Adelaide, Brisbane, Melbourne Host Successful Poker Series

Live poker is back in Australia. As positive Covid-19 cases decrease and vaccination rates increase, Aussie life is slowly but surely returning to something resembling normal. There may still be masks and massive amounts of hand sanitizer, but poker rooms are reopening and hosting impressive tournament series. Two of those just wrapped as February began – the Stacked Poker Championship in Adelaide and the Treasury Poker Festival in Brisbane. And the latest was the Australian Poker League Poker Tour, which completed its APLPT Melbourne tour stop.

Stacked Poker Championship

One of the first live poker tournament series of 2022 was the Stacked Poker Championship. Stacked Social in North Adelaide hosted the series of five tournaments from 28 January to 7 February.

The previous series ran 16-24 May 2021 during a time when many were still wary of the pandemic. Those five events attracted 319 entries in total, with a total prize pool of $338,790. The $2K buy-in Main Event had 123 of those entries and $252K for its prize pool.

When all was said and done, the results were:

• $350 NLHE Accumulator: 117 entries, $36,270 prize pool, Tin Win won for $10K
• $550 NLHE Monster Stack: 73 entries, $36,500 prize pool, Huey Lam won for $10,700
• $350 PLO 5-Card: 121 entries, $37,510 prize pool, Jacyn Che won for $10,200
• $550 NLHE Terminator: 71 entries, $35,500 (half to knockouts), Mike Gainer won for $5,500
• $2,200 NLHE Main Event: 181 entries, $362K prize pool, Joe Sandaev won for $75K

All in all, the 2021 series garnered 563 entries and $507,780 in prize money. Entries increased by more than 75% and the prize pool just over 50% from the 2021 series.

Treasury Poker Festival

It appears that this was the very first iteration of the Treasury Poker Festival. The Treasury hosted the series of nine events starting on 28 January. Buy-ins ranged from $220 to $1,500. Most of the tournaments were No Limit Hold’em, but Omaha players had one PLO option.

The results were:

• $550 NLHE Opener: 235 entries, $117,500 prize pool, Yitian Fan won for $23,879
• $330 NLHE Deepstack: 120 entries, $36K prize pool, Simon Mockeridge won for $10,620
• $250 NLHE Freezeout: 92 entries, $20,700 prize pool, Daniel Noja won for $6,567
• $220 PLO: 72 entries, $21,200 prize pool, Sayak Ratul won for $6,360
• $330 NLHE Teams: 40 entries, $12K prize pool, Charles Caris & Adrian Sportelli won for $2,460
• $440 NLHE Big Bounty: 154 entries, $30,800 (half to bounties), John Boardman won for $8,276
• $1,100 NLHE Main Event: 364 entries, $364K prize pool, Adrian Sportelli won for $76,433
• $1,500 NLHE: 85 entries, $114,750 prize pool, Hussein Hassan won for $37,006
• $330 NLHE Mega Stack Turbo: 76 entries, $22,800 prize pool, Francis Nguyen won for $7,752

In total, the series delivered 1,238 entries and awarded $739,750 in prize money across the nine events. Needless to say, Treasury Brisbane will likely bring this festival back at a later date.

APLPT Melbourne

The Australian Poker League kicked off 2022 with a successful APLPT stop at Southport Sharks in Queensland. That January series exceeded expectations by awarding $548,075 over the course of the 21 tournaments.

Without much rest, the next APL Poker Tour stop offered 21 tournaments in Melbourne. The 3-6 February series estimated that it could award $750K at the Club Italia Sporting Club in St. Albans. Let’s check out the results:

• $120 NLHE Opening Event (Event 1): 119 entries, $13,700 prize pool, Eyal Levy won for $2,515
• $600 NLHE Deep Freeze (Event 2): 166 entries, $87,150 prize pool, Zhixiang Ang won for $17,040
• $80 Crazy Pineapple (Event 3): 69 entries, $6,880 prize pool, Kara Nikkel won for $1,855
• $2,500 Centurion NLHE (Event 4): 17 entries, $182,400 prize pool, Daniel Dessmann won for $49,250
• $180 NLHE Main Event ($200K est) (Event 5): 360 entries, $233,400 prize pool, Daniel Dessmann won for $46,080
• $80 NLHE Masters NLHE (Event 6): 59 entries, $6,320 prize pool, Peter Karlovic won for $1,705
• $350 NLHE 6-Max (Event 7): 96 entries, $36K prize pool, Romain Morvan won for $9,720
• $80 NLHE Turbo Deepstack (Event 8): 73 entries, $6,480 prize pool, Andrew Gonn won for $1,355
• $120 NLHE Terminator (Event 9): 110 entries, $10,090 prize pool, Zachary Harris won for $2,265
• $1,250 NLHE Jackstar Super High Roller (Event 10): 22 entries, $226,550 prize pool, Khac-Trung Tran won for $42,215
• $80 NLHE Ladies Event (Event 11): 57 entries, $5,600 prize pool, Lisa Trevellick won for $1,850
• $80 NLHE Friday Freezeout (Event 12): 119 entries, $9,520 prize pool, Josh Kitos won for $2,520
• $450 NLHE Mini High Roller (Event 13): 178 entries, $84,100 prize pool, Liam Jehu won for $19,470
• $120 Big NLH120 (Event 14): 128 entries, $16K prize pool, Thinh Pham won for $4,080
• $200 NLHE Teams Event (Event 15): 72 entries, $12,160 prize pool, Caroline Lin & Grant Wheeler won for $3,250
• $80 NLHE Saturday Night Hyper Turbo (Event 16): 63 entries, $6K prize pool, Mark McQuinn won for $1,780
• $300 NLHE Monster Stack (Event 17): 241 entries, $83,280 prize pool, Fred Mohajerani won for $18,425
• $80 PLO (Event 18): 61 entries, $5,680 prize pool, Chris Jewell won for $1,860
• $80 Sunday NLHE (Event 19): 114 entries, $11,520 prize pool, Venkata Potluri won for $2,320
• $350 PLO 8-Max (Event 20): 93 entries, $38,100 prize pool, Jason White won for $8,290
• $60 NLHE Freezeout Finisher (Event 21): 85 entries, $5,100 prize pool, Sam Beasley won for $1,375

Across the schedule, there were 2,302 entries in total. And that brought the cumulative prize pool to $1,086,030. That is nearly double the amount paid out in Queensland last month.