Poker Writer
Triton Super High Roller Series added a player of the year race with a $200,000 prize to honor 10 years on tour. Triton announced the news on X on Monday, calling it “a new race for greatness.”
The Ivan Leow Player of the Year race will reward the top 10 competitors at the end of the Triton poker year. The 2026 tour starts on the island of Jeju, increasingly a poker hotbed, during the first stop of the year, from March 13-31.
Monetary Incentive For Players
The Triton announcement uses a lot of flowery buzzwords about battling against and outlasting the world’s best to win the title. But the key part is the commitment to a monetary prize for the winning player. Triton boasted that it is giving back to the players who have made the series what it is over its decade of existence.
The World Series of Poker Player of the Year race contrasts with the new Triton race. For much of its existence, the WSOP POY race did not award a monetary prize to the winner, as players simply battled for a POY banner. That will change in 2026 with the WSOP POY race now having a monetary ladder of prizes.
Notably, $200,000 is not a huge prize from a Triton Super High Roller Series perspective. It is about two to eight buy-ins worth on a tour whose stakes usually range from $25,000 to $100,000, with occasional events having larger buy-ins. But it is still a significant sum of money that will incentivize some extra volume from players.
Triton also promised a “dymanic” prize pool that could grow larger than $200,000, teasing as high as $350,000.
The point system will follow the same format that Triton has used in previous years. Artur Martirosian won the the 2025 version of the Triton POY race.
On top of the $200,000 Ivan Leow POY race, the mid-stakes Triton tour, Triton ONE, will also have a new leaderboard race. Called “Player ONE,” the leaderboard chase will give $66,000 in rewards.
Who was Ivan Leow?
Ivan Leow was a co-founder of the Triton Super High Roller Series. The Malaysian poker player was a prominent member of the high roller poker community. He founded the Triton series with fellow Malaysian poker players Richard Yong and Paul Phua.
Leow died suddenly on Sept. 17, 2022, at the age of 41 while playing during the Triton Cyprus series. Triton then cancelled the remaining events to mourn his passing. Some reports said he died of a heart attack.
The POY race remembers his legacy with the honorary name.
