Andrew Lichtenberger Wins Poker Masters Title On His Birthday

Andrew Lichtenberger celebrated his thirty sixth birthday in fashion on Wednesday, Sept. 20. The veteran poker professional emerged victorious from a subject of 85 entries to seize the title in occasion no. 5 of the 2023 Poker Masters to seize his sixteenth recorded stay event title.

Lichtenberger earned $204,000 because the champion of the $10,000 buy-in no-limit maintain’em occasion that ran contained in the PokerGO Studio at ARIA Resort & Casino in Las Vegas. The rating elevated the World Series of Poker bracelet winner’s profession event earnings to greater than $15.9 million.

A really magnificent second and expertise a lot thanks and like to everybody supporting in addition to, and particularly, the @PokerGO workers for being so heat and sort on my thirty sixth revolution across the solar https://t.co/e70Ajn5FhW

— Andrew Lichtenberger (@luckychewy) September 21, 2023

This was Lichtenberger’s fifth ultimate desk and first title of 2023. With 1,122 Card Player Player of the Year factors, he’s now among the many prime 500 contenders within the 2023 POY race sponsored by Global Poker.

He additionally secured 204 PokerGO Tour factors for the victory. This was his third money of the Poker Masters sequence, having additionally positioned seventh in occasion no. 3 and thirteenth in occasion no. 4. With 266 PGT factors and $265,700 in earnings accrued up to now, he now sits in third place within the race for this 12 months’s Poker Masters Purple Jacket. He trails solely Vladas Tamasauskas (506 factors) and Ren Lin (299 factors).

The prime 13 finishers made the cash on this occasion, incomes a share of the $850,000 prize pool. Just six contenders moved on to day 2, with two-time bracelet winner Daniel Lazrus within the lead and Lichtenberger in fourth chip place to begin.

2021 WSOP primary occasion champion Koray Aldemir (sixth – $51,000) was the primary to fall, along with his Okay-J unable to win a preflop showdown towards the 8-7 suited of Lazrus. Brock Wilson recorded his third money and second final-table displaying of the competition on this occasion. His run resulted in fifth when his A-7 suited bumped into the A-Okay of Lazrus and the pocket tens of bracelet winner Brian Kim. The pocket pair held up and Wilson was despatched packing with $68,000.

Lichtenberger quickly overtook the lead, successful an enormous pot towards Kim with the identical prime pair of tens with a better kicker. Kim scored the subsequent knockout, making eights stuffed with kings on the river and getting all the chips in towards the kings and nines of Niko Koop (4th – $85,000).

The subsequent massive all-in confrontation noticed Lichtenberger shove from the small blind with pocket threes. Lazrus referred to as all-in from the large blind with pocket sixes. Lichtenberger flopped a set and held from there to eradicate Lazrus in third place ($102,000).

Heads-up play started with Lichtenberger holding 7,625,000 to Kim’s 3,000,000. It didn’t take lengthy for all the chips to get within the center. A number of palms into the match, Lichtenberger open-shoved from the button for simply shy of 21 massive blinds efficient with A6. Kim referred to as with AQ from the large blind and the board ran out 7436A. Lichtenberger’s aces up earned him the pot and the title, whereas Kim earned $144,500 because the runner-up finisher.

This was Kim’s eleventh ultimate desk of the 12 months, with almost $2.7 million in POY earnings and three,976 factors accrued alongside the best way. As a end result, he has climbed into twenty second place on the POY leaderboard.

Here is a have a look at the payouts and rankings factors awarded on the ultimate desk:

Photo credit: PokerGO / Antonio Abrego.