It must be a good feeling to almost double your lifetime earnings in a week. That’s just what New York’s Daniel Santoro did, as he won the World Poker Tour’s (WPT) Foxwoods World Poker Finals in what turned out to be a final table that was a tale of two halves. For the victory, Santoro won $449,910, giving quite a boost to his previous live tournament earnings of $260,862.
Here is how the chip counts looked going into the final table:
1. Steven Brackesy – 1,807,000
2. Christian Harder – 1,293,000
3. Daniel Santoro – 1,163,000
4. Bob Carbone – 588,000
5. Eli Berg – 496,000
6. Andy Frankenberger – 374,000
If anyone in the crowd blinked, they might have forgotten Eli Berg was even there, as he went out on the third hand of the day. Berg raised pre-flop to 36,000 and both Christian Harder and Andy Frankenberger called. Berg opened the betting again after a K-7-7 flop, Harder called the 73,000 chip bet, and Frankenberger folded. When a Ten dealt on the turn, Berg slowed down and checked, but then moved all-in after Harder bet 104,000. Harder called, showing A-A, while Berg was behind with K-Q. Another Seven fell on the river, clinching the hand for Harder and sending Berg home in 6th place.
Frankenberger hit the rail just after Berg, on hand 13. After a pre-flop bet by Steven Brackesy, a call by Santoro, and a re-raise by Harder, Frankenberger moved all-in. The first two to put their money in the pot folded, but Harder called with pocket Kings, facing off with Frankenberger’s A-T. While Frankenberger did pair his Ten, he needed more than that to win and was eliminated in 5th place. That hand gave Harder a healthy chip lead with a stack of 2,149,000.
Ten hands later, we had what was perhaps the biggest hand of the final table. Brackesy, the chip leader to start the day, got into a pre-flop raising war with Santoro before ending up all-in with a shaky A-4 suited. Santoro made the call with pocket Queens. None of the community cards helped Brackesy and just like that, after having almost 1.5 million chips to start the hand, he was gone. Santoro was now up to 3,279,000, more than 1.3 million ahead of Harder.
After a hectic first hour, things slowed down a bit. Bob Carbone did double up through Harder shortly after Brackesy’s ouster, but other than that, not much of note happened for a while. It wasn’t until hand 97 that the heads-up pairing was determined. After a min-raise by Santoro pre-flop, Carbone moved all-in, followed by a call by the aforementioned min-raiser. Santoro got what he wanted, as he held A-A, while Carbone had T-T. Since you already know Santoro won the whole thing, you can probably guess that Carbone didn’t find any of the board cards too useful. He went out in 3rd place, winning $166,271.
Going into heads-up play, Santoro had a large chip lead over Harder, 4,490,000 to 1,230,000. For about the first 30 hands, Santoro grew his lead, getting Harder down under 400,000 chips, or just 9 big blinds. But Harder was able to double-up twice in quick succession, bringing his stack back to what it was when heads-up began. Fifteen hands after the second double-up, Harder fell back a few hundred thousands, but doubled-up again on the next hand, and then three hands later, took a 1,810,000 chip pot to almost pull even. Four hands later, Harder grabbed the chip lead.
Harder extend his lead to about 800,000 chips, but on hand 166 of the final table, Santoro grabbed it back. The see-saw continued, as Harder doubled through Santoro on hand 185, almost reversing the chip stacks at the beginning of the one-on-one contest. But just four hands later, Santoro returned the favor and for the next several hands, the two jostled for the lead.
Santoro had built up a 600,000 chip lead by hand 200 when he re-raised a pre-flop raise by his opponent. Harder took that as an opportunity to move all-in and Santoro snap called. Harder’s hand was T-T, while Santoro had A-K. The race was on. J-8-5 on the flop. Harder was still ahead. 2 on the turn. Then, after the final burn card, Santoro spiked a King on the river to eliminate Harder and win the WPT Foxwoods World Poker finals.
WPT Foxwoods World Poker Finals – Final Table Results
1. Daniel Santoro – $449,910
2. Christian Harder – $248,962
3. Bob Carbone – $166,271
4. Steven Brackesy – $129,816
5. Andy Frankenberger – $99,585
6. Eli Berg – $83,580
