David Lappin and Dara O’Kearney have issued a joint statement announcing they are parting ways with WPT Global, effective immediately.
It comes after WPT Global announced they would be signing Ren Lin as an ambassador – a player who was banned from GGPoker and WSOP live events in October 2025 for his part in a ghosting scandal.
Lappin had been critical of the decision to allow Lin to play at WSOP Paradise in The Bahamas just seven weeks later.
In the statement, the pair said this meant it would be “untenable” to continue in their company roles.
“In June 2025, we joined WPT Global as ambassadors, putting The Chip Race content slate under their sponsorship,” the statement reads.
“The signing of Ren Lin as a Global Ambassador came as a shock to us. Given our personally held and outspoken views on the scandal surrounding him, it was immediately obvious that our continued roles with the company were untenable. As a result, we are parting ways with WPT Global.
“We obviously do not have an immediate plan for the future, but we sincerely hope to be back with Chip Race episodes, Lock-Ins and strategy videos in the very near future.”
Players take principled stand
Walking away from their deal means The Chip Race podcast is once again on hiatus and underscores that, for Lappin and O’Kearney, principles take precedence over self-interest.
The pair had been ambassadors at Unibet, which had sponsored The Chip Race for eight and a half years, up until May 2025.
As Lappin said at the time, "That partnership produced 170 episodes, 101 Lock-ins, and countless strategy videos. It reached a worldwide audience in excess of 20,000 listeners from 72 different countries and garnered 5 GPI Global Poker Award nominations and 3 wins."
The signing of Ren Lin also led to a wave of in-fighting among different WPT brands – WPT Global, ClubWPT Gold, and the WPT umbrella brand – that started on Sunday and ran through to Monday, leaving a trail of deleted posts and reputational damage to WPT.
In a now-deleted post on X, WPT wrote, “WPT Global is a licensee of the World Poker Tour. We do not officially endorse any of their ambassadors.”
When WPT Global signed Fintan Hand as an ambassador just a week earlier, the reaction was very different.
You can read a full breakdown of what happened following the signing of Ren Lin below.
