Article by Khurshid Ahmad
The inaugural WPT Online India (WPTOI) was all the rage on Adda52.com with several thousands of players getting into the action from 5th to 22nd November 2020 in pursuit of WPT glory and hefty prizes. The series featured a total of 154 events, including 31 trophy events across 18 thrilling days.
To say the WPTOI was a success would be an understatement as the festival attracted a total of 60,434 entries to generate a total prize pool of a whopping INR 15,15,24,396 which got distributed among the 2,856 players. There were two leaderboards featuring 35 Lac in prizes for the inaugural series. The biggest of the two leaderbaords was the 25 Lac Mega Leaderboard that was topped by Ashish Munot who scored 778 points to win 10 Lac uptop and a WPT trophy, while the second leaderboard, the Mini Leaderboard that rewarded low stakes players, was won by Arjun Arora who scored 2,152 points to win 3 Lac and a WPT Trophy for his amazing consistency through the series.
More than a dozen of players walked away with a whopping seven-figure prizes. Dreams came true for many players at all bankroll levels. Thanks to the plethora of online satellites running throughout the series allowing MTT players the opportunity at a life-changing payday for a fraction of the buy-in.
There were 31 trophy events, including the series headliner, the 2.5 Crore GTD Main Event, 65 Lac GTD Super High Roller, 50 Lac GTD High Roller and 30 Lac GTD WPT – Mike Sexton Tribute. The player who dominated a massive field of 2,573 entries in the Main Event was Kumar Sahaj aka “kumar69” who seized the prestigious WPT Trophy, a Hublot Classic Fusion chronograph watch worth U$10K, a $5K WPT passport and the largest single payout of the series, INR 50 Lac. Sahaj defeated Siddharth Barot “psychg0d” in the heads-up, who walked away with INR 26.49 Lac prize.
The super high roller was won by Siddhanth Kripalani “Sidstack” who banked INR 19.38 Lac for outlasting a guarantee-crushing field of 137 entries. The high roller crowned a winner in WSOP bracelet winner Abhinav Iyer aka ‘checkshove’ who added a WPT Trophy and INR 17.55 Lac to his name. The best part was that all trophy events went on to crush their respective guarantees.
We play for glory and money but sometimes we also play to pay respect to one of the greatest legends this sport has ever produced. On the final day, the WPTOI had the special Mike Sexton Tribute tourney with a $1000 Passport and a fine trophy for the winner. Hemant Padamwar aka “hemper” took down the special event to win himself INR 9.79 Lac and a beautiful WPT Trophy.
Bringing Players Of All Types To Adda52
The WPT and Adda52 made reaching players of all bankroll levels a big part of the action. There were plenty of female players, low stakes and high stakes players who participated in the WPTOI series.
Pratibha Arya‘TeamRocket’, who is primarily a cash game reg, was the only female player who won a trophy event at the WPTOI series. She came out on top of a strong field of 376 entries in the 35 Lac GTD WPT India 6-Max Championship tourney to add a WPT Trophy and INR 9.40 Lac to her name.
Arjun Arora “Beatthefish66” was the most consistent player as he won as many as 10 tournaments, collecting INR 9,71,065. He went to top the Mini Leaderboard to win a WPT Trophy and 3 Lac prize.
The WPT Online India series surpassed all expectations; the following statistics attest to the same:
WPTOI Series Statistics
Number of Series Events: 154
Total Series Guarantee: INR 13,55,80,000
Total Series Prizemoney Awarded: INR 15,15,24,396
Total Number of Entries: 60,434
Total ITM Players: 2,856
Leaderboard Prizes: 35 Lac
WPT India Main Event – Biggest Prizepool Event!
Number of Flights: 10
Guaranteed Prize: INR 2.5 Crores
Prize Pool Reached: INR 2.57 Crores
Unique Players: 803
Total Entries: 2,573
ITM Players: 269
WPTOI Trophy Events
Number of Trophy Events: 31
Guaranteed Prize: INR 9,47,00,000
Prize Pool Reached: INR 10,65,81,683
Unique players in Trophy Events: 2,073
Total Entries in Trophy Events: 21,834
Top Winners From WPTOI
There were many notable performances throughout the WPT Online India series. More than a dozen of players boosted their bankrolls with hefty seven-figure prizes by the end of the online festival.
The WPT India Main Event winner Kumar Sahaj placed as the top on the earnings list with his main event win for INR 50 Lac. He was followed by Siddharth Barot with INR 30,59,267 and Laksh Pal Singh with 28,31,813. Raghav Bansal and Siddhanth Kripalani placed fourth and fifth in terms of earnings.
1.Kumar ‘kumar69’ Sahaj – 50,00,000
2.Siddharth ‘PsychG0D’ Barot – 30,59,267
3.Laksh Pal ‘BoomTilt23’ Singh – 28,31,813
4.Raghav ‘BaLuGaWhAlE’ Bansal – 24,08,846
5.Siddhanth ‘Sidstack’ Kripalani- 21,97,832
A Look At WPTOI Leaderboards
Along with massive prizes on offer, an additional prizemoney of 35 Lac was up for grabs across two leaderboards. The biggest of the two was the 25 Lac Mega Leaderboard. The 2019 WPT India Main Event champion Ashish Munot added another achievement to his name for his stellar performance at the festival. He topped the 25 Lac Player of the Series Mega Leaderoard with 778 points. Munot was awarded 10 Lac and a magnificent WPT trophy. Here is a look at Munot’s top WPTOI scores:
> 30 Lac GTD WPT Mega Stack – 1st for INR 9.03 Lac
> 20 Lac GTD WPT Wednesday Feature – 1st for INR 4.11 Lac
Finishing second and third in the Mega Leaderboard race were the lawyer turned poker pro Ashish Ahuja aka ‘rocky3705’ from Chandigarh with 761 points, and Delhi-based poker pro Raghav Bansal aka ‘BaLuGaWhAlE’ with a total of 724 points. Here is a quick look at the leaderboard top 10 players:
Rank – User Name – Points – Prize
1. ragspoker – 778 – 1000000
2. rocky3705 – 761 – 500000
3. BaLuGaWhAlE – 724 – 300000
4. BoomTilt23 – 715 – 200000
5. lazyman – 702 – 150000
6. badtameez_donk – 694 – 120000
7. gaganhyd – 663 – 100000
8. aggtarun – 660 – 60000
9. ksn123 – 660 – 40000
10. PsychG0D – 608 – 30000
Topping the 10 Lac Mini Leaderboard was the most consistent player of the series, Arjun Arora aka ‘Beatthefish66’. He shipped as many as 10 tournaments and made several FT finishes to secure 2,152 points and win the leaderoard race. He was awarded a beautiful WPT trophy and 3 Lac for his amazing consistency. Finishing runner-up to him was Gadadhar “gd1921” Behera who won several tourneys, apart from making plenty of deep finishes. Here is a look at the top 10 leaderboard players:
Rank – Username – Points – Prize
1. Beatthefish66 – 2152 – 300000
2. gd1921 – 2072 – 200000
3. Lokimon – 2025 – 125000
4. prakash7639 – 1967 – 100000
5. Kumartomar – 1955 – 70000
6. Nit2Donk – 1813 – 60000
7. gauravgoru – 1676 – 50000
8. StupidCommonMan – 1505 – 40000
9. kritagya_17 – 1418 – 30000
10. MrGTO – 1364 – 25000
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