It’s getting to be that time of year again. Coming May 30, it’s time to start the search for the next Chris Moneymaker and begin the 2008 World Series of Poker!.
But just as Christmas isn’t the only holiday in December, the WSOP isn’t the only major series of poker tournaments coming up. The Eighth Full Tilt Online Poker Series (FTOPS VIII) gets under way May 7th at 7:00 PM EST with the $200+$16 NL Hold’em 6-Max hosted by superstar player John Juanda. The $750K guaranteed MTT is the first in a series of 24 events culminating in the May 18th $2,000,000 guaranteed Main Event hosted by Jennifer Harman.
FTOPS VII Main Event champion, Reverse, outlasted poker pro Thomas Wahlroos heads up to claim the $456,401.66 top prize. Other poker stars such as Ram Vaswani, Erick Lindgren, Brad Booth and Scott Fischman all finished in the money in one or more of last year’s 20 events.
New to this FTOPS is the May 17th $2,500 + $120 two-day NL Hold’em designed to attract additional top pros and the three mystery tournaments, for which no information will be provided by Full Tilt until a short time before the start of each. These three mystery tournaments are spread out over the course of the 12 day series and prove to be a unique addition to this eighth edition of the FTOPS. The first mystery tourney is scheduled to begin on May 8th at 7:00 PM EST and will be hosted by David “The Dragon” Pham. The second is scheduled for Sunday, May 11th at 2:00 PM EST and will be hosted by Paul Wasicka. The third and final mystery tourney will begin on Thursday, May 15th at 2:00 PM EST to be hosted by Markus Golser.
Players who make the final table in any FTOPS event will receive a limited edition Full Tilt Jacket in addition to the prize money. The 24 players who manage to come out on top of any tournament this year will not only win the top prize money, the limited edition jacket but also a gold FTOPS jersey, a coveted gold jersey avatar for use on Full Tilt Poker and an entry into the FTOPS Season II Tournament of Champions.
FTOPS VIII also features a unique “Bouncebackability” Freeroll where any player who finishes on the bubble in a tournament (the last player eliminated before the money) will gain access to an exclusive freeroll for an entry into the next FTOPS Main Event.
Satellite tournaments have been underway since April 7th and will continue all the way up until the day of the Main Event, May 18th. Players who win multiple satellites will be included in the FTOPS VIII Satellite Challenge whose official rules state:
The player(s) who win the most entries into each individual event will be credited with a T$ amount equal to twice the buy-in of that specific tournament. For example, if a player wins five entries into our FTOPS VIII Main Event, they will receive a tournament buy-in and $535 in Tournament Dollars (T$) for each of their other satellite wins, along with an additional $1,000 in T$ as the winner of the satellite challenge. The player who finishes second will be credited with a T$ amount equal to the buy-in of that specific tournament.
