Since joining PokerListings.com as a tournament reporter before the 2006 World Series of Poker, Owen Laukkanen has traveled the globe, following the professional poker circuit and rarely stopping in one place for more than a week at a time. He has been called “the top up-and-coming live tournament reporter today” and his poker writing has garnered him praise from industry observers ThePokerBiz, Wicked Chops Poker, Pokerati and the denizens of Neverwin Poker, among others. Together with fellow reporter and partner in crime Matt Showell, Owen has helped to revolutionize poker journalism...

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Since joining PokerListings.com as a tournament reporter before the 2006 World Series of Poker, Owen Laukkanen has traveled the globe, following the professional poker circuit and rarely stopping in one place for more than a week at a time. He has been called “the top up-and-coming live tournament reporter today” and his poker writing has garnered him praise from industry observers ThePokerBiz, Wicked Chops Poker, Pokerati and the denizens of Neverwin Poker, among others. Together with fellow reporter and partner in crime Matt Showell, Owen has helped to revolutionize poker journalism with his entertaining, light-hearted and often criminally punny looks at the world of high-stakes tournament poker.

Owen possesses a B.A. in Fine Arts (Creative Writing) from the University of British Columbia and before coming to PokerListings occupied himself writing short fiction and stage plays, some of which were published and some of which even won awards. He graduated in 2006 and immediately turned his attention to the poker world, spending two months in the scorching Las Vegas summer during the last days of the pre-Jamie Gold era, learning the ropes of the tournament reporting trade over the course of a 50-day trial by fire.

Eighteen months and two world champions later, Owen and Matt have successfully launched the PokerListings.com Live Tournament section and carried it from its first baby steps at the WPT5 Festa al Lago tournament to the Caribbean Poker Classic, the Aussie Millions, the World Series of Poker Europe and the PokerStars Caribbean Adventure, in the process visiting such exotic locales as Monte Carlo, Dublin, Barcelona, Macau, Prague and Tunica, Mississippi. He has scored interviews with circuit regulars from Joe Hachem to Josh Arieh to Justin Bonomo and written extensively on the jet-setting tournament lifestyle.

You can catch Owen at the biggest poker tournaments on the circuit, notebook and oversized camera lens in hand and obscure pop-culture reference at the ready, racking up frequent flier miles and word counts in casinos around the world.