Ante Up For Africa, a celebrity filled charity poker event that has been a popular fixture at the World Series of Poker for the last three years, once again brought out an impressive number of stars from the worlds of poker, film, sports, music and TV, to play cards for a worthy cause.

Yesterday's event, which as usual aimed to raise money and awareness for Africans in need, attracted almost 50 more players than last year and raised over $350,000 for Enough and Refugees International, two organizations dedicated to helping the displaced people of Darfur while simultaneously working to end that region's ongoing humanitarian crisis.

Some of the well known celebrities and poker professionals that attended the $5,000 buy-in charity event included Brad Garrett, Barry Greenstein, Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, Phil Hellmuth, Sarah Silverman, Charles Barkley, Chris Ferguson, Montel Williams and of course PokerRoad's Annie Duke and Don Cheadle, the co-founders of Ante Up For Africa, and the ones most responsible for the event's obvious success. 

One big surprise of the night was the arrival of Mike Tyson, a man at this point so iconic that he appeared to be almost the celebrity of the celebrities, easily garnering much of the room's attention when he arrived, whether he wanted it or not.

The winner of the event was poker pro Alex Bolotin, who after his victory quickly donated half of his winnings to the night's charity. 

For the first time, this year's Ante Up For Africa tournament was fully covered by ESPN and will air, along with the rest of their 2009 WSOP event coverage, sometime later this summer.
 
For more information on Ante Up For Africa, or to make a tax deductible donation, visit www.anteupforafrica.org.


Story by Mark Anderson