The Gutshot Bar and Restaurant in London
When the coolest-sounding poker club opened its doors to London's card-crazy throng early in 2004, no one could have predicted its instant success. However, more than two years on and with membership (available immediately with driver's license or passport) 18,000 and rising, the Gutshot feels like an old friend, one you'll go back to time and again.
Gutshot became one of the largest cardrooms in Europe when it added a 160-seat tournament room, bringing its total capacity to more than 250 players.
Situated in trendy Clerkenwell, where you'll find oodles of relaxed bars, cafes and restaurants frequented by London's young and beautiful media types, the club itself has a bar and restaurant. Set over two floors, the first level has a small bar, plasma TV showing sports and poker and a small eating area with some comfy couches thrown in around the dining area. Also on this floor is an Internet cafe where you can play poker online while eating and drinking to your heart's content. If you sign up with the Gutshot's own poker site, your Internet time is free; otherwise it's just £2 (about $3.60) per hour to play on other sites. (One pound is about $1.80.)
Head downstairs and you'll find the small but cozy cardroom with about a dozen tables, all named after famous players: Hellmuth, Brunson, etc. But in this place, unless you play in a cash game, you'll be shuffling the cards yourself. The tables are the old-school round variety, with no dealers. It might sound like poker hell, but it makes for an initimate venue and, instead of a faceless casino floor, the Gutshot feels like a members' poker club where everyone knows each other.
This place is all about tournaments. There are two events most days, almost exclusively hold'em, although there is a pot-limit Omaha tourney once a week, which costs just £5 ($9) to enter with unlimited rebuys. Most of the events are freezeouts, with buy-ins ranging from £5 to £100 ($180) for the big Saturday night tournament. And although Vegas seems a long way off, the club is also currently running live qualifiers to the WSOP Main Event on Monday nights with a £200 buy-in.
If ring games are more your cup of tea, the Gutshot has them in spades. The club closes at 6 a.m. (sometimes never), and there are plenty of insomniacs for whom the Gutshot is a second home. Again, the range of games varies wildly from pot-limit Omaha to no-limit hold'em and dealer's choice. The buy-ins cater to everyone from complete beginners, who can sit down in a 25p-50p (.50-$1) blinds, £25 maximum buy-in game, to high rollers who can sit down with as much as they want in a £1-£2 no-limit game. The rake is 5 percent up to a maximum of £10. Some tables use a £3 per hour seat charge.
In terms of atmosphere, the club can be intimidating. You might want to practice shuffling and dealing before hitting the tables, and you'd do well not to "coffeehouse," or you might find yourself on the receiving end of same.
Overall though, the hot basement and diverse clientele make for what a real poker club should feel like: lively, interesting and a home away from home. And if Phil Hellmuth, Chris Ferguson and Howard Lederer can find time to drop into this club on recent trips to London, then it must be worth a visit.