Vanessa Rousso to play in Isle poker "Battle at the Beach" events
Vanessa Rousso, the 2001 Wellington High valedictorian who was featured in a two-page advertorial spread in Sports Illustrated's swimsuit edition, will be playing Monday in the Battle at the Beach at the Isle Casino and Racing.
Rousso will do a meet-and-greet at 11 a.m. Monday, then play Monday afternoon in the $900 tournament. There are two "first days" of that tournament, on Sunday and Monday.
Rousso is in town to promote her series of "Big Slick" boot camps, which I'll write more about March 27 in Showtime.
The quick details: The boot camp covers Rousso game theory (she's a math whiz) and costs $399. She's doing a short promotional freebie Saturday at the Palm Beach Kennel Club, then starts the instruction April 5 at the Isle, April 11 at the Jacksonville Orange Park Kennel Club and April 26 at the Palm Beach Kennel Club.
Meanwhile, the Battle at the Beach highlight begins Thursday, a heads-up tournament that I wrote about in Friday's Showtime section.
Rousso, interestingly, finished second in the recent heads-up tournament filmed by NBC.
Events: $900 Deep-stack event with opening days Sunday and Monday; finals on Tuesday; $550 one-day event on Wednesday; $900 Florida Heads-Up Championship, with opening days Thursday and March 27; finals March 28-29.
Call 954-972-2000.
NICK SORTAL began playing 3-card "gut" and "Indian poker" on high school band trips, moved on to "night baseball" and "pass the trash" during a Dr. Pepper-infused midnight game in the 1980s at the St. Louis Globe-Democrat, and now play in a regular neighborhood Hold 'Em game in Plantation. I have been given the assignment of writing about the gambling life in South Florida casinos for the Sun-Sentinel...which means sitting around watching poker on TV now counts as research.
