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Up to 200 strip poker players competed on Saturday (August 19) to see who would lose their shirts -- and more -- and who would scoop 10,000 pounds by retaining their clothes and modesty. Organised by Irish bookmaker Paddy Power, the inaugural World Strip Poker Championship took place at the prestigious Cafe Royal in central London with players battling it out in games of "No Limit Texas Hold 'em". The bookmaker said it decided to hold the competition after its spoof April Fool earlier this year generated a lot of interest. "It started off as an April Fool's joke. On April Fool's Day, every year we send out a press release saying that we're gonna do something crazy. Like sometimes we're gonna paint a horse green and run it in the Grand National, but this year we pretended that we're gonna have a strip poker tournament. But suddenly we were inundated with people calling us and saying how do we play, when is it on, how do we register and so we said we better do this for real. So four months later, here we are. " Players of both sexes from over 12 countries are battled it it out for the Golden Fig Leaf trophy and the right to revel in the title of World Strip Poker Champion. Two participants from Germany came all the way over to London just to participate in the event. They reckoned they stood a good chance to win: Aside from strict rules governing the poker play, there were clear guidelines on the stripping element -- most importantly that each player starts the match by...