The first ever $1 million worth backgammon tournament was held at the Atlantis Resort in the Bahamas. The tournament was won by Mr. Andreas Maertens, a 33-year old poker enthusiast from Germany. Aside from the honor of being the first ever champion of the tournament, Maertens took home $600,400 in cash prizes.

During the finale of the tournament, Maertens edge out Lasse Hiorth Madsen from Denmark, 23-22. Both players qualified in the online tournaments organized by tournament officials. Aside from these 2, there are about 10 former world champions in the tournament.

The total cash pool exceeded the guaranteed prize money of over $1 million and reached as high as $1.2 million. Maertens had to pay about $40 for the buy-in in the tournament that he has joined to qualify for the backgammon tournament in the Bahamas and Madsen had to pay the $34 required fee for the online backgammon satellite tournament.

Tournament officials said that like poker, the emergence of backgammon aces are bound to affect the way the game is played and viewed as a whole. Maertens is a native of Bielefeld, Germany and has been a devoted follower of both backgammon and poker for almost a decade now and even won the German Backgammon Open back in 1996.

When asked how he feels about his win, he said that he is very happy about it since he did not really expect it. He does not even view himself as one of the top players in Backgammon.