If you want to catch up on October 26–November 1, 2026, this was a week of heads-up finishes and big-name runner-ups. Andy Lee beat Joe Hachem for the Victorian Poker Championship Main Event in Melbourne, and Kyle Grupp turned a home-casino habit into his first WSOP Circuit ring at Turning Stone. In Las Vegas, the PGT Sprint produced two different winners in two days. Online, CoinPoker and PokerGO unveiled PGT Online, and GGPoker's PLO Series opened on November 1. Last week's October 19–25 roundup covered the Poker Masters finale, so this one picks up from there.

Andy Lee Beats Joe Hachem Heads-Up to Win the Victorian Poker Championship Main Event

According to PokerNews on October 27, 2026, Hun Wei "Andy" Lee won the $2,500 Victorian Champs Main Event at Crown Melbourne. The field was 715 entries, the prize pool was A$1,573,000, and first place paid A$350,000. Joe Hachem, the 2005 WSOP Main Event champion, finished second for A$210,000. Zac Miravet took third for A$135,000 and Ben Richardson fourth for A$90,000, and Poker Media (October 27) notes that 89 players were paid.

The final nine returned with Lee in front. PokerNews's chip table shows Lee on 9,955,000, or 83 big blinds, and Hachem on 2,735,000, or 23 big blinds. Lee did not keep that lead for long. PokerNews says Hachem doubled early with pocket kings, and Lee told the site that calling Hachem's all-in with pocket nines was a mistake he recognized right away. He said he reminded himself to stay patient. Poker Media says Lee got back on top by knocking out Nektarios Dimitrakis in sixth place: the chips went in on a jack-nine-ten flop with Lee holding ace-jack against ace-four, and neither the turn nor the river helped Dimitrakis. Lee then won two of the next three eliminations to set up the duel.

Heads-up lasted more than two hours, and PokerNews says the chip lead changed hands several times. At one point Hachem was down to two outs on the turn and hit a six to survive. The last hand started with Hachem raising to 1,600,000 on the button and Lee moving all in from the big blind. Hachem called with ace-five against Lee's pocket jacks. The 7♥ A♥ 3♣ flop put Hachem ahead, the Q♦ turn did not change that, and the J♥ river gave Lee a set, which is three of a kind made with a pocket pair and one matching card on the board. Hachem had also won the Limit Omaha Hi-Lo event earlier in the series, according to Poker Media.

Lee told PokerNews that Hachem is the reason he started playing poker, and that this win felt better than his A$25,000 Challenge title at the Aussie Millions in May because it came against Hachem heads-up. He also said he had not been to Crown since COVID, so winning two events there in one year was a good feeling.

If you play tournaments yourself, Lee's description of the early part of that final day is the most useful detail in the story. He told PokerNews he knew he had the chip lead but also knew he had to be patient, and that he did not think he played the first level well. After the pocket-nines call, he felt his table image was poor, so he decided to pick better spots instead of forcing the action. It is a simple lesson, but it applies at any buy-in: when a chip lead disappears early, waiting for a good spot can matter more than trying to win the chips back all at once.

Kyle Grupp Wins WSOP Circuit Turning Stone for $246,362

According to the WSOP on October 26, 2026, Kyle Grupp won the $1,700 No-Limit Hold'em Main Event at WSOP Circuit Turning Stone in Verona, New York. The field was 996 entries across three starting flights, and the prize pool was $1,508,940, comfortably above the $1,000,000 guarantee. Grupp collected $246,362, his first Circuit gold ring, and a $5,000 package for WSOP Paradise. Joel Cattelane finished second for $164,220 and Steven Tabb third for $114,576. The WSOP release says the festival ran 18 ring events from October 15 to 26. One row of the WSOP results table prints third place as $144,576, but the release text and Card Player both say $114,576. This article uses $114,576.

Card Player (October 26) adds the context. Grupp lives in Clarence, New York, and had made two earlier Circuit Main Event final tables: fourth at this same event in 2023, and sixth at WSOP International Circuit Montreal in 2025. The $246,362 is the largest score of his live career, ahead of the $165,000 he earned for 54th place in the 2025 WSOP Main Event, and Card Player puts his lifetime cashes above $836,000. Tabb's $114,576 was the second-largest score of his career, behind a $122,296 third place at the 2017 World Poker Tour Rolling Thunder Main Event. Three-handed, Grupp shoved the small blind with 6♠ 3♠ into Tabb's short stack. Tabb called with A♣ 9♠, and a Q♠ 8♥ 3♣ J♣ 2♦ board paired Grupp's three.

Cattelane started heads-up with the chip lead, and Grupp came back. The turning point, per Card Player, was a river bet of almost 28 big blinds on an A♣ K♦ 9♣ 9♦ 3♣ board; Cattelane had three-bet preflop and bet the flop and turn, checked the river, and folded. That gave Grupp roughly a 2-to-1 lead. On the final hand Grupp raised the button with J♦ 9♠ and Cattelane three-bet to 4,500,000 with A♣ 3♣. On a K♣ 9♠ 7♣ flop Cattelane bet 7,500,000 with the nut flush draw, and Grupp called with second pair. The 10♠ came on the turn, Cattelane shoved his last 5,700,000, and Grupp called. The 2♥ river changed nothing, so Grupp's nines held.

Jesse Lonis and Sergei Kislinskii Win Back-to-Back PGT Sprint Events

According to PGT on October 30, 2026, Jesse Lonis won PGT Sprint Event #3, a $5,300 No-Limit Hold'em tournament, from 78 entries. First place paid $101,000 and 164 PGT points. Sam Laskowitz was second for $78,400. PGT notes that the top two prizes reflect amounts after a deal. Lonis had already reached the final table in both earlier Sprint events, sixth in Event #1 and third in Event #2, and PGT puts his total for the series at $175,350. Laskowitz now has a second runner-up finish in a short span, after the Poker Masters finale covered in last week's roundup.

TightPoker (October 31) says Lonis started heads-up with a lead of nearly 4-to-1, and the two struck a deal before playing on. On the last hand Lonis held A♣ 4♣ against Laskowitz's A♠ 6♥, and a 10♣ 5♣ 2♣ 9♣ 3♠ board gave him an ace-high flush on the flop. Adam Hendrix, who finished sixth in the 2025 WSOP Main Event, went out in third for $50,700 when his A♣ Q♠ lost to Lonis's pocket sixes. TightPoker also lists the first two Sprint winners: Chino Rheem took Event #1 for $119,600, and Brock Wilson took Event #2 for $110,600 from 79 entries.

The bubbles were the other storyline. Event #3 paid 12 of its 78 entries, and TightPoker says Alex Foxen was the player who missed the money in 13th. Sam Soverel's eighth-place exit set the seven-handed final table, with Lonis as chip leader. A heads-up deal, for anyone new to the term, is an agreement to split the remaining prize money based on stack sizes before the match is played out. TightPoker notes that deals like this come down to stack sizes and payout jumps, which is why PGT marks the top two prizes in Event #3 as post-deal amounts.

The next day, Sergei Kislinskii won Event #4 from 57 entries for $91,200 and 137 PGT points. PGT says it was the first PGT title of his career. Card Player (October 31) describes a swingy finish: Brandon Sunshine started heads-up with more than a 3-to-1 chip lead, then Kislinskii flopped a straight against Sunshine's top two pair and took the lead. On the final hand Sunshine shoved the button with K♠ 9♥ and Kislinskii called with A♣ 10♥. The board ran A♥ Q♠ 9♠ 6♠ 2♦, and Sunshine took $57,000 for second. Earlier, Kislinskii had doubled through 2015 WSOP Main Event champion Joe McKeehen with pocket sixes against pocket fours. McKeehen finished third for $39,900. Event #4 paid nine of 57 entries, and Card Player says Sunshine burst that bubble by eliminating Dan Sepiol, the 2023 World Poker Tour World Championship winner. Nick Palma, who won Poker Masters Event #2, was the first player out in the money, in ninth for $8,550. Card Player says Sunshine placed third in Event #3 a day earlier, but PGT's results table has him fourth for $37,050.

According to PGT's schedule, the series is dark on October 31 and November 1, then resumes on November 2 with three $10,500 events through November 4. Kislinskii's previous best result was a $78,750 runner-up finish at the 2024 PGT Kickoff, per Card Player.

CoinPoker and PokerGO Announce PGT Online With $250M in Guarantees

According to Card Player on October 27, 2026, CoinPoker and the PokerGO Tour announced PGT Online. CoinPoker's own post on X is dated October 23. The program runs from November 2026 to November 2027, with $250,000,000 in guarantees spread across six series. The first, the PGT KickOff Online, runs November 8–30 with a $50,000,000 guarantee. These are the headline events Card Player lists:

The November 15 Mystery Million is the first Mystery Bounty tournament on CoinPoker, with a top bounty of $50,000. Card Player also notes that Jeremy Ausmus, a CoinPoker ambassador, won his tenth career PGT title at this year's Poker Masters. Select champions will receive physical trophies, and qualifying events are labeled "Trophy Events" in the lobby. PokerStrategy (October 26) adds that the first PGT Online tournaments were already appearing in the CoinPoker lobby, that more events were still to be added, and that players will not necessarily need to pay the full buy-in: satellites and freerolls are expected to offer cheaper routes into many of the headline events.

The season ends with a $1,000,000 winner-take-all final for 50 players at the PokerGO Studio in Las Vegas in January 2028. Winner-take-all means one player takes the entire $1,000,000 and the other 49 finalists get nothing from that prize pool. Seats come through PGT Millionaire Challenges. Any day you enter at least one PGT Online tournament counts as an active day, and completing a challenge such as playing 10 consecutive days earns a Loyalty Badge. Each badge becomes a ticket to a qualifier tournament for the Vegas Final. Seat holders must be 21 or older and complete KYC verification. The coverage does not say whether players in every country can take part. These are real-money tournaments, so check your local rules and the site's terms before you consider joining.

GGPoker's $20M PLO Series Starts November 1

According to PokerNews on October 30, 2026, GGPoker is running the PLO Series from November 1 to 17. PLO is Pot-Limit Omaha, and PokerNews mentions both the four-card and five-card versions. The series has more than 450 tournaments, with buy-ins from $15 to $10,000 and guarantees from $10,000 up to $1,000,000. The total guarantee is $20,000,000.

Six events carry a $1,000,000 guarantee. Three are the $10,000 GGMillion$ PLO tournaments, which start at 7:00 p.m. UTC on November 1, 8, and 15. The other three are multi-stage events: the $215 PLO Mystery Bounty Main Event, whose final stage is on November 9, the $1,050 PLO Bounty High Roller, with a final stage on November 16, and the $25 PLO Ocean KO, with a final stage at 6:30 p.m. UTC on November 2. PokerNews says the Ocean KO guarantees at least $1,000,000 even at a $25 entry, and that its progressive random bounties could push the total higher.

If you want to see how Ocean KO works, and how a $5 version reached 420,084 entries earlier this month, the October 12–18 roundup walks through it. The series also has a $200,000 leaderboard for the top 1,500 players. First place receives T$10,000 and a $10,000 GGMillion$ PLO High Rollers ticket, according to PokerNews.