27 Jan

Crown Aussie Millions celebrates 19th Anniversary in 2017

Aussie Million Championship Poker EventAustralia plays host to a wide variety of national tournaments and championship games, revolving around everything from athletic sports to more mentally challenging competitions, like chess. For poker players, there’s none more famous, or lucrative, in all f the southern hemisphere than the Australia Poker Championship, a.k.a. Crown Aussie Millions.

This esteemed, multi-event poker festival takes place every January – or at least, it has since 2001. The Australia Poker Championship actually dates back nearly two decades now, to its inception in 1998. Back then, the Crown Melbourne hosted the tournament during the winters month of July.

History of the Australia Poker Championship

Australia Poker Championship Aussie Millions

The Crown Casino in Melbourne, Victoria officially opened its doors in 1997 (following a preliminary staffing and training launch at a temporary location in 1994). Poker tables were immediately introduced, but it wasn’t until July of 1998 that the property hosted its first championship poker event.

The debut Crown Australia Poker Championship requested a $1,000 buy-in to the Main Event, attracting 74 entries to the Limit Holdem tournament.

Organizers shuffled the schedule a few years later, moving it to the summer month of January in 2001, hoping to attract international players to the felt. They also upped the buy-in to $5,000; a move that initially backfired as the number of entrants dropped to 40. However, the prize pool was a lot larger, paying $200k compared to the $74k prize raised in its debut year, and that got more players’ attention.

By 2003, the global poker community had finally caught wind of the Australia Poker Championship. That year, 122 players from all over the globe posted an even higher $10k buy-in. The prize pool hit seven figures for the first time, jumping to $1.2 million.

2005 was a landmark year for Crown Casino’s growing championship poker event. The field more than doubled to 263 (compared to two years prior), with over half coming from overseas. The prize pool escalated to $2,630,000 – the largest ever witnessed in the southern hemisphere. That was the year the poker event earned its timeless nickname, the Aussie Millions.

The number of entrants, and subsequent prize pool, have continued to rise every year, breaking one record after another. It’s currently lauded as the largest poker tournament in the southern hemisphere, and is recognized by many as being the second most prestigious poker championship event in the world, behind the World Series of Poker (WSOP) in Las Vegas.

Aussie Millions Preliminary Events

Being crowned the Aussie Millions Poker Champion isn’t the only goal for poker players come January. The events list tends to grow a bit longer each year, right along with the Main Event prize pool.

The 2017 Australia Poker Championship is packed with 26 events, including a few high roller tourneys that are very popular among today’s most celebrated poker pros, celebrities and wealthy businessmen.

In 2006, the Crown Casino introduced what was – at that time – the highest buy-in event in the world; a $100,000 Challenge. It really was a challenge, too. Betting was restricted to pot limit rules pre-flop, switching to no limit post-flop, and gave players just 30 second to act. That event is still players to this day.

In 2011, they upped the ante again, adding a super high roller $250,000 Challenge. For a brief time, that became the new, richest high roller event in the world. That title was stripped when the WSOP hosted a $1,000,000 Big One for One Drop in 2012.