Florian “Venom” Kohler crowned WPA World Artistic Pool Champion

The 2023 WPA World Artistic Pool Championship was held at the Bay City, MI branch of the Boys and Girls Club of the Great Lakes Bay Region February 7 – 10. This year was unique as all the door proceeds, half the profit from program sales and cue ball sales was donated to the Club. It was the first time that our sport partnered with such a worthy cause. The tournament featured: a VIP dinner for players and sponsors, a limo service to and from venue to hotel, a total payout of $15,400.00 all while raising $1420.00 for the Boys and Girls Club.

Every professional sport will evolve over time and Artistic Pool is no exception. Many records that seem to be insurmountable when they are established, will still fall over time. In this day and age, the records that have defined the many different cue sport disciplines are falling one by one. Florian Kohlerjust broke his one hour and his 24 hour record for Trick Shots made and he also established the 48 hour Artistic Pool record. The 2023 WPA World Artistic Pool Championship gifted us with many firsts, many lasts and many records. Florian broke the preliminary round record on a nine foot table at this year’s tournament with 294 out of 320 points. The previous record of 282 out of 320 was set by Gabi “Mr. Perfect” Visoiu (Romania) at the 2019 Masters. Florian broke it by 12 points.

The tournament started out with 21 players attending from 5 different federations within the WPA umbrella. Countries represented were: USA, Canada, South Africa, Argentina, France and Taiwan. Players included former WPA World Champions, Chi-Ming Lin, Mike Massey and William DeYonker. Former WPA World Champion, Tom “Dr. Cue” Rossman acted as Master of Ceremonies.

Players shot 40 shots in a “golf” style trying to score as high as possible. During these preliminary rounds, we crowned 10 different WPA World Discipline Champions as well as a Rising Star Champion and a Sportsmanship Award recipient.

Finals

(1) Florian Kohler 87 pts over (3) William DeYonker 39 pts

All throughout the tournament, Florian “Venom” Kohler seemed to be on a mission to earn the last title that has eluded him. He had placed second twice before in prior World Championships. This year he was not to be denied as he was never in danger of a loss in the playoff matches and easily defeated William “Billie Joe” DeYonker in the finals. We, the WPA Artistic Pool Division Board, congratulate Florian on his achievement