Bovada Poker has released the schedule for its 2014 Black Diamond Poker Open Series which offers $3 million in guaranteed prize pools across two hundred events.
In 2013, Bovada Poker´s Black Diamond Poker Open was a staggering success – with more than $1.2 million paid in prizes over the 172 online poker tournaments that were included in the schedule. For 2014, Bovada Poker aims to shatter that record by offering a 200 event Poker Open Series with $3 million guaranteed in prizes.
The Black Diamond Poker Open is divided into two sections – the “Contender Series”, which consists of 100 events with micro and low stakes buy-ins starting from $3.30, and the “Championship Series”, which is comprised of tournaments that have mid and high stake buy-ins from $22.00 and which is where the highest rewarding events can be found.
Black Diamond Poker Open – Contender Series
The Black Diamond Poker Open “Contender Series” gets underway on Tuesday 18 February and will run through to Wednesday 12 March. The “Kickoff” Event is a $22.00 buy-in NL Texas Hold´em tournament that has a guaranteed prize pool of $10,000 and, because it is scheduled for a Tuesday, offers a good chance of an overlay.
The remainder of the Contender Series should also see several under-subscribed tournaments – particularly those played in the less popular disciplines of Pot Limit Omaha and Seven Card Stud – while other NL Hold´em events will be played in a variety of formats; including Re-Buy, Deepstack, Heads-Up, 6-Max, Shootout and “Escalator” – in which the level lengths increase as the tournament progresses.
The feature tournament in the Black Diamond Poker Open Contender Series schedule is the $55.00 buy-in Main Event which will be played at 8.03pm (ET) on Sunday 9 March and has a $50,000 guaranteed prize pool. Players who wish to compete in this event have just over a month to take advantage of the comprehensive range of Main Event qualifiers in the Bovada Poker tournament lobby.
Black Diamond Poker Open – Championship Series
Following a ten-day break to catch our breaths, the Black Diamond Poker Open “Championship Series” gets underway on Saturday 22 March with an $82.00 buy-in NL Texas Hold´em event that has a guaranteed prize pool of $20,000 – so not as much chance of an overlay in this event, but there are plenty more before the Championship Series concludes on Sunday 13 April.
Although the Championship Series and the Contender Series start and close with similar events, one is not a mirror image of the other. A different variety of tournaments will be included in the Championship schedule such as a PL Omaha Super Knockout (where the buy-in and bounty are of equal value to make it more worthwhile to eliminate another player) and a Super Turbo Deepstack NL Texas Hold´em tournament in which players receive 10,000 starting chips.
The Championship Series Main Event is a $450.00 buy-in NL Texas Hold´em tournament with a $300,000 guaranteed prize pool from which the winner will collect a minimum of $60,000 and the Black Diamond Poker Open Championship watch that has a value of $5,000 (subject to any final table deals). A qualifying path into the Championship event can also be found in the Bovada Poker tournament lobby.
Black Diamond Poker Open is Open to All the World
Despite being exclusively a USA-friendly poker site, players from Bovada Poker will be joined by others from all over the world for the Black Diamond Poker Open. Both the Contender and the Championship Series will be open to Asian players from Bodog88.com and European poker players who chose to play online poker at Bodog.eu.
The full schedules for the Black Diamond Poker Open are available on all three websites, and players from the US will be happy to see that the timings of the most valuable events are more favorable for those that live on the Eastern Seaboard!
