Top Women Poker Players Head For London

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Party Poker's inaugural Women's World Open imminent

The first televised Party Poker.com $3 000 buy-in Women's World Open poker tournament is imminent, starting in London on August 7 and running through to August 10, with 36 top women players vying for a prizepool worth $108 000, with a $50 000 main prize.

American competitors flying in from the United States include Jennifer Tilly, Liz Lieu and Shannon Elizabeth.

Tilly can probably boast the most impressive tournament track record, with her World Series of Poker Ladies Event win in 2005 and a first in the World Poker Tour Ladies Night Out that same year. Since then the actress and poker player been honing her game and racking up cashes at major WSOP and WPT events.

Liz Lieu has a long list of international tournament cashes, including several WSOP events. Before her foray into the tournament realm, she'd already established herself as a winning cash-game player.

Shannon Elizabeth brings a lot of star power to the event as well. She will be playing as well as commentating with Jesse May at the event. The actress, best known for her role in American Pie, is making her way up in the poker ranks. Most recently she cashed in a WSOP event and also came in third in the 2007 NBC National Heads-Up Championship, taking out Barry Greenstein and Jeff Madsen along the way.

The three will have their work cut out for them as some of Europe's most accomplished women players will be fighting for supremacy and the big money. They include former PartyPoker.com World Open winner Pippa Flanders, Xuyen Pham, European Ladies champion Jackie Meecham, Katharine Hartree, Jackie Vaswami and Deborah Rogers.

"This is the first women's tournament we have held, and we are delighted by the excellent line-up and hugely encouraged by the positive interest we have already received from broadcasters all over the world before a card has been dealt," said a PartyPoker.com spokesman.