By James Potter

One of the great things about the all APPT events is the hospitality on offer. Season 2 has followed the lofty heights set by Season 1 when it comes to the Opening Party. They are never quiet affairs and they are not reserved for the VIPs – it’s a great opportunity for all the local and overseas PokerStars Qualifiers to run shoulders with their heroes (and soon-to-be foes).

The PokerStars.net APPT SKYCITY Auckland Festival of Poker is already a success, and earlier today the SkyCity Poker room broke a New Zealand record, with 18 full tables of players seated at the start of the $550 Pot Limit Omaha event – the largest official poker gathering to date. The event began this evening at 6.15pm local time, and with the party starting at 9pm it was easy to spot the dejected faces of the recently busted slipping quietly into the party.

Bar 3, situated right next to the SKYCITY Poker room, was the venue for tonight’s party and everyone turned out to play. Some of the big names, such as Team PokerStars Pros Greg Raymer and Lee Nelson, and PokerStars Sponsored player Tony Hachem rolled straight off the plane into the function. It is always great to see the local players getting to meet the pros that they have watched on television over the years.

Local influence found its way into every corner of the party, with a strong Polynesian theme being celebrated. While new arrivals to the party were lei-ed as they walked through the doors, local band Karamol, self professed “young cats with old souls”, played what they described as “Polynesian inspired R’n'B and Soul”.

Adding to the warmth of the reception on arrival was a Pacific Welcome Cocktail for each guest. For the budding bartenders amongst you, this was a mix of vodka, Malibu, pineapple juice, passionfruit pulp and mixed tropical fruits. Of course I selflessly offered my services in sampling one of these, all in the name of accurate reporting.

Such selflessness was also extended to sumptuous range of (the fried senorita banana bacon roll deserves a mention), and naturally a wide range of local NZ wines and beers. The later flowed plentifully and were readily consumed by the players at a lively rate, especially by those lucky enough to be playing on Day 1B.

We look forward to bringing you the coverage on Day 1A tomorrow, from 12:15pm NZ time. I’m off to sample one or two more of the local beers before getting a good night’s sleep.

By James Potter

The Pokerstars.net APPT Celebrity Poker Invitational, hosted by Team PokerStars Pro Lee Nelson and Brooke Howard-Smith, was the perfect way to kick-off a big week of celebrations culminating in the APPT Auckland main event here at SKYCITY Auckland later this week. Some celebrity events lack that x-factor, but this was certainly not the case with a well structured tournament that went well into the night.

Howard-Smith, who co-hosts the ultra-popular Celebrity Joker Poker on New Zealand TV with Lee Nelson, is excited about the prospect of hosting some of the world’s best poker players into his “home” poker room.

“Poker’s growing so fast in New Zealand and this tournament is exactly what’s needed. It’s a chance for promising New Zealand poker players to test themselves against some of the world’s best. In the past, with the exception of the National Champs, Kiwis had to fly to Australia, the US or Asia to play a large multi-day tournament,” Howard-Smith said, before joining his celebrity cohorts at the SKYCITY tables.

The unofficial religion in New Zealand is Rugby. Whenever the All Blacks (the NZ rugby team, aptly named as they wear all black jumpers, shorts and socks) lose, the country goes into mourning. Ali Williams and Sean Levine showed how good a rugby players they are at the event as did their fellow Rugby League internationals Benji Marshal and David Kidwell

There was also a bevy of local radio, television and media personalities as well as premier jockey, New Zealand’s own Shane Dye, who rode in and showed what he was all about as a poker player. Unfortunately the line up of pros were all early exits with Lee Nelson unable to show of his skills to his adoring fans as he was one of the first to hit the rail (but managed to sign a few copies of his books on the way out).

The winner was a local businessman who beat a very competitive final table and won himself a main event.

“It was such a thrill to play with not only the celebrities but the poker pros as well. I haven’t been playing poker that long and it was great to have a win and especially beat a few of my mates from my local home game,” the lucky winner said.

The bubbly was flowing as was some of NZ’s finest wines and arguably the world’s most awarded beer: the national icon Steinlager. It was a good night all-round, and a great way to welcome NZ’s biggest celebrities to the world of tournament poker.

By James Potter

KiaOra or welcome to the Land of the Long White Cloud. New Zealand is one of the world’s hidden gems. Comparable in size to Great Britain or Japan, the country is packed with some of the world’s most stunning scenery – from vast mountain chains, steaming volcanoes, sweeping coastlines, deeply indented fjords and lush rainforests.

If you are, however, one of those thrill seeking types you won’t be disappointed either as bungee jumping and jet boats are both proud NZ inventions. Combine all that with a temperate climate and a tiny population of just four million and you have an ideal year-round holiday destination.

New Zealand’s largest city, Auckland, is the host for the tournament and day one of the main event kicks off on Thursday. Auckland really puts the ‘Pacific’ in Asia Pacific Poker Tour – the city lies on the shores of the Pacific Ocean. Auckland’s waterside location has fostered the locals’ love affair with the sea, earning it the nickname “City of Sails”.

Auckland’s heart beats to a Polynesian rhythm, its people a melting pot of South Pacific and Asian cultures and a strong indigenous Maori heritage. This diversity brings with it an abundance of unique dining and shopping experiences.

New Zealand hasn’t been immune to the wave of poker fever sweeping the planet. So it’s appropriate that New Zealand has been added to the PokerStars.net Asia Pacific Poker Tour schedule for 2008.

SKYCITY Auckland casino will be the venue. Visitors won’t have any trouble finding their way to the venue, as it lies at the base of Sky Tower, the southern hemisphere’s tallest tower at 328m (taller than even the Eiffel Tower in Paris and the Sydney Tower).

In addition to the Sky Tower, the Skycity complex (refurbished just two years ago) includes a large theatre, a convention centre and hotel, and six bars and seven restaurants. The main feature however is the casino, offering more than 100 tables and, of course, Skycity’s own branded poker room the Poker Zone.

This is the first major international poker tournament ever held on New Zealand’s North Island, and the best Kiwi players are licking their lips at the prospects of taking on some of the world’s best players.

Make no mistake; some of the world’s best will be here with the likes of Team PokerStars pros and World Champions Joe Hachem and Greg Raymer confirmed starters. Other world class players like PokerStars Sponsored Players Grant Levy, Eric Assadourian and Tony Hachem will join a large ‘Aussie’ contingency who will travel ‘over the ditch’ to head the charge.

Leading the list of contenders is Team PokerStars Pro, Lee Nelson, NZ’s best known and most popular poker personalities. After moving to Auckland from the US in the early 1990s, no player has done more to promote poker in New Zealand than the man known as “Final Table” for his habit of running deep into poker tournaments. His crowning achievement came in 2006 when he pocketed $A1.3 million for winning the Aussie Millions.

Nelson heads a list of experienced local campaigners including Graeme ‘Kiwi G’ Putt, Robert Wang (two final tables at the 2008 Aussie Millions), Constantine Harach and Jamil Dia, who won the Aussie Millions in 2005. Also take note of the next generation of the strong local talent headed by players including James Honeybone (last year’s Manila Cup champion), Josh Egan (fourth in the 2007 PokerStars EPT London main event), Richard Grace (runner-up in the 2007 NZ Champs main event) plus online standouts Joel Davies and Shaun Goldsbury.

We are very excited to bring you all the action from the culmination of the first SKYCITY Festival of Poker – the NZD $3000 buy-in PokerStars.net APPT Auckland Main Event which will start at 12.15pm on Thursday (local time).

This past summer in July, the Federation Internationale de Poker Association (FIDPA) announced that the Bellagio Cup was the first tournament played under the FIDPA tournament rules. Many of the players wondered what those rules were exactly, so we asked for a copy–none were available.

Now another tournament is underway at Bellagio, this time its the Festa al Lago. Again the FIDPA is creating a lot of publicity about another major tournament operating under the international rules. Again, we asked for a copy of the rules and again–not available.

Interesting, they are using rules for a big poker tournament but no one has a copy of the rules. By the way, Jack McCelland the tournament director at Bellagio and perhaps the most respected TD in the United States is a member of the FIDPA board.

The FIDPA is an organization founded by Marcel Luske and Michelle Lau in 2007, to: “establish a standardized set of rules and procedures that would bring consistency to tournament play, throughout the world.” Not a bad idea but we are now seeing another tournament at Bellagio, played under FIDPA rules and we still can’t get a copy of the rules. The website FIDPA.com, we were pointed to, does not exist. By the way Marcel Luske also founded the International Poker Federation (IPF) in 2002. Everyone seems to be giving Marcel a pass on performance because he is such a nice guy.

Does the poker world really need yet another group of poker players with no experience at organizational practices making up a name (XYZ) and talking and acting like they are going to do something for “all of poker.” We have already seen the limp results from the World Poker Association (WPA) with their executive infighting and tea party poker etiquette rules.

Was there something wrong with the Tournament Director’s Association (TDA)? They have strong support, actual printed rules and an open format for discussion and evolution of those rules. Do we need the FIDPA? Does it actually exist or is this just some PR pipedream talked about during long airline flights between international poker events.

So simply question for the FIDPA: Where the hell are these rules?

London has been the focal point of the poker world over the last month or so, not least with the second running of the World Series of Poker Europe at the Casino at The Empire, presented by Betfair, writes Rob Eddy.

John Juanda became the first American to win a WSOP bracelet on this side of the Atlantic and with it, a pretty substantial paycheck.

But he was not the only big winner in the UK’s capital after compatriot Michael Martin came back from the dead to scoop £1,000,000 with his victory in the European Poker Tour’s London leg.

Everyone in the poker world has heard of the old adage of ‘all you need is a chip and a chair’, and although Martin’s situation perhaps was not as dire as that, he made a remarkable comeback to take down the prize.

Again it was another truly global final table with players, albeit a little less famous than those at the WSOPE, hailing from Ireland, Poland, Canada, Sweden, Germany, France and two from the US.

And I doubt that any of them would have picked Martin to be the last man standing after he found himself in a seemingly hopeless situation with just 95,000 chips, with the blinds at 40,000 and 80,000.

This position arrived with just four players left it has to be said but with the chip leader having over 2million, and Martin barely being able to cover one big blind it is still a pretty amazing feat.

The 22-year-old American, who finished fifth in the EPT Grand Final in Monte Carlo earlier this year, won a number of coin flips to triple up and double up twice, before he knocked out Eric Liu in fourth place when his Ac 9S held up against Js 10h.

He then sent Marcin Horecki packing in third place when his Ks Jd beat Kh 8d with a jack on the river, after an 8 on the turn.

Starting heads up play, Martin now held a 4 to 1 chip lead over Sweden’s Michael Tureniec and it was perhaps surprising that it took 105 minutes of play before Martin could finally celebrate his first tournament victory, when his pocket 4s held up against Kh 9c.

The £5,200 buy-in event had proved to have grown in popularity with the field of 596 players this year, compared to 392 in 2007, creating a prize pool of £3,349,200 and the biggest first prize dished out in London this year (so far).