Barry Carter thinks the Irish Open should be a bucket list event for any poker player after a record breaking series.
There is a myth in poker circles that when you go to an Irish poker festival, it is rife with drinking, gambling, and the locals don’t take the game seriously.
The reality is that the locals understand variance, so it sometimes seems like they are not taking the game seriously. In fact that are taking poker more seriously than most.
OK, there is a lot of drinking though.
While a lot of the poker world is enjoying poker on a cruise ship right now, I can’t think of anywhere I would have rather been than a rainy Dublin for the Irish Open. Ireland is my favourite place to play poker, and most people who have visited agree.
A truly ‘festive’ poker festival
What I love about Irish poker is that the locals understand the nature of the game. In the United Kingdom, where I am from, card rooms are rife with people complaining about bad luck. Players will remind you about a bad beat you put on them five years ago, or moan about not having been dealt anything good for two hours. Most other countries I have played poker in are very similar, in some cases, they take bad beats even worse.
My great observation about the Irish is that they appreciate the variance aspect of poker. They don’t ruminate on it as much as most players, they don’t apologise for it when it goes their way, and they accept bad fortune at the table more readily. I don’t think the average Irish player is better or worse than players from any other country, they just understand the game better.
Outside of the World Series, to me, the Irish Open is the best festival in poker. The key word being ‘festive’. There is more drinking and more joking than at any other festival too. Irish Poker is also less ‘casino’ centric and often takes place in hotels, which has always led to a communal atmosphere.
A bucket list event
It has been great to see the recent growth of this event. Around 1,000 live and online satellite seats contributed to the record-breaking field. The operators also ran a very fun series of events away from poker including karaoke, darts, shuffleboard and all manner of other ‘pub games’. This happens at other festivals outside of Ireland, but it is more embraced in the Emerald Isle.
Yes, the weather can be miserable in April, but be honest, most of us never see the destination country that much anyway on a poker trip. After the World Series the Irish Open, or at least one of the other festivals in Ireland, should be on any poker player’s bucket list.
Have you played poker in Ireland? Let us know in the comments: