With more people playing poker online now than ever before, here’s a look at 5 things you most likely didn’t know about online poker tournaments.
Most online players are beginners – One of the first things that you need to know about online poker tournaments, is the fact that most online players are beginners. People think that seasoned poker professionals enter these online tournaments as a way of keeping their poker game sharp, or simply as a way of making some easy money and working on a new poker tournament strategy before they enter the big tournament later in the month. The reality of the situation however, is that most players in online poker tournaments are beginners just looking for a bit of fun. That’s the great thing about online poker – it’s fun for everyone.
Online poker is nothing new – Okay, compared with the primitive versions of poker played centuries ago, online poker is very new, but in terms of modern technology today, not so much. Although online poker tournaments have only become especially popular over the last decade or so, online poker has actually been around for well over 25 years. That’s right, there were people working on their online poker tournament strategy many decades ago. When the internet was just being discovered, there were forums and sites out there where people could play poker online, which brings us to fact number 3.
One of the first online tournaments was a Texas Hold’em game – One of the first online poker tournaments ever created was a free-to-enter game which was setup by a group of friends with a passion for poker. They used to talk about the game on an online forum and decided to create the WRGPT (World Rec.Gambling Poker Tournament. Each bet had to be taken by email and a special server told players when it was their turn. Games would often last days. It’s safe to say that we’ve come a long way since then.
The biggest online tournament had over 250,000 entrants – Back in 2015, a popular online poker site hosted a tournament. It was, to date, the biggest online tournament ever, with a whopping 253, 692 people entering it. Before that, the previous record was set back in 2013, where 225,000 people entered with the hope of winning. Incidentally, back then, the winner in 2013 was a man from Russia, who took home a cool $25,000.
Tournaments are not over quick – If you’re entering a poker tournament to simply work on your poker tournament strategy then you may wish to resign yourself to the fact that you’re in for a long wait. Online poker tournaments are not the same as those quick poker games that you play with your buddies online when you’re bored at night. Most tournaments take several hours to complete, and as you might expect, the more people that enter the tournament, the longer the game will last. Typically you’re looking at, at least six hours, although tournaments have been known to last days online.