While there have been plenty of international players inside the Rio All Suites Hotel & Casino for the 2012 World Series of Poker, they haven’t had much impact on the final tables that have been played to this point. That all changed on Wednesday as two players from outside the United States took down bracelets for their countries in the final tables contested yesterday.
Event #9 – $1500 No Limit Hold’em Re-Entry
The first ever “re-entry” event in the history of the WSOP concluded on Wednesday with the final nine survivors from the massive, 3404-entry field that started off the tournament last week. Ryan Olisar headed a stellar field that featured defending $50,000 Poker Players’ Champion Brian Rast, two Canadian pros in Ashkan Razavi and Greg Mueller and the latest hope for breaking the curse of a non-male WSOP bracelet winner (alive since 2008) in Amanda Musumeci, who was in third place at the start of action.
Olisar came out of the gates quickly, knocking some chips from the stacks of Razavi and Rast, prior to Derrick Huang’s elimination of a short stacked Dien Le in ninth place. This opened the floodgates for the players to begin their march from the ESPN Main Stage as, in the next ten minutes, Musumeci knocked off Benjamin Reinhart in eighth place (pocket Aces versus A-K) and Huang sent Mueller to the rail in seventh (pocket Kings versus Q-10).
Razavi would get back in the fight by doubling up through Duy Ho before there was a change atop the leaderboard. After a raise from Olisar, Musumeci three bet the action to 210K and Olisar made the call to see the 8-K-3 rainbow flop. Olisar check-called Musumeci as the twosome would move on to another King on the turn. After a double check, a river four brought a check from Olisar and a debate about one of the controversies of the early days of the WSOP.
Prior to the start of the tournament schedule this year, WSOP officials wanted players to announce their bets at the final table with the simple words, “Raise,” “Call” or “Fold,” with punishments ranging from warnings to potential elimination from the tournament. After some uproar from the players, this rule became a “suggestion” (in the words of Tournament Director Jack Effel) and the players seemed to calm down. In the case of the above hand, it did potentially have an effect on the action at hand.
Musumeci layered out a big river bet and, without announcing her intentions, began to put out at least five stacks of 100K each in chips, before moving the first stack over the bet line. The tournament director called Musumeci for a string bet and only allowed her to put out the original 105K that she had first put over the line (almost 700K was in the pot), rather than her intended action. Olisar made the easy call but dropped his cards in the muck after seeing Musumeci unveil her pocket Aces. The hand would give Musumeci the lead, but it could have been much bigger had she been able to push her original intended bet against Olisar.
The players then settled in to a long period of shuttling chips around the table. It would take an hour and a half before Rast, who had bled chips at the final table, finally succumbed to Razavi in sixth place. Musumeci would lose the lead for a hand to Huang before gaining it back, only to see Razavi now make his stab at the chip lead. His pocket tens (on a 3-Q-9-2-8 board) bested Musumeci to assume the lead almost five hours into the action.
Once in the lead, Razavi stormed to the championship. He eliminated Ho in fifth place and, while Musumeci was able to take down Olisar in fourth, Razavi would strike right back in eliminating Huang. When the heads up battle began, Razavi had a 6:1 chip edge over Musumeci.
Within thirty minutes, Razavi had all of Musumeci’s chips and the WSOP bracelet. On the final hand, Razavi raised and Musumeci made her stand. After a call, Razavi had a slight edge with his K-10 over Musumeci’s suited Q-9. A ten on the flop only added insult to injury and, once no Queen came on the turn or river, Canada’s Ashkan Razavi was the champion.
1. Ashkan Razavi (Coquitlam, British Columbia), $781,398*
2. Amanda Museum (Philadelphia, PA), $481,643
3. Derrick Huang (New York, NY), $347,228
4. Ryan Olisar (Naperville, IL), $252,379
5. Duy Ho (Honolulu, HI), $185,378
6. Brian Rast (Las Vegas, NV), $137,632
7. Greg Mueller (Vancouver, British Columbia), $103,258
8. Benjamin Reinhart (La Porte, IN), $78,259
9. Dien Le (Bellevue, WA), $59,969
* – largest first place prize to this point of the 2012 WSOP
Event #11 – $1500 Pot Limit Omaha
Of the nine men who came to the green baize to determine the champion in the $1500 Pot Limit Omaha event, five nations were represented. The United States, Canada, France, the Ukraine and the Netherlands were all represented with the U. S.’s Charles Tonne leading the pack. Befitting the nature of the Omaha game, the pace of the final table was rapid as it was completed within four hours.
In the first two hours of play, David Schnettler, Calvin Anderson, Canada’s Brian Garbe and Rodney Brown would be dispatched in ninth through sixth, respectively, as the Netherlands’ Vincent van der Fluit assumed the chip lead over Tonne. Tonne would push the action over the next hour as he was responsible for the eliminations of Alex Dovzhenko, Damien Lhommeau and Tristan Wade (fifth through third) in reaching heads up with van der Fluit with the duo almost equal in chips.
Heads up only took an hour to complete and, although he would get out to a two million chip lead, Tonne would be ground down by van der Fluit to see the Dutchman take the lead. On the final hand, van der Fluit would raise and, after a call from Tonne, they would see an A-5-2 (two club) flop.
After Tonne checked, van der Fluit put out 65K, only to see Tonne raise to 315K. Van der Fluit was undaunted, making his own pot bet and Tonne went all in. After van der Fluit made the call, Tonne saw the bad news; his 10-9 (of clubs) 5-Q (club flush draw) were behind van der Fluit’s J-2-7 (all clubs) A (top and bottom two pair, redraw to larger club flush). The drama ended on the next card when the King of clubs peeled off, leaving Tonne drawing dead and the championship in the hands of van der Fluit.
1. Vincent van der Fluit (Utrecht, the Netherlands), $265,211
2. Charles Tonne (China, MI), $164,132
3. Tristan Wade (Boynton Beach, FL), $102,690
4. Damien Lhommeau (Nanteuil, France), $74,536
5. Alex Dovzhenko (Kiev, the Ukraine), $55,025
6. Rodney Brown (Brea, CA), $41,249
7. Brian Garbe (Ontario, Canada), $31,375
8. Calvin Anderson (Yukon, OK), $24,186
9. David Schnettler (San Diego, CA), $18,896
