PokerStars guaranteeing $15 million in prizes for TCOOP 2016

(PRESS RELEASE) -- The first major online tournament festival of the year returns to PokerStars.com, an Amaya Inc. brand, from Jan. 21-31, as the Turbo Championship of Online Poker (TCOOP) gears up for 50 fast-paced tournaments and a guaranteed $15 million in prizes.

Now in its fifth year, TCOOP has become an iconic major online championship every January. The focal point is the prestigious $700 buy-in Main Event, which will take place on Jan. 31 and feature a $2 million guarantee, but there are a host of new unmissable elements added for this year's festival, including:

-- The first three-phase tournament in PokerStars 'COOP' history (see below)
Progressive Ultra-Knockout tournaments in TCOOP for the first time (Events 03 and 34, where 75% of each buy-in goes to knockout prize money)
-- Debut of 4x-Turbo tournaments in TCOOP (Event 10)
-- A Hyper-Turbo, Deep, One Rebuy One Add-on (1R1A) tournament (Event 50), which has only previously been deployed for satellites

Kicking off TCOOP is the three-phase tournament – a $27 NL Hold'em [6-Max, Turbo] – with many Phase 1 tournaments running every day from January 7-21. Players may continue to play in as many Phase 1s (and Phase 2s) until they successfully qualify for Phase 3. Each Phase 1 and Phase 2 is slated to take approximately one hour to play, ensuring that players will know where they stand after a relatively short amount of time. The Phase 2 tournaments run three times a day, with the last one taking place at 10 a.m. ET on Jan. 21. The Phase 3 tournament, which marks the official first day of TCOOP, takes place at noon ET on Jan. 21 and has a huge $1.5 million guarantee.

"I'm really looking forward to TCOOP," said Team PokerStars Pro Online member Mickey "mement_mori" Petersen. "The turbo structures, coupled with the range of games and formats, keeps things fun and interesting every day. Plus, with each tournament only lasting a few hours, it's a great way to try and get a big score in a short space of time."

PLAYER OF THE YEAR
Additional prizes are awarded for players who do consistently well throughout the championship. Here is the list of prizes for the top 100 finishers on the Leader Board:

-- 1st: Champion's Trophy and 2015 SCOOP [H] Main Event ticket
-- 2nd: 2015 SCOOP $5,200 ticket
-- 3rd-5th: 2015 SCOOP $2,100 ticket
-- 6th-10th: 2015 SCOOP [M] Main Event ticket worth $1,050
-- 11th-100th: 2015 SCOOP [L] Main Event ticket worth $109

ONLINE SATELLITES
PokerStars is running online qualifiers to every event in TCOOP, with cash buy-ins starting from just $0.11 Beginning in early January, StarsCoin satellites will be available from just 1 StarsCoin. Log in to the PokerStars client and click on 'All Games' > 'Online Events' > 'TCOOP' > 'All' to find the qualifiers.