Gambier Poker Johnnie Walker Classic
Gambier Poker offers a unique experience when you play poker in Mount Gambier. Those traveling from away will instantly recognise the beauty of this township and what it has to offer. It is situated at the bottom of the state and centered equally between Adelaide and Melbourne. The scenery is amazing and surrounded by stunning pine plantations, which supports the majority of the working population of the Limestone Coast. It is only 30km from the coast which is the heart of the Rock lobster industry. Mount Gambier was settled next to a non-active volcano filled with fresh water which the town relies on its main source of water. The Blue Lake has this striking blue colour which is seen from November to March caused by the algae.
Poker has had a very strong association in Mount Gambier ever since the rise of the Joe Hachem era in 2006. Many hotels took to the rush of poker clubs such as NPL APL and 888 however there were too many options available in town and they were not sustainable. Eventually it was the RSL who had the upper hand and with the club offering great service had the monopoly of the players.
RSL ran poker for 11 years straight until 2018 when the directors of the RSL poker decided to change venue and became Jens Poker at the Jens Hotel. It was that year when poker venues saw the importance of hosting poker series with multiple events over a weekend and offering guaranteed prize pools. This began a new era of Poker and brought players together from various regions making the poker community even tighter.
Enter the Jens Poker promoting. The more the directors travelled the more Jens Poker was promoted. Jens needed a series of their own and in 2018, enter the Johnnie Walker Classic. It was a huge success and had player travel from as far as NSW, Melbourne and Adelaide to experience the weekend. The following year was even bigger and the prize pool grew to $15,000 first place.
2020 saw the rise of Covid19 and unfortunately due to State Health Restrictions forced the JWC to be postponed until the following year, Queens Birthday Long Weekend in June.
The numbers were looking fantastic for the event in 2021 however a massive outbreak of Covid19 in Victoria saw our SA border slam shut to Victoria within weeks of the event. Because the majority of our player base was from Victoria, our decision to postpone the event again wasn’t an easy one at all.
To accommodate our local base players who had already prepared for our JWC, we created a proxy event and called it the ‘Little Blue’ named after our local swimming hole which looks like the blue lake.
The Little Blue tournament was a great success however it was quickly decided to hold two Little Blue events on either side of our JWC.
In January 2022, the Jens Poker committee unanimously agreed to return Poker back to the RSL and rename it Gambier Poker. The RSL has the best facility in town to hold a large poker event. The move back to the RSL has been a positive one and will secure a well run weekly tournament structure all year around. The weekly tournaments are very affordable and suits the local poker community with their needs and expectations.
Monday nights:
Terminator structure (or satellite structure depending on the weeks leading into our series events)
$40.00 buyin.
15 minute blinds
30K stack.
Wednesday nights:
10 week series consecutively.
$40.00 buyin ($5 towards series final)
15 minute blinds
30k start stack.
