Patrick “pads1161” Leonard has built one of the most complete résumés in modern online poker. The British professional is a WSOP bracelet winner, the all-time record holder with 16 SCOOP titles and, after winning twice during WCOOP 2026, has climbed to 15 WCOOP titles and 31 combined PokerStars COOP victories.
Leonard’s career stretches considerably further than one online leaderboard. He has more than $5.4 million in recorded live tournament cashes, co-founded the bitB poker coaching operation, represents CoinPoker and reached 32nd place in the 2026 WSOP Main Event before helping eventual champion Lucas Jumalon prepare for the final table.
There are players with bigger individual live scores and players with more WSOP bracelets. Very few have remained near the top of online tournament poker for as long while continually adding new games, formats and business interests to the mix.
Who Is Patrick Leonard?
Patrick Leonard is an English professional poker player from Newcastle upon Tyne, best known online as “pads1161.” Born on December 30, 1988, Leonard came through the online tournament scene before establishing himself as one of Britain’s most successful players across both internet and live poker.
Football was his original sporting obsession. Leonard has recalled playing regularly as a teenager before poker games with friends gradually became more important, especially after losing gave his naturally competitive side something new to attack.
He began studying the game seriously rather than simply playing. Online poker forums, strategy discussions and watching high-stakes players became part of his education, with Leonard later describing how he would search through old posts from players such as Tom Dwan and Andrew Robl to understand how successful professionals had developed.
The work eventually carried him from small stakes to the top of the online tournament rankings.
From Newcastle Poker Games to World Number One
Leonard’s early poker education included games at Grosvenor in Newcastle, where he has joked about just how tight his original strategy was. Seeing stronger players open and three-bet hands he would never have considered playing helped dismantle some of those early assumptions.
Online tournaments then became the centre of his career. Leonard reached the top of the PocketFives worldwide rankings for the first time in 2014 and subsequently returned to the number one position multiple times.
The screen name “pads1161” became familiar in major Sunday tournaments and championship series. Rather than relying on one enormous result, Leonard built his reputation through volume, study and repeated success against elite online fields.
That approach remains visible more than a decade later.
Four Days in Las Vegas Change Leonard’s Live Career
For several years, Leonard’s online reputation comfortably exceeded his live résumé. That changed rather dramatically in July 2017.
Leonard won the $25,000 Aria High Roller 67 for $403,200 on July 10. Three days later, he won another $25,000 Aria High Roller for $386,400.
The following day he entered the $10,400 Bellagio Cup XIII and won that too, collecting $475,940.
Three victories in four days produced $1,265,540 in prize money and remain three of the biggest individual live cashes of his career. The Bellagio victory is still his largest recorded live tournament score through September 2026.
It was also a useful reminder of tournament poker’s ability to make opinions look silly very quickly. Leonard has recalled receiving criticism about his live game earlier during that Las Vegas trip, only for perceptions to reverse once the trophies arrived despite him believing he was playing essentially the same poker.
Patrick Leonard Wins His First WSOP Bracelet
The World Series of Poker bracelet eventually arrived in 2022, although Leonard had to share the moment with another very good poker player.
He partnered Norway’s Espen Jorstad in the $1,000 Tag Team event, with 913 teams entering. Leonard and Jorstad defeated the Jamie Kerstetter and Corey Paggeot partnership heads-up, earning $74,042 each and a first bracelet for both players.
Jorstad then did something considerably more difficult a little over two weeks later by winning the WSOP Main Event for $10 million.
Leonard came close to adding bracelet number two in 2023 when he finished third in the $1,500 Limit 2-7 Lowball Triple Draw. At the 2025 WSOP, he made another significant run when third in the $25,000 Heads-Up Championship for $180,000.
Patrick Leonard’s Huge 2026 WSOP Main Event Run
The 2026 WSOP produced another important live result. Leonard survived deep into a 9,208-entry Main Event field before eventually finishing 32nd for $265,000.
That may not have produced another bracelet, but his involvement in the Main Event story did not end when his own chips disappeared.
Twenty-two-year-old Lucas Jumalon reached the final table as chip leader and brought Leonard into his preparation team during the break before play resumed. Jumalon returned to Las Vegas in August, led the final table from beginning to end and eventually defeated Lauri Sääskilahti heads-up for the $10 million first prize.
Leonard was on Jumalon’s rail when the championship was won.
It added another dimension to a career already heavily connected to coaching. Winning the Main Event is one thing Leonard has not done himself, but in 2026 he helped prepare the player who did.
A $315K Win Starts Leonard’s 2026 Live Season
The Main Event was not Leonard’s only major live score of 2026. He opened January by winning the $10,100 PGT Last Chance #2 at the PokerGO Studio for $315,000.
A month later, he finished runner-up in the $15,200 PGT Mixed Games Big Bet Mix for another $166,950. Hendon Mob records show almost $950,000 in live tournament cashes for Leonard during 2026 through September.
His career live total now stands above $5.46 million.
Those figures still tell only part of the story because Leonard remains primarily associated with online poker, where the numbers become considerably more unusual.
Patrick Leonard Becomes the SCOOP Record Holder
Leonard entered 2026 already among the most successful players in Spring Championship of Online Poker history. He left SCOOP sitting alone at the top.
Six victories during SCOOP 2026 moved him to a record 16 career titles. The run included wins in PLO8, No-Limit Hold’em, 2-7 Triple Draw and 8-Game, with Leonard at one point winning two versions of the same 8-Game event in a matter of minutes.
The variety matters as much as the number.
Leonard originally built his reputation primarily as a No-Limit Hold’em tournament specialist, but deliberately expanded his mixed-game knowledge later in his career. SCOOP has increasingly become the clearest evidence that the experiment worked.
He has now won SCOOP tournaments in Hold’em, PLO, PLO8, Stud Hi-Lo, 6+ Hold’em, 2-7 Triple Draw and 8-Game.
WCOOP 2026 Takes Leonard to 15 Titles
September has provided more of the same.
Leonard entered WCOOP 2026 with 13 titles before winning the $530 NLHE Deep Stack for $19,838. He then won the $530 NLHE Turbo for $15,428 to move to 15 career WCOOP victories.
Poker Type recently covered Leonard’s WCOOP title near miss after he finished runner-up to “Manolo Poppe” in the $530 Wednesday Surprise Mystery Bounty. He has also finished second in a $1,050 PLO PKO during the current championship.
That leaves Leonard on 15 WCOOP titles as of September 26, 2026.
The number puts him behind Benny Glaser’s WCOOP record of 17, but Leonard currently owns something Glaser does not: the overall PokerStars COOP record.
Sixteen SCOOP titles plus 15 WCOOP titles give Leonard 31 combined championships.
WCOOP 2026 does not finish until September 30, so that number should probably be written in pencil for a few more days.
bitB and Patrick Leonard’s Poker Coaching Career
Playing is only part of Leonard’s influence on modern tournament poker. He is also a co-founder of bitB, the coaching and mentoring operation that grew from a staking project into a long-running development programme for tournament players.
The name predates the company. Leonard used “Best in the Business,” shortened to bitB, for an early poker blog when he was still playing tiny stakes and publicly talking about eventually becoming one of the best players in the world.
Leonard later joined forces with players including Samuel “€urop€an” Vousden and Tomi “elmerixx” Brouk. The current bitB operation lists Leonard as a co-founder specialising in ICM, heads-up play and exploitative strategy.
The business fits naturally with the way Leonard approaches poker. He has spent much of his career publicly discussing study methods, tournament structures, player development and the process of improving rather than treating poker knowledge as something that must remain hidden behind a laptop.
Coaching Jumalon before the 2026 WSOP Main Event final table provided a particularly visible example of where that work can lead.
Patrick Leonard and CoinPoker
Leonard joined CoinPoker in 2024 after previously representing partypoker for around seven years. His role was announced as a strategic ambassador position rather than simply a traditional sponsorship arrangement.
At the time, Leonard said his work would include security, transparency and communication between players and the operator. His arrival also included plans to work with security teams around issues such as bots, real-time assistance and other prohibited software.
He remains part of CoinPoker’s ambassador roster in 2026.
That relationship has occasionally crossed into wider poker politics. Leonard has regularly been outspoken about online poker security, game integrity and the responsibilities operators and sponsored professionals have towards players.
For someone who has spent most of his career making a living online, those are not exactly abstract subjects.
Patrick Leonard Videos
For a detailed look at Leonard’s career and current thinking, his August 2026 appearance on the Skill Game Poker podcast with Johnnie VIBES is particularly useful. The 90-minute conversation covers his WSOP Main Event run, early poker career, PocketFives rise, bitB, solvers, coaching and helping Lucas Jumalon prepare for the Main Event final table.
A shorter PokerGO video follows Leonard during his own deep run in the 2026 WSOP Main Event. It provides a more immediate look at Leonard playing on poker’s biggest live stage rather than discussing the game away from the table.
How Does Patrick Leonard Play Poker?
Trying to describe Leonard purely as an online No-Limit Hold’em tournament player no longer works.
He has deliberately expanded into mixed games, heads-up poker and live cash games, arguing that learning different forms of poker can improve skills that transfer back into tournament play. By 2025, Leonard was describing regular mixed cash sessions at the Bellagio alongside his tournament schedule.
His SCOOP and WCOOP records demonstrate the same versatility. Leonard has won major online championships across traditional Hold’em, short deck, Omaha variants, draw games and mixed rotations.
He is also closely associated with extreme overbets.
Leonard popularised the term “Power Jam” for situations where a player bets many times the size of the pot, normally using a polarised range containing very strong value hands and sufficient bluffs. The underlying poker theory is not new, something Leonard freely acknowledges, but the name stuck.
It is very Patrick Leonard. Take a complicated strategic idea, give it an easily remembered name, discuss it publicly and then complain when opponents start calling more often.
Patrick Leonard’s Career Highlights
- One WSOP bracelet
- 2022 WSOP $1,000 Tag Team winner with Espen Jorstad
- 32nd in the 2026 WSOP Main Event for $265,000
- Coached 2026 WSOP Main Event champion Lucas Jumalon before the final table
- Record 16 SCOOP titles through September 2026
- 15 WCOOP titles through September 26, 2026
- PokerStars record 31 combined SCOOP and WCOOP titles
- Six SCOOP titles during the 2026 series
- Two WCOOP titles so far during WCOOP 2026
- More than $5.46 million in recorded live tournament cashes
- Career-best live score of $475,940 for winning the 2017 Bellagio Cup XIII
- Three major Las Vegas tournament victories in four days during July 2017
- Former world number one in the PocketFives online poker rankings
- Co-founder of bitB
- Current CoinPoker ambassador
Those numbers place Leonard comfortably among the high-stakes poker players who have managed to remain relevant through several very different eras of the game.
Football, Data and Life Away From Poker
Poker is not Leonard’s only competitive obsession.
He grew up playing football and remains a Newcastle United supporter. In 2020, he became involved with Newcastle Independent FC, a club he had played for when he was younger, while also working on a football analytics project called DONTSHOOT.
Leonard later said the club used some unconventional data-driven approaches, particularly around set pieces. After several successful seasons, he moved his investment from Newcastle Independent into Hashtag United.
The crossover is not difficult to see. Poker, football analytics, coaching and staking all reward people prepared to study large quantities of information and then argue endlessly about what it means.
Leonard appears quite comfortable with that arrangement.
The Patrick Leonard Legacy
Leonard’s place in poker is unusual because there is no single result that defines him.
The WSOP bracelet matters. So do the three Las Vegas wins in four days, the deep 2026 Main Event run and more than $5 million in live cashes.
The online record is still the centrepiece.
Thirty-one combined SCOOP and WCOOP titles represents success across different eras, buy-in levels and poker variants. Leonard has remained competitive while online tournament strategy has become dramatically more sophisticated, then responded by broadening rather than narrowing the games he plays.
His coaching record adds another layer. Leonard is now not only winning major tournaments himself but helping younger players prepare for situations as extreme as a WSOP Main Event final table.
At 37, there is little indication that the championship chase is winding down. He has won six SCOOP titles and two WCOOP titles in 2026 alone, with several days of the current WCOOP still remaining.
The more immediate question is therefore not what Leonard’s final totals will look like.
It is how long this page will stay accurate.
Where to Watch Patrick Leonard Play Poker
Leonard remains particularly active during PokerStars SCOOP and WCOOP, where pads1161 is one of the easiest screen names to find near the business end of mixed-game and high-level tournament fields.
Live, he regularly appears at the World Series of Poker and PokerGO Tour events in Las Vegas. He also plays mixed cash games and continues to appear in poker interviews, podcasts and strategy content connected to bitB and his wider work within the game.
As a CoinPoker ambassador, Leonard also appears in the operator’s games, promotions and poker content.
Where to Follow Patrick Leonard
Pads is active on social media, you can find him at:
X: Padspoker
Instagram: Padsonpoker
Patrick Leonard FAQ
How old is Patrick Leonard?
Patrick Leonard was born on December 30, 1988. He is 37 years old as of September 2026 and will turn 38 in December.
What does the nickname pads1161 mean?
“pads1161” is Leonard’s best-known PokerStars screen name. He has used several aliases across different poker sites during his career, but pads1161 is the name most closely associated with his SCOOP and WCOOP records.
What does bitB stand for?
bitB means “Best in the Business.” Leonard originally used the name for a poker blog when he was a young low-stakes player with ambitions of eventually becoming one of the strongest players in the game, long before it became the name of his coaching and staking operation.
What is Patrick Leonard’s net worth?
Patrick Leonard’s net worth is not publicly known. Tournament databases record gross prize money rather than profit, and they do not account for tournament buy-ins, travel costs, staking arrangements, swaps, business investments, cash-game results or taxes.
What is Patrick Leonard’s biggest online poker cash?
One of Leonard’s biggest publicly reported online tournament scores came in 2020, when he finished runner-up in a $25,000 WSOP Online Circuit High Roller on GGPoker for approximately $1.61 million. Online earnings databases can differ because players use different screen names and not every result is publicly tracked.
What football team does Patrick Leonard support?
Leonard supports Newcastle United. He grew up in Newcastle, played football himself and has also invested in football projects including Newcastle Independent and Hashtag United.
What is Patrick Leonard’s Power Jam?
A Power Jam is Leonard’s name for an extremely large overbet, often several times the size of the pot. The strategy normally involves constructing a polarised range containing very strong value hands and bluffs rather than using a conventional small or medium bet.
Is Patrick Leonard still involved with bitB?
Yes, bitB’s current website lists Leonard as a co-founder and coach, with ICM, heads-up poker and exploitative strategy among his specialties.
Is Patrick Leonard a CoinPoker ambassador?
Yes, Leonard joined CoinPoker in 2024 as a strategic ambassador and remains on the operator’s ambassador roster in 2026.
Did Patrick Leonard coach a WSOP Main Event champion?
Yes, Leonard helped Lucas Jumalon prepare for the 2026 WSOP Main Event final table after Jumalon reached the final nine as chip leader. Jumalon returned in August and won the Main Event for $10 million, with Leonard present on his rail.
