Last night's event in the PokerStars World Championship of Online Poker (WCOOP) offered a quarter of a million dollars to the eventual winner. The tournament, like the 20-hour-long event No. 5 before it, was a marathon – it lasted more than 18 hours.
The event, a $200 buy-in (with $15 entry fee) no-limit hold'em rebuy tournament, had a $1 million guarantee. The event attracted 2,188 entrants to generate a prize pool of $1,322,800. Among the notables who finished within the top 50 were Scott "SCTrojans" Freeman (50th, for $3,042), Team PokerStars member Luca Pagano (36th, for $3,968), Randal "RandALLin" Flowers (21st, for $5,688), and AMAK316 (29th, for $3,968).
When it got down to the final table, there were still at least two notable players remaining: Chris "LUHMAN" Martin (currently 15th in the Card Player Online Player of the Year race, including his finish here) and puffinmypurp (currently 21st in the OPOY standings, with his finish here). Puffinmypurp was the short stack when the table began, and, correspondingly, he became the first player eliminated when his pocket eights ran into pocket aces. He earned $11,641 for ninth place.
LUHMAN had entered the table as the chip leader, and he carried his stack all the way to four-way play, when the remaining players decided to pause to discuss a chop. A by-the-chips chop was agreed upon, with $66,000 remaining on the line for the winner. Kiwid10 was the chip leader at that time, followed by ruthan, LUHMAN, and yojje, respectively.
The two big stacks, kiwid10 and ruthan, then tussled, and ruthan came out victorious, leaving kiwid10 shortstacked and out shortly thereafter. Ruthan eventually found his way into heads-up play versus LUHMAN with a 2-1 chip lead. The final hand found LUHMAN holding A-10 and ruthan with pocket kings. The kings held up and LUHMAN left the table in second place with his chopped payout of $109,241. Ruthan won the tournament and collected the extra $66,000 to put his total winnings at $198,126. Ruthan also snagged a shiny gold WCOOP bracelet for his victory.
The results after the chop were:
- ruthan – $198,126*
- Chris "LUHMAN" Martin – $109,241*
- yojje – $107,109*
- kiwid10 – $144,539*
- Qcity1 – $59,129.16
- Blinda74 – $44,578.36
- OlliPolli – $31,350.36
- 777NMC – $19,445.16
- puffinmypurp – $11,640.64
* Payout reflects a four-way chop that left $66,000 for first place.
The official results were:
- ruthan – $259,533.36
- Chris "LUHMAN" Martin – $130,957.20
- yojje – $93,125.12
- kiwid10 – $75,399.60
- Qcity1 – $59,129.16
- Blinda74 – $44,578.36
- OlliPolli – $31,350.36
- 777NMC – $19,445.16
- puffinmypurp – $11,640.64
Today features two events: event No. 10 – the $300 buy-in (with $20 entry fee) $500,000-guaranteed heads-up no-limit tournament, which starts at 3 p.m. ET – and event No. 11 – the $200 buy-in (with $15 entry fee) $100,000-guaranteed razz tournament, which starts at 4:30 p.m. ET. To sign up for PokerStars to play in today's events – or any of the 14 remaining events – and to collect an exclusive deposit bonus through Card Player, please click here. For a list of events remaining in the WCOOP, click here.
