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Copyright 2006 Florida Today

January 6, 2006

HEADLINE:
Poker players converge at Texas Hold 'Em tournament

Author: Billy Cox

Body:

The Texas Hold 'Em craze gets serious this weekend when more than 500 players are expected to converge on Cocoa Beach. When the smoke clears on Sunday evening, only one will advance to the Travel Channel's World Poker Tour finals in Reno, Nev.

"We've got some really strong players coming in," says Bob Danoff, founder and president of Final Table Tour, which started last summer in Brevard County. "Some of these guys have won 13, 14 times, and they'll be getting extra chips."

The showdown is at the Cocoa Beach Holiday Inn, which has been drawing between 60 and 110 players at its poker events on Friday and Saturday nights.

"I'm just amazed at how quickly this whole thing has grown," says hotel director of sales and marketing Rick Hutcherson. "The great thing is, it looks like we're going to have people coming in from out of town and staying overnight. This is turning out to be a real winner for us."

Danoff's Final Table Tour tournament, which features winners from more than two dozen venues across the Space Coast, begins Thursday and Friday evenings at 6. Saturday's playoff sessions get under way at 9 a.m. and 6 p.m., and Sunday's final round will be between 4 and 5 p.m. The winner advances to the WPT championships in March, where contestants from around the country play for real money instead of chips.

But the second season of Final Table Tour poker actually began Sunday night, and subsequent Texas Hold 'Em tournaments will get under way every 90 days

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