The World Championship of Online Poker (WCOOP) returns to PokerStars from September 8 to October 2 and with it, the site is offering up a first-of-its-kind, pre-series poker boot camp. WCOOP Boot Camp offers you the chance to sharpen your skills in the buildup to one of the year's most prestigious online poker series.
Running from August 4–19, the WCOOP Boot Camp is designed to provide recreational players with a platform from which they can prepare for PokerStars' flagship MTT series. The 80-strong schedule of accessible, mainly low buy-in tournaments, coupled with a comprehensive (and free – see below) training program, will help you arrive at the start of WCOOP in the best possible shape.
Each event in the Boot Camp series has two levels – Low and High – so there are 160 tournaments in total, with buy-ins starting at $2.20. The two Main Events, with $109 ($1 million guaranteed) and $1,050 ($400K guaranteed) buy-ins play out on Sunday, August 18. You can find the full Boot Camp schedule on PokerStars.
Win a WCOOP Power Path Gold Pass
Additionally, the WCOOP Boot Camp Leaderboard will reward the top 100 players. Those that finish in the top 6 will win coveted WCOOP Power Path Gold Pass bundles valued at €10,300, plus a place in the upcoming WCOOP League draft. The Gold Pass will earn players a spot in the €5,300 Main Event at EPT Barcelona with accommodation and other PokerStars perks.
For those that finish 7–20, Power Path Silver Passes await, and the top 100 will claim $109 Sunday Million tickets. Players with a Silver Pass earn a seat in two ESPT tournaments to be held during the EPT Barcelona series.
As an added bonus, PokerStars plans to give away $50,000 worth of tickets for players that either play a minimum of 10 Boot Camp events or cash in two events.
What is the WCOOP League?
The WCOOP League takes inspiration from this year's inaugural SCOOP League and will pit six teams against one another in a quest to be crowned league champions. Captains named so far are Lex Veldhuis, Ben 'Spraggy' Spragg, Fintan 'easywithaces' Hand, and Parker 'tonkaaaa' Talbot.
There are two more team captains to be announced shortly and each team will select one of the top six finishers in the Boot Camp Leaderboard to join their ranks. A special draft will be held at EPT Barcelona, where the team captains will select their remaining players.
Free training sessions August 3-9
If you need to brush up your skills before the WCOOP Boot Camp, the BBZ Poker training site will host free training sessions on Discord from August 3–9.
All players are free to join the seminars, and daily instruction from the BBZ team – led by founder Jordan 'bigbluffzinc' Drummond – will focus on formats scheduled for the following day to give you the best chance at success on the felt.
You can join the BBZ Discord channel for free with this invite. Look for the sub-channel POKERSTARS BOOTCAMP, where you'll find the Zoom links for the sessions as they're released.
