Hollywood Poker Open St. Louis Regional Main Event Kicks Off This Saturday
For the past week, the Hollywood Poker Open (HPO) has been hosting its latest festival at the Hollywood Casino in St. Louis, Missouri. The stop, which had 34 feature events on the schedule, will culminate this Saturday with the $1,115 Regional Main Event, a tournament the PokerNews Live Reporting team will be keeping track of in our live blog.
"HPO St. Louis will be a great event, and there is a lot of excitement buzzing around Chris Moneymaker and his chance to defend his title from last season," said PokerNews Editor-in-Chief Donnie Peters. "Moneymaker's also coming off a final table at HPO Grantville where he looked to be the favorite, but then fell short. This makes for a great two-fold story — one of his redemption from the last event and another of him reigning as champion."
Indeed, the 2003 World Series of Poker Main Event champ is in St. Louis seeking a title defense. Last year, Moneymaker won the HPO St. Louis for $36,259, which you can read all about by clicking here.
Others expected in St. Louis are several of those currently competing on the HPO Season 3 Leaderboard. Right now, John Moe of Cincinnati, Indiana, sits atop the leaderboard with 55 points, but Barry Schultz of Arlington, Tennessee, and Jerry Zehr of Carmel, Indiana are hot on his heels with 40 and 34 points, respectively. However, anyone coming into town will have to deal with the red hot John Longowa, who looks to win the HPO St. Louis Leaderboard after winning both Event #5 and #8.
The St. Louis stop is the fifth of the season, and comes after several successful stops. Last November, Jesse McEuen took down the HPO Lawrenceburg for $49,676, and in early February Charles Maxcy took down the HPO Toledo Regional Main Event for $37,465 after a chop. From there, Donald McArthur won the HPO Tunica Regional Main Event for $17,100, and most recently Steven Gurney-Goldman took down the HPO Grantville Regional Main Event for $29,342.
At all of those stops, and of course in St. Louis, the HPO has been awarding seats into the season-ending Championship Event at M Resort Casino Spa in Las Vegas.
"We plan to not only give away hundreds of seats to the Championship again, but we will also implement similar seat winner promotions to the Regional tournament series as well," said HPO Tournament Director Bill Bruce. "These HPO tournament fields are such a great mix of traveling poker professionals and local promotion winners which makes the tournaments really attractive to all levels of poker players."
Here's a look at the remaining HPO St. Louis schedule (HPO Featured Events denoted w/ *):
| Day | Date/Time | Event | Buy-In |
|---|---|---|---|
| *Thu | 4/23 - 3pm | 20a - NL Hold'em Deepstack Flight A | $300 |
| *Thu | 4/23 - 7pm | 20b - NL Hold'em Deepstack Flight B | $300 |
| Thu | 4/23 - 10pm | 21 - Turbo Satellite (Main Event Seat Guaranteed) | $125 |
| Fri | 4/24 - 12pm | Merge/Restart Flights | - |
| *Fri | 4/24- 1pm | 22 - NL Hold'em Deepstack | $300 |
| Fri | 4/24 - 3pm | 23 - Mega Satellite (Main Event Seat Guaranteed) | $235 |
| Fri | 4/24 - 5pm | 24 - Turbo Satellite (Main Event Seat Guaranteed) | $125 |
| Fri | 4/24 - 7pm | 25 - Mega Satellite (Main Event Seat Guaranteed) | $235 |
| Fri | 4/24 - 10pm | 26 - Turbo Satellite (Main Event Seat Guaranteed) | $125 |
| Sat | 4/25 - 10am | 27 - Mega Satellite (Main Event Seat Guaranteed) | $235 |
| *Sat | 4/25 - 12pm | 28 - HPO REGIONAL MAIN EVENT | $1,115 |
| *Sat | 4/25 - 3pm | 29 - Pot Limit Omaha Hi & 8 or Better | $235 |
| Sat | 4/25 - 5pm | 30 - Ladies No Limit Hold'em | $235 |
| Sat | 4/25 - 7pm | 31 - No Limit ($4,000 Guarantee) | $125 |
| Sun | 4/26 - 11am | 32 - Seniors No Limit 2 (age 50 & older) | $235 |
| Sun | 4/26 - 12pm | Main Event Restart | - |
| *Sun | 4/26 - 3pm | 33 - NL Hold'em Deepstack (Six-Handed) | $235 |
| Sun | 4/26 - 6pm | 34 - H.O.R.S.E. | $125 |
For more on Season 3 of the Hollywood Poker Open, visit HollywoodPokerOpen.com. Also, check out this HPO video featuring Moneymaker:
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