Alex Lipkin emerged victorious within the World Series of Poker Circuit fundamental occasion Graton Casino and Resort on Feb. 24. In addition to incomes his first WSOPC gold ring, he additionally secured the most important payday of his poker profession: $162,520.
“One time doesn’t prove anything, but I’m going to be more confident in a tournament knowing I’ve done this before. Because before this I only had two deep runs in the WSOP, and I didn’t play many tournaments. I’m not going to consider myself a great player now since I won one tournament. I’m still an amateur, but I don’t get easily intimidated at the poker table, even by experienced guys,” mentioned Lipkin after the win. “Hopefully I know what I’m doing, but I’m still just an amateur.”
Lipkin was cruising close to the highest of the chip counts for almost all of the event, so one of many questions touched on his journey via the event beginning on Day 1. “I’ve had that before in some tournaments. I was running really well the first couple of levels, the first couple of hours; and usually that’s not the greatest time to run well. That’s why I was telling myself, ’don’t get crazy and stupid and think you’re invincible.’ So I held back, and I kind of tried to play stack preservation so I don’t lose this big-stack advantage,” mentioned Lipkin.
The interview ended with a dialogue about his final battle towards Michael Lin, and Lipkin supplied these ideas on the ultimate match that lasted for greater than two hours. “When we got to short-handed, I don’t have a lot of experience short-handed … but the cards kind of played themselves, and I found good cards when I needed to. I picked up pocket kings when two players were all in. Heads up was kind of a battle, I found a flush on the turn but he was a really good player and kept chipping up. He had a big lead and we decided to take a break, and during that break I decided that I wasn’t aggressive enough, and I started playing aggressive with the worst hands. I got even, and then I got lucky, he had eights against queens. What are you going to do?”
The $1,700 buy-in no-limit maintain’em poker event featured two beginning flights which collectively drew 558 entries. That constructed a ultimate prize pool value $845,370, simply surpassing the assure of $500,000. The high 85 gamers all secured a min-cash value $3,429, and that’s what number of returned for Day 2. Familiar faces that made a deep run within the event included Lily Kiletto (tenth), Lawrence Chow (twelfth), Jasthi Kumar (twenty first), and Matt Wantman (twenty fifth).
The ultimate desk started with Lipkin sitting second in chips firstly of play. Saad Aljoher was then taken out by Lipkin in ninth place, and he stored the momentum rolling by taking out Alan Capurro in eighth. A lineup of bustouts together with Yoh Lee (seventh), Antonio Ma (sixth), and Brendan Buckner (fifth), and Brett Murray (fourth) occurred in fast succession after that whereas Lipkin stayed out of the way in which however stored accumulating chips.
Third place went to two-time bracelet winner Marco Johnson, and Lin scored the knockout to take a greater than 2:1 chip benefit into the ultimate. Lipkin scored a double to seize that very same benefit for himself, after which the stacks evened up between the ultimate two gamers.
That’s nearly the place the chip stacks stood when the ultimate hand transpired with Lipkin opening to 500,000 earlier than Lin went all in. Lipkin known as to cowl with pocket queens, they usually have been forward of the pocket eights held by Lin. The board bricked out to ship Lin to the rail in second place, and he stacked up $108,149 because of the deep run to take his complete earnings above $217,000.
Here is a have a look at the payouts and POY factors awarded on the ultimate desk:
| Place | Player | Earnings | POY Points |
| 1 | Alex Lipkin | $162,520 | 840 |
| 2 | Michael Lin | $108,149 | 700 |
| 3 | Marco Johnson | $74,400 | 560 |
| 4 | Brett Murray | $52,156 | 420 |
| 5 | Brendan Buckner | $37,227 | 350 |
| 6 | Antonio Ma | $27,116 | 280 |
| 7 | Yoh Lee | $20,157 | 210 |
| 8 | Allan Capurro | $15,303 | 140 |
| 9 | Saad Aljoher | $12,076 | 70 |
The subsequent WSOP Circuit event sequence is already working at Horseshoe Baltimore in Maryland with the Main Event happening from Feb. 27 to Mar. 3.
Photo credit: Graton Resort & Casino, WSOP.
