Major Live Poker Tours in Europe

World Series of Poker Europe

Launched in 2007, World Series of Poker Europe (WSOPE) made it possible to, for the first time in history, get a WSOP bracelet outside Las Vegas. So far, every WSOPE has been held at the Casino at the Empire in Leicester Square in London.

Just like WSOP, WSOPE welcomes players from all over the world, not just European players. Unlike the casinos in Las Vegas which must enforce a 21-year age limit for players, casinos in London are allowed to permit players of 18 years of age and upwards.

European Poker Tour

Sponsored by PokerStars, the European Poker Tour (EPT) premiered in 2004 and distinguishes itself from the World Poker Tour (WPT) by allowing eight players at the final table instead of six. In the early seasons, the buy-ins for EPT tournaments were significantly lower than for WPT tournaments but nowadays they are on roughly the same level. EPT is taped by Sunset + Vine for television broadcast in Europe. Each season give rise to seven programs.

Scandinavian Open (a part of EPT)

The European Poker Tour (EPT) Copenhagen is affectionately nicknamed Scandinavian Open due to its high degree of Scandinavian and Nordic players. During the first seven seasons of EPT, Nordic players have won the EPT Copenhagen Main Event five times. Sweden has three golds, while Denmark and Finland holds one gold each.

The first Scandinavian victory in EPT Copenhagen took place during the second season of EPT, when Copenhagen resident Mads Andersen defeated Norways Edgar Skjervold in heads-up to claim a first prize consisting of nearly 2,55 million DKK.

During the following season it was Sweden's turn to claim its first EPT Compenhagen victory, when Magnus Petersson from the Swedish capital Stockholm defeated French PokerStars pro Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier and was awarded over 4 million DKK.

During season four, the title went not to a Scandinavian player but to Nordic player Jens "Jeans" Kyllönen from Finland. The final table was also a chiefly Nordic affair, consisting of two Fins (including Kyllönen), two Swedes, two Danes, one Norwegian and one Frenchman. 20 year old Kyllönen managed to outlast all his opponents to grab a first prize worth nearly 6,55 million DKK.

The fifth season brought a second gold to Sweden from Copenhagen, this time thanks to Swedish poker player Anton Wigg. Wigg didn't buy into EPT Copenhagen – he qualified through PokerStars.com and thus earned 3 675 000 DKK after wagering practically nothing.

The sixth season's EPT Copenhagen was also won by a Swedish poker player when Michael Tureniec outlasted Per Linde, who is also from Sweden, in heads-up. This time, the first prize consisted of 3,7 DKK. In addition to Tureniec and Linde, three other Nordic players reach the Main Event final: Juha Helpi from Finland, Mudassar Khan from Denmark and Nikolas Liakos from Sweden.