This summer, PartyPoker used different methods for erasing tournament fees based on the buy-in.  Tournaments with buy-ins greater than $6 had their fees dropped.  For example, a $20 + $2 tournament turned into a $20 + $0 tournament.  The prize pools were the same; players simply got to play for free.  In tournaments with buy-ins under $6, the fees were rolled into the buy-in.  A $5 + $0.50 tournament, for example, morphed into a $5.50 + $0 tournament.  Thus, the overall price remained constant but the prize pool was increased.

Let’s look at the example we used back in July to see how this would affect the prize payouts:

Before the promotion, a 1,000 player $5 + $0.50 tournament would have a $5,000 prize pool (1,000 players times $5).  According to PartyPoker’s payout schedule, first place in a tournament of this size wins 23.5 percent of the prize pool, or $1,175, while second place would receive 13 percent, or $650.  Now, because the tournament is $5.50 + $0, the prize pool grows to $5,500 without any more money coming out of the players’ pockets.  As such, the first and second prizes will now be $1,292.50 and $715, respectively.  Essentially, PartyPoker has added extra money to the prize pool.

Of course, for tournaments with buy-ins greater than $6, the prize pool and payouts remain unchanged since the tournament fee is just removed, rather than added to the buy-in.

PartyPoker has been in a heated battle with the iPoker Network for the title of second largest online poker room or network in the world for several years now (it was actually a battle for third before Full Tilt Poker went under).  As it stands currently, online poker traffic monitoring site PokerScout.com lists iPoker in second place with an average of 3,850 cash game players over the past seven days.  PartyPoker is nipping on iPoker’s heels with 3,800 players.

While an increase in multi-table tournament players will not directly affect those rankings, since they are for cash games, they may boost PartyPoker’s numbers indirectly as players come for the tournaments and stay online to try the cash games.

PartyPoker has not posted anything about how January’s rake free tournaments will affect how players earn PartyPoints, but it is probably safe to assume that since there will be no fees, there will be no PartyPoints.