888poker will play host to one of the major online poker festivals this year. The XL Blizzard series will provide more than a week of intense poker action at the world’s third largest online poker site. The festival kicks off on February 6 and will run through to February 16, offering a massive $1.4 million guaranteed prize pool.
Whether you’re a recreational player or an experienced pro, the festival has something in store for you. You can choose from 34 events, with buy-ins ranging from $5.50 to $320. There will be no shortage of chances for you to take a shot at the huge prize pool as 888poker will also be running a number of satellites, giving you the chance to enter into events for a fraction of the price. The site will also host daily freerolls, so stay tuned!
Main Highlights
The first event on the schedule is the $50,000 Opening Event set to take place on February 6. It comes with a $109 buy-in, with 30,000 in starting chips played in 15-minute blind levels. Players are allowed up to three shots, and the late registration period will run for 210 minutes. Last year’s Opening Event attracted 954 entries, and was taken down by Russia’s “plomoor” for $16,458.50
Another event to look forward to during this year’s series is XL Blizzard #10 – $100,000 Tune-Up. Taking place on February 9, the event has a $160 entry fee, with $100,000 in guarantees up for grabs. Blind levels will also increase every 15 minutes, similar to the Opening Event, but players will begin with a larger stack of 50,000. Players can re-enter up to three times, within a longer late registration period at 260 minutes.
888poker Ambassador Chris “888Moorman” Moorman outclassed a field of 744 entries to capture last year’s Tune-Up event for $21,092.40. Moorman is currently at the top of online poker’s all-time money list with close to $16 million in lifetime earnings.
The highest buy-in event on this year’s schedule is the $100,000-guaranteed High Roller, taking place on February 11. The event features a $320 entry fee, with 15-minute blind levels and 50,000 in starting chips. Players are also allowed up to three re-entries, with the event adopting the same late registration period as the Tune-Up event, at 260 minutes.
The High Roller event has two smaller versions also running on the same day – the $30,000 Mini High Roller with a buy-in of $55, and the $20,000 Late High Roller which comes with an entry fee of $109.
The 2019 edition of the XL Blizzard $100K High Roller was won by Canadian player “bybababy” for $19,558.56, after topping a field of 281 entries.
This year’s schedule is also packed with a wide variety of formats, such as PKO, Deepstack, 6-Max, and 8-Max. Buy-ins for these events start from as low as $22.
XL Blizzard Main Event
The cream of the crop is the $250 buy-in Main Event which offers a cool $500,000 in guarantees. Apart from being one of the biggest events on the schedule, the Main Event also adopts the best structure, featuring a starting stack of 50,000 chips, played in 20-minute levels. The late registration period is also the longest at 5 hours, permitting up to three re-entries.
Last year’s Main Event attracted a huge field of 1,783 entries and 531 rebuys, generating a total prize pool of $543,790 that was shared by the top 207 players. The biggest slice went to “.RUIT.HORA.” of Russia who won $91,847.27 as top prize.
Satellites & Freerolls
888poker is giving you the chance to take part in XL Blizzard without spending that much, via plenty of qualifiers running on the site.
There will be two daily freerolls, one for the XL Blizzard Main Event which will give away a $250 seat to the top 15 players; the other freeroll will award dozens of tickets to the XL Blizzard Mini Tune Up Event. Earn at least a 30th-place finish and secure your own seat!
The Main Event qualifier runs at daily at 20:00 GMT, until February 15 only. Qualifier for the Min Tune Up Event is scheduled at 18:05 daily until February 8. To enter the freerolls, you must have made at least one real money deposit to your own 888poker account. If you haven’t registered yet, get started by downloading 888poker now!
For the full details and schedule of the 2020 XL Blizzard online poker festival, visit the 888poker website.