The finale of the 12th Full Tilt Online Poker Series (FTOPS) will kick off on Sunday. Two Main Events will occur: a $535 buy-in FTOPS finale with a $2.5 million guaranteed prize pool and a $55 buy-in MiniFTOPS tournament with at least $500,000 up for grabs.
The FTOPS festivities began on May 6th with a $216 buy-in No Limit Hold’em Six-Max tournament that attracted a healthy field of 4,445 players. It was the largest event held so far during the high-stakes FTOPS schedule, with a $322 buy-in No Limit Hold’em tournament generating the second greatest field of 4,145 runners. The latter tournament did not reach its $1.5 million guarantee, but you won’t hear any complaints from Full Tilt Poker player Doc Sands, who walked away with $259,000. Heads-up, he defeated Sebago2811, who pocketed $157,000. A total of 648 players finished in the money; rounding out the final table were z81ima (third place for $102,000), Luukie21 (fourth place for $79,500), jojo69jojo (fifth place for $60,000), Ramux (sixth place for $45,000), fats713 (seventh place for $34,500), MichaelBpzpz (eighth place for $26,250), and ryanbluf (ninth place for $19,500).
Professional poker player Dutch Boyd, who plays on Full Tilt Poker under the screen name Dutchalicious, took down a $322 buy-in Razz event that occurred on Thursday. Boyd won a $2,500 buy-in No Limit Hold’em Six-Max tournament during the 2006 World Series of Poker (WSOP) for $475,000 and his first (and so far only) bracelet. He took fifth in another No Limit Hold’em Six-Max tournament two years ago, boosting his bankroll by $169,000. Boyd finished 12th in the 2003 WSOP Main Event for $80,000, the tournament won by Team PokerStars Pro member Chris Moneymaker that is often cited as the start of the modern poker boom. To put Boyd’s $80,000 payday in perspective, the 12th place finisher in the 2008 WSOP Main Event, Chris “SLOPPYKLOD” Klodnicki, banked $591,000.
The MiniFTOPS has run concurrently with its high-stakes counterpart. However, it offers buy-ins that are one-tenth as much. The very first event saw 14,059 players tackle the felts in a $22 buy-in No Limit Hold’em Six-Max tournament. In fact, all but one of the first 21 events failed to attract at least 1,000 players. A total of 8,293 hopefuls turned out for MiniFTOPS Event #8, a $26 buy-in No Limit Hold’em Six-Max Knockout. The tournament was ultimately won by seeya2010, who banked $26,000 in the event, which more than doubled its guarantee. Other Top 10 finishers included mv052 (second place for $17,481), –XGAL2 – (third place for $12,605), tizzle26 (fourth place for $8,293), ADED (fifth place for $5,307), meissexyboy (sixth place for $3,483), plznoflush (seventh place for $2,255), tomac1976 (eighth place for $2,255), kingtilts (ninth place for $1,642), and PECULNIDRO (tenth place for $1,642).
The FTOPS XII leader board is currently paced by MKMADTILT, who boasts 383 chips and a slight lead over torden, who has 362. Full Tilt Poker pro Gavin Smith is in sixth place on the leader board with 290, while David “The Dragon” Pham and Berry Johnston sit at 24th and 27th, respectively. Leader board points are based on a person’s finish in an FTOPS or MiniFTOPS event.
Today marks the start of the $2,620 buy-in No Limit Hold’em Two Day Event, which kicks off at 2:00pm ET and is hosted by Durrrr Challenge participant Patrik Antonius. Last time around, the multi-day affair was won by fyrtuk, with Grndhg25, wuddacooler, csimmsux, Halfrek, hAAydon, and amak316 all having recorded wins since the tournament debuted during FTOPS V. The Two-Day Event will play down today to its final two tables or the conclusion of Level 17, whichever occurs first, and then resume on Sunday at 2:00pm ET. Each player receives a starting chip stack of 300 big blinds and levels last 30 minutes each. The tournament boasts a guaranteed prize pool of $2 million. The MiniFTOPS version features a $266 buy-in and $200,000 guaranteed.
Stay tuned to Poker News Daily for the latest from FTOPS XII.
