Chris Moneymaker was down to his last big blind on the bubble of the $25,000 GG Million$ before he spun it into a vintage $903,000 win at Triton Montenegro.
The Maestral Resort in Montenegro is the last stop for the third season of the Triton series, and Moneymaker took down the second of fifteen events.
It wasn't easy — Triton never is — and Moneymaker had to outlast a star-laden table that included Brian Kim, Ding Biao, Adrian Mateos, Lewis Spencer, and Isaac Haxton. The event drew 163 entries and a prize pool of $4,075,000, from which the champ took the third-largest live score of his career behind the 2003 WSOP Main Event and a $2 million win for a fifth-place run in the $250K Luxon Invitational at Triton London last August.
"I didn't think I'd be sitting here," Moneymaker said in his post-win interview. "The old Chris would have punted off his stack. But I waited."
Chip and a chair for Moneymaker
Moneymaker's patience on the bubble paid off with a run of good cards and soon his one big blind had become several.
"I hit a three-outer on the river (on the bubble) and then a six-outer a couple of hands later to double again. I was thinking to myself, you know what, this is going to be 2003. I'm not going to lose any more hands today."
Those old familiar footsteps were heard throughout post-bubble play as Moneymaker steadily built the top stack for the final table. From there he teamed with heads-up rival Kim to work through the stacked field before their final confrontation.
Moneymaker entered heads-up play with 51 big blinds to Kim's 30 and it only took three hands for the champ to finish the job.
The win comes on the heels of Moneymaker's sixth-place finish for $382,007 in ACR's Venom event at the beginning of May. And while it may not be a full Moneymaker Renaissance (yet), he's enjoying it all the same.
Talking afterwards, Moneymaker said, "It's insane. I never thought I'd be pulling this one off."
"This doesn't remind me of the win at the WSOP," he added. "This one, I'll be honest, was a lot harder. The players here are just so good. This is the elite of the elite, and while the WSOP was sweet, competing against these guys and holding my own is, honestly, it's sweeter to me than the World Series because I know how good these guys are."
You can watch Moneymaker's big win right now on the Triton YouTube channel.
Triton Montenegro GG Million$ results
| Rank | Name | Prize |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Chris Moneymaker | $903,000 |
| 2 | Brian Kim | $609,000 |
| 3 | Igor Yaroshevskyy | $419,000 |
| 4 | Ding Biao | $341,000 |
| 5 | Danilo Velasevic | $272,000 |
| 6 | Adrian Mateos | $209,500 |
| 7 | Lewis Spencer | $153,000 |
| 8 | Morten Klein | $110,000 |
| 9 | Isaac Haxton | $91,300 |
Images courtesy of Joe Giron/Triton Poker
