f you’re looking to play poker in Europe these days, you are in luck. More online casino and poker rooms are popping up throughout Europe than ever before, and in many countries, even if you don’t have access to a live card room, you can still go online for poker action right in your own home. If you’re willing to do a little traveling around Europe, you can also benefit from the tournaments offered on the European Poker Tour.
How the European Poker Tour Began
The European Poker Tour started in 2004 when PokerStars decided they wanted their own tournament series to rival the World Poker Tour. The advantage PokerStars had is that they could offer exclusive satellite tournaments online to every event. The EPT started out with six tournaments, in Barcelona, London, Dublin, Copenhagen, Deauville, Vienna and Monte Carlo. The Grand Final in Monte Carlo gathered 211 entries and paid 635,000 Euros to the winner, Rob Hollink of the Netherlands.
The Growth of the European Poker Tour
Since then, the European Poker Tour has exploded and become wildly successful. While the first season of the EPT collected 1468 players and a total prize pool of nearly five million Euros, the recently completed Season Five collected 7,901 players from an incredible 97 countries and gave away a staggering 54,940,712 Euros. The biggest prize of all went to Poorya Nazari, who won the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure to the tune of three million dollars. The Caribbean is not actually in Europe, but is part of the tour as the oldest PokerStars event. The biggest winner on the continent was the Grand Final winner Pieter de Korver, who collected 2.3 million Euros for his Monte Carlo win.
Benefits to the European Poker Tour
What’s nice about the EPT is that while Europeans are encouraged to play, you don’t have to be European to do so. In Season Five, PokerStars sent over 3,000 players to EPT tournaments throughout Europe, meaning there was plenty of poker action all over Europe even when the major tournaments weren’t running. Thanks to the EPT, poker is going strong all across the European continent and if you want to know more about this Poker activity in Europe you can try and visit some top uk casinos online to have a very good idea on this matter.