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Meet Natural8 India’s APT Taipei Tournament Chip Leader, Akshat Sharma

If you have been grinding online for a while now, you must surely know of Akshat Sharma. This poker pro participated in the India-exclusive tournament for APT Taipei 2024 by Natural8 India and took the numero uno spot. The game was paused when the final table was set with the top 6 players. Sharma is chip leading with a stack of 436,042 chips. The India-exclusive qualifier will resume in Taipei on 4th March at 12 PM.

For those who aren’t aware of this tournament, Natural8 India hosted an exclusive tourney to APT Taipei 2024 on 11th February at 8 PM. Here, the top 3 finishers will get tickets to the Main Event worth ₹1.85 Lakh each and the remaining three finishers will get tickets to the Mini Main Event worth ₹60K each. 

Who is Akshat Sharma?

Sharma hails from Bangalore and has a Master of Business Administration (MBA) degree. This 33-year-old did not wish to join any conventional job and took to poker as a full time gig. 

Next, we wanted to know what attracted Sharma to the card game. The pro who’s on a break currently, revealed that the strategy part of the game pulled him into the fold. Sharma further added that he enjoys the social interactions that happen while grinding and the ability to get into another person’s head, got him excited about the card game. 

This player with the nickname ‘FOLDMONK’ started his journey back in 2011 and played poker five days a week. While Sharma is enjoying his break away from the daily grind, he does play poker occasionally. This again could be the reason why the pro did not play the entire Sunday schedule and opted to grind only in the India-exclusive APT Taipei 2024 qualifier. We asked Sharma what made him grind in the Natural8 India exclusive tourney. The pro responded by saying that he found added value in this tournament in the form of playing the final table in Taipei and signed up for it. 

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He further added that since the tourney was an India-exclusive one, the field was relatively smaller and it took him a few attempts to build his stack. But from there on, the game was pretty straightforward, the pro stated. Sharma also mentioned that when you are running well, the game feels easier. 

When it comes to the Asian Poker Tour (APT), the upcoming Taipei stop will be Sharma’s first time at the series. Back in the day, this Bangalore guy played poker in the Philippines on smaller stakes while on a vacation and had a gala time.  

It was time for Sharma to sign off but we did not let him go without asking him about that one moment in poker which was the most memorable. The pro gave a heartwarming answer which will surely melt your hearts. He said the day he convinced his parents to let him play poker full time against opting for a 9 to 5 job, was his biggest win. Well, we hope to see Sharma crush the live felts when the India-exclusive tournament resumes in Taipei and ship top title in the series. 

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