This Week in Poker: April 27 – May 3

In the PokerGuru feature ‘This Week in Poker’ we bring to you the weekly round up of the biggest online scores by Indian MTT players along with the top stories from both the live and online poker circuit.

Here are this week`s top stories

The week saw a slew of live tournaments globally and several new champions taking titles, with the major one being the European Poker Tour (EPT) 12 Grand Final at the Monte Carlo Casino in Monaco. The stop is currently at Day 3 of its Main Event and saw its Super High Roller conclude, after Fabian Quoss won it for €849,059.

Nationally, we had the Greed Championship at Kolkata’s Aquarium 7, won by Aditya ‘Bitti’ Agarwal for ₹4 lakhs. The event also saw Team PokerStars Pro Aditya Agarwal’s wife; Shuchi Aagrwal claim her first live tournament cash of ₹1.5 Lakhs for a fourth place finish. Almost, simultaneously, the New World of Sports (NWOS) Club in Pune concluded its inaugural tournament, which was claimed by Ankit Turkhud for ₹2.75 lakhs.

An important activity this week was a discussion conducted by the Indian Merchant Chamber (IMC) on the legalizing of gambling in India by an expert panel. Domestic news also includes progress in the PIL filed by Jay Sayta, with the Maharashtra government considering MTDC run offshore casinos.

In upcoming events, there is the Manila Megastack 5, which began today at the Grand Ballroom, City of Dreams, Manila and will host 11 official Asia Player of the Year events. The six-day series will feature a ₱6M GTD Main Event, apart from several exciting side events. Dhaval Mudgal from India will be seen in action at the series.

Besides regulars, more and more new players are emerging to participate and score at both, live and online global tournaments and this can be evidenced at our weekly Online Railbird Report, as well as in a significant win at none other than a side event at the Mecca of poker, Las Vegas.

The World Series of Poker (WSOP) is now just a few weeks away and a surprise Indian winner in Sin City was Praveen Dwarkanath, who won the Daily Tournament at Wynn for a sum of about $10K.

In the coming days, we can expect to see more players at international events, through the exciting promotions at Spartan Poker, which has provided a terrific platform for aspirants, giving them an unbelievable opportunity to debut at global arenas. One such will be Pranay Kapoor, who was the winner of the Gladiator Race in March and got a trip to Vegas. Pranay also made a runner-up finish in the NWOS tournament. Another was Jagdeep Singh, who won a Greek holiday for two in the “Poker Olympics” at Spartan Poker.

You too can win big, as Spartan Poker has another new offer on this month, with the Magical May promo that has a huge ₹25 lakhs in prizes for an innovative leaderboard, as well as deposit bonuses.

Online action too saw many new players making scores this past week and Young Gun Sharad ‘keenlye’ Rao claimed the “PokerGuru Star of the Week” title for his two final table finishes amounting to almost $11K.

In this edition of our weekly report, we also bring you news from the concluded ACOP Platinum Series, the announcement of key dates from the new EPT 13 schedule, tournament reports from the WSOP Circuit Harrah’s Cherokee, Borgata Spring Open and the Choctaw Poker Night in America.

We also have news about the Global Poker League’s Week 4, the California online poker bill and a new poker show on Poker Channel.

Online Railbird Report

Sharad takes this weeks “PokerGuru Star of the Week” title for an accumulative $11K this week. Both his scores were on PokerStars, with a sixth place for $3,700.07 in the ‘Bounty Builder $109, $175K GTD’ and a second place for $8,082.47 in the ‘Big $55, $70K GTD’.

Another big winner was Shravan ‘shravanc’ Chhabria who made $4,851.29 for winning the PokerStars ‘$109 Battle Royale [Early Edition, Progressive KO], $20K GTD’.

Other notable scores include:

‘Piyush16’ who made $2,130.00 for first place in the Party Poker Heavyweight: Kangaroo – $5,000 Gtd

Sahil ‘antilog’ Agarwal made two scores at PokerStars, with a fourth place finish for $1000 in the ‘Bounty Builder $44, $20K GTD’, as well as a win in the ‘Bounty Builder $11, $15K GTD’ for $573.

Rohit ‘buzzzbeee85’ Mariwalla scored $1,404.90 for second place in the PokerStars $22 NLHE [6-Max, Hyper-Turbo], $8K GTD’

Siddhant ‘raveoholic007’ Kapoor made a second place for $1,111.37 in the PokerStars ‘Hot $4.40, $8K GTD’

Spartan Poker Promos

Last month’s Pok O’ Lympics saw Jagdeep Singh win himself a Greek holiday and the action continues at India’s fastest growing site, Spartan Poker, with fabulous offers and an amazing Magical May promo. Up for grabs will be a huge ₹25 lakhs in prizes and four different tiers to vie for. Be it newcomers or regulars, May also has a lot in store with Deposit Bonus up to 200%*.

IMC – Discussion On ‘Legalization in Gambling’

The IMC hosted a panel discussion on legalization of gambling in India and three out of the four experts spoke out in favour of legalization. The consensus was that gambling could not be eradicated, being an inherent part of human nature; it could only be regulated for the benefit of society.

Read the complete story here.

MTDC Moots Offshore Casinos

The PIL filed by Jay Sayta, saw the Maharashtra government mulling its response, whether to ratify the Casino Act or not. The MTDC stated that allowing casinos would bring in large revenues from tourism and also suggested that the state run offshore casinos for foreigners initially. These if successful, could later permit Indian residents also.

Read the complete story here.

NWOS (Pune) Debut Tournament

The inaugural ₹22,000 buy-in NWOS tournament was won by Ankit Turkhud for ₹2.75 lakhs, after a four-way deal. Making a second place was Spartan Gladiator champion, Pranay Kapoor for ₹2.45 lakhs.

Read the complete story here.

Aditya “bitti” Agarwal Wins Greed Championship at Aquarium 7, Kolkata

In Kolkata, the inaugural Greed Poker Championship at the Aquarium 7 Poker Room also witnessed a four-way deal, where Aditya “bitti” Agarwal won the event for ₹4 lakhs. It seemed to be an ‘Agarwal’ final table, with Varun “Zampaa” Agarwal making second place for ₹3 Lakhs, Mayank Agarwal finishing third for ₹1.5 Lakhs. Shuchi (Chamaria) Agarwal, better half of Team PokerStars Pro Aditya Agarwal made a fourth place finish for ₹1.5 Lakhs.

Read the complete story here.

ACOP Platinum Series Concludes

China’s Zhi Lin was the champion of the concluding ACOP Platinum Series Main Event for HK $258,810. The event saw 239 entries and Jose Rivas made a runner-up finish.

Read the complete story here.

Enhancements Announced For 2016 WSOP

The upcoming 2016 WSOP festival will have several new enhancements for participants and fans. These will include an eQueue payment process to fasten payouts, a ‘Chipin’ tool for updating stack counts, and headphones will now be allowed up until the final table. Changes were also made in the series’ web streaming and a new ‘social media guru’ appointed to answer queries.

Read the complete story here.

PokerStars and Monte-Carlo Casino EPT 12 Grand Final

The last stop of the EPT 12 seemed to be an all-pro affair, with numerous notables emerging to clinch titles.

It began with Chance Kornuth winning the €10,300 High Roller for €351,108, after a three-way deal.

Read the complete story here.

Next up, in the €100,000 Super High Roller, Ole Schemion came in out of the cold and denied Mustapha Kanit back-to-back EPT titles, by winning the event for €1.597,800.

Read the complete story here.

The next event saw Schemion almost making his second EPT title himself, but finally settling for a runner-up finish. The deal saw Fabian Quoss win for €849,059 and Schemion took home €857,241.

Read the complete story here.

Currently the €5,300 Main Event is down to Day 3, with more than 150 players still in the fray. The event saw a huge entry-crowd of 1,098 and generated a prize pool of €5,325,300.

India’s Paawan Bansal played the event, but was busted on Day 2.

Key-Dates For EPT Season 13 Announced

As the EPT 12 reaches its ending, key dates for its next – Season 13 were announced. The organizers have released important details about the inaugural Barcelona stop, as well as the Malta and Prague stops. Satellites will begin on May 8 at PokerStars.

Read the complete story here.

Praveen Dwarkanath Wins Daily Event For $10K At Las Vegas

The $225 buy-in Daily Tournament at Wynn, Vegas was taken down by Indian player Praveen Dwarkanath for $10K. The event had a $25K guaranteed and unlimited buy-ins allowed. There were totally 135 entries and starting stacks provided were 10,000, with blind levels of 40 minutes.

Praveen narrated his tournament progress to PokerGuru, “The tournament was a good structured tournament. I got off to a good start right from the word go and chipped up consistently.

By the time we were at level 8 I was chip leading and from there on it was no looking back. Maintained the chip lead to ship it. The second in chips lost his stack to me when I opened QQ and he shoved on a KQX flop with AK.

My chip lead increased by a huge margin after this. This is my first major win and I am super excited about it. Considering that I have had a couple of deep runs at Goa recently, I was looking forward to winning a tournament sooner or later.

This definitely was not a planned event for me and that makes sweeter.”

Maurice Hawkins Claims Seventh Ring At WSOP Circuit Harrah’s Cherokee

Making history across the ocean in the US, was Maurice Hawkins, who became the first player to win back-to-back WSOP Circuit Main Event titles. After claiming two rings last to last week, Hawkins went on to win the $1,675 Main Event for $279,722 and his seventh gold ring.

Read the complete story here.

Paul Volpe Takes Down Borgata Spring Open

In New Jersey, the 2016 Borgata Spring Poker Open $2,700 Championship was claimed by native Paul Volpe for $356,255, who was ecstatic at the win.

Read the complete story here.

Poker Night In America Won By Kim Dao

Meanwhile, two states away in Oklahoma, Kim Dao emerged the winner of the Poker Night in America $1,675 Main Event for $286,402, after outlasting 1,064 entries.

Read the complete story here.

GPL Week 4 Update

Olivier Busquet of the LA Sunset team and Anatoly Filatov team manager, Moscow Wolverines were the game-changers in Week 4 of the GPL, both winning significant points for their teams.

The Montreal Nationals with 47 points and the Moscow Wolverines with 58 points were leading their respective conferences, of Americas and Eurasia.

Read the complete story here.

California Online Poker Bill Approved

After years, the California Online Poker Bill was finally passed by the Assembly, though the ‘bad actor’ hurdle remains, with several members declaring they would later negate their vote. The bill had been recently amended and had gained the approval of almost all parties, except the Pechanga tribe.

Read the complete story here.

New Poker Show – ‘Prime Time Poker Report’

Poker Central, the world’s only dedicated poker channel will be floating a new TV series – Prime Time Poker Report from May 18. The hour-long episodes will feature celebrity guests, humour, events and interviews to engross viewers.

Read the complete story here.

That wraps up this edition of our weekly report, but do keep your browsers pointed this way, as we return next week, with all the updates from the world of poker.