The Summer of Sports is when many of sports' biggest events take place during the three months when the weather is at its warmest. Every four years, it's the Summer Olympics, and between that quadrennium it's the FIFA World Cup...both events that stop the world. For tennis fans, the year's last three Grand Slams take place, with the biggest one Wimbledon taking place between the French and U.S. Opens. It's also the case for golf, with the U.S. Open, The Open Championship in Britain and the PGA Championship all taking place over the summer. The biggest annual race in cycling and arguably sports' toughest and most-enduring test, the Tour de France, takes place in Europe. And in America, there's the climax of the NBA and NHL seasons and horse racing's Triple Crown.
It's also during the hottest season of the year that the biggest event in the world of card sports and gaming take place, and fittingly enough it takes place in that desert oasis & adult playground known as Las Vegas, NV. While fans were busy following the NBA and NHL playoffs, the World Series of Poker commenced its month & a half-long festival of tournaments as it marks its 45th anniversary this year. Even with events that have happened to the sport in recent years after the game's boom in the early & mid 2000's, the WSOP is bigger than ever with more events and prize money at stake.
And just wrapped up last week is the bulk of what is the biggest in the slate of 68 events of various types of what is referred to as "poker's version of Woodstock"...the $10,000 No-Limit Texas Hold 'Em World Championship. The November Nine final table was determined in the early hours of Wednesday morning, July 15th, and when those players reconvene, a financial windfall awaits the player who emerges victorious when all the cards are dealt and the chips fall in one man's hands.
And just wrapped up last week is the bulk of what is the biggest in the slate of 68 events of various types of what is referred to as "poker's version of Woodstock"...the $10,000 No-Limit Texas Hold 'Em World Championship. The November Nine final table was determined in the early hours of Wednesday morning, July 15th, and when those players reconvene, a financial windfall awaits the player who emerges victorious when all the cards are dealt and the chips fall in one man's hands.
In 1970, gambling icon and mob boss Benny Binion gathered together seven of poker's best-known players to his Horseshoe Casino along Fremont Street in downtown Las Vegas for a single invitational tournament. But little did Binion & those players know at the time that their little get together would ultimately rise to becoming one of the year's biggest pop culture events and an event that has brought a relatively obscure sport into becoming one of America's favorite leisure activities.
