Shark Rankings are a fully independent entity. We ensure that no external supporter or sponsor has any influence on how the rankings system works or which tournaments partake in our major bonuses.

Our ranking system and the prizes that we guarantee are funded by the fees that we charge each club, festival and online site. The fees cover for the listing and promotion of each ranking event for each member club and also for the inclusion of their own personal web pages within SharkRankings.com.

No additional fees are charged to the poker player at any time either during live or online events. There are three distinct types of member to SharkRankings.com – the live poker club, the festival organiser and the online sites. Each are handled differently in how we interact with them and also how their events are represented on the ranking leaderboards.

The Different types of Shark Rankings Members

The Live Clubs

Each live club's entire tournament schedule are treated as ranking events towards the club ranking leaderboards. For every live club, SharkRankings.com hosts an individual ranking leaderboard that contains results entirely from their tournament schedule. We call this the Club Ranking Leaderboard.

The results from each of the participating clubs also appear on the Overall Club Leaderboard which takes into account all club ranking tournaments across the country.

Each club also nominates a single monthly event. The results of this event contribute to the National Ranking Leaderboard. The National Ranking Leaderboard consists of results from each of the participating live club's monthly event and all the results from participating festivals and major tournaments.

The Festivals and Major Tournaments

All tournaments run by participating organisers, either festivals or major events, are treated as ranking events and go towards the National Ranking Leaderboards.

Online Sites

Participating Online sites nominate specific tournaments that are to be treated as ranking events. Each online site can have as few or as many as they wish. Like the live clubs, each online site's ranking tournaments go towards their own individual ranking leaderboard. They also go towards the Overall Online Leaderboard which takes into account all the online ranking events.

The Different Types of Ranking Leaderboard

So not only are there different types of members but SharkRankings.com are hosting different types of ranking leaderboard – each relevant to the type of results from which they are formulated.

The Club Ranking Leaderboard and the Online Ranking Leaderboard

Each individual live club and online site has their own specific ranking leaderboard. Each leaderboard consists only of the results from that individual member's ranking tournaments. This allows regular players of the club or online site participate in their own ranking competition.

The live club leaderboard is called the Club Ranking Leaderboard and the online site leaderboard is called the Online Ranking Leaderboard. These can all be located in the Rankings section of the site.

The Overall Club Leaderboard and the Overall Online Leaderboard

All the ranking tournaments for each individual live club and online site also count towards the overall ranking leaderboards. This allows players from the specific live club or online site compete against other clubs and online sites on one leaderboard.

The live clubs participate in the Overall Club Leaderboard and the online sites compete in the Overall Online Leaderboard. These can also be located in the Rankings section of the site.

The National Leaderboard

The National Leaderboard consists of specific ranking tournaments. These tournaments are all live events and are confined to the larger and more significant tournaments of the year.

To qualify for inclusion on the National Leaderboard a tournament must meet one of the following criteria;

• Be a nominated national ranking event from a live clubs regular tournament schedule – maximum one per month. Only participating clubs are allowed.
• A tournament contained in the schedule of a participating festival.
• A participating major poker event such as Irish Open, IPO, UKIPT etc.

How the Ranking Points Work

All qualifying tournaments automatically awarded ranking points to the top 10% of the field – to a minimum of 3. There is no need for players to submit results or contact SharkRankings.com unless you notice a discrepancy with one of the results or if you want to consolidate your ranking points on the Overall Online Leaderboard obtained from different sites under different usernames.

Ranking points are awarded based on three factors – the size of the field, your finishing position and the effective buy-in. The effective buy-in is calculated by dividing the total prizepool by the number of players – this is to accurately accommodate rebuy events.

Based on these three criteria we have developed the following formula to generate ranking points; (10 * SQRT(Total Players) * (1 + CUBERT(Effective Buy-in))) / SQRT(Position)

SQRT = Square Root, CUBERT = Cube Root

We feel that this formula, although rewarding players who go deep in large events, also ensures that no one event has a dominating effect over the others.

However, only a player's best ranking score within a calendar week (Mon–Fri) or their best score throughout an entire festival or major event, will count towards their ranking position. This is to ensure that the ranking leaderboards are not influenced by a high volume of play.

The Shark Rankings are designed to find the best players based on skill.

How to Qualify for SharkRankings.com Prizes

All prizes awarded by SharkRankings.com will be based solely on the ranking positions of the players. Various prize events will be announced over the course of the season. The current prize events are listed below.

SharkRankings.com €10,000 Freeroll

The €10,000 freeroll takes place after the end of the calendar year once all the ranking events have been completed. Players will qualify for the freeroll based on their finishing position on each of the SharkRankings.com ranking leaderboards.

To qualify for the freeroll and secure your seat, simply complete one of the following scenarios;

• Finish in the top ten of the National Leaderboard, or
• Finish in the top ten of the Overall Club Leaderboard, or
• Finish in the top ten of the Overall Online Leaderboard, or
• Finish first in any of the Club Ranking Leaderboards, or
• Finish first in any of the Online Ranking Leaderboards