Pokerstars is close to dealing it’s 25 Billionth hand and because of this monumentus milestone, PokerStars is having a huge promotion called the 25 Billion Bash!  The poker promotion involves many rewards for players including milestone hands, a reload bonus, the mega milestone hand and more!

Milestone Hands
Every millionth hand, starting from 24.5 billion, PokerStars is giving away cash prizes to the winners and the players dealt into the hands.  The bigger the limit you are playing at the bigger the prize will be.  At the micro limits the winner of a milestone hand wins $300, whereas if you play the high limits and win a milestone hand you would receive $2500.

25% Reload Bonus
PokerStars is also offering at 25% reload bonus to all players.  This is a very rare thing for PokerStars to offer reload bonuses, so rare in fact that this is the biggest reload bonus PokerStars has ever offered.  You should take advantage while you can and make your deposit now.  The bonus is a 25% matching bonus up to $250.

Mega Milestone Hand
The 25 Billionth hand at PokerStars is going to be one to remember.  Over $250K will be given away just on one hand of poker.  The winner receives a prize package of over $150K which includes $100,000 in cash as well as packages to the EPT Final, the WSOP, the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure and the World Championships of Online Poker main event.  All other players that were dealt into the hand split $100K.

Those are the main parts of the 25 Billion Bash put on by PokerStars, but we shouldn’t forget that Stars is also having $60K in new depositors freerolls for the days leading up to the 25 billionth hand.  They are also increasing the Sunday Million and Sunday Warm-Up guaranteed prize pools so to coincide with the “25″ theme.  The Sunday Million will have a guarantee of $2.5M and the Sunday Warm-Up of $1,250,000 on Sunday February 15th. 

This is a perfect time to sign up at PokerStars or deposit to take advantage of the bonuses.  Or you could just try to play more ring games and hope for the best!  It would be quite the lottery, but somebody has to win it.

Titan poker has started their Million Dollar Rake Race.  From January 12th to April 28th Titan Poker is giving away $1,000,000 in cash to all of their players who are playing cash games at Titan Poker.

The main event challenge is running throughout the entire event and is giving away a prize pool of $300,000.  First prize in the main event is $75K and after 2 days vader793 from Canada is off to an early lead.  Prizes are paid right down to 3000th position, which is a $30 prize.

There are also monthly and weekly rake races, with monthly races giving away $50K each and weekly races handing out $5K each.

On top of this there are 3 day Country races, where players from a specific country compete for the prize pool.  For example from Jan. 25 to Jan. 27, Canadians will compete in a $3000 rake race.  26 countries in total have their own personal races.  To see if your country is included check out the schedule.

By playing in Titan Poker cash games you are already competing in every race you are eligible for at any given time.  You can participate in all of the races at once, including the main event, the monthly, weekly and country rake races.

By playing in Titan Poker cash games you will automatically earn Titan Points which will determine your placement in the races.

Sign up to Titan Poker now to take part in this amazing promotion!

Sit and go madness is back at Full Tilt from January 9th at 4pm EST until 4pm ESt no January 11th.  Earn the most sit and go points in any of the two hour blocks during Sit and go madness to win the cash prizes.  First place in the $1-$2 group is $20, and first place in the $50 to $110 group is $500 every 2 hours.  There are 7 places paid every 2 hours.

The overall leaderboard is also in effect, with the top 2 players from each of the 4 buy-in categories meeting in a $5k 8 player tournament on the 17th of January.  And lets not forget about the raffle.  Every time you win a sit and go during Sit and go madness you earn one raffle ticket towards the more than 1000 prizes being given away in the raffle. 

Just make sure the tournaments are labeled in green and multitable like a madman for your chance at some of this extra cash being given out by Full Tilt.  This is a great promotion for sit’n'go players who are used to multi-tabling.

PKR has come out with a new online poker promotion to make your 12 days of Christmas even more exciting.  Starting December 23rd PKR is adding a bonus prize to a big guaranteed tournament for 12 days.  These prizes total more than $5000 in added prizes.  Here is the tournament schedule:

Dec. 23 – 1:30pm EST – $3K guaranteed limit holdem – First place wins a bonus PSP-3000 and a Go!Cam.
Dec. 24 – 1:30pm EST – $5K guaranteed NLH – First place wins a bonus XBOX360 Elite System
Dec. 25 – 3:00pm EST – $5K guaranteed NLH – First place wins a bonus Playstation 3
Dec. 26 – 1:30pm EST – $10K guaranteed 6-seat NLH – First place wins a bonus iPod touch
Dec. 27 – 3:00pm EST – $100K guaranteed NLH – First place wins a bonus Nintendo Wii with Sports pack
Dec. 28 – 10:00am EST – $5K guaranteed 6-seat NLH – First place wins 2 bottles of Cuvee Cristal 2002
Dec. 29 – 1:30pm EST – $5K guaranteed PL Omaha – First place wins a B&W Zeppelin iPod speaker
Dec. 30 – 1:30pm EST – $5K guaranteed terminator – First place wins a Sony Cyber-shot DSC-T700 Digital Camera
Dec. 31 – 10:00am EST – $5K guaranteed Speed – First place wins a bonus Sony PRS505S eBook reader
Jan. 1 – 3:00pm EST – $15K guaranteed NLH – First place wins a bonus Panasonic SC-PT860 DVD Home Cinema System
Jan. 2 – 1:30pm EST – $5K guaranteed Terminator – First place wins a bonus Sony BDP-S550 Blu-ray Disc Player
Jan. 11 – $5K Freeroll – Play in 3 or more Christmas Cracker tournaments to gain entry into this freeroll.  The more tournaments you play in, the bigger your starting stack for this freeroll will be!

So if you are looking for some more cool gifts for Christmas, PKR may have your answer.  I would only suggest playing in these tournaments if you were already planning to play some poker that day as the tournaments are not that great value, with only first place winning an extra prize.  However, if you do manage to outlast the field, you can take home some pretty sweet gifts.

If you don’t have a PKR account yet, be sure to get the top PKR bonus code around when making your initial deposit. At least download PKR and try out the software, you will be sold!

Poker promotions are a great way to continue to build your bankroll after you have exhausted the initial deposit bonuses for the majority of the reputable online poker rooms. 

After you have used all the additional money the poker rooms gave you to try out their rooms, you have to look for other ways to gain an edge.  These can include rakeback, freerolls (such as the country freerolls at Full Tilt), overlay tournaments AND online poker room promotions.  Many promotions offered by poker rooms give money and prizes back to the players. 

For example, the Doyle’s Room bounty promotion gives players a free entry into their first bounty tournament, which is a value of $27.50.  On top of this players can earn extra bounty money from knocking out Doyle or his friends.  This all turns into additional cash being added to the tournament.

Another example would be Carbon Poker’s monthly rake race promotions, which are always the exact same with different themes, which kind of annoys me, but they are still giving cash back to the player.  Or even Full Tilt’s happy hour.  Full Tilt Points are basically cash because they can buy you into tournaments or purchase you Full Tilt merchandise. 

Poker series’ held by rooms almost always have extra prizes or a winners freeroll that gives back to the players.  For example the Cake Poker Reindeer Games promotion has added prizes for every tournament, such as 5 seats added to the $250K guaranteed, $5000 added to the prize pool, etc, not to mention the $20K Reindeer Games finals which the top 9 finishers from each event earn entry to. 

As you can see poker promotions are a great way to build your bankroll, because you can actually be at an advantage to the house.  Any time a poker room offers a promotion such as a money added tournament, a rebate or special bounties, you should try to take advantage of these offers, rather than just play regular tournaments where the poker room earns 10% of your buy-in.

A smart strategy would be to look at our bonuses page.  Try to clear all these bonuses while building your bankroll, which will give you a lot of additional poker funds.  Start by playing at the poker rooms that give you the best poker bonus and work your way down through the remaining poker rooms bonuses.  Then come back and stay on the look out for new poker promotions that are coming up, that put the advantage back in your hands.  It’s all about continuing to build your bankroll by gaining an edge any way you can!!

Targeted: All players who are tired of hold’em and omaha and are looking for a new poker variation.
Value: No added value
Chance of big payday: Whatever you put in, determines what you can win
Type of Promotion: New Variation of Draw Poker
Take Advantage: If you are looking for an interesting draw poker game, where big hands are often present, then yes.

Details
32 Card Draw Poker is increasing in popularity across Europe and is now available to be played at Devil Fish Poker.  Only the top half of the deck is used, (7-A), which results in a lot more big hands such as full houses and quads.  All these big hands causes a lot of fast paced action, which makes 32 Card Draw one of the most exciting poker games around. 

There are some rule changes.  The ranking of hands is different than in regular poker, with a flush beating a full house and certain suits being more valuable for flushes than other suites.  There is also an option to offer to split the pot.  Also, (A,7,8,9,10) counts as the lowest straight in 32 Draw Poker.

Here are the hand rankings for 32 Card Draw:
1. Royal Flush
2. Straight Flush
3. Four of a Kind
4. Flush
5. Full House
6. Straight
7. Three of a Kind
8. Two Pair
9. Pair

Suit Rankings
1. Hearts
2. Diamonds
3. Clubs
4. Spades

Overview
32 Card Draw looks to be an exciting form of poker.  I’m definitely going to try it out this Thursday after I play my weekly Devilfish Bounty Tournament.

Rating: 4/5

Targeted: all players
Value: $600 in added bounties
Chance of big payday: There is a guaranteed prize pool of $12500 with the buy-in at $30…
Type of Promotion: Bounty tournament – money added tournament
Take Advantage: Yes

Details
To celebrate the upcoming bond movie, “Quantum of Solace”, PKR is changing their regular Wednesday night bounty tournament into a Bond Bounty.  The tournament will take place this Wednesday @ 2pm EST.  The buy-in is $30 and there will be a guaranteed prize pool of $12,500.  All six bonds will be in the game, from Connery to Brosnan to Craig.  Knock out any bond and you’ll receive $100.  Also $5 of the buy-in goes on the head of all the other players in the tournament as well, so any other player you knock out nets you $5.

Overview
This tournament is a good value tournament with $600 extra added to the pot, in the form of the 6 bond bounties.  PKR’s bounty tournaments are always a ton of fun, and I would encourage anyone who can to play and get in the 007 mood.  If you are thinking about becoming a new player at PKR, make sure you get a PKR bonus code when making your first deposit to take advantage of their bonus offers.  You should at least download PKR and try out the best poker software in the industry.

Rating: 5/5

Targeted: all players
Value: up to $10000 in live tournament entry fees
Chance of big payday: Very good.  If you earn enough VIP points you will earn a trip to a live tournament of your choice
Type of Promotion: Frequent play promotion
Take Advantage: Yes

Details
Earn VIP points by playing in Devilfish Poker ring games or tournaments and you can earn yourself a trip to a live tournament anywhere around the globe.  For example:

Earn 14,200 VIP points to earn an entry into the €2000 buy-in, Irish Poker Championships on Jan 2nd.
Earn 37,500 VIP points to earn entry into the $10000 Aussie Millions.
Earn 54,000 VIP points to earn entry into the 2009 World Series of Poker Main Event!!

There are a ton of tournaments to earn entry into and you have plenty of time to earn your VIP points.  There is no monthly minimum so you can build up your VIP points whenever you have the time. 

Other tournaments which you can earn entry into through Devilfish Travel include:
Asian Poker Tour Phillipines – 13500 points
WPT LA Poker Classic – 54000 points
Irish Open 2009 Main Event – 25000 points
WPT Championship – 137500 points
EPT Grand Final – 75500 points
And many more!

Overview
This is an amazing promotion, as any player who plays online regularly can surely earn enough points within the time frame to gain entry to a live tournament somewhere around the globe.  For example the Irish Open is in April and only requires 25000 points.  Thats less than 5000 points a month, which is very doable for any regular player.

All you have to do is play at Devilfish Poker, earn your VIP points, then go to the Devilfish Travel page and book your trip!