On 16th – 19th of October, 290 players gathered in sports poker club “Du Karaliai” (city of Vilnius) to participate in the 5th Annual Lithuanian Sports Poker Championship – the biggest sports poker event across the region.

In Lithuania poker is perceived as a sport and a lot of people are enjoying the game without risking any money – all such events in Lithuania are without any buy-in or entrance fee.

This championship was special for several reasons – all main cities of Lithuania were represented as well as very deep tournament structure was employed. More than 20 percent of all participants were women.

The whole tournament had three starting days, second and the final days. In total more than 40 hours of poker has been played during the tournament and the final table took 7 hours. For the first time, two ladies and even a wife and a husband took part in the final table. That has never happened before.

Matas Levanas became 5th champion of Lithuania. He beat very experienced player Mantas Urbonas. Heads up phase took more than 3 hours to complete.

Find out more about the Lithuanian Sports Poker Federation here – https://matchpokerfed.org/blog/member-nation/lithuania/

The Macedonian Poker Federation has started their own tournament competition 3 times a week at their online poker room just for registered members (Macedonian Citizens over 18 years old). 10 days ago a new set of Macedonian ranking tournaments for all registered members began and will be conducted 3 times a week – every Sunday, Monday and Thursday! Start with 2000 chips 15/30 blinds increasing every 10 minutes. This competition will end on 19 march following a short break for the New Year from 29th December to 11th January. The winner of the competition will take his/her place in the Macedonian national team for the IFP World Cup in Berlin next year.

At the moment only 3 places have been confirmed in the Macedonian national team.

1.Aleksandar Trajkovski (captain of the team)

2. Ljupcho Manevski (Macedonian player of 2013)

3. Suzana Al Salkini (best female player for 2013).