Iowa poker players, get ready! The Mid-States Poker Tour is winding its way back to the Riverside Casino for a return visit. The Iowa State Poker Championship happens this weekend and features a $200,000 guarantee.
$1,110 Iowa State Poker Championship coming July 23-25
The $1,110 buy-in Iowa State Poker Championship takes place July 23-25. The MSPT trophy event has two Day 1 starting flights on Friday and Saturday, then culminates with a final Day 2 on Sunday.
Here is the schedule:
| Date | Time | Event |
|---|---|---|
| Friday, July 23 | 3 p.m. | $1,110 Main Event Day 1A (Trophy Event) |
| Saturday, July 24 | 3 p.m. | $1,110 Main Event Day 1B (Trophy Event) |
| Sunday, July 25 | 11 a.m. | $1,110 Main Event Day 2 Restart (Trophy Event) |
Players at the Iowa poker event will receive 25,000 chips to start. The event features 40-minute levels throughout until heads-up when levels will be reduced to a half-hour. Players have the option to re-enter once per Day 1 flight during late registration, which means each can enter a maximum of four times. Those who bag to end the first Day 1 flight can’t play the second starting flight without forfeiting their stack.
The no-limit hold’em tournament will use the big blind ante until 27 players remain, at which point it will switch to standard antes.
Satellites for the tournament are already underway at the Riverside Casino. Currently, there are $70 satellites in which players can win seats into one of the $260 satellites that started Saturday, July 17. Those $260 satellites will run every day next week, including Friday and Saturday, with the top 20% of finishers winning seats into the Iowa State Poker Championship.
On Sunday, July 25, there is a side event as well: A $360 Last Chance Showdown event starting at noon.
Satellites are in the Riverside Casino Poker Room through the first part of the week. After that, the action will move to the Riverside Casino Event Center.
Mid-States Poker Tour continues busy Season 12
The MSPT continues to charge ahead through 2021 after being sent to the rail by the COVID-19 pandemic for much of last year.
After beginning Season 12 in early January, the tour has staged eight events through the first half of this year. It included one previous visit to the Riverside Casino in March and a couple stops in South Dakota.
That earlier Riverside Casino visit culminated in a $1,100 Main Event that drew a whopping 862 entries. That huge turnout created a massive $834,672 prize pool. That was more than four times the event’s $200,000 guarantee and likely bodes well for another guarantee-busting turnout next week. Daniel Sepiol of Indiana won the top prize of $162,750.
The last Iowa State Poker Championship took place in July 2019 at the Meskwaki Casino in Tama. That $1,100 event drew 401 entries and had a prize pool of just over $387,000.
Most recently in June the MSPT hosted a couple even larger tournaments at the Venetian in Las Vegas. Both were $1,100 events, and the first drew nearly 2,800 entries for a $2.69 million prize pool. The second was a $1,600 buy-in event. That one drew just over 2,000 entries had an even larger prize pool of $2.86 million.
Iowa poker players can look forward to the Mid-State Poker Tour in South Dakota a couple more times this year. The tour will go back to the Grand Falls Casino in Sioux Falls in August. It will then return again to the Silverado Casino in Deadwood in October.
