The Phamily Poker Classic that took place in Harveys' poker room in South Lake Tahoe yesterday was a great success, raising over $5200 for The Mockingbird Foundation, the 501(c)(3) whose volunteers run Phish.net. Great thanks to all of the players for supporting this event, and especially to organizers Kevin Young and Jamey Brill, who also organized the Classic that took place in Atlantic City last year! The tournament was won by BRYAN BACHRAD ($1680), with tournament organizer KEVIN YOUNG – a bounty player for the Foundation – managing to finish in second place, thus securing an additional $1100 donation (after tipping the dealer) for the Foundation. A $300 donation to the Foundation also occurred when Taper420 -- who played as a bounty player -- made the money, finishing in 7th place!

Special thanks are due to Jonathan Lamb, who designed a beautiful poster for the event, and who took the time to sign each poster, which every participant received. Jon even created a special “Final Table” poster for the folks who made the money.

We also want to thank those who donated wonderful noncash prizes, listed in detail below, and to the volunteers who assisted Kevin, Jamey and me at the event: Phillip Zerbo, TaoPauly of Coventry Blog, and Taper420 for playing as bounty players; and Tori McCammon, Steve Paolini and Herschel Gelman.

Final Table and payouts: Bryan Bachrad ($1680, 1st place); Kevin Young ($1140, 2nd); Mike Mundell ($900, 3rd); Braden Lloyd ($660, 4th); Joshua Vaughn ($480, 5th); Alison Kihara ($420, 6th); Taper420 ($300, 7th); Bob Conley ($240, 8th); and Chris Carver ($180, 9th). Congratulations, again, to you all on your success!

The top five finishers received a host of noncash prizes, including posters from various Phish shows last year (including Pollocks) that were signed by both the band and the artists. Many items were raffled off over the course of the event as well. We greatly appreciate the many donations that were made to the noncash prize pool: PHISH, who donated numerous posters, CDs, and a Joy Box Set; SONOS.com and Thomas Meyer, who donated two PLAY3 ($299) systems; Serralles and Don Q, who donated a high-end bottle of rum; Chaco and Merrell footwear (four $110 coupons, courtesy of Kent Doobrow); David “Mr. Miner” Calarco, who donated several autographed copies of his book, MR. MINER’S PHISH THOUGHTS, due to be published later this year; PhanArt Pete Mason, who donated 10+ posters from various artists throughout the Phish community; CDs from the band Five Eyed Hand and its guitarist, Chris Zanardi; miscellaneous Phish.Net merchandise, and other items, including copies of “The Phish Companion, 2nd Edition,” the Phish tribute album, “Sharin' in the Groove,” and Erin Cadigan’s scary-good poster for the Phamily Poker Classic tournament that took place in October 2010 in Atlantic City.

Again, thanks so much to those of you who played in this tournament, to Kevin and Jamey and the other volunteers, and to the generous noncash prize donors, for helping to raise over $5200 in support of The Mockingbird Foundation’s efforts to raise funds for music education programs for children and young adults.