The 21 year old poker prodigy from Lake Worth Florida, Ashton Griffin, is the newest North American Poker Tour (NAPT) Champion. Griffin eliminated 6 players in consecutive shootout tables earning himself $560,000 in the NAPT Venetian High Roller Bounty Shootout.

The victory is Griffin’s largest live cash to date. During season 1, Griffin finished 7th at the LAPT San Jose for $28,956. The NAPT Venetian High Roller Bounty Shootout was a $25,000 buy-in invitational and featured 49 of the best poker players in the world, amongst them, the former WSOP Main Event Champion Peter Eastgate who ultimately finished in 7th place.

Team PokerStars was well represented in the event with Chris Moneymaker, Daniel Negreanu, Dario Minieri, Joe Hachem, Barry Greenstein, Betrand Grospellier, John Duthie, Hevad Khan, Vanessa Rousso and Steven Paul participating.

Other players at the invitational event included Annie Duke, Antonio Esfandiari, Phil Hellmuth, Jennifer Tilly and Phil Laak.

Seven players were randomly selected to seven tables with $5,000 being deducted from each participants buy-in to be used towards the bounty awards given to any player that eliminates another from the tournament. The seven winners from the opening round each received $75,000 and the final table was winner take all. PokerStars added an additional $100,000 bonus to the player that sent the most players to the rails. Team PokerStars pro Scott Seiver was the lucky winner of the $100,000 bonus knocking out 8 players.

The event was taped for broadcast by ESPN with airing dates to be announced.

The inaugural $5,000 buy in NAPT Mohegan Sun event, April 7th-11th, is the next stop on the Poker Stars NAPT schedule.

PokerStars runs regular qualifiers for their live NAPT events.