The Card Player Poker Tour Palm Beach Kennel Club stop recently wrapped up, crowning Florida’s John McNulty as the latest champion in the $1,100 no-limit hold’em $250,000 guarantee main event.
The CPPT caught up with former high-stakes online cash game pro Brian Hastings, who finished seventh in the main event for a $9,947 payday to get his take on the inaugural tour stop. Hastings was one of the biggest names in the field, which also included Chino Rheem, Mukul Pahuja, Matthew Waxman, Eric Blair and Chance Kornuth.
Hastings fired just one bullet in the re-entry event and nearly saw his tournament life come to an end not once, but twice on day 2, both times making an improbable hand on the river to stay alive.
Up against the pocket aces held by Blair, Hastings was all-in with 10
7 when the board ran out J
9
348
. Soon after Hastings was all-in for his tournament life, this time against Luke Brereton and Evan Teitelbaum, holding A3. The board completed in Hastings’ favor a second time when it was spread KQ524.
Things continued in that same manner at the final table when Hastings got all in with A4 against Blair’s JJ. Again the cards would fall in favor of Hastings, this time AAK7A, prompting Brereton to announce to the table that Hastings “just won’t die.”
Hastings was ultimately eliminated by Brereton in a three-way all-in along with Tom Gleason.
Diana Cox: What brought you to this main event?
Brian Hastings: It was a tournament that was pretty close to my house and I’d been to the Kennel Club in the past and thought they ran things pretty well. I think got like tenth or so in a tournament here before. I thought it was a pretty well run tournament and it’s a nice little shot up 95 for me.
DC: Talk about the tournament itself and your journey from day 1 to the final table.
BH: It was pretty smooth sailing up until we were down to two tables honestly. I chipped up a lot on day one and I had a pretty nice stack at the end of the day. I got up to about 160,000 which was pretty solidly above average and then on day 2 I just kind of coasted along and chipped up a bit for a while. Then I lost a few pots, won a big double up with queens against eights when there were two tables left with about 16 players or so. I had a nice stack for a while but got short and then came the fun. The fun all-ins where I was able to hit some lucky cards and make the final table.
DC: How was the final table for you in terms of your opponents?
BH: It was a pretty tough table. I mean, there was a lot of good players at that table, some guys I know are professional poker players that live down in Florida, I’ve played with Sean Winter a bunch and he is a good player. I’ve played with him both in cash games and in tournaments and he plays really well. I’ve played with Ian O’Hara a little bit and I think he plays really well. I’ve actually never played with Luke that I know of unless I played him on line in the past.
DC: If the tour returns next year, will you come back for it?
BH: Yeah, I think so.
