Nordic Poker Festival 2019
Los Angeles, CA (May 16, 2019) – World Poker Tour® today announced the WPT® Gardens Poker Festival as the first event on the WPT Main Tour of Season XVIII. The $5,000 buy-in event will take place from July 20-25, 2019 at The Gardens Casino, in Hawaiian Gardens, CA. History of Yellowstone Ski Festival For over 40 years, cross country skiers from across North America and around the world have traveled to West Yellowstone, Montana’s Yellowstone Ski Festival to begin their Nordic ski season on the Rendezvous Ski Trails. The Yellowstone Ski Festival takes place during Thanksgiving week.
2020 Yellowstone Ski Festival Update
- Nordic Poker Festival at Casino Schenefeld: 10 days poker event near Hamburg, Germany, starting from Nov 15th, 2019. For details see schenefeld.casino-sh.de.
- The Nordic Poker Championship is held at Casino Copenhagen in Denmark from November 6 th to 10 th. The capital of Denmark is big enough to be a metropolis with shopping, culture and nightlife yet small enough to be intimate and easy to navigate.
- Meet us online through a series of Nordic Tech Webinars or see us at tradeshows and other events worldwide Upcoming events Current period 2021 (3) 2020 (25) 2019 (19) 2018 (2).
November, 2020
With the current pandemic situation becoming more serious each day in Montana, the Fall Ski Festival Committee feels that it’s in the best interest of our guests and athletes to cancel some of our activities this Thanksgiving including the FIS/WYSEF and West Yellowstone Altius Biathlon races and the Try-It Biathlon Clinic.
We want everyone to have a great ski experience but not at the expense of their own health or the health of
With sufficient snow the Rendezvous Ski Trails will be groomed.
*The educational clinics which will have limited athletes and students are still scheduled at this time.
We will be following all Covid protocols suggested by our local, state and county agencies.
Thank you for your understanding and patience during the pandemic.
We will focus our efforts on providing “First Tracks” for Nordic Skiers in November.
Thanksgiving week will be all about skiing!
Due to the pandemic and economic factors we will not have the on snow demos and the variety of off-snow expo activities.
Look to our website, Facebook page (@RendezvousSkiTrails) or Instagram (YellowstoneSkiFest) for continued updates.
Email: info@skirunbikemt.com with questions or call Freeheel & Wheel 406-646-7744
You are the reason our Yellowstone Ski Festival is so successful year after year!
We are looking forward to kicking off the Nordic Season with you, here in West Yellowstone!
Yellowstone Ski Festival operates under a special use permit on the Custer Gallatin National Forest.
For over 40 years, cross country skiers from across North America and around the world have traveled to West Yellowstone, Montana’s Yellowstone Ski Festival to begin their Nordic ski season on the Rendezvous Ski Trails. The Yellowstone Ski Festival takes place during Thanksgiving week. The event's highlights include a series of Nordic skiing clinics, competitive races, Biathlon races, the On Snow Gear Demo, an Indoor Ski Show, and a variety of presentations, clinics, and classes.
Whether you are a beginning skier or an experienced racer, West Yellowstone is THE place to start your ski season. Each year, approximately 3500 skiers from around the United States and Canada travel to West Yellowstone for the Yellowstone Ski Festival. Where else can you participate in ski clinics coached by former Olympic athletes and lifelong Nordic skiers, try out and purchase the latest ski gear and accessories, and share the Rendezvous Trails with so many great skiers? The Yellowstone Ski Festival offers all of that and more!
We hope that we will see you at this years Yellowstone Ski Festival. Stay tuned to this website for regular updates as our planning progresses. Please support our local sponsors and the equipment manufacturers who come to West Yellowstone for Thanksgiving.
Roger Teska has won the 2019 World Poker Tour Gardens Poker Festival $5,000 no-limit hold’em main event. The 34-year-old from Bloomington, Indiana outlasted a field of 373 total entries in the event to win his first WPT title, the top prize of $368,475 and a new 2019 BMW X1.
This was the third-largest score of Teska’s career, behind his fourth-place showing in the 2011 WPT Championship for $371,665 and his win in the 2018 Caribbean Poker Party MILLIONS World $25,000 buy-in high roller for $2,000,000. Teska now has career live tournament earnings of $3,284,077.
In addition to the title and the money, Teska also took home 1,200 Card Player Player of the Year points for the win. This was his first final-table finish of the year, but it alone was enough to see him move just outside of the top 200 in the 2019 POY race, which is sponsored by Global Poker.
Teska entered the six-handed final table of this event in second chip position behind Lior Orel. The first player to be eliminated was World Series of Poker bracelet winner Cord Garcia. The champion of the first-ever ‘Colossus’ event got all-in on a Q1076 board with Q10 for top two pair, only to find out that Lars Kamphues had flopped top set with the QQ. Garcia was drawing dead and hit the rail in sixth place ($73,600).
Kamphues flopped another huge hand that resulted to an elimination not long after that. He picked up 44 and raised from the cutoff. Card Player Poker Tour Bicycle Casino main event champion Andrew Wisdom three-bet with the AQ and Kamphues called to see a flop of 554. Wisdom check-called a bet of 450,000 from Kamphues, who had flopped a full house. Wisdom paired his ace on the A turn and check-called again, this time to the tune of 380,000. The 9 completed the board and Kamphues moved all-in once Wisdom checked to him for a third time. Wisdom made the call and saw the bad news. He took home $96,545 for his fifth-place finish.
Nordic Poker Festival 2019 Tickets
During four-handed play Teska and Kamphues clashed in a key preflop showdown, with Teska getting all-in holding 88 up against the AK of Kamphues. Teska won the race to double up, taking a chunk out of Kamphues’ stack in the process. Kamphues lost another race not long after, with his pocket jacks failing to hold against Teska’s AQ[[suit:heart]. Just like that, he was knocked out in fourth place ($128,320).
Pocket jacks fared no better for Lior Orel. He got his last chips in with JJ, only to find that Laszlo Molnar had been dealt KK. Molnar ended up making kings full to send Orel home with $172,770 as the third-place finisher.
Molnar took a sizable lead into the final showdown against Teska. He was a favorite to win it all on the first hand of heads-up action, as all the chips got in with Molnar holding a dominating AQ against Teska’s QJ. Teska hit a broadway straight on the turn to double up, though, cutting Molnar’s lead to less than a 2-to-1 advantage.
The two ended up battling for 41 hands. By the time the final cards were dealt it was Teska who held a massive lead. Molnar got his last chips in with KQ and Teska called with A6. The board ran out J9432 and Teska’s ace high was good enough to earn him the pot and the title. Molnar took home $235,615 as the runner-up finisher.
Here is a look at the payouts and POY points awarded at the final table:
| Place | Player | Payout | POY Points |
| 1 | Roger Teska | $368,475 | 1200 |
| 2 | Laszlo Molnar | $235,615 | 1000 |
| 3 | Lior Orel | $172,770 | 800 |
| 4 | Lars Kamphues | $128,320 | 600 |
| 5 | Andrew Wisdom | $96,545 | 500 |
| 6 | Cord Garcia | $73,600 | 400 |
Winner photo credit: Joe Giron / WPT.