While the live poker world takes its first tenuous steps towards trying to return to some semblance of normal, the World Poker Tour is trying to keep their people busy over the summer. Joining up with partypoker, the WPT will offer the inaugural WPT World Online Championships, a series of poker tournaments with guaranteed prize pools that will challenge the competitors across a plethora of formats and disciplines.
Five Players Will Become WPT Champions’ Club Members
Beginning on July 17, the WPT and partypoker will host tournaments that have over $100 million in guaranteed prize pools and the champions will be noted in the annals of WPT history. Five players who take down the larger tournaments on the schedule will earn their place on the WPT Champions’ Cup. These five tournaments also promise to be some of the most entertaining events on the schedule.
Four of the tournaments will be a $3000 ($200 juice) buy in tournament that will feature four different formats of No Limit Texas Hold’em. Eight-Max, Six-Max, Mix-Max (starting at eight and working down each day) and the traditional Knockout formats will be utilized. The fifth event will be the featured event of the schedule: the $10,000 ($300 juice) WPT World Championship Online Main Event. This event will start on August 29 and conclude on September 2.
For those that might find those price tags a bit high, there will be an entire slate of tournaments that might meet a player’s pocketbook. Micro- and mini-stakes events will coincide with their Main schedule brethren. There will also be plenty of opportunities on partypoker to get in on the cheap, with satellites starting at $4 ($.40 juice) or they can use their partypoker LIVE Passport to get into the Main Event. The WPT World Online Championships will also feature Pot Limit Omaha (both Hi and Eights or Better) and a Heads-Up championship.
“Largest Series in Both of Our Histories”
“The WPT World Online Championships brings together the World Poker Tour and partypoker together once more for what will be the largest series in both of our histories,” said Adam Pliska, Chief Executive Officer of the World Poker Tour, during the announcement of the event. “The spectacle on display during the WPT Online Series will be heightened once more come July with another major milestone for the World Poker Tour. Five WPT Champions crowned in a single series is a first for the WPT in 18 seasons and we look forward to welcoming them all into the WPT Champions’ Club.”
“This is a true series for the players across the board,” Hermance Blum, WPT Vice President Europe, added. “Limited re-entries, buy-ins at all levels, and five ways to become a WPT Champion are all highlights of the first-ever WPT World Online Championships continue to deliver the live experience online.”
“I’m delighted that we have been able to partner with WPT to revive the WPT World Championships and bring the series online for the first time,” partypoker Managing Director Tom Waters commented. “We want to give the festival more of a live event feel, so the tournaments will be structured as such, including single re-entry for all NLHE events, freezeouts, limited late registration, and limited Day 1s. Due to popular demand, players will be able to see each other’s real names at the tables.”
The WPT World Online Championships are a bold step by an organization that hasn’t taken on such an audacious task previously. Normally the WPT will just run their tournaments in coordination with another entity, with the WPT taking charge for the Main Event. It also appears that it will be a direct competitor for the online World Series of Poker schedule, giving players more options for their summer poker dollars than ever before.
