Victory in Poker Masters Event #7 puts Chidwick in running for the purple jacket

Poker Masters Event #7: $10,000 No Limit Hold'em saw a star-studded final table come together. The list of players who cashed is made up predominantly of high-stakes tourney regulars like Ben Yu, Sean Perry, Dan Smith, Shawn Daniels, and the eventual winner Stephen Chidwick.

Event #7 at the Poker Masters was one of the smaller events of the series with just 68 entries. The big bet games have ranged from 66 entries to 86 entries. The big outlier of the series so far was (unsurprisingly) the 8-game mix, the only tourney with fixed-limit play. The 8-game mix got just 30 entries.

Event #7's field made for a prize pool of $680,000 with ten players paid. Chidwick won $183,600 for his first-place finish.

Chidwick's win also bumped him into 5th place on the Poker Masters Leaderboard with a total of 232 points. It is a pretty close-run competition at the top. One more decent cash or win could put Chidwick over the top, replacing Daniel Negreanu in the #1 spot. Negreanu currently has 281 points from one win and another cash.

"It feels great. I always feel like when I’m coming into a series like this that I’m one of the favorites to string together some big results and win the jacket," Chidwick said in his post-game interview. "To get off the mark the past couple of days, and put myself in contention... I guess it’s a bit of a relief, heading into the higher stakes portion of the series, to be able to be within striking distance [of the jacket]."

Purple reign

Chidwick worked hard for his spot at the top. Even while putting in the long hours playing at the series, he still finds time to study.

"I spend a lot of time in between days — and in the run-up to series like this — trying to prepare as best as I can," he told interviewers. "Especially for this kind of series when there’s a tournament every single day for 10-plus days. If you’re doing well you play ten, eleven, or twelve hours per day. I still try and find the time when I’m done to review spots or look at streams or other things to prepare for the next day."

That study paid off for him over the last few days when he finally ran deep in the 8-game mix, taking third. Then he jumped right into Event #7 and ran as deep as possible.

Players started with 125,000 in chips. By the time play got down to the final five, Chidwick was comfortably leading the pack with 2,950,000. Second place, held by Dylan DeStefano at the time, had just 1,970,000 in their stack. DeStefano held that second-place spot until heads-up play but never really gained on Chidwick.

When A P Louis Garza busted in third, he left DeStefano with 2.82 million to Chidwick's 5.68 million.

The final hand

The end came with the blinds at 40k/80k and a big blind ante of 80k. DeStefano made it 180k to go from the button with Q❤️T♠ in the hole. Chidwick three-bet to 550k and De Stefano called.

With 1,180,000 in the pot, the flop came down Q♠9❤️5♦️, pairing DeStefano's queen. Chidwick bet about 1/4 pot, and DeStefano called.

Chidwick led again into the 3♣ on the turn, this time for 525k. The pot stood at 2,930,000. DeStefano's stack stood at 885k. Chidwick covered him handily.

The river was the 8♠. Chidwick shoved, and DeStefano called off the rest of his stack, hoping to catch a missed draw or low-pair turned bluff. Instead, Chidwick flipped over K♦️K♣ to take the pot and the title.

"If I stop enjoying it, then I’ll probably stop playing as much," Chidwick said after winning $183,600. "But right now, I love it as much as I ever have, my motivation is very high, and I just really, really enjoy it. I don’t have any plans to slow down anytime soon."

DeStefano won $136,000 for his second place finish.

You can watch the final table live stream recording on PokerGO.

Poker Masters Event #7: $10,000 No Limit Hold'em complete results

Featured image source: PokerGO