By Sean Chaffin
There’s a lot of poker on the horizon for Chance Kornuth. At the WPT L.A. Poker Classic, Kornuth placed 43rd and was eliminated on Day 3. On March 31, Kornuth will battle to join the WPT Champions Club when the WPT Gardens Poker Championship final table resumes at HyperX Esports Arena in Las Vegas.
That event will be filmed for broadcast, but there’s also another big event approaching – the Galfond Challenge. Longtime pro and online poker entrepreneur Phil Galfond has challenged virtually any player in the world willing to face him. Galfond reached out on social media offering to play anyone in heads-up No Limit Hold’em or Pot Limit Omaha.
Galfond has several players lined up including Bill Perkins and Daniel Cates. The challenge had been suspended briefly after a €900,000 loss, but is expected to resume this week. The matchup with Kornuth is set for around April 10 and they will be playing 35,000 hands of Pot Limit Omaha at two online heads-up tables at stakes of €100/€200.
“I’ve got a lot of studying to do,” he says. “I’ve done a lot of solver work, looking at spots I wanted to inquire about. Also, getting my mental duration ready to play heads-up that long. So I’ve been practicing playing people as well and doing everything to get ready. We’ll see what happens.”
Along with the action on the tables, Kornuth will have a €250,000 side bet with a shot to win €1 million from Galfond. He’ll be watching Galfond’s other matches in the meantime as well.
Along with all of that, Kornuth has been working with WPT Champions Club member Alex Foxen on a new business venture. The 33-year-old originally from Denver, Colorado, has more than $7.4 million in live tournament winnings including $392,715 on the WPT. He now lives in Las Vegas, but will head to Toronto or Vancouver for the Galfond Challenge.
When the Gardens Poker Championship resumes, Kornuth will be ready and hopes to add a WPT title to his already illustrious career. He should have plenty of people there cheering him on.
“My mom’s flying in, a bunch of friends and neighbors will be there,” he says. “It should be fun.”
Kornuth had a chance to make his second TV final table but fell shy. He looks forward to future opportunities to reach the Las Vegas stage.
“It would be incredible,” he says. “I have thought about it just a little bit, but you really don’t want to get your head wrapped around that too much. You’ve just got to stay focused.”
Sean Chaffin is a freelance writer in Crandall, Texas, and his work appears in numerous websites and publications. Follow him on Twitter @PokerTraditions.