One of the most popular UK poker personalities, Victoria Coren, sits down with the PokerStars film crew to talk about her career in and out of poker. From her early years writing and submitting short stories to her current gigs creating various features and columns for poker publications, Coren explores her love/hate relationship with her role as a professional writer.

Last last night, or early this morning depending on your sleep cycle, we showed you this cool pic of Sebastian 'taktloss47’ Ruthenberg sitting with almost $1 Million dollars in front of him. Now, the details of that session are coming out and it turns out that “taktloss47” destroyed Full Tilt Professional Gus Hansen in a single session to the tune of $877k.

While this photo is a little old, it’s from the 2013 Burning Man, Antonio Esfandiari just posted it yesterday and it’s pretty cool. Check out Esfandiari hanging with good pal, high-stakes poker pro Brian Rast and, yes, that’s his pops right behind them.

All three sitting in the middle of the desert watching the massive bonfire that is Burnring Man.

Watching the man Burn this year w my Rasty ! #BurningMan #DadInBackground

Watch: Antonio Esfandiari Choose Money Over Magic

It was just a few weeks ago, during the 2014 Aussie Millions, that the incendiary words of former WSOP World Champion Joe Hachem started a firestorm about what it means to be a poker ambassador and how the personality in poker has seemingly evaporated. Now, former champ Jonathan Duhamel has taken to the PokerStars Blog to have his say and, in general, he doesn’t see things as black and white.

Since Black Friday the relocation services of Poker Refugees have helped roughly 400 players find a safe international place to grind. Now, they are actively pushing a new “all inclusive” package to help you take a trip to Mexico specifically to play the upcoming PokerStars Spring Championship of Online Poker (SCOOP) in Playa del Carmen.

World Series of Poker Bracelet winner and EPT Champion Sebastian 'Taktloss47’ Ruthenberg takes a virtual seat across from Full Tilt Poker Professional Gus Hansen and plops down nearly $1 million of online currency behind.

The pair were playing a little $2k/$4k 2-7 Triple Draw – which is a fixed limit game – meaning the German’s bankroll was never at an immediate risk and obviously cannot be “gotten in” at the push of a single button. Still, it’s an impressive sight to see so many number strung together with a dollar sign at the front, yea?

For what it’s worth, we’re pretty sure (from multiple sources online) that Taktloss47 is the German pro Ruthenberg, but even HighStakesDB- who posted this pic – does not have it as him on their site.

Everyone knows that sometime high-stakes poker player Dan Bilzerian is a consumer of fast cars and high powered rifles. Well, he hit the shooting range the other night with a shotty and some clay pigeons to show everyone that he doesn’t need an alarm for home security.

Blasting skeet tonight, even got a couple shooting from the hip.

Speaking of shooting ranges: According to an article appearing on SOFREP.com (The Special Operations Forces Situation Report), it turns out that Bilzerian was sooooo close to being a NAVY SEAL but it looks to be a safety violation on a shooting range that led to his training class dismissal.

I’ve verified that Dan was in BUD/S 229, 238, and 239 before being dropped from training with class 239 for a safety violation on the shooting range. To address the “no good reason” comment from Dan, in my opinion it’s likely that his instructors felt that he wasn’t a good fit for the SEAL community and were looking for any excuse to drop him from training. This why we call it a “selection” process, and it doesn’t end, even when you get to your SEAL Team. Dan, as a former instructor myself, I know that your instructors did have a good reason. Reflect on the reason and become a better man for it. After all, you did complete 99% of one of the hardest military selection courses in the world.

Not that anyone would dispute that he was tough enough to be a SEAL.

Yep! It’s another awesome segment of Phil Ivey candidly talking with Bluff Magazine video producer Thomas Keeling about everything under the sun. In this clip, an older, wiser and more personable Ivey ponders his legacy in poker, talks about what the Ivey League means to him, pledges support for the WSOP and qualifies Phil Hellmuth as a “great poker player…errr a great tournament poker player.”

We’re giving Bay Area poker pro Pat Lyons a lot of F5 love this week as he’s the guy who risks his cell phone to bring us some of our favorite bad beat posts, he’s an entertaining, polarizing guy. As you may have read he’s already mixed it up with poker author Jonathan Little a couple of times (the pair have a shot at a trilogy as they are both still alive) and now he’s talking about what he’d do if he won the whole damn thing at Bay 101.

BJ Nemeth. Joe Giron. Neil Stoddard. Hell, even WhoJedi. You most likely don’t know these these names (well, except for that last one) but they are the unsung heroes of tournament reporting.

The last time Jason Somerville made his picks on a UFC card he had a decisive victory, going 3-0 and providing winners to all who took the time to watch. Well, Somerville is back breaking down this Saturday’s UFC171 Pay-Per-View event where Robbie Lawler and Johny Hendricks battle for Georges St. Pierre’s newly vacated Welterweight Championship belt.

Team PokerStars Pro Jake Cody has a lot on his mind. His girlfriend, Alex, is two weeks away from giving birth to his first daughter, Arianna, and, in anticipation, Cody has been watching some “quite graphic” videos of what is about to transpire and he’s taken to the PokerStars blog to deal with his feelings.

Meanwhile I’d say I am about 89% excited, and the rest a little bit scared. It’s all starting to seem a lot more real now that we’re getting so close. In the baby classes we’ve been shown a lot of videos which are quite graphic and I think scarred me a little bit. I’m starting to think I’m not really going to go down there too much on the big day, but I’ll try to help Alex as much as I can.

While everyone may think that Phil Laak and Antonio Esfandiari are true BFF’s some forget that Laak is also has quite a history with the oft-emo Jason Mercier (seen here actually smiling!). In fact, the duo not only tangled in one of the most memorable hands ever in the NBC Head-Up Poker Championship…

...but also Laak paid Mercier 1k back in 2011 for the privilege of being able to know some pretty intimate stuff about Jason.

The pair enter day two of the Shooting Star with their bounty in tact.

Team Ivey pro Patrik Antonius and his good poker frienemy Phil Ivey sit down to talk about one of the largest pots either one of them have ever played on television. In a sit down session for an Ivey League promotional video, Ivey and Antonius are asked to take us through the notorious Sky Poker hand (posted after the jump) where the pair dig deep into their bankroll as well as go multi-levels deep in thought thanks to “props.”

In an obvious effort to get more traction here on the monster website that is F5, Bluff Magazine has released part 3 of their stand-up interview with poker great Phil Ivey. In this clip Bluff video producer Thomas Keeling talks to Ivey about who he considers his real friends in poker and how close to the vest is he with those he plays against.

Ivey claims to like most of his fellow high-stakes competitors but he likes to keep them at a distance as not to feel responsible for them with negative variance comes calling for them. He calls it “cordial” for the most part but is always wary of who he chooses to schmooze with.

Watch Part I – PHIL IVEY HAS TOO MUCH TIME ON HIS HANDS
Watch Part II – PHIL IVEY NOT BOTHERED BY BILZERIAN 'BROKE’ RUMOR

How many more parts does Bluff have in the can? Stay tuned, as this Ivey interview is one of the best in recent memory so we’ll feature every one of them!

Ultimate Poker released another part of the mini documentary about the magical past of their UP brand ambassador Antonio Esfandiari.

This time, he hits the Las Vegas strip with a deck of cards and befuddles the passerby’s with clever card cutting and slight of hand. Another fun video delving into the past of one of poker’s premiere personalities.

Check out Episode One of Strip Magic

Sweet revenge was served for poker author Jonathan Little yesterday during Day 1B of the World Poker Tour Bay 101 Shooting Star. First we need to rewind a couple days to the preliminary event when word broke on Twitter that Jonathan Little had busted the 2k at the hands of F5 pal and bad beat photog Pat Lyons...but in his exit, he called Lyons an angle shooter.

Everyone loves a good prop bet. Also, many of you love a good, stiff drink. Well, poker pro Kyle Julius is well known for loving both and so that’s why he was given such a good price to take a “No Alcohol” bet.

Spanish Team PokerStars Pro Leo Margets will appear in the upcoming airing of the Spanish version of the popular TV show Survivor (called Supervivientes). Set to air this coming March 17 in Spain, the Barcelona born Margets will be trying to thrive on the beaches and in the wilderness of Honduras against 8 other Spainish TV personalities and psuedo-celebs.

Who knew Phil Ivey had such a nice smile?! In part two of Ivey’s interview with Bluff Magazine video producer Thomas Keeling, he opens up about the “No Home Jerome” rumors of his early fake ID Atlantic City days, how he got started playing poker and his propensity to shoot high-stakes craps.

Last week, the World Poker Tour released their preview of Episode 2 of the Borgata Poker Open. Now, they’ve taken the same clip and let Tony Dunst get his hands on it. The Raw Deal host breaks down the action street by street from inside the mind of protagonist Vanessa Selbst. As you’ll see, Dunst likes just about everything Selbst chooses to do in this clip…well, except for what she wears to the final table.

Bay 101 Shooting Star Tournament Director Matt Savage locked down a few minutes with the always compelling poker bad boy Matt Marafioti to talk tournaments and his tough guy image. Marafioti, in an exceptionally good mood, praises the healthy crowd and the tournament at Bay 101 while recounting how his past few outings ended up in typical bad beat fashion.

Savage delves into hot button issues for Marafioti as well as the one time Twitter superstar explains why he let his one-time vibrant account go dormant and how he’d like to find a way to sue video creator SrslySirius for his hilarious 'I’m Such An Awesome Guy’ music vid.

As for his narcissistic image, Matt explains that it was all part of reality show that didn’t get greenlit years ago and so, while that’s not really him, he sometimes plays up to it in the poker world. So take a minute or two and catch up with Marafioti.

The new kid on the block in the poker magazine game, 2Pair Magazine, is looking to spread their wings and expand. Recently the magazine (with their successful fledgling tour) put out the call, looking for help in a number of areas including writing, photography and tournament coverage.

2010 World Series of Poker November Niner, Filippo Candio, announced on his Facebook Page this week that he is stepping away from the game of poker. According to PokerPT, Candio made the announcement after a televised news story aired that accused Candio of tax evasion.

As it turns out, that story was based on a news item from 2 years ago, which was proven not to be true. Despite the fact that the news outlet retracted their story, Candio apparently has had enough and announced that after the PPT Campione D’Italia later this month, he’s done with poker.

Phil Ivey is becoming a personable promotion machine. As high stakes poker games dry up for the man considered to be the biggest poker talent on the planet, Ivey looks to spend more time on various business ventures. Number one on his list – Ivey Poker. In this video Ivey sits down to a one-on-one interview with Bluff Magazine's Thomas Keeling to talk all things training videos.

This PokerNews video from earlier in the year has finally surfaced where hostesses Kristy Arnett and Sarah Grant take a page from the boys of Workaholics and try to “get weird.”

In the inaugural segment the ladies as poker pros a total non sequitur to the poker conversation at hand to see what goes on in the mind of the famous faces of the felt. In this edition, the girls contemplate packing on the pounds and how much it would cost to keep a large amount of extra weight on for a full year.

Recent LAPC Champion Chris Moorman, Team PokerStars Online Pro Mickey Petersen, Team Ivey’s Dan Smith, World Poker Tour Champion Moshin Charania and Triple Crown winner Jake Cody all weigh in with how much it would take.

Poker mindset coach Jared Tendler teams up with his “Mental Game Of Poker” partner Barry Carter over at Pokerstrategy to delve into the what a proposed WPT would do to the player psyche and to see if it’s a good idea for the game.

Everest Poker made a splash today by announcing the signing of UK poker pro Sam Trickett to be their new brand ambassador. Easily considered one of biggest unsigned names in poker, Trickett boasts a resume that includes two Aussie Million High Roller titles, a Partouche Poker Tour title and, of course, nearly $20 million in career earning thanks to his 2nd place finish in the inaugural World Series of Poker Big One for One Drop in 2012.

Shamed into hiding for his part in the Full Tilt/Black Friday debacle, one-time poker hero Chris “Jesus” Ferguson may be preparing to make a return to poker as soon as the 2014 World Series of Poker. According to a number of posts on Two Plus Two by the highly credible, well-respected poker journalist Diamond Flush, with the repayment of players now complete Ferguson (and Lederer) may assume that all is forgiven.

With regards to Ferguson and Howard Lederer's state of mind, Diamond Flush writes:

He has plenty of money and does lead a non-ostentatious lifestyle, but I assure you he has plans to return to poker when ppl get repaid, as does Howard. They assume all is forgiven and some regulars in the LV circuit think thats true. Many otoh, do not.

Also, when posed with the theory that Ferguson has so much money from his Full Tilt disbursements that he’s unlikely to be seen in public again, Diamond Flush replied with what sounds like a statement of fact.

He expects to be back, especially for WSOP.

Diamond Flush, who is well known for being a part of the original Subject:Poker crew continues to cover the toughest of topics in the poker industry including Black Friday and the legal ramifications of its major players.

The thread, “Any news on Chris 'Jesus’ Ferguson” covers a great many topics related to Ferguson, Lederer, Full Tilt and Black Friday, making the whole thing (mostly the 2nd page on) a pretty interesting read – highlighted by the insights of Diamond Flush – check it out.

High-rolling poker beast and part-time Justin Bieber clone, Mike “Timex” McDonald was contemplating making a last minute trip to the Bay Area to jump in the World Poker Tour Bay 101 Shooting Star, but he was was looking for a sign if he should go or not.

That sign came in the form of this anti-gambling campaign message plastered on a double door at the campus where he’s taking a business 101 course. Clearly, McDonald, who has already won over $4 million in 2014 alone, is not the target demographic.

So, did he heed the advice of the door and “stop the chase?”

While California has been exempt from the winter freeze of the Polar Vortex, things got pretty chilly on this hand from one of the World Poker Tour Bay 101 Shooting Star 1k Main Event satellites.

Our resident bad beat, big hand reporter Pat Lyons, who bubbled the final table of the 2k prelim last night, snapped a quick shot of this gross cooler where someone’s 1k shot at getting into the Main Event (which starts today at 11:00am PST) is shattered.

Flopped full house runs into flopped quads…and the rest is history.

Everyone knows that Jeff Gross is one high stakes professional poker player that likes to get down whenever possible. That being said, the TeamU member understands that to be considered a top tier pro, it’s not good enough to simply be good pals with Olympic Gold Medalist Michael Phelps, you also have to do the work.

Joseph Cheong sure knows how to relax before a big tournament. When he’s not hanging out with lion cubs, he’s back in hotel getting a facial so he can look pretty for the cameras. The World Poker Tour Bay 101 Shooting Star Main Event begins later today and while Cheong is not a bounty himself, he’ll be looking to have his photo taken with as he busts one of the 50 Superstars who are.

At the start of play on Monday, you can watch the action from the floor of the Bay 101 Casino via their live stream.