Fish and Chips: 2009 World Series of Poker Europe Kicks Off in London

Just moments from now, the World Series of Poker Europe gets underway over in London, with the first of four bracelet events beginning at Empire Casino in Leicester Square. They’ve stretched out the mini-series to last over a couple of weeks, with each subsequent bracelet event beginning only on the final day of the previous one.

Here’s the complete schedule (all events start at noon):

Event No. 1: Friday, Sept. 18th
No-Limit Hold’em
(£1,000 + £75), 4-day event

Event No. 2: Monday, Sept. 21st
Pot-Limit Hold’em/Pot-Limit Omaha
(£2,500 + £150), 3-day event

Event No. 3: Wednesday, Sept. 23rd
Pot-Limit Omaha
(£5,000 + £150), 3-day event

Event No. 4: Friday, September 25th
Main Event, No-Limit Texas Hold’em
(£10,000 + £350), 6-day event

You can find the daily schedule as well as structure sheets and other info about WSOPE over at Betfair. And PokerNews will be there, too, live blogging all four events. Not sure who all is at the helm, but I do see Snoopy has written the intro post for the first event. I’m gonna guess the ever witty Danafish is there, too. (And maybe Homer? Also, ever witty.)

I understand ESPN will be producing 10 hours of coverage from the WSOPE as well, so there will be a lot of chronclin’ goin’ on at the Empire over the next couple of weeks.

This marks the third year for WSOPE. So far seven WSOPE bracelets have been awarded, the most notable, of course, being the one claimed by Annette Obrestad in the 2007 Main Event. Obrestad turns 21 today, by the way, so expect to see her in Vegas next summer.

The first two years of the WSOPE featured H.O.R.S.E. events, but that has been dropped in favor of that PLH/PLO mixed event this year. Both years the H.O.R.S.E. drew only a little over a hundred entrants -- the smallest field each year -- so that probably figured into the decision to drop the event.

Will be curious to see how the numbers go for all four events this time around in London. Again, the European Poker Tour has arranged its London stop to follow the WSOPE (running Oct. 2nd-7th), so a lot of pros will be spending the next few weeks there hanging out by the Thames.

Last year there were 410 runners for that initial lower buy-in NLHE event -- the biggest field ever for a WSOPE event. Interestingly, both in 2007 and 2008 there were exactly the same number of entrants for the £5,000 PLO event (165) and the same number entering the £10,000 Main Event (362). (The British pound is currently worth about $1.63, by the way, so we’re talking a $16K-plus buy-in for that Main Event.)

I’ll be distracted somewhat this weekend helping cover the World Championship of Online Poker Main Event over on PokerStars, a two-day, $5000 + $200 buy-in NLHE event that begins on Sunday. Will be doing some live blogging for that one, so check it out over at the PokerStars blog. In between, though, I’ll be looking in over at PokerNews to see what’s happening in London town.

Have a good weekend, all.