Spin & Go Milllionaires — who are they?
Get to know top jackpot winners in Spin & Go.
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The first millionaire
Russian PokerStars player 'sss66666' became the first person ever to win $1 million in a $5 Spin & Go. He hasn't given his name, but told PokerStars that he is a 33-year-old handyman who lives in the south of Russia. He has always struggled to make ends meet, so the $5 buy-in in the Spin & Go was a big investment for his modest bankroll.
The shock of it all made it hard for him to play, as he revealed:
"It was actually quite difficult. My heart was pounding and the adrenaline was rushing. I have never felt that way before. I pulled myself together, realising this was the opportunity of a lifetime. I knew I was guaranteed $100,000, and I would have been very happy with that."
He has no intention to continue as a handyman now he has seven-figures in the bank, and revealed to the blog how he plans to use the money:
"I shall make sure the family has no financial problems, and I shall also make a donation to charity for children who need expensive treatment. I have not decided what to do with the rest of it yet."
Jackpot hitter from Estonia
Estonian 'barrakuuda4' became the 9th player to enter the Spin & Go millionaire club, but amazingly it wasn't his first top jackpot!
In August he was one of the first six players to hit a $300,000 jackpot at the freshly introduced $100 buy-in. Spin & Goes aren't even his "major" in poker games. He prefers MTTs and 6-max HyperTurbo SNGs. In Spin & Goes he averages only a couple hundred tournaments a month.
Brazilian rush
It's no surprise that poker is now booming in Brazil, PokerStars made a lot of effort to introduce hot-tempered South Americans to the game.
And in October it was Brazilians — Samara Lúcio and 'wrawras' — who took home the first two million during the Spin & Go Anniversary promo. We surely should expect more green-yellow flags at the tables in the near future!
Hobby players dominate
At the moment there are 12 players in the Spin & Go millionaire club. In your opinion, how many of them are pros or at least regulars? Let's see.
Before this October we had 5 millionaires from Russia, Czech Republic, Canada and Poland. All of them were recreational players.
In the last month we had 7 more. 'Barrakuuda4' and 'handbt1' are SNG and MTT regulars, but it is the latest winner Kevin 'Koovoon' Laird whom many consider to be the most worthy millionaire candidate from the professional poker community. His career results are amazing, and some people even call him "The Bubble killer". Well, probably we should rename him to "The Jackpot killer" as in the space of 12,000 Spin & Goes (that's not a lot in terms of Spin & Go distances) he won 3 x100, 1 x200 and now a x10,000 jackpot!
So, 3 out of 12 give us 25%. Not bad, huh?
Mobile millionaire
The story of 'bladsonpoker' is particularly interesting and somewhat bizarre. He won his million dollars playing on his mobile. His main concern at the time was a $4,40 MTT. As you understand, playing just one table can be quite boring, so he used Spin & Goes to relieve the boredom.
The point is that having won the jackpot he continued playing that MTT for 90 more minutes. Talk about self-control and discipline!
Pros also win
However pros do win jackpots. The stories of Eduards 'CodyWestwind' Kudrjavcevs and EPT and WPT winner Andrey 'angier' Pateychuk are worth mentioning.
Eduards was one and a half months into his 9-month marathon to win $100k playing MTTs but had made no progress. That afternoon he was cooking breakfast and registered into a 25 Euro Spin & Go that changed his life.
Pateychuk's story is similar. 3k tournaments without much success and then x3,000 at the $60 buy-in — top jackpot at the moment.
