Tennis Pro and Team PokerStars member Rafa Nadal apparently will put his studies in the art of deception to the test next month in his online poker tournament debut.
The 26-year-old has been recovering from a knee injury that left him sidelined on the court since the summer. And the fourth-ranked tennis star could jump to the virtual felt before returning to the clay.
Nadal is registered for the Spanish Championship of Online Poker main event on December 9, more than 5 months after PokerStars signed him, according to Spanish poker news site poker10.com.
The “ESCOOP” tournament series, the first of its kind, runs on PokerStars.ES, the new regulated online poker room in Spain which went live in June 2012. It is open to Spanish residents only. It begins this Sunday and culminates €200 buy-in main event a week later.
Nadal is one of four on PokerStars’ “Team SportsStars,” a list that also includes fellow tennis champ Boris Becker, a Dutch hockey player and a Swedish ski pro.
Since signing Nadal, PokerStars has documented his poker training, featuring videos in which he learns to play on the mobile app and a learns to “bluff” by working incognito at a golf course in Mallorca.
The endorsement has been heralded as the biggest in the industry, well-timed with regulation of online poker in his home country of Spain.
