Online World Series of Poker Shatters Records with $27.6M Prize Pool
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The World Series of Poker (WSOP) online event wrapped up this week after about two months of play with the breaking of several poker records including the largest online tournament prize pool.
The total prize pool at poker’s biggest stage reached almost $27.6 million and the event featured the largest online poker tournament prize ever awarded: $3.9 million. The Online Main Event first-place accolade was presented to Stoyan Madanzhiev, a resident of Bulgaria.
Madanzhiev outlasted over 5,800 players to win. China’s Wenling Gao came in second and won $2.7 million.
Capturing third place was Tyler Rueger of the US, who won $1.9 million. New Zealander Thomas Ward won $1.35 million as he came in fourth place.
A total of 203 players won at least $100,000, and 54 WSOP bracelets were claimed. Also, the event saw the most entries ever for a WSOP tournament: 44,576.
Increase in Online Poker Predicted After Return to In-Person Play
Another player in the tournament was Avi Rubin, a Johns Hopkins University professor of computer science and technical director of the Johns Hopkins University Information Security Institute.
During the tournament, the computer security and applied cryptography expert sailed his boat from Maryland to New Jersey. He docked there for a few days so he could compete in a couple of WSOP bracelet events.
It is not surprising that this year’s WSOP was the largest online event ever. After all, poker players want to play, and this year, that was the only option,” Rubin told Casino.org on Thursday.
“Once things get back to normal, I expect that we’ll see a shift back to in-person live poker, especially for cash games,” Rubin added. He said security issues in online poker are “much more serious for cash games than tournaments.”
He explained that the response to the pandemic led to “much higher-quality online systems, and great user acceptance, so I think that even after safe live games return, we will see a permanent increase in the presence of online poker.”
The WSOP online took place at GGPoker between July 19 and September 6. There were 239,754 tournament entries.
The continuing pandemic forced the postponement of the in-person WSOP. Initially, it was scheduled for the Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas.
The WSOP began in 1970. That makes it poker’s longest-running tournament.
Many Players Move Online
When asked about the WSOP online event’s popularity, James Whelan, a psychology professor and co-director at the University of Memphis’ Institute for Gambling Education and Research, told Casino.org that recent national data suggested that many frequent gamblers switched to online play due to COVID-19 “and the lack of available in-person options.
“I would guess that these experiences will result in some being more comfortable with online betting,” Whelan added. “Of course, we have also seen people … who did not gamble for several months and then the casinos reopened and off they went.”
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