“We’re thrilled to be doing another WSOP Academy promotion just for Rounders Radio listeners,” stated Annie Duke, UltimateBet’s Cardroom Consultant. “The Ultimate Poker Show attracts poker players who really want to take their game to the next level so a promotion that offers seats in the WSOP Academy couldn’t be more fitting.”

The WSOP Academy Main Event Primer, set to get underway on June 29th at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, is designed to prepare poker players for the world’s most prestigious poker tournament. The 3-day program is built to help poker fans advance through the enormous field of players all the way to final table.

Texas Hold’em players can win their way to Las Vegas for June 29th’s WSOP Academy through a locked $5 buy-in tournament each Sunday. The password for the private tournament is announced every Sunday on Rounders Radio’s Ultimate Poker Show, a live online show hosted by UltimateBet’s own Mark “P0ker H0″ Kroon.

The top nine players of each password protected Sunday tournament will win a spot in June 22nd’s Main Event. The Main Event pays out two seats to the WSOP Academy plus $1,000 for travel, accommodations and expenses.

Online poker players who don’t win a spot in the Main Event through the locked Texas Hold’em tournament can still secure a seat for 5,000 UltimatePoints. Additionally, players may register for satellites from as little as 500 UltimatePoints to make their way to the Main Event.

To take advantage of this incredible offer from Ultimate Bet, sign up and use our Ultimate Bet Referral Code to get a 111% bonus on your first deposit, up to a maximum of $1,100!

It’s a natural evolution, actually. After spending so many years betting on sports, we decided we may know a thing or two about it and what better place to share our knowledge than one of our top websites. At first, we are just going to be adding reviews of all of the great online sportsbooks in addition to where to find the best bonus codes for these sports betting websites. Once we get that section complete, we’ll add some sportsbetting news and maybe even a few picks.

As of the time of this writing, Mike has added a review of Gamebookers.com as well as our exclusive Gamebookers Bonus Code. Sticking with another PartyGaming website, we went ahead and added our new PartyBets Bonus Code, as well.

Hope you all enjoy!

This charity event takes place on July 1st 2009, right before the start of the World Series of Poker Main Event, opening up the field to possibly every qualified poker player around the world.

“This is a very exciting and almost unbelievable poker opportunity,” said John Colville, director of Golden Nugget poker. “To not only be able to give our tournament winner a seat on nationally televised Poker After Dark, but also be able to help raise money for these great kids, is fantastic. This is simply huge for everyone involved.”

The potential for this charity event is obviously huge. The buy-in for the tournament, which takes place at the Golden Nugget Casino, is $330 with $200 rebuys and $100 add ons. All the money will go to the Boys and Girls Club charity.

If you can’t make the World Series of Poker main event or any of the other events for that matter, you can play with some of the pros at FullTiltPoker.com. If you are new to FullTilt Poker, be sure to use our FullTilt Poker Referral Code when signing up at FullTiltPoker.com for the maximum deposit bonus available.

Other online poker games are rock solid. Poker games online like Texas Hold’em poker, Omaha Poker, 7-card stud, and the slight variants such as the Hi/Lo betting and the different betting structures are where you want to get your start in playing online poker.

Different online poker rooms offer different online poker games. Be sure and check with the poker room before signing up. To make things simpler we have included, in our online poker review section, a breakdown of each online poker room and the different online poker games that each room offers. FullTilt Poker & UltimateBet seem to offer the most online games between all of the different rooms.

We also have an extensive rules section of online poker games including:

• Texas Hold’em Poker
• 7-Card Stud Poker
• 7-Card Stud Hi/Lo Poker
• Omaha Hold’em Poker
• Omaha Hi/Lo Hold’em Poker
• 5-card Stud Poker
• 5-Card Draw Poker
• Razz Poker
• Crazy Pineapple Poker

Playing Online Poker, especially for real money can be a bit scary for people, but the fact is that online poker playing is one of the safest bets on the internet. There are, however, many complex aspects to playing online poker, I will try and cover as many of them as thoroughly as possible.

After all, you need to decide which poker games to play and learn the rules of poker games before you can get started. One of the best ways of doing that is by playing online poker for free. After that, things like which online poker rooms do I choose? And, when you are ready to start playing online poker for real money, what are your deposit options and bonuses.

Playing Online Poker

Online poker games – When Playing Online Poker, it is imperitive to have a full working knowledge of the rules of the most popular forms of poker. Poker comes in all different varieties, there is the ever popular Texas Hold’em Poker, followed by Omaha Poker. Seven Card Stud Poker is also popular but seems to have less of a following than Texas Holdem Poker and Omaha Poker.

Due to the nature of the rules of omaha poker and the rules of 7-card stud poker, there are variation in betting that lead to Hi/Lo Omaha Poker and Hi/Lo 7 card stud. These poker games are slightly more advanced than other poker games and I feel that you should first have a full understanding of regular omaha and 7 card stud poker before diving into the more advanced betting games.

However, it is with these poker games that you get your start playing online poker.

Play Free Online Poker – The best way to start out playing online poker, by far, is by playing online poker for free. This way, you can get a good feel for the software and graphics of the online poker room that you are playing. After all, it is the software interface of the online poker room that is where all of the action is. I have several different internet poker rooms that I use for playing poker online, in my online poker reviews section, I have reviewed each of them in detail, and provided a general break-down of each different online poker room. Here are quick links to each room:

Play poker for real money – After you get a feel for playing online poker for free money and get pretty good at it, I recommend that you try playing online poker for real money next. Sure, when you are playing online poker for free money, you get a chance to learn the rules of poker and you get comfortable with the poker software interface, but you don’t get a feel of what online poker is actually like. You see, people tend to bet a bit more carelessly when playing with fake money. When it’s actually money involved, people tend to play online poker a bit differently.

Makes sense, right?

Well, when you finally do decide to come to the real money tables when playing online poker, check out our online poker bonus codes to make sure you maximize your money when first starting out. These online poker rooms love to give free money to new players making their first deposit. Also, they make it very easy with lots of different deposit options. Be sure to check out our detailed online poker review of Absolute Poker, FullTilt, Pokerrom.com, UltimateBet, and PokerStars. We are adding new online reviews every week, so be sure to check back.

See you at the tables!!!

Golden Spirit Poker is a now defunct online poker room that was promoted by Anna Benson, wife of baseball player Chris Benson.  Golden Spirit Poker was part of the Ongame network which features other online card rooms such as Mansion Poker, Pokerroom.com, Hollywood Poker, Holdem Poker, Euro Poker, and the newer Chan Poker.

Golden Spirit Poker is Closed

If you were looking for Golden Spirit Poker, I would suggest checking out one of the other, more sucessful rooms from the onGame network.  Golden Spirit Poker is now closed to all players.

Test PokerStars

Give PokerStars a test and give this world class online poker room a try for free.

PokerStars is a marque poker room and now you can test PokerStars out without even having to play. If you want to play, there are plenty of free games for you to test pokerstars with. If you want to get really serious, then test pokerstars out on their real money tables.

click to enlarge

PokerStars Table

click to enlarge

PokerStars Lobby

Test PokerStars – Here’s how

Ready to give PokerStars a Test? Or maybe you just want to get a feel for the software at PokerStars without having to register. Let’s get started then!

Download the software at PokerStars to test. - Follow the easy to use instructions and you will be giving pokerstars a test in no time.

Check out the tables. - No need to hurry and register. Look at the software at PokerStars before giving PokerStars a test on the tables.

Set Up a new account - Click on “account” from the lobby, select “create new account” and follow the prompts from there.

Choose your nickname (User ID) - Be sure to do this carefully, once it’s done, it can not be changed.

Fill in the rest of the information - Go over your entries twice and make sure you’ve entered the correct information, then press ok.

Give PokerStars a Test, enjoy the games!

Test PokerStars now]]> http://www.poker30.net/articles/test-pokerstars/feed/ 0 http://www.poker30.net/articles/starting-texas-holdem-poker-hands/ http://www.poker30.net/articles/starting-texas-holdem-poker-hands/#comments Wed, 23 Jan 2008 02:00:20 +0000 Mark http://www.poker30.net/articles/starting-texas-holdem-poker-hands/   

Ace Ace (AA)
Rockets, Bullets, American Airlines, Teepees, Alan Alda, Snake Eyes 

King King (KK)
Cowboys, King Kong, Gorillas, Kangaroos, Krispy Kreme 

Queen Queen (QQ)
Ladies, Snowshoes, hilton Sisters, Siegfried & Roy, Jailhouse Rock  

Ace King suited (AKs)
Big Slick 

Ace Queen suited (AQs)
Big Chick, Little Slick, Doyle Brunson (because he once said he never plays AQ) 

Jack Jack (JJ)
Jokers, Fishhooks, Hooks, Gents, Johnnies, Jay Birds, Kid Dynamite 

King Queen suited (KQs)
Royal Couple, Marriage 

Ace Jack suited (AJs)
Blackjack, Ajax, Apple Jacks, Jackass 

King Jack suited (KJs)
Kojak, King John, Harry Potter (JK Rowling), Just Kidding 

Ace King offsuit (AKo)
Big Slick, Big Ugly]]> http://www.poker30.net/articles/starting-texas-holdem-poker-hands/feed/ 0 http://www.poker30.net/articles/poker-hand-rankings/ http://www.poker30.net/articles/poker-hand-rankings/#comments Wed, 23 Jan 2008 01:57:44 +0000 Mark http://www.poker30.net/articles/poker-hand-rankings/

The following poker hand rankings apply to every game of poker. These poker hand rankings are very general and do not account for “wild cards” or anything like that. If you want to see the odds of getting these hands, check out our probabilty section.

Royal Flush
A, K, Q, J, 10 all of the same suit. The Big Kahuna. The hand everyone strives for and the reason we play this game.
Straight Flush
Any five card sequence in the same suit. (Ex: 8, 9, 10, J, Q and A, 2, 3, 4, 5 of same suit). You can take this hand straight to the bank.
Four of a Kind aka “Quads”
All four cards of the same index (Ex: Q, Q, Q, Q). A great hand when you can get it.
Full House aka “Boat”
Three of a kind combined with a pair (Ex: A, A, A, 5, 5). Many a round has been won and lost on this hand. Mostly won.
Flush
Any five cards of the same suit, but not in sequence. No need to turn red with embarrassment with this hand.
Straight
Five cards in sequence, but not of the same suit. After all, you wouldn’t want to clash.
Three of a kind aka “trips” aka “a set”
Three cards of the same rank.
Two pair
Two separate pairs (Ex: J, J, 9, 9).
One pair
Two cards of the same rank. (Q, Q) Sometimes called a San Francisco Pair.
High Card
Highest card in your hand. Well at least you tried.

Note: The royal flush is included as a straight flush above. By itself, the royal flush can be formed 4 ways (one for each suit), giving it a probability of .000001539077169 and odds of 649,740 : 1.