Eighteen events for under $2,200: inside Playground's October festival
The MSPT Canadian Poker Championship runs 1–12 October at Playground near Montreal. We have published all eighteen events — and the schedule says something clear about who Canadian live poker is actually for.
Playground, twenty minutes from downtown Montreal in Kahnawà:ke, hosts the MSPT Canadian Poker Championship from 1 to 12 October 2026. We have published the full eighteen-event schedule, plus the club's weekly tournament calendar and a refreshed venue page.
**Read the price list and you learn who it is for.** Eleven of the eighteen events cost $500 or less. Six are $300 or under. The two cheapest, at $250, are Mega Stacks on consecutive days. Only four events break four figures: the $1,000 Mystery Bounty, the $1,150 Main Event, the $1,000 Progressive Knockout that closes the festival, and the $2,200 Mega Stack High Roller — which is the biggest buy-in of the entire twelve days. There is no $5,000 event, no $10,000 event, nothing aimed at a short high-roller week. This is a festival built to fill a 44-table room with recreational players, and the structure follows: the opener alone has six Day 1 flights.
**The Main Event is unusually generous with flights.** Four Day 1s on four consecutive days, 8 to 11 October, with Day 2 on the 12th. At $1,150 that is a lot of chances, and it is the reason Playground can pull a field from Montreal, Ottawa, upstate New York and Vermont without asking anyone to book a full week off work. Playground feeds it with $180 milestone satellites — three a day in the final week.
**The weekly schedule is worth knowing on its own.** Outside festivals Playground runs something almost every day: a $100 Deepstack Turbo that is the cheapest regular game, a $150 Monster Stack three evenings a week, and a $300 NLHE Bounty on Wednesdays capped at 72 entries that is the biggest weekly event. The Monday game is the interesting one — mixed Pot Limit Omaha and Hold'em with three lives, a format popular enough that the festival promotes a $250 version into the numbered schedule.
**Two practical notes.** During festival weeks the numbered events replace the daily schedule entirely, so the calendar, not habit, is what to check before driving up. And Playground says plainly on its own site that it operates no online gaming site — anything online using the Playground name is not them.
All dates, times and buy-ins come from Playground's own tournament calendar, read on 15 September 2026, and festival schedules do move.
Frequently asked questions
When is the MSPT Canadian Poker Championship 2026?
1 to 12 October 2026 at Playground in Kahnawà:ke, Quebec.
How much is the Main Event?
$1,150, with four Day 1 flights on 8–11 October and Day 2 on the 12th.
What is the biggest buy-in?
The $2,200 Mega Stack High Roller — there is nothing larger on the schedule.
Does Playground run tournaments outside festivals?
Yes, almost daily — from a $100 Deepstack Turbo up to a $300 Wednesday bounty capped at 72 entries.