PokerStars has been in a similar position as many other hosts of live poker tours. The European Poker Tour was just one of its series that PokerStars had to put on hold in 2020 without any idea of when it may be safe to restart.
The good thing for PokerStars is that it has its very own platform on which to run the tournaments online.
Last month, the leading global online poker site announced that it would offer the first-ever EPT Online in November. There were 20 tournaments, a cumulative series guarantee of $20 million, and official EPT trophies to send to every winner.
Players responded positively.
Overall Numbers
PokerStars delivered some final numbers from the EPT Online and the Mini EPT Online, the version that offered buy-ins of 1/10 the price.
--Prize money awarded: $21,226,100 ($20M GTD)--Prize money awarded in Mini EPT: $5,534,706 ($3.3M GTD)--Total entries: 13,222--Total entries in Mini EPT: 278,874--Players winning multiple events: 1 (Bert “girafganger7” Stevens won 2 events)
The EPT Online Main Event in the regular series brought in a strong crowd for the $5,200 buy-in tournament, so strong that the prize pool far exceeded the $5 million guarantee. The 8-max tournament ran from November 15-18 with these totals and results.
--Total entries: 1,304--Total prize pool: $6.52 million
As usual with an EPT final table, the Main Event found names like apestyles, MissOracle, and Tim0thee in the virtual seats. It was the latter who made it to heads-up against WhatIfGod from Sweden. Despite Tim0thee’s experience and skills, WhatIfGod emerged victorious after starting two-handed play with nearly even stacks.
1st place: WhatIfGod (Sweden) $1,019,081.902nd place: Timothy “Tim0thee” Adams (Canada) $728,632.823rd place: David “MissOracle” Yan (New Zealand) $520,965.604th place: tikidiii (Finland) $372,484.995th place: Viacheslav “VdV1990” Buldygin (Russia) $266,323.096th place: Enio “Bozzano JNR” Bozzano (Brazil) $190,418.557th place: Andreas “daskalos20” Christoforou (Netherlands) $136,147.388th place: Jon “apestyles” Van Fleet (Canada) $97,344.259th place: vip25459 (Kazakhstan) $78,796.80
https://twitter.com/PokerStarsBlog/status/1329120502632370183?s=20
As for the Mini EPT Main Event with its $55 buy-in, it was a smash hit. It also surpassed its guarantee of $500K, leaving it in the virtual dust.
In the end, a player from Russia named edyvpakistan won the title and $79,139 in prize money.
Newest EPT Champions
From the main series, the tournament fields and final tables were exciting. And it all led to these results:
Event 1: $1,050 NLHE 8-Max Arena Championship ($1.5M GTD)
Total entries: 2,426
Total prize pool: $2,426,000
Winner: DON JOHAN (Norway) $356,768.52
Event 2: $10,300 PLO 6-Max High Roller ($500K GTD)
Total entries: 70
Total prize pool: $700,000
Winner: Ka Kwan “kaju85” Lau (Andorra) $188,937.72
Event 3: $5,200 NLHE 8-Max High Roller ($500K GTD)
Total entries: 131
Total prize pool: $655,000
Winner: David “MonkeyBausss” Laka (Georgia) $143,566.75
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