Being the first to accomplish something carries prestige, notoriety, and pride. For Aram Oganyan, those attributes belong to him as the inaugural winner of the WPT Voyage Championship aboard Virgin Voyage’s Scarlet Lady.
After battling through a field of 293 entrants over three days of play in international waters, Oganyan emerged victorious after a three-way deal to close out the marquee event.
WPT Voyage Championship final table results
| Place | Player | Prize |
| 1 | Aram Oganyan | $214,245* |
| 2 | Carlo Basurto | $202,885* |
| 3 | Austin Srur | $188,670* |
| 4 | Farid Jattin | $100,000 |
| 5 | Dan Sepiol | $75,000 |
| 6 | Romulo Dorea | $55,000 |
| 7 | Kasey Mills | $42,000 |
| 8 | Iman Dan | $34,000 |
| 9 | Marcelo Giordano | $28,000 |
*Result of a three-way deal. First-prize amount includes the winner’s $10,400 seat into the season-ending WPT World Championship at Wynn Las Vegas.
Riding high from South Korea to the Caribbean
Oganyan has enjoyed recent tournament success on a higher level than he’s known before. Riding the momentum from a personal high score of $989,501 in a $25k Triton event in Jeju, South Korea, Oganyan was ready to get back into the mix as soon as possible.
“I almost didn’t play this,” he told reporters after his victory. Oganyan played some online events on Monday, busted earlier than he had hoped, and that allowed him to hop into the WPT Voyage Championship. The rest, as they say, is history. “I mainly play bigger events. I just wanted to run it up, fire more bullets, and get in there.”
A tournament-ending compliment and flips to decide it all
With three players remaining and quite a bit of money up top, the players decided to chop the money and set aside the title and a small amount of the prize pool to flip for.
“They wanted to chop it, and I always take someone asking to chop as a compliment,” Oganyan told the WPT. “Like, ‘Hey, I think you’re good at poker and I don’t think I have a big edge over you.’ So we just agreed to cut the variance down, flip for the championship and here we are.”
On the first of two blind flips, the shorter-stacked Oganyan made two pair to triple up versus his two opponents. On the second, he found pocket deuces which turned into a set to finish the job.
Plans for the rest of the Voyage
Oganyan wasn’t sure what he’d be playing as he boarded the ship, but winning the marquee event was certainly a nice reward for taking the trip.
He plans to enjoy the company of his cabin mate, enjoy the onboard drinks, and gamble it up in celebration for the final few days of the cruise. He’ll also hop in the $10,000 Turbo to try and parlay his win into even more money.
Regardless of what happens as the ship eventually heads back for Miami, what happened here will always be his. Oganyan won the first WPT Voyage Championship, etched his name forever on the Mike Sexton trophy, and cemented his name in poker history.
Congratulations to Aram Oganyan for his impressive victory and taking home $214,245 for his win over international waters!
Images courtesy of the WPT.
