Sunny Florida is the sight of the $5,000 buy-in World Poker Tour (WPT) bestbet Scramble Championship from Nov. 15-19. More specifically, one of the top spots for tournament poker in the Southeast — bestbet Jacksonville.
At the time of publishing, it hadn't even been 24 hours since Michael Wang finished off his first WPT title with a CAD $384,738 victory in Montreal at Playground. And now it's time for the World Poker Tour to shift its focus back south to the United States for its near-annual trip to Jacksonville where Frederic Normand, a Canadian, will look to defend his title.
Normand defeated 365 players to join the WPT Champions Club and win $351,650 one year ago. He'd go on to win a $1,600 buy-in WPT event at Wynn Las Vegas a month later for a career-best $417,828 score.
Defending a title in any poker tournament is never easy, but Normand can begin his quest to do so on Nov. 15 at noon ET with the first of two Day 1 starting flights — the second taking place at the same time a day later. All players who bag chips on either of the opening sessions will come back on Nov. 17 for Day 2 at noon, followed by Day 3 (Nov. 18), which is scheduled to play down to the final table of six.
The final table on Nov. 19 begins at 2 p.m. Players start with 50,000 chips and will play 60-minute levels on Day 1, and then 90-minute levels on Days 2 and 3 before returning to the 60-minute levels at the final table. Once heads-up play starts, the clock will drop to 30-minute levels.
PokerNewswill be on-site at bestbet Jacksonville throughout the tournament providing daily feature stories and recaps.
| Date | Session | Time (ET) |
|---|---|---|
| Nov. 15 | Day 1a | Noon |
| Nov. 16 | Day 1b | Noon |
| Nov. 17 | Day 2 | Noon |
| Nov. 18 | Day 3 | Noon |
| Nov. 19 | Final Table | 2:00 p.m. |
[*]Images courtesy of the World Poker Tour/Drew Amato.