Online Poker Press

While the list of deserving poker pros without a WSOP bracelet is long, before this afternoon French pro Fabrice Soulier was right at the top.

After a decade of playing poker and $2.68 million in live tournament earnings Soulier’s poker resume did not include a win at the World Series of Poker.

That changed in a big way today in Las Vegas when he defeated Shawn Buchanan heads-up to win this year’s $10,000 HORSE Championship.

Soulier pocketed $609,130 for the win.

“I feel great,” Soulier told PokerListings.com moments after the win.

“This is the best day of my poker career by far,” he said.

While this victory doesn’t represent Soulier’s biggest cash, that was a $700k score last year for third at the Partouche Poker Tour main event, it’s certainly the most emotionally important.

“I’m very emotional as a player and it’s very demanding for me and I have to work to control my emotions maybe more than other players,” he said.

“That’s a key for me and in this tournament I think I did a pretty good job.”

Soulier began playing poker more than ten years ago, while working as a director in French television.

Juggling an increasingly successful poker hobby with TV projects like Une Gars, une Fille Soulier eventually made the decision to devote himself full time to playing cards.

Not including today’s win, Soulier had cashed at the WSOP 17 times, including four final tables.

Despite having the reputation as a solid player Soulier had been going through a rough patch so far this summer.

He told us he had bricked 19 WSOP events in a row before this victory.

Entering the heads-up match with an almost seven to one chip lead, the pressure was squarely on Soulier’s shoulders.

“I slept very badly,” he said with a laugh.

Soulier points to the immense support he’s received in the poker community, particularly from French players, when explaining his ability to keep it together and close the door on Shawn Buchanan.

“It’s great to have all this support and I want to thank everyone for that,” he said.

For all the action from Las Vegas keep an eye on our 2011 WSOP Live Coverage section, brought to you by Party Poker.

Vancouver may not have a Stanley Cup but thanks to Dan Idema the city is home to another WSOP bracelet winner.

Just two days after the local Canucks hockey team lost the Stanley Cup Finals and the city spun out into a violent riot, Idema finished off three days of hard-fought poker with a $378k victory in the $10k Limit Championship at the 2011 WSOP.

It was a slightly bittersweet victory for Idema who had hoped to see his favorite team bring home the hardware in addition to his own personal victory. 

“Yeah it was a little bit of redemption I guess,” he said. “It’s really tough. Obviousl

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Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier and Jason Somerville highlighted a thrilling Day 15 at the 2011 WSOP.

After a week of lesser-known winners, Grospellier and Somerville were a welcome addition to the winner’s podium on Day 15 of the WSOP.

Thanks to a delayed final table, it was one of the busiest days yet at the 2011 WSOP with a total of seven events running.

Here’s the rundown on all the action that occurred on Day 15:

Event 18 $1,500 No-Limit Hold’em Day 4 

Event 18, which drew 3,157 players, was never supposed to go four days but a marathon session last night went too long to finish.

Six players returned to play down to a winner today with 25-year-old Foster Hays leading everyone in chips.

Indeed Hays eventually parlayed his chip lead into his first WSOP bracelet and $735k. Casey Kelt

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Coming on the heels of Black Friday and tough economic times worldwide, many people expected attendance at this year’s WSOP to plummet.

So far, those people have been proved wrong.

We’re 11 events into the 2011 WSOP and attendance has increased 2.6 percent from last year. This includes numbers from the Heads-Up Championship, which drew 128 entrants, exactly half of last year’s 256.

Out of the 11 events, this year’s Heads-Up Championship was the only event with an increased buy-in, up to $25,000 from $10,000 in 2010.

So despite hosting only half the entrants, this year’s $851,192 first prize was the largest ever awarded in a heads-up tournament. 

If you don’t include the Heads-Up Championship, attendance at this year’s WSOP has increased by 3.9 percent so far. The event that

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For the last few weeks we’ve been rolling out our WSOP Best Bets series, shining the spotlight on players from whom we expect big things at the 2011 World Series of Poker.

High-stakes online poker pro Thorsten Schafer was included in our German edition, and just one week into the World Series he’s cashed in the $10,000 Pot-Limit Hold’em World Championship.

The event attracted 249 of the world’s best high-stakes tournament pros and boasted a total prize pool of over $2.3 million.

Many players put great importance on getting results early in the World Series of Poker but Schafer disagrees, indicating a confidence in his game that isn’t built on small cashes.

“Honestly I don’t care about early results,” he told PokerListings.com moments after busting in 17^th place, good for $25,348.

“I know there’s a lot of variance in these events and I know that if you play your A-game, and you’re playing well, results will follow,” he continued.

As a high-stakes cash game regular online, Schafer has learned that the most critical thing in poker is to always play your best, regardless of short term results.

Schafer began his poker journey close to five years ago with a small deposit of $50. Since then he’s clawed

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It’s been two days since Phil Ivey released his controversial statement about Tiltware and fellow poker pros are starting to weigh in and pick sides.

In his statement Ivey took Tiltware LLC, Full Tilt Poker‘s software company, to task for its inactivity and indecision in returning player funds post-Black Friday.

Ivey went so far as to say he’s skipping the entire 2011 WSOP because U.S. pla

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