August 28 2011, Marc Convey

The tournament room at the PokerStars.com European Poker Tour Barcelona was full Sunday because 465 players turned up with the hope of scooping the whopping “850,000 first-place prize. The field totaled out at 811 players, creating a prize pool of “4,055,000. The man at the top of the chip counts is Guillaume Darcourt, who bagged up 195,300 chips and will lead the field coming back for Day 2.

Darcourt amassed his stack by running a huge multi-street bluff with on a board. His river shove finally got his opponent off his hand. The Frenchman showed and then utilized this image to build his stack all the way to the end of the day. He has a history of using a big stack well, including his 35th place finish at this year’s WSOP Main Event and a WPT title are.

He’ll have to be on top of his game though because the chasing pack from today’s field has formidable talent including Eugene Katchalov (153,100), Leo Fernadez (148,600) Vytautas Milvydas (172,400) Marvin Rettenmaier (114,200), Matthias De Meulder (110,000) and James Mitchell (84,000).

Those remaining from Team PokerStars Pro, apart from the three above, are Ivan Demidov (36,600), Jason Mercier (25,500), Arnaud Mattern (21,400) and Victor Ramdin (21,400). And we can’t forget Team PokerStars SportStar Boris Becker who seemed to have a very enjoyable knockabout with Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier en route to building a 47,500 stack.

The talent on show Sunday confirmed what we thought Saturday; EPT Season 8 is well and truly alive and kicking. Those who came but failed to progress included: Chris Moneymaker (coolered), John Duthie (queens never good), Viktor Blom (sophisticated bluff fail), Roberto Romanello (stuck in the blocks), Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier (Beckered), Daniel Negreanu (missed the world) and Liv Boeree (three-outered). The list goes on. The omens for the live tournament scene in Europe this coming year look very good indeed.

The remaining 228 players will combine with the 179 survivors from Day 1a, meaning 407 players will return at 1200 CEST (0300 PDT). Only 120 on those will walk away with a payday. The min-cash will net them “8,000 and if you make the final table the money starts at “73,000 and rapidly increases in ever bigger jumps. Of course there is always the chance for stardom as well tomorrow since the TV set is built and ready to go for the feature table that will be in action until the sweet end of the tournament on Thursday.

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August 28 2011, Barry Carter

Time is running out to reap the rewards of the PokerStars VIP Club Mega Month. All of August, players have been able to leapfrog the VIP rankings as PokerStars has reduced the qualification requirements by 90 percent.

You can fast track your way to Platinum Star VIP for just 750 VPPs in August, rather than the usual 7,500 required. You can also get to Gold Star for 300 instead of 3,000, and Silver Star for 75 points instead of 750.

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To give you an idea of just how generous this promotion is, a 6-max $1/$2 limit player can get to SilverStar in just two hours of play, and if the same player can get 20 hours in before the end of August, they will reach Platinum Star (And you can reduce those hours significantly if you play more than one table at a time).

Likewise, if you play in the Sunday Million, Sunday Warm-Up, or any other $215 Sunday Major today, you will automatically hit SilverStar. The same can be said if you play in a $215 WCOOP STEP 4 tournament, and even better, if you qualify for a STEP 5 and play it in August, you will automatically make Gold Star.

Here’s what Daniel Negreanu has to say about the PokerStars VIP Club Mega Month:

“It’s taken me over ten years to become a VIP in the poker world, but this month at PokerStars, you can build BronzeStar, SilverStar and GoldStar VIP Status ten times faster than normal – which is huge and has never been done before! Obviously this also means 50 percent more FPPs – save to get a treat from the VIP Store offering anything from a PokerStars T-shirt to a Porsche Cayman S. If you are going to be playing WCOOP this September – don’t forget, the satellites are happening now so this is the perfect time to qualify!”

If you sign up to PokerStars through PokerNews, not only can you participate in this promotion, you can also qualify for any future exclusive promotions we have with PokerStars (The value of which has been in the hundreds of thousands over the last few years), and a 100% up to $600 first deposit bonus. Don’t forget to use marketing code “POKERNEWS.COM.”

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