WSOP 2011 Gets Underway Today

Today the 42nd World Series of Poker gets underway at the Rio All Suites Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.
This world renowned tournament series will now run for a month and a half between May 31st and July 19th and award a record 58 gold bracelets, culminating in the $10k Main Event on July 7th.
New events to look out for at WSOP 2011 include the $25k NLHE Heads Up Championship, as well as the $2.5k six-handed 10-game mixed event and the $5k six-handed PLO event.
There have also been a number of other changes to this year’s WSOP. These include an unprecedented amount of television coverage, as well as for the first time the ESPN network or WSOP.com recording every final table.
In addition, this year the player’s comfort will be more closely addressed than ever by limiting the amount of play per day to a maximum of 10 levels.
On the competitors front, one of the top pro to take note of at WSOP 2011 is record bracelet holder Phil Hellmuth currently on 11 bracelets and hoping to pull further away from nearest rivals Johnny Chan and Doyle Brunson both on 10.
Eight times winner Phil Ivey will also prove a formidable force at the competition, no doubt boosted by the extra incentive of millions of dollars in prop bets with fellow pros. In 2010, for instance, Ivey and Howard Lederer made the biggest known prop bet in poker history after a bet was made for $5 million that Ivey couldn’t win 2 WSOP bracelets over a two year period.
However, Ivey did manage to capture a bracelet last year at the $3,000 H.O.R.S.E. and one more title over the next few weeks will see him collect the enormous sum from fellow Full Tilt pro Lederer.
At the time of the wager, Lederer known as the “Poker Professor” had assumed WSOP fields would continue growing over the next few years thus making Ivey’s task harder. However, in the wake of Black Friday it is now expected the fields will drop off somewhat although estimates vary greatly by how much.
As the WSOP 2011 gets underway today, here at Onlinepoker.net we will endeavour to keep you updated with all the main news coming from Las Vegas as it occurs.