Poker King News and Notes for February 2nd, 2008

We've been traveling over the past couple of days and haven't had too much of a chance to update the site. Here is a quick update on all of the news and notes from the past couple of days, condensed into one report:

-Mike "Timex" McDonald is chipleader of the 2008 EPT Dortmund heading into the final day of play. He currently has a stack of 862k in chips, while his next closest competitor, Johannes Strassmann, had 827k in chips. Another well-known online player, Christian "charder" Harder, will be looking to improve on his seventh finish at the 2008 PCA. He currently has a stack of 339k in chips.

All of the players are guaranteed at least 85,000 euros, with the first place finisher receiving 933k euros.

-Gavin Griffin completed one of the most impressive tasks ever when he took down the 2008 Borgata Poker Classic (WPT). Griffin became the first player EVER to a WPT event, WSOP event and EPT event. No other player on the face of the planet can say the same.

Griffin overcame a tough final table that included the likes of Lee Watkinson and David Tran to take down the first place prize of $1.4 million

-Justin "Zeejustin" Bonomo failed in his attempt to take down his first major "live" poker event, as he ended up finishing in eight place for $135k. Bonomo has come so close to winning his first live tournament, but hasn't quite managed to go all the way yet. Bonomo isn't just one of the best "young" poker players in the world; he is one of the best poker players in the world, period.

-the main event of the Borgata had 507 players, a sharp decrease from the 571 players that entered the event last year. This breaks the recent string of large live poker events with larger fields than the year before. The EPT Dortmund tournament also has a smaller field than last year (411 vs 493 the year before), but the buyin was larger, creating a larger prize pool. The prize pool this year is 3.164 million euros, compared to 2.317 euros the year before.

-the saga of Ed "Bluescouse" Hollis continues. After busting all of the money that was lent to him (save for 600 pounds according to his blog), Hollis has announced plans to sell his house to get back into the big games. Hollis was on a rollercoaster ride the past couple of days playing on Betfair, before his bankroll was finally crushed in a 62k pound pot where his flush was beaten by a higher flush. His latest blog posting has lead to 42 comments being posted so far, mainly by concerned readers imploring him to get help.

-"kinexxx" ended up the big winner in the NLHE cash games on Full Tilt Poker in January, followed by Phil Ivey and "Ziigmund". "FinddaGrind" ended up the big winner of the PLO games on FTP in January, finishing the month up over a million dollars. He was followed by "Dustin Dirksen" and "Ziigmund".

That's all for now. We'll have some more comprehensive updates over the course of this weekend as we get settled.

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