India’s largest poker site-Adda52.com launched Mega Suits tourney recently in 2017. The first Mega Suits took place in October 2017 and featured INR 30 Lac GTD prize pool with INR 10 Lac for 1st place. The success of this monthly tournament then led to an increase in the overall prize pool- a whopping INR 40 Lac GTD. This month’s Mega Suits took place yesterday, 14th January and the winner of this mega event was Sahil Agarwal who plays on adda52.com under his online name ‘Bhaijiii’.
The 40 Lac GTD tournament had a buy-in of INR 5500 and ‘Bhaijiii’ overcame a record field of 742 entries to win his first-ever Mega Suits title and collect a hefty INR 1000000 in the top prize money. The event began at 8 PM and went on for almost 8 hours. After several hours of the fierce battles, it was ‘Bhaijiii’ and ‘thegrinder’ who reached heads up and the latter had to settle for a runner-up prize of a cool INR 620000. Top 45 players were paid out in this tournament with a min-cash of INR 14000.
The last hand of the tournament came with the blinds running 30,000/60,000. ‘thegrinder’ who held 6h-Jh moved all-in pre-flop for 729044 in chips and was called by ‘Bhaijiii’ who held Ah-2s. The board ran out 4d-8s-7h-Qs-10d and ‘Bhaijiii’ eventually took down the coveted title with high cards.
OPN Team had an online conversation with Sahil ‘Bhaijiii’ Agarwal wherein he talked about his poker journey, win and his overall experience in this tournament. Here are the excerpts:
Q- Hi Sahil, congratulations on winning Adda52’s prestigious tournament- Mega Suits. Please tell us a bit about yourself and your educational background?
Hi, I have studied engineering and worked at Infosys for 3 years before deciding to quit that job and take poker professionally. Currently, I am a co-owner/coach at https://www.indianpokerpros.com/ along with Abhishek Rathod, Danish Shaikh, Kanishka Samant and Sir Anup Palod where we coach and stake players.
Q-How and when did you come across the mind game of poker? When did you first pick up the game?
During my college days, I learned the game and have been playing on and off since then. After getting to know Adi Agarwal, I decided to take it up more seriously under his guidance.
Q- Coming back to Mega Suits, how does it feel to win such a prestigious tournament?
It feels great. I have had a lot of final table finishes but closing one out is always special, that too one of such magnitude.
Q- Describe your journey through Mega Suits. Any keys hands or takeaways?
I was short for the most part of the tournament. I was grinding my stack stealing some blinds here and there. Then, I decided to play solid and give up marginal spots because people seemed to be in some hurry of winning it. And it’s a long tournament you can’t win it with one hand. I sat there patiently waiting for good spots and it worked out for me.
Q- Any turning points in this tournament where you felt that you could ship it?
I got a pretty good position at the final table. The other big stack was to my right and I could put pressure on him. That helped a lot. Finally, a hand happened me vs him where I went all-in with QQ and he had AK. That was for almost all the chips. After winning that flip, I was pretty sure I was winning the title.
Q-You beat ‘thegrinder’ in the heads-up battle. Could you please explain your heads-up gameplay?
The heads-up did last long as he was pretty short. But ‘thegrinder’ had a position on me and he took really good spots against me and played really well. Despite having a short stack, he gave me the toughest time on the FT.
Q- What three qualities does it take to become the winner in online tournaments?
Basic understanding of the game, patience and definitely some luck.
Q- According to you, who are the best online poker players in India and why?
Adi Agarwal, Danish Shaikh, Aditya Sushant and Adda52 Team Pro-Amit Jain are without a doubt the best in India. I don’t have to say ‘why’- their consistency says it all.
Q-Your feedback on Mega Suits? What are other Go Crazy Tourneys you planning on Adda52.com?
I am planning to play all #GoCrazyTourneys. Mega Suits was very well-structured and Adda52 has come a long way fixing the few glitches they had when it came to tournament poker. Kudos to them!
Q- Finally, any advice or tips to share with the aspiring poker players in India?
Poker looks like an easy way of making money, but it is not. Especially tournament poker comes with a lot of ups and downs and will make you question your abilities every other day. If you want to take poker seriously, you have to put in a lot of work in studying and get better at the game. Also, getting a coach always helps. At https://indianpokerpros.com, we have a lot of such players who have taken the game seriously and are doing really great.