Gutshot Poker Club
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Gutshot Poker Club (also known as The Gutshot Poker Collective or simply The Gutshot) is a poker club, bar, restaurant and internet cafe located on Clerkenwell Road, London, England. The club opened in March 2004, and since claims almost 25,000 members. The founders of the Gutshot Club are Barry Martin and Derek Kelly.
The club runs poker ring games, and tournaments one to three times per day. The club hosts four festivals of poker per annum.
Amongst the successes achieved by members of the club are:
- Tiffany Williamson, 2005 World Series of Poker (WSOP) main event, 15th place ($400,000) and highest-placed female participant
- Roland De Wolfe, World Poker Tour (WPT) fourth season Grand Prix de Paris winner (€479,680;) WPT fourth season championship, 3rd place ($1,025,505); European Poker Tour (EPT) third season Ireland winner (€554,300); 2007 Irish Poker Open, 2nd place (€325,000)
- Praz Bansi, 2006 World Series of Poker bracelet winner ($230,209)
In addition to many English poker players, former WSOP main event champions Phil Hellmuth Jr, Chris Ferguson, Chris Moneymaker, Greg Raymer and Joe Hachem have also played at the venue, as well as others such as Scott Fischman, Howard Lederer, Marcel Lüske and Andy Bloch.
In May 2006, the Gutshot held the first ever event of the Showdown Poker Tour, a £3,448 buy-in event won by EPT winner Mats Gavatin.
The club also has its own online poker software.
On 16 January 2007, the owner of the club was convicted of contravening the Gaming Act. The jury in the case rejected Derek Kelly's contention that poker was a game of skill, and thus exempt from the Gaming Act. Derek Kelly appealed this verdict at the Royal Court of Appeal in London but failed. The next forum for this case would be the House of Lords in London.[1]
During the 2008 World Series of Poker Event 2, $1500 No Limit Holdem, Gutshot regular James Akenhead cames second for over $520,000. He lost a preflop all-in with AK to Grant Hinkle's T4 when the flop came down TT4 with a T on the turn.
