PokerStars Championship

The PokerStars Championship was a series of global poker tournaments which began in 2017. The formation of the series was announced in August 2016, when PokerStars revealed that the European Poker Tour and other poker tours were being rebranded.^[1] Seven tournament festivals were played in the inaugural season, in the Bahamas, Panama, Macau, Monte Carlo, Sochi, Barcelona and Prague. PokerStars also announced another series of tournaments, PokerStars Festival, which features lower buy-in events. The series was discontinued after the inaugural season.

PokerStars Championship

Sport	Texas Hold 'em
Founded	2017
Ceased	2017
Official website	pokerstarslive.com

PSC Main Event winners

Season	Date	Event and location	Main Event winner	Prize
1	6–14 January 2017	PokerStars Championship Bahamas	Christian Harder	$429,664
	14–20 March 2017	Panama	Kenneth Smaron	$293,860
	1–9 April 2017	Macau	Elliot Smith	HKD2,877,500
	29 April–5 May 2017	Monte Carlo	Raffaele Sorrentino	€466,714
	25–31 May 2017	Sochi	Pavel Shirshikov	₽29,100,000
	21–27 August 2017	Barcelona	Sebastian Sorensson	€987,043
	12–18 December 2017	Prague	Kalidou Sow	€675,000

Results

Source:^[2]

Bahamas

• Venue: Atlantis Resort, Paradise Island, Bahamas
• Buy-in: $5,000
• 7-Day Event: January 6–14, 2017
• Number of buy-ins: 738
• Total Prize Pool: $3,376,712
• Number of Payouts: 143

Final table
Place	Name	Prize
1st	Christian Harder	$429,664*
2nd	Cliff Josephy	$403,448*
3rd	Michael Vela	$259,980
4th	Aleksei Opalikhin	$191,420
5th	Michael Gentili	$140,940
6th	Rasmus Glaesel	$103,780
7th	Allon Allison	$76,400
8th	John Dibella	$56,260

*Deal between the final two players.

Panama

• Venue: Sortis Hotel, Panama City, Panama
• Buy-in: $5,300
• 7-Day Event: March 14–20, 2017
• Number of buy-ins: 366
• Total Prize Pool: $1,775,100
• Number of Payouts: 71

Final table
Place	Name	Prize
1st	Kenneth Smaron	$293,860
2nd	Harpreet Gill	$217,860
3rd	Denis Timofeev	$161,340
4th	Jonathan Abdellatif	$119,480
5th	Robin Wozniczek	$88,480
6th	Anthony Diotte	$65,520
7th	James Salmon	$48,520
8th	Byron Kaverman	$35,920

Macau

• Venue: City of Dreams, Cotai, Macau
• Buy-in: HKD42,400
• 7-Day Event: April 1–9, 2017
• Number of buy-ins: 536
• Total Prize Pool: HKD20,796,800
• Number of Payouts: 103

Final table
Place	Name	Prize (HKD)
1st	Elliot Smith	2,877,500*
2nd	Tianyuan Tang	2,577,500*
3rd	Daniel Laidlaw	1,724,000
4th	Avraham Oziel	1,280,000
5th	Aymon Hata	950,000
6th	Yen Chen	705,000
7th	Yan Li	521,000
8th	Xuan Tan	386,000

*Deal between the final two players.

Monte Carlo

• Venue: Monte-Carlo Bay Hotel & Resort, Monte Carlo, Monaco
• Buy-in: €5,300
• 7-Day Event: April 29–May 5, 2017
• Number of buy-ins: 727
• Total Prize Pool: €3,525,950
• Number of Payouts: 143

Final table
Place	Name	Prize
1st	Raffaele Sorrentino	€466,714*
2nd	Andreas Klatt	€402,786*
3rd	Andrey Bondar	€271,500
4th	Maxim Panyak	€199,900
5th	Michael Kolkowicz	€147,120
6th	Diego Zeiter	€108,300
7th	Davidi Kitai	€79,750
8th	Romain Nardin	€58,740

*Deal between the final two players.

Sochi

• Venue: Casino Sochi, Sochi, Russia
• Buy-in: RUB 318,000 ($5,590)
• 7-Day Event: May 25–31, 2017
• Number of buy-ins: 387
• Total Prize Pool: 150,000,000
• Number of Payouts: 55

Final table
Place	Name	Prize (RUB)
1st	Pavel Shirshikov	29,100,000
2nd	Vladimir Troyanovskiy	18,450,000
3rd	Seyed Ghavam	13,335,000
4th	Dmitry Vitkind	10,785,000
5th	Lavrentiy Ni	8,535,000
6th	Timur Bubnov	6,570,000
7th	Daniyar Aubakirov	4,890,000
8th	Nadar Kakhmazov	3,540,000

Barcelona

• Venue: Casino Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
• Buy-in: €5,300
• 7-Day Event: August 21–27, 2017
• Number of buy-ins: 1,682
• Total Prize Pool: €8,157,700
• Number of Payouts: 247

Final table
Place	Name	Prize
1st	Sebastian Sorensson	€987,043*
2nd	Lachezar Petkov	€917,347*
3rd	Raffaele Sorrentino	€850,110*
4th	Brian Kaufman	€402,000
5th	Andre Akkari	€317,960
6th	Usman Siddique	€252,000
7th	Aeragan Arunan	€193,000
8th	Albert Daher	€136,000

*Deal between the final three players.

Prague

• Venue: Casino Atrium Prague, Prague, Czech Republic
• Buy-in: €5,300
• 7-Day Event: December 12-18, 2017
• Number of buy-ins: 855
• Total Prize Pool: €4,146,750
• Number of Payouts: 128

Final table
Place	Name	Prize
1st	Kalidou Sow	€675,000*
2nd	Jason Wheeler	€570,000*
3rd	Michal Mrakes	€332,000
4th	Gabriele Lepore	€249,000
5th	Harry Lodge	€196,000
6th	Colin Robinson	€147,000
7th	Matas Cimbolas	€104,000
8th	Valentyn Shabelnyk	€72,850

*Deal between the final two players.

Future

On December 15, 2017, PokerStars announced that it will bring back regional tour brands in 2018. These include the EPT, Asia Pacific Poker Tour (APPT), and Latin American Poker Tour (LAPT).^[3] Therefore, the PokerStars Championship label will no longer be used.