Mitchell Hynam Breaks Career Record at The Galway Poker Festival – The Apopka Voice

The first week of the year was reserved for the Galway Poker Festival – first big event in the Irish Poker Tour for 2025. 694 players competed in the main event with a €700 buy-in, where they competed for a share of the €418,570 prize pool. Let’s take a look at the results of the amazing tournament at Galway’s Galmont Hotel.

Irish poker main event games

Readers are advised to take a closer look at the rules of Irish poker to better understand the game. This mix of Texas Hold’em and Omaha is actually quite popular throughout the UK and Ireland and is played on many online poker sites. Its main characteristic are the initial four hole cards, of which two are discarded after the flop bet. 

IPT tournaments, while held in Ireland, mostly focus on the no-limit Texas variant. The main event’s top 70 players have won a share of the award pool, of which UK’s own Mitchell Hynam won his career-best €83,600 prize. Daryl McAleenan was in second place with an astounding €60K win, followed by Derek Baker with €35K. At the final table of the tournament, Michael Dwyer was busted first and went home with €11,570 in his pocket.

A lot of people were rooting for Mary Galvin to be the first female champion of the tournament, but her amazing run was cut short as she took fifth place at the finale, taking home a magnificent sum of €19,000.

Other events at GPF

This year saw an astounding 18 events going on at Galway’s premium venue. Aside from the main event, the biggest turnout was at the €400 Paddy Power Mystery Bounty where 261 players competed for a share of the €97,125 prize pool. This event was sponsored by Paddy Power, recently praised for their contribution to health awareness causes in the UK. 

The final winner was Paul Lynam with a €23,750 share. Liam Chevalier won €20K as the best out of 59 competitors in the €1,100 Galway High Roller tournament. 280 people signed up for the €300 Claddagh Poker Cup where David Cleary was the best with a €17K share of the €70K prize pool. Other five-digit prize winners were also Mark Finnane with €11,800 from the €650 Galway Omaha Championship, and Alexander Bernstein who won €10,650 in the €Galway Poker Cup.

Coming up on the IPT

Right after the Galway leg of the tour, we’ve seen Limerick take the spotlight with the €30K In A Day event on January 11, and then the Munster Poker Festival on the weekend of January 24-26. Cork hosts their own event at the Macau Sporting Club & Casino on Feb 7-8. Glasgow will offer massive prizes during the Glasgow Poker Festival in The Alea Casino, where the organiser guarantees a £270,000+ prize pot.

However, what’s gonna be the most hyped part of the spring leg of the tour is certainly the St. Patrick’s Weekend €100K for €100 in Dublin. The event will take place in the Greenisle during the St Patricks’s Day Parade which is apparently going to be “bigger, better, and taller” than ever this year as per Dublin’s Lord Mayor Emma Blain. Combined with an amazing guaranteed prize pool of over €200K this will certainly be something to look forward to both for the players and the worldwide poker audience. 

IPT events after Dublin will proceed in Athlone, Tipperary, Dundalk, Clondakin, and Donegal within a few weeks apart, finaling on September 14.