The largest winner's payday to date in the ongoing WSOP Online international series on GGPoker has been taken down by Portugal's Joao Vieira, the champion in Event #29, $25,000 GGMillion$ Super High Rollers Championship. Vieira, participating in the event from Brazil, topped a 145-entry field to earn $760,396.10 and his third career World Series of Poker gold bracelet.
Vieira began Thursday's final day of action in third place of 14 returning players, behind Brazil's Felipe Ketzer and Poland's Wiktor Malinowski. Ketzer ran bad early and exited in 11th place, while Malinowski stayed near the top of the leaderboard, eventually finishing third for $463,762.52.
In the end, however, it was Vieira prevailing over Belgium's Pieter Aerts, the last of several short-stacked players who stood between Vieira and the title. Aerts began the day in ninth position before climbing to make the heads-up finish, eventually settling for the tourney's $593,837.70 runner-up payday.
Vieira took a commanding lead in the event during four-handed action, when his pocket aces held up against German pro Leon Sturm's A-K. The largest pot of the finale sent Sturm, who played from Austria, to the rail with $362,179.34 in third-place money. One avid viewer captured and posted the pivotal hand on X/Twitter:
The 145 entries in the GGMillion$ Super High Roller combined to build a prize pool of $3,552,500. The final-table finishers and payouts in Event #29 were as follows:
- Joao Vieira (Brazil) - $760,396.10
- Pieter Aerts (Belgium) - $593,837.70
- Wiktor Malinowski (Macau) - $463,762.52
- Leon Sturm (Austria) - $362,179.34
- Thomas Muehloecker (Austria) - $282,846.94
- Niklas Astedt (Sweden) - $220,891.63
- Mikita Badziakouski (Slovenia) - $172,507.32
- Chris Hunichen (Costa Rica) - $134,721.08
- Elior Sion (England) - $105,211.52
