The celebrated International Poker Open gets underway tonight live on Unibet Poker. The six-day bonanza of IPO fun features a total of 12 scheduled events – plus numerous superqualifier satellites – with the flagship €50,000 guarantee Main Event starting on Saturday. All 12 events on the schedule come with a prize pool guarantee, with more than €150,000 guaranteed across the whole festival. Click here for the full schedule or search for “IPO” on the Unibet poker client.
The €50 buy-in IPO Warm Up is the first official tournament on the schedule. It starts at 7pm tonight (Ireland/UK time) and comes with a €15k guarantee. Other festival highlights include a two-day, €25k guaranteed High Roller Event, a €25k guaranteed Mini Main Event, the €2k guarantee #QUEENRULES Ladies’ Event and a €4k guarantee Omaha tournament.
The move online will give IPO regulars a very different experience from their annual jaunt to Dublin but Unibet Ambassador Ian Simpson aims to keep up the bants by live-streaming every single day of the festival on his Twitch channel.
He said: “While we can’t meet in person to enjoy the famous craic that comes with Irish poker, the Unibet twitch community is the nicest on the internet. We will all be railing each other as we chase the gorgeous trophies that are on offer. We’ll be going live every day at 6pm local time.
Satellites
IPO satellites have been running on Unibet since September. Each of the last four Sunday night qualifiers guaranteed five €300 Main Event seats but turnout has been huge, crushing the guarantee and awarding seats to 35+ players. There are still plenty more chances to win your way into the Main Event – the IPO superqualifiers are running every night with three on Saturday at 4.30pm, 5.30pm and 6.30pm (Ireland/UK time.) The final Unibet qualifier takes place on Friday night at 7pm with ten seats guaranteed.
If you’re after tips on playing satellites, then don’t miss Unibet Ambassador Dara O’Kearney, author of the best-selling Poker Satellite Strategy, who will be chatting to IPO tournament director Nick O’Hara in a Facebook Live session tonight at 7pm. Dara’s book, published in February 2019, is considered the absolute “bible” for recreational and professional satellite players alike. He said: “The IPO has been a highlight of the Irish poker calendar for my career. It was one of the first live events I ever played. As we head back into lockdown, it’s sad the event can’t take place live but I know the craic will be transferred to the Unibet client.”
The International Poker Open has been one of Europe’s longest-running and most popular live poker events and has been held annually since 2008. Tournament director Nick O’Hara said: “Obviously it’s a real shame that we couldn’t have a live event this year but restrictions around Covid-19, and concern for player & staff safety, really made it impossible. We’re very grateful to the amazing Unibet who have been extremely supportive and ensured that IPO 2020 could still go ahead. The entire festival – including side events and a ton of satellites – is being hosted on the Unibet poker client.”
Facebook live and updates
O’Hara will be hosting a Facebook Live session every night of the festival starting at 7pm tonight, Thursday and Friday, and 6pm on Saturday and Sunday. He added: “Social media is one of the ways we can keep up the legendary IPO atmosphere so I’ll be going on Facebook live every night to give updates about the festival and chat with special guests. Tonight we have Dara O’Kearney at 7pm and then Andy Black at 7.30pm. Over the next few days, I’ll also be joined by David Lappin, Ian Simpson, Philip Baker and many others. We’d love everyone to join our IPO facebook group so you can keep up with what’s happening in the tourneys and get involved.”
Main Event
The €300 IPO Main Event starts on Saturday at 6pm UK time – with one re-entry permitted until the end of late registration (15 levels.) All players start with a 25,000 stack with blind levels set at 12 minutes on Day 1 and 20 minutes on Sunday.
Unibet Ambassador David Lappin, who finished 11th in last year’s Main Event, said: “The IPO Dublin has been a consistent fixture on the Irish poker calendar since 2007 so there was no way Unibet were going to let 2020 be the exception and it’s still going to be a lot of fun.”
It’s easy to set up a Unibet account – and you can play via either via the Unibet Poker Client or directly from your browser. See unibet.com/poker for more details.
Last year British player Luke Boynton took down the Main Event for €24,450. The 35-year-old from Birmingham, who had been playing poker for around 15 years, was involved in a six-way ICM chop before going on to win the event and the prestigious IPO trophy. It was a lifetime best cash for Boynton and took his total live tournament winnings to over $40k. There were 755 entries in total with 95 players getting a share of the €191,395 prize pool.
Nataly Sopacuaperu, Unibet Open’s Head of Events, said: “We’ve been sponsoring the IPO since 2018 and we are delighted that we can help make this year’s event a success by hosting it online. The IPO is a significant date in the poker calendar and even though this year’s event will be very different, Ian Simpson’s Twitch stream and the Facebook live sessions will be a lot of fun and help create the community atmosphere that players relish at live events.”
For full details, please visit https://internationalpokeropen.ie/.
