Hollywood Casino Charles Town Poker Room Review
Dating back to 1933, the Hollywood Casino at Charles Town Races is less than an hour’s drive from both Baltimore, Maryland and Washington, D.C., and it welcomes more than 2.5 million visitors per year.
The race track
- Information and Reviews about H'wood Charles Town Poker Room in Charles Town, including Poker Tournaments, Games, Special Events and Promotions. Hollywood Casino.
- Hollywood Casino at Charles Town Races: Terrible Poker Structure - See 1,169 traveler reviews, 57 candid photos, and great deals for Charles Town, WV, at Tripadvisor.
Hollywood Casino Charles Town Poker Room (unofficial). 50 table poker room on two floors - located just outside the eastern city limits of Charles Town, West Virginia.
The Hollywood Casino offers one of the most complete horse racing calendars in the country with a total of 162 days of live racing on schedule for 2018. This includes the $1.2 million Charles Town Classic, one of 20 stakes races scheduled, which has handled as much as $4.8 million in action.
Other special racing days on the calendar are the Race for the Ribbon day run annually in September and the West Virginia Breeder’s Classics.
The wagering options for the live races vary based on the number of races on schedule, which ranges from an eight-race program up to a 13-race program. The wagering menu includes win/place/show, exactas, trifectas, superfectas, daily doubles, pick 3s, and $0.50 pick 4s (depending on which race you begin your bet).
In addition to the 162 live racing dates annually (running from January through December), the casino also offers a complete season of simulcast horse and dog racing across the country, 365 days a year – from Saratoga in New York to Del Mar in San Diego.
The live racing at Charles Town is typically a 7 p.m. start, but with the simulcast racing starting at 1 p.m. or sometimes earlier, a truly full year of racing is offered.
Other gaming options
The casino boasts a full spectrum of table games, including blackjack, roulette, craps, pai gow, and baccarat, as well as an 18-table poker room and more than 2,500 slot machines.
Hollywood Casino Charles Town Poker Room Reviews
On September 1st, it also added the one ingredient still missing from its fully formed casino – a sportsbook. The newly opened sportsbook facility is run by William Hill US and accepts bets on football, basketball, hockey, soccer, baseball, golf, tennis, auto racing, rugby, cycling, boxing and MMA, and cricket.
Hollywood Casino Charles Town Poker Room Review
Additionally, Hollywood Casino partnered with DraftKings Sportsbook for online sports betting. The popular mobile sports betting app launched on Aug. 28, 2019.
You can also participate in the full spectrum of wager types, including straight bets, parlays, match-ups, futures, props, and the increasingly popular in-play betting.
With 24 odds-displaying monitors and 50 feet of wall space dedicated to television viewing, the presence of William Hill, the largest operator of sports gaming in the United States, is clearly felt on site.
Other facility amenities
Hollywood Casino touts itself as so much more than just a casino or race track. As an entertainment destination, it features two bars – H Lounge and Skybox Sports Bar – and two award-winning restaurants, Final Cut Steakhouse and 9 Dragons.
It also has a 1,200-seat events center that hosts comedians like Jay Leno and Jeff Foxworthy and musical guests ranging from the Grammy-winning Clint Black to 1989 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductees The Temptations.
Also just a short and free shuttle ride away is the 153-room The Inn at Charles Town, which features 18 suites overlooking the race track.
Promotions and rewards
The variety of nightly promotions offered by the casino changes each month. The current promotions include Ricochet Rewards, which guarantee a total of $25,000 of free slot plays offered on Wednesdays.
There is also the night of 1,000 winners when for each hour over a 10-hour stretch, 100 winners will receive $100 in slot play. The Lucky Table promotion offers a $10,000 grand prize, and the Hot Summer Dreamin’ promotion gives away a Jeep, a Camaro, and $20,000.
That last promotional night is only for members of Marquee Rewards, the free rewards card that provides benefits to 24 gaming locations across the country. Points are earned on money wagered at all video and table games, as well as any money spent on dining and retail.
The most basic of rewards are complimentary (comp) points that can be bundled to provide free plays. Higher-tiered rewards members can get discounts on rooms, parking, and event tickets, with prizes all the way up to airline ticket reimbursements and complimentary cruises.
The casino’s past and future
Gambling officially made its way to West Virginia in 1933, when the race track at Charles Town first opened its doors.
An up-and-down history involving a number of ownership changes over the years appeared to have finally taken its toll by the 1990s, when the track was on its last financial legs.
It regained its footing in 1996, when a vote allowed the track to install video lottery machines, which evolved into slot machines. A vote in 2009 led to the addition of table games and a poker room. Now, 85 years after it took the very first pari-mutuel bet in the state of West Virginia, the casino is leading the way for gaming in the region.
Due to its new partnership with William Hill, Penn National Gaming (the owners of Hollywood Casino at Charles Town Races) seemed prime to launch an online and mobile version of its sportsbook in West Virginia. It’s what William Hill has done recently with its ventures in New Jersey, and it’s what it is best known for around the world.
What the final version of its online sportsbook looks like remains to be seen. What that will ultimately mean for the online gaming market in West Virginia and the region at large is also unknown.
Considering the hard charge into the market following the Supreme Court’s ruling in May, drastic changes are expected.
With the final table set for the WSOP Main Event, I got the itch to play some poker. I kept seeing those commercials on TV about how Hollywood Casino at Charles Town in West Virginia just opened up with table games and poker room, along with slots and such, so a couple friends and I decided to take the 80 min drive and check it out this past weekend. Normally, whenever we have the urge to gamble a bit, we always head up to Borgata in Atlantic City, but that’s 2.5-3 hr drive each way. We figured if Hollywood Casino made a good impression on us, we would make this our home casino.
Well, our first impression was not…well, let’s just say it wasn’t good. Waiting 90 minutes just to put our names down on the waiting list for poker was already ridiculous and waiting another 5 hours to sit down at a poker table was even more ridiculous. Just based on that experience alone, I never want to go back to Hollywood Casino ever again. Why wait 6.5 hours to play when I can drive to Borgata in less than 3 hours? I could also decide to play poker online at Pokerstars and try to win money like Boku87 instead.
While waiting for a seat at the poker table, we figured we’ll wait it out by at least playing some table games, such as blackjack, 3-card poker, pai gow poker, craps, and roulette. We then ran into two major problems. One problem was that there was no open tables to play at. All of the seats were filled by other players and each table was hovered by dozens of people just watching. On top of that, the table game minimum limits were too high for our bankroll. At $50 minimums, we could only afford to play 4-5 hands before we go bust. Anyway, we were finally able to play some poker at around 7:30pm. We ended up leaving at around midnight.
I have to say that I cannot recommend going to Hollywood Casino for some table game action. You would be lucky if you can even find a seat.
If you enjoy the volatility of table games such as roulette or blackjack, consider opening an account with EZtrader. EZtrader is essentially gambling with the stock market. Basically, you choose whether a certain stock will go up or go down within the next hour. If you guess right, you get paid. If you guess wrong, you lose your bet. You can read my full review of EZtrader here, for more detailed analysis of how EZtrader works.
With that said, if you ever decide to make a trip to Las Vegas or Atlantic City with your buddies, you should learn which games have the best odds of winning. Here are my top 5 games that have the best odds.
My Top 5 Best Odds Casino Game
1. Blackjack (0.48%)
House has 0.48% edge. Dealer stands on soft 17, player may double on any two cards, player may double after splitting, no surrender, no resplitting of Aces. This is a fast game and averages about 70 hands per hour.
2. Three-Card Poker (3.37%)
House has 3.37% edge, assuming you play both Ante and Play. The edge increases to 5.32% if you play Ante, Play, and Pair Plus. Three-Card Poker is a little slower than Blackjack and can expect to see about 50 hands per hour.
3. Mini-Baccarat (1.2%)
House has about 1.2% edge. This is also a fast paced game with expected hands per hour at around 70.
4. Pai-Gow Poker (1.96%)
In Pai-Gow Poker, you make two hands from 7 cards dealt to you. one 5-card hand and one 2-card hand. The odds of player winning both hands is 28.61%. The odds of house winning both hands is 29.91%. The odds of a tie or a push is 41.48%. So if you do the math, you will win or tie 7 of 10 hands played. The game is played very slow at about 30 hands per hour.
5. Spanish 21 (0.40%)
House has 0.40% provided that House stands on soft 17. If house hits on soft 17, the house edge increases to 0.76%. This game is very similar to the traditional blackjack and is played at about 70 hands per hour.
What’s your favorite casino game to play? Also check out Ultimate Money Blog’s Yakezie Carnival.