WSOP 2016 Kicks Off: Colossus II Highlights First Weekend
(Las Vegas) – The 47th annual World Series of Poker begins today, as the doors of the Rio Convention Center open to poker players for cash games and satellites. The first of this year’s 69 bracelet events begins Wednesday.
This year’s Series features several changes based on player feedback, perhaps none more significant than a modified payout structure. Now, almost every event will pay 15% of field, with a minimum payout of 1.5 times the buy-in. Approximate payouts for any event can be found in the online payout calculator.
Colossus II Highlights First Weekend
The first open event of this year’s World Series is Colossus II, beginning Thursday morning. Last year’s Colossus event drew a record 22,374 entries. The eventual winner, Cord Garcia, took home a first-place prize of over $638,000. The 2016 incarnation is expected to be even bigger. There are six starting flights – two each on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, and first-place is guaranteed $1,000,000.
New Events
As always, there are several tournaments that have never before been held at a WSOP. Perhaps the early front-runner for most fun tourney of the summer is the Tag-Team event (Event #61, starting July 7). Each team will consist of 2-4 players, and the cost of entry is $1,000 per team.
There are also three new mixed-game events: Triple Lowball, Triple Omaha, and half no-limit hold’em/half pot-limit Omaha.
In total, there are eight new events on this year’s schedule:
Event #4: $1,000 Top Up Turbo – June 5
Event #12: $565 Pot-Limit Omaha (Re-entry) – June 9
Event #23: $2,000 No-Limit Hold’em – June 15
Event #40: $2,500 Mixed Triple Draw Lowball – June 23
Event #45: $1,500 Mixed No-Limit Hold’em / Pot-Limit Omaha – June 26
Event #53: $1,500 Mixed Omaha (PLO/8, Limit Omaha/8, Big O) – June 30
Event #54: $888 Crazy Eights No-Limit Hold’em – July 1
Event #61: $1,000 Tag-Team No-Limit Hold’em – July 7
High Buy-in Events
This year there are three events with buy-ins bigger than $10,000, highlighted by the Poker Players Championship. This $50,000 buy-in tourney features an eight-game mix (limit hold’em, Omaha hi/lo, seven-card stud, Razz, seven card-stud hi/lo, no-limit hold’em, pot-limit Omaha, and 207 triple draw lowball). This is the 11th running the Championship, which last year was won by Mike Gorodinsky, who went on to earn WSOP Player of the Year honors.
Also returning this year is the $111,111 High Roller for One Drop event. This is the biggest buy-in of the summer, and is part of the WSOP’s continuing partnership with One Drop – a charity dedicated to providing sustainable access to clean water in impoverished areas.
Lastly, the $25,000 pot-limit hold’em event returns after its successful debut last year.
The highlight of the WSOP is always the Main Event. It’s scheduled to begin July 9. There are once again three starting days, and play will continue through July 18. When it’s down to the official final table of nine players, play will pause for over three months. Then the final table will be played out live on ESPN from October 30-November 1 as we watch to see who will succeed Joe McKeehen as the winner of poker’s most prestigious prize.
