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There are still plenty of chances to play your way onto the bwin Team for the Irish Open in April, but the clock is starting to tick more loudly. While time may be running out to book your reservation, you’ve still got tons of ways to play your way onto the Team, including the weekly online finals, the Bounty Hunter, and the Lucky Steps.

bondjamebond started off March on the right foot in the Bounty Hunter held on March 1st, outlasting a field of 313 runners to take down 1st place and the $8,000 Irish Open trip package that comes with it. He’ll be playing for the Team for the first time, where he’ll join plenty of other fresh faces as well as crafty old veterans such as Wieringen, ChipLieder85, and LocStaOnFire (who recently finished 3rd at EPT Berlin for a huge payday of €350,000).

The Irish Open online finals at bwin offer players two shots each week at taking down a $8,000 trip package to the upcoming Irish Open in April. We’ve seen a mix of familiar faces and new names play their way onto the bwin Team roster in recent weeks, and last Sunday’s online finals would feature a battle of new and old when it came down to heads-up play.

kobe71 represented bwin at the 2009 APT Macau and would be trying to win another trip with the Team, facing off against tbac1 in heads-up action after the rest of the field was eliminated. tbac1 has never been on a trip with the bwin Team but he was coming off a huge GSOP series that saw him take down more than $100,000 in total prize money, so he was definitely on a roll.

In the end it’d be the veteran who’d prevail, with kobe71 getting it all-in pre-flop with A9o versus tbac1’s A7o, and kobe71’s dominating hand held up to ship him the $8,000 Irish Open trip package and another amazing trip with the Team, this time to Dublin.

kobe71 at the 2009 APT Macau

Team veterans Puggy82 and Wieringen have been front and center here on the blog in recent months (with both representing the Team at the Aussie Millions and Wieringen already qualifying for the upcoming Irish Open) and they each notched a nice score in the High Roller held on February 23rd.

The High Roller is a new tournament offering at bwin but it’s been immensely popular right out of the gate, easily shattering the $25,000 guarantee every time it’s run. The February 23rd edition sported a prize pool of $46,000, with $12,420 slated to go to the winner.

Which would be none other than Puggy82, who added to his impressive collection of big online tournament wins with a victory in the High Roller worth $12,420; it also tied him with NeilMc for bragging rights with each claiming a ChampionChip and High Roller title). Aside from some tough defeats in various Irish Open online finals, February was a good month for Puggy82, as in addition to his High Roller win he also took down the $20,000 European Daily (plus 4th in another) and had nice scores in the $50,000 European Rebuy and other smaller tournaments.

Wieringen also had a good run in the High Roller as well, finishing 4th for $4,002. He ran hot in February himself, cashing for $11,850 in GSOP #13, taking down a $12,000 NL tourney for $4,342, and taking 2nd in a $7,000 Canadian Daily.

The Irish Open online finals give bwin players two shots each week at joining the bwin Team for what promises to be an amazing trip in April when they descend on the Irish Open in Dublin for the first time. While the $320 buy-in might seem frightening at first to players with more modest bankrolls, tons of satellites run each and every day that enable players to play their way into the online finals.

The online finals on February 25th drew 32 entries, which meant that it would be a winner-take-all affair as far as the $8,000 Irish Open trip package up for grabs. In the end that top prize would go to Scorpdoc, who’d get the best of LurvigaLauri in heads-up play to take down the victory. NeilMc would make the final table before bowing out in 9th, as far as familiar names from past trips with the Team trying to book an adventure to the Emerald Isle in April.

The Irish Open action is still hot and heavy at bwin poker, with the Lucky Steps, weekly online finals, and the Bounty Hunter ensuring that more and more players each week get a chance to sample the poker high life with the bwin Team.

Hedeberg was the first to get in on the action, winning the Bounty Hunter on February 15th to secure a $8,000 trip package to the Irish Open. Next up was theo1345, who not only survived a tough field of 45 runners in the online finals, but had to defeat Team veteran AKplus1 in heads-up action to grab his $8,000 trip package.

Last but not least was the $800 Lucky Steps Finals, which had a big turnout of 20 runners, which meant that two $8,000 trip packages were up for grabs. Luck was on the side of petergmember and barra18, who each would survive to finish in the top two spots and lock up $8,000 packages to the 2010 Irish Open in Dublin.

The Bounty Hunter may have already punched one lucky winners ticket to the Irish Open, but there’s another $8,000 trip package up for grabs in this week’s Head Hunter Finals on February 27th.

The below 7 players collected the most scalps during the Bounty Hunter and get to compete in a private tournament amongst themselves, with $9,300 in prize money up for grabs, including a coveted ticket to join the bwin Team at the Irish Open in April:

Thomayek
kirb18x
volidas10k
ALCIONE12
8BB1
arviserd1
wolf872x

kirb18x is fresh off his big cash of AU $100,000 at the Aussie Millions, so tune in on February 27th to see if he can play his way back onto the Team for a second event in a row.

Despite frigid temperatures across much of Europe, the action at the tournament tables has really been heating up in recent weeks at bwin. GSOP IV just wrapped up and the tournament series continues to shatter records at bwin, seemingly with every tournament that’s run.

The GSOP Grand Slam Finals sported a prizepool of over half a million dollars and more than 16,000 players played in at least one GSOP event, with nearly $4 million in total prize money paid out over the course of the tournaments.

The bwin Team completed another amazing live event trip at the Aussie Millions, and now its time to focus on the upcoming Irish Open trip in April.

Players can win $8,000 trip packages to the Irish Open in a variety of ways, including through the Lucky Steps, the weekly online finals, and the Bounty Hunter and Head Hunter tournaments.

As always the bwin blogging and video teams will be on the ground in Dublin bringing you all of the exciting action and fun with videos, podcasts, chip counts, and recaps of all the big hands.

bwin has also kicked it up a notch as far as its regular weekly tournaments, increasing the guarantees by $1.2 million across more than 50 daily tournaments.

In addition to all the daily tournaments you already love and play, bwin has also added a new $7,000 Russian Daily tournament, which runs each day at 17:30 CET.

Another exciting week of poker is in the books at bwin, with a variety of tournaments last week punching the tickets to the Irish Open for new and familiar faces alike. bwin players can snag a $8,000 trip package to the Irish Open in April in many different ways, playing their way in through the Bounty Hunter and Head Hunter, the online finals, the Lucky Steps, and via the Winter SnG Decathlon (you can find the current leaderboard here).

canmarco777 took 1st in last week’s Bounty Hunter action to claim his Irish Open trip package, with Sergio660Has settling for 2nd (although he did pocket a nice cash of $1,680).

Two different Irish Open online finals were held, which would send a total of 3 players to join the bwin Team in Dublin. In the first one on February 11th, two trip packages would be up for grabs in a tough field of 64 runners that includes familiar names such as Puggy82, Wieringen, King_Dirk, and Speedzebre. While Puggy82 and Wieringen both made the final table, each had to settle for winning a ticket to another online finals when they finished 6th and 4th, respectively. TheRealMG82 and IFoldAKs1 would scoop up the trip packages, with antero13 the unfortunate bubble boy.

The online finals held on February 14th would feature a smaller field of 39 runners and one trip package up for grabs, but it’d be a very stacked field including the likes of NeilMc, LocStaOnFire, King_Dirk, Puggy82, Wieringen, raysondk, AKplus1, and weniotto (fresh off his big cash at the Aussie Millions). The final table wouldn’t get any easier, featuring Wieringen, King_Dirk, LocStaOnFire, raysondk, NeilMc, and AKplus1, with Wieringen coming through to take down the $8,000 trip package and, yet again, join the bwin Team for another amazing live event.

Wieringen wins his ticket to join the Team at another live event for what seems like the millionth time.

While the new Bounty Hunter tournaments on bwin are sending more amd more players to join the bwin Team at the Irish Open (including ChipLieder85 in recent weeks), the Head Hunter now offers a second chance for Bounty Hunters cash in.

This week the Head Hunter will feature the 7 players from the Bounty Hunter with the most knockouts (except for any winners of the $8,000 Irish Open trip packages, who don’t get to play in the Head Hunter) battling it out for $12,930 in guaranteed prize money. Below are the 7 players who qualified for the Head Hunter, all of whom will be hoping to add more scalps to their collection:

Dg0815
_AssassinS_
manifico66
Escorba
nudos27
canmarco777
stasomfaen

As if the GSOP action wasn’t enough at bwin poker over the last week, action heated up on the Irish Open front as well, with more players (some new faces and some very familiar ones) battling to grab a $8,000 Irish Open trip package to join the bwin Team for the next big live event.

First up was the Bounty Hunter, which would award three $8,000 Irish Open trip packages to the top 3 finishers. 728 players would turn out for the $100 buy-in NLHE freezout, which would see zuzanka77, ZoliN7806, and none other than ChipLieder85 take down the top spots and trip packages. While zuzanka77 and ZoliN7806 are new additions to the bwin Team, ChipLieder85 has been around the block more than a few times with the Team, cashing at both the Aussie Millions and the WSOP Main event.

The Irish Open online finals on Sunday February 7th sported a $320 buy-in and drew 47 runners, which meant that it’d be an all-or-nothing affair as far as one $8,000 trip package up for grabs. It looked like that prize would go to another very familiar face, with Puggy82 getting down to heads-up action with pufulet1965 and holding a big chip advantage, but pufulet1965 would fight all the way back, eventually taking the victory and the chance to join the Team for the Irish Open in April.

The new Lucky Steps tournament would also send two fortunate players to Dublin to join the Team, with k0nr4d1 and dani616 each winning a $8,000 trip package in the $800 Lucky Steps Final held on February 7th.

ChipLieder85 will be back to join the Team at the Irish Open