Dublin Winter Festival Rocks Green Isle – Irish Poker Tour Keeps on Growing

The Green Isle Hotel once more proved itself to be a magnet for Irish and international poker players as ambitious guarantees were smashed and a great time was had by all.

The festival opened with the €20,000 guaranteed Paddy Power Mystery Bounty. It looked like a big target for Friday lunchtime but 131 entries and 37 re-entries later there was a total prizepool of €38,000. Anthony Gaughan pulled the first €3,000 bounty and a €1,500 but was knocked out in 11th. The second €3,000 bounty was not pulled out all through the FT knockouts until Keith Brennan and Thomas Faulkner were heads up playing with the knowledge that there was a huge benefit in finishing first. Eventually, Tom triumphed and trousered a total of €11,350 with Keith having to settle for €4,050.

Meanwhile, the ME had started and the numbers just grew and grew over the next day and a half until the original guaranteed €100k had ballooned to a startling €195,000 prize pool. Eventually, James O’Sullivan (€39,000) overcame Derek Baker (€35,000) in the heads up after they had reached a deal. Remarkably Derek’s much better half Liz Kelly finished third for €19,000 as part of a great double triumph. The Keith Touhey was next for €13,500 and even fifth place was good enough for a €10k+ cash for Justin George. Not bad for a €300 entry.

Leaderboard Tussles

Despite Paul Carr’s big lead in the Paddy Powered Leaderboard he started to get worried when main rival Darren Harbinson took down the Saturday Omaha sideshow and gained 400 points. Paul entered every dog race thereafter in an attempt to bounce back until he snared second place in the closing 4/5 Omaha. He should be safe enough now especially as Tour Generali Fintan Gavin has finally withdrawn from the contest.

The top 16 will qualify for a massive freeroll at the Tour Final back in the Green Isle at the end of December. Check out the standings on irishpokertour.com your home for all tour news.

Galway Poker Festival

The Galmont Hotel will host the Galway Poker Festival from January 3rd – 7th and 12 lucky players won €1,200 packages at the Winter Festival. Paddy Power Poker is running satellites around the clock up till this great event. Do not miss out.

Winter Festival Packagers
Keith Touhey
Liam McVeigh
Colm Chan
Shyamrag Charuvil
Greg King
Colin Doyle
Emmet Mullin
Sean Towey
Derek Baker
John Murphy
Elizabeth Kelly
Alan Swan