The SKEMA Poker Club organised the first ever France-wide student poker tournament which took place on the 27th of March. The tournament was organised by the SKEMA Poker Club in partnership with the casino group Tranchant, one of the most important professional poker tournament organisers in France.

The tournament was divided into two halves: the first part took place in every participating school or university thus selecting a winner from each school. The second part of the tournament pitted the winners from each school / university against each other.

This French student poker championship brought together students from all Grande Ecole academic backgrounds: Medicine, Business, Engineering, Journalism…

The final was won by an Engineering student from a Parisian university: the Centrale Paris. After winning he said: “I’m very proud to have won this title against such tough competition. I would like to thank, especially, the organisers: SKEMA Poker Club and the team from Tranchant Casinos.”

SKEMA has two poker clubs:

• On the Sophia Antipolis campus: the SKEMA Poker Club whose mission is to promote and familiarise students with the game. The club organises regular competitions; emotions often run high behind the stone-cold poker-faces.

• PickPoker on the Lille campus: they organise and participate in competitions. They also encourage beginners to take up the game, as well as showing films in association with another society: the Seventh Art society (film society).



Poker is a game that requires skill, more so than luck, to win regularly.

Skill 1: Mathematics

A good poker player knows the general probabilities of the game. For example, they know that you have about 1 in 8.5 chance of hitting a set (three of a kind) when holding a pair.

Skill 2: Discipline

A disciplined player knows when to play and when to quit. He recognizes when he is on tilt (emotional over-heating) and is aware when a game is too interesting to just quit while ahead.

Skill 3: Psychology

A good player always empathizes with his opponents. He tries to know what they’re thinking and understand the decisions they’re making and why they’re making them. He tries to have answers to these questions:

1. What hand does my opponent have?
2. What hand does my opponent think I have?
3. What hand does my opponent think I think he has?

Skill 4: Understanding Risk vs. Reward

Poker players are willing to take a long-shot risk if the reward is high enough, but only if the expected return is higher than the risk.

Skills transferable to the world of business. Perhaps?