EPT Numbers Soar:
The Italian EPT event held at San Remo from April 18 - 23 saw 1,178 players pay the €5,000 buy in. It is only the second year for this event, but it has already become the most popular of the continental EPT events. In its first year it sold out with 701 runners and the organizers were clearly right to increase capacity this year. Almost 450 of the participants were from Italy. This season the EPT achieved significant growth in numbers in Italy, which has an underdeveloped live poker scene and growth has been most notable. The only tournament on the tour that saw a dip in numbers was the Warsaw event in Poland. The EPT Grand Final in Monte Carlo, still underway at the time of this writing, saw a field of 935 runners battle it out for a €2,300,000 first prize. Last year's Grand Final attracted 842 players.

Moorman's Dad wins Manchester GUKPT:
Online tournament pro Chris Moorman has been in the top two or three of the Pocket Fives rankings for quite some time now. When news broke that someone by the name of Moorman won the latest Grosvenor UK Poker Tour event in Manchester, one would be forgiven for assuming that Chris had finally achieved a major live victory. However, the Moorman in question was Chris's father Simon, who was playing in only his second-ever live event. His first was a £10 re-buy tournament and he had no intention of playing in the 298 runner event at the G Casino in Manchester until his son bought him into it as a late birthday present. Did Chris pass on his poker skills to his father or was it the other way round? Simon netted £88,630 for his efforts in the 4-day event.

UK Poker Tax Introduced:
The British Government hit the live poker industry with a tax on revenues of up to 50 percent. The news has not been well received by the gaming industry with some speculation that the authorities may have made a mistake in announcing the new tax regime. The tax brings poker in line with duty charged on house games such as blackjack, roulette and slots and could potentially force some casinos to close their poker rooms. Whether the tax stays in place for long remains to be seen.

Black Belt Poker Launched:
2008 Irish Open champion Neil Channing has launched a new online poker community site called Black Belt Poker. The martial arts themed site aims to be a social networking site for online players and will also offer training and bankrolling schemes. They have already set up a series of boot camps that will be hosted by Channing and Phil Laak. At present the site is purely an information and networking portal, but they will shortly be opening their own online poker room on the iPoker network.

24 Hour Opening at the Vic:
The Grosvenor Victoria Casino in London is latest UK poker room to become a 24-hour operation. Since April 6, the casino's doors have remained open, with some of the smaller games now running non-stop around the clock. The casino, which hosts the London EPT and the GUKPT Grand Final, recently opened a VIP poker room intended for high stakes games and private functions. The casino's senior poker room manager is Jeff Leigh.

Jonathan Raab is a poker consultant and tournament reporter. He also represents online poker site Blue Square at live poker events in the UK and Europe, and manages the GUKPT. Email Jonathan at jr@bluesq.com