Rio Video Poker Tournament

Featuring a comprehensive slate of tournaments in every major poker variation, the WSOP is poker’s longest-running tournament in the world, dating back to 1970. In 2019, the event attracted 187,298 entrants from 118 different countries to the Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas and awarded more than $293 million in prize money. Gold Coast: For video poker fans who are B Connected club members, there's a $5,000 free video poker tournament every Friday from 2-10 p.m. In Tournament Alley. The first-place winner will get $1,500. You get your free tournament entry ticket at a kiosk after earning 300 same-day points. A schedule of Rio All-Suites Hotel & Casino poker tournaments, including time, buy-in, blind structure, and more. You also can find Rio All-Suites Hotel & Casino phone number, address, and website. Viewers who are looking for a way to watch the World Series of Poker Main Event final table — stop looking. There will be no live video coverage, on TV or online, of the final table of the U.S. But an example would be if you held a $1,000 buy-in no-limit hold’em tournament at the Rio, you could run a $10,000 buy-in event over at Planet Hollywood at the same time.

This summer, when playing in a World Series of Poker Daily Deepstack event, we got a chance to experience the Rio poker room. While the WSOP is certainly not the time to get a perfect read on the day-to-day operations of the Rio poker room, it did give us some sense of the atmosphere. To round out our review, we did a bit of research to determine the flow of cash and tournament action.

Casino Setting

The Rio is about a mile west of the Strip on Flamingo Road. It is part of a small constellation of casinos in the immediate area. The Flamingo is slightly west of the Rio, as is the Palms. The Gold Coast lies right across South Valley View Boulevard. So there are a couple of options within easy walking distance if you want to check out other casinos. The Strip is also theoretically walkable in 20-25 minutes, but beware, it’s a lot longer than it looks.

Parking is free at the Rio. A garage and multiple outdoor lots lie around back near the Conference Center (where most of the WSOP events are held).

Non-Poker Amenities

The Rio is one of Vegas’s largest casinos off the main Strip. It is part of the massive Caesars Entertainment empire which owns several properties in Vegas, including Planet Hollywood, and many other properties across the United States. It is, of course, a full-service casino (hotel, slots, table games, race & sportsbook, etc.).

The Rio has a buffet of course, but are a bit lean on the high-end restaurants. There are, however, a lot of quick eating and casual options. We recommend the take-out window at Guy Fieri’s El Burro Borracho Restaurant. They also have sit down service, but the reduced menu at the takeout window represents a great value with excellent quality food.

The Rio Poker Room Comfort

The 14 table Rio poker room is separated from the casino floor with a glass wall on one side and half walls on the other two sides. There is some space between the room and the gaming floor, so you are not too close to the noise or smoke. Large TVs ring the room.

Video Poker Tournament At Rio

The ceiling is high and the air quality is good. The tables are pretty tightly packed in this small room and the lighting is dim throughout the room. The felts are in good shape, but had they not been swept recently the day we played. Chips were clean and very new looking. Chairs were comfortable, being adjustable, wheeled, and well padded.

During the WSOP event, several tables sat outside the walls of the poker room. It is not clear how many remain throughout the year. If the claim of 14 tables is accurate, some must remain. Unsurprisingly, it is smokier and louder at those tables, and it feels like you are playing in the aisle of the casino gaming room. Because pretty much, you are.

Poker Room Staff

As we played in a Daily Deepstack that ran in conjunction with the WSOP, the dealers were mostly not regulars. That said, most were solid. The floors, however, ran an excellent tournament. There was a female floor who had the loudest and clearest voice I have heard in any poker room. Every level jump was clearly announced. There was no doubt about who held the authority in the room. Later, when they escorted the group from the Rio poker room to the convention hall for late tournament stages, she guided us like ducklings through the winding hallways beautifully.

Wait staff circulated immediately when the tournament started and seemed very attentive throughout.

Players at the Rio Poker Room

Grade: incomplete. This was a not a normal Rio tournament so not the normal Rio poker population.

Tournament Structure

The Rio poker room’s standing tournament has a $65 entry fee (with $22 rake -yes, Virginia, an abysmal 34% rate) for 5,000 chips and 20-minute blinds. It offers a $5 staff bonus for another 5,000 chips, so most people likely buy-in for $70, with the functional rake at a potentially record-setting 39%! The tournament guarantee is a whopping $500. This tournament runs four times per day (10am, 1pm, 4pm, and 9pm). This gives the savvy poker tournament player four opportunities to say “No freakin’ way” and find any number of better structures in town. In previous years, we have stopped into the Rio to ask about the tournaments and got the feeling that they rarely go off. Bravo Poker also indicates that tournaments do not run often, and are small when they do.

Cash Game Activity

Bravo reporting indicates that the Rio poker room runs one to two cash tables on a weekday, at best (there were zero some nights), and not too many more on weekends.

Overall Assessment of the Rio Poker Room

The Rio’s claim to fame in the poker world lies in its role as the host of the WSOP. They do a great job with the WSOP, which has become a much anticipated annual pilgrimage for us. The rest of the year, the Rio plays a minor role in the Vegas poker scene. The small room is a bit cramped but otherwise is fairly comfortable. Their volume of cash and tournament play is low to non-existent. The tournament rake is about the worst we’ve ever seen. It is actually kind of ironic: the host site of the WSOP has a standing poker room that appears to be an afterthought to the rest of the casino.

• Comfort
• Tournament Structures
• Personnel

Summary

The Rio’s claim to fame in the poker world lies in its role as the host of the WSOP. The rest of the year, the Rio plays a minor role in the Vegas poker scene. The small room is a bit cramped, but otherwise is fairly comfortable. Their volume of cash and tournament play is low to non-existent. The tournament rake is about the worst we’ve ever seen. It is actually kind of ironic: the host site of the WSOP has a standing poker room that appears to be an afterthought to the rest of the casino.

Stu D. Hoss is a recently retired Air Force aviator. He has visited and served in over 40 countries including flying combat missions in the Balkans, Afghanistan, Iraq, and the Horn of Africa. Most of it under the guise of keeping the world safe for democracy, better blackjack, and for a few other personal reasons. He has been playing blackjack for almost 20 years and cut his teeth on the tables of South Lake Tahoe during flight training in Northern CA. Mr. Hoss uses basic strategy and the HiLo count method to give himself a chance against the house edge. He currently resides in NV and is weighing his options for a second career.

On a surprisingly mild late spring afternoon in the Vegas Valley, I sauntered to the mailbox expecting to find the usual junk mail and a couple of bills, which I did. Amongst all that was a mailer from the Four Queens Hotel and Casino in downtown Las Vegas. Experience has taught me that casino mail is never a bad thing. I quickly opened the item to find this on the first page: 'Come join us for a Sizzlin’ tournament! The Four Queens invites you to our $12,000 Sizzlin’ Video Poker Tournament June 17-19, 2011 where you can cool down but the games stay HOT!'

Needless to say, I grabbed my calendar to check the dates and reached for the telephone. A quick call to reservations and I was in. I’d be playing my first video poker tournament! The following is the story of that tournament and some things to consider when playing a video poker tourney, or any tournament for that matter.

The first thing to think about when playing any tournament is its equity. Simply put, this means are all entry fees returned in prizes? If so, you have a 100 percent equity tournament. If the equity is less than 100 percent, you have a negative equity tournament and you might be best served to reconsider your participation. The Sizzlin’ Summer Tournament made this calculation easy. The tournament was an invite-only offer from casino marketing, according to the casino’s Special Events Manager. There was no entry fee and the invite included three free nights in the hotel, a free breakfast buffet during registration on Saturday, and a special gift. The gift turned out to be a decorative sun-face, suitable for hanging, I guess. Mine is still in the box, but I did bring it home!

Players participated in two sessions, one on Saturday, and one on Sunday. Each session was 10 minutes and the game was 10/7 Double Bonus (DB). A full house pays 10 credits, while a flush pays 7 credits, hence the 10/7 portion of the moniker. The double bonus occurs when you hit quad 2s, 3s, and 4s, which pay 400 credits (bonus!) for a maximum five-coin bet. The big bonus is four Aces, which pays 800 credits (double bonus!) for a max bet. All other four-of-a-kinds pay 250 credits for a max bet. The downside is that two pair only returns your original wager. There were 12 machines available each round and four rounds per hour. Before my first round, I asked Linda, the Special Events Manager who served as the tournament director, how many participants she had registered. I confirmed the number of entrants when the final rankings were posted Sunday evening. The total was 191. This meant I had about a 7.8 percent chance of finishing in the green (15/191) just by entering and showing up.

The prize breakdown for this tournament was as follows: 1^st Place $4,500, 2^nd Place $1,250, 3^rd Place $1,000, 4^th Place $775, 5^th Place $550, 6^th Place $500, 7^th Place $400, 8^th Place $350, 9^th Place $300, 10^th Place $175, 11^th Place $150, 12^th Place $125, 13^th Place $100, 14^th Place $75, and 15^th Place $50. There was an additional incentive to make both your sessions. The second day, two random video poker machine numbers were chosen each round for $50 in cash. Tournament staff went around to each player and the player picked a number from a cloth sack. There were two winners in each sack for a 2 in 12 (16.7 percent) chance of winning $50. Somehow, I failed to pick one of the lucky numbers, but I liked the odds for just showing up and playing a tourney that didn’t cost me anything.

There are two general formats in video poker tournaments: those that you play for a specified period (called 'Speed Tournaments'), and those where you play for a fixed amount of credits over a fixed period. The Four Queens tournament was a Speed Tournament. I prefer that format and felt confident it would increase my odds of finishing in the money. I generally average between 700 and 800 hands per hour in normal play. For 10 minutes, I figured I could ramp up the pace with minimal strategy errors. The extra hands I would play compared to other tournament players could make a big difference.

Video Poker Tournaments In Vegas

I had learned 10/7 DB years ago with the aide of strategy cards and computer training software. I still carry a strategy card and practice before a long weekend where I know I’ll be playing several thousand dollars in coin-in at this game. In my opinion, it is a complicated game to play at a high level and has a high degree of variance. However, with perfect play the game yields a 100.17 percent return. If you can find 10/7 DB in a casino that offers good comps, cash back, and marketing offers (rare these days), then it is worth your time to learn to play it properly. For me, the Four Queens is one of those casinos. Other casinos in the Las Vegas market require four times the coin-in to earn points, which limits my play of this game. For the record, Aliante Station in North Las Vegas fits this later category.

Rio Las Vegas Video Poker Tournament

Breakfast and registration began Saturday morning at 8 AM. I have found most players tend to register immediately. I learned from a slot tournament experience years ago that my time was better spent in bed than waiting in a long line to register. I showed up at 9:25 AM with no one in line, the day’s baseball numbers from the sports book in hand, registered, picked up a copy of the tourney rules, and studied them over a leisurely breakfast. Round times are the same for each player both days. They were first come, first serve. By arriving later, I drew the next to last round. I like to play as late as possible so I have an idea what scores players who competed in earlier rounds have already achieved. Unfortunately, accurate information was difficult to find. I asked the tournament director if first round scores would be posted Saturday night. Linda told me that their software doesn’t allow them to tabulate first round results and only the final scores are posted when all rounds are complete. All the scores are input into a laptop computer by hand and tallied using a basic spreadsheet. I question the 'software can’t do one-day totals' answer. I am thinking an 11-year old kid could figure out a way to fix that. However, for a free tourney with good comps, I wasn’t about to rock the boat because I wanted to be invited back.