December always promises a rich bounty of festive poker, and this week has seen action aplenty both live and online.
EPT PragueRound Up
A beautiful, picturesque city - Prague's a popular winter poker destination and this year's PokerStars €1,100 Eureka Main Event attracted a record turnout of 4,017. After three days’ play, the final table is set with in-form UK player Jack Sinclair poised in pole position.
Sinclair’s already had an excellent 2022 with two major runner-up spots in the Barcelona Estrellas Main Event and EPT London Main. This time round, he’ll be looking to nail the win and the €496,760 1st place prize money when play resumes at 12pm CET later today.
With nearly $15 million in live tournament results and a WSOP bracelet in his back pocket, Ben Heath has firmly established himself as one of poker’s top talents. He showcased those high calibre skills in Prague this week, picking up back-to-back €25k High Roller wins (for a quarter million euros apiece) in the space of two days.
Spectacular stuff.
GGPoker Round Up
Meanwhile online, GGPoker continued its winter series and though the fields and prizes couldn’t quite match last week’s bumper turnouts, there was no shortage of drama. Lars "Babyccino" Nystedt in particular stood out with several impressive deep runs in major events.
The WSOPC $525 Bounty Hunters High Roller, $1M GTD was the first of Babyccino’s star turns - $72,236.57 his reward for securing 2nd place in the 2,446-strong field.
It was Daniel “angenit” Vicente who beat him to the punch, dusting off all comers to pick up the trophy and collect a welcome six figure score of $115,393.68.
Final table results below:
| WSOPC Series $525 Bounty Hunters HR Main Event, $1M Gtd | ||
| Runners: | 2,446 | |
| Prize Pool: | $1,223,000 | |
| 1 | angenit | $115,393.68 |
| 2 | Babyccino | $72,236.57 |
| 3 | Erfunden | $46,081.85 |
| 4 | wolverine27 | $36,745.66 |
| 5 | Peter Patricio | $28,952.57 |
Not to be denied victory, Babyccino went one better in the WSOPC HR $1,050 Main Event, $400k GTD, crushing the field to pick up the “W” and $83,777.18 in prize money. Songjiahao ran him close, narrowly edged out in 2nd place – good for $62,823.72.
Further down the leaderboard was the irrepressible Artur Martirosian – his 5th place finish for $26,492.56 the latest in a long string of cashes for the crusher from Russia.
Here are the final table results:
| WSOPC HR $1,050 Main Event, $400k GTD | ||
| Runners: | 447 | |
| Prize Pool: | $447,000 | |
| 1 | Babyccino | $83,777.18 |
| 2 | Songjiahao | $62,823.72 |
| 3 | simplyriver | $47,111.15 |
| 4 | OPPikachu | $35,328.39 |
| 5 | A Martirosian | $26,492.56 |
The GGMasters $150, $500k GTD drew a field of 3,643 – just sneaking past the guarantee with a $502,734 prize pool.
Golden Shark proved himself the apex predator, snapping up 1st place for $57,262.92 by devouring jankaaaa (2nd – $42,938.10) heads-up.
Final table results as follows:
| GGMasters $150, $500k GTD | ||
| Runners: | 3,643 | |
| Prize Pool: | $502,734 | |
| 1 | Golden Shark | $57,262.92 |
| 2 | jankaaaaa | $42,938.10 |
| 3 | Eder Campana | $32,199 |
| 4 | Ksky | $24,145.86 |
| 5 | MasesNeto | $18,106.81 |
At the nose-bleed stakes of the $25,500 Sunday Ultra High Roller, Michael Addamo backed up his victory last week with another podium spot - this time running out 3rd for $145,191.83.
Denying him consecutive victories was GoProWarrior, whose third buy-in proved a treat, seeing him home to the win for $258.191.80, ahead of Rodrigo Selouan in 2nd ($193,616.47.)
PokerStars Round Up
PokerStars’ marquee Sunday event, the $5,200 Titans$400k GTD, saw Brazil’s Yuri "theNERDguy" Dzivielevski (1st - $107,963.88) fend off a spirited challenge heads up from Irish pro Ronan “Sw33ney” Sweeney (2nd - $80,864.84) to claim the spoils.
Dzivielevski maintained a dominant position throughout the latter stages of the tournament, and entered the heads-up with a healthy chip lead. Sweeney fought hard to shift the balance of power but was consigned to second place when he ran an ill-fated triple-barrel bluff into Dzivielevski's backdoored straight.
Full results below:
| $5,200 Titans $400k GTD | ||
| Runners: | 68 | |
| Prize Pool | $400,000 | |
| 1 | theNERDguy | $107,963.88 |
| 2 | Sw33ney | $80,864.84 |
| 3 | Ceis25 | $60,567.72 |
| 4 | vojta555cz | $45,365.20 |
| 5 | Anjeyyy | $33,978.52 |
The record turnouts at the EPT are great news and show recent world events haven’t shaken players’ thirst for poker. With the EPT Prague Main Event playing out this week, there's plenty of Christmas poker presents to look forward to in the coming days. Keep warm and enjoy!
