The Poker Mag

The Bellagio Cup V Event is a prestigious event on the WPT circuit, and has attracted some big names who are fresh from the chaos of the WSOP in Las Vegas. Just last night the winner was finally decided for the 2009 Bellagio Cup V Event, after an exciting tournament featuring some great players.

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26 year old Brazilian Alexandre Gomes lifted the title after his duel with Faraz Jaka head up. Gomes had actually been one of the shorter stacks during the tournament as they went into the final table action, and did very well to fight back and win. His final hand was with (A,J) against Jakas (A,7), and netted him almost $1.2 million poker prize money.

Other notable players at the final table included Justin ‘BoostedJ’ Smith who is an accomplished online poker player, and also Erik Seidel, who has a wealth of experience and WSOP bracelets to his name. Seidel finished 6th place, and little known player Christoffer Sonesson finished a very commendable 5th. Pro player Alec Torelli was the next to fall in 4th place, after his (A,Q) lost it’s race against the (10,10) of a rapidly advancing Alexandre Gomes.

Justin Smith managed 3rd place, but it was Gomes who made it heads up and defeated a foe who had spent much of the time on the final table as chip leader. After this exciting final table, many will be looking forward to the next event scheduled on the WPT, but then there will be others who are simply glad of a rest after the hectic past 6 weeks.

This years WSOP has lived up to it’s billing again this year with plenty of first class action and some stories to tell for everyone who was involved. For those that wish to see the pros do well, they again did not disappoint, with Phil Ivey picking up 2 bracelets, and jeff Lisandro manging a haul of three.

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All the events except one have now been completed, as have three days of the final event at the time of writing this. The main event is upon us once more, and has seen it’s fair share of well known faces eliminated thus far. Day 1 had to be split into different groups in order to have enough space to cope with the several thousand poker participants, and there is a danger that in years to come there may be a cap on entrance numbers due to the interest in the main event.

The first day saw Allen Cunningham, Freddy Deeb, Doyle Brunson, Ivan Demidov and many other well known faces eliminated from WSOP, but there were still many other top pros who made it through to day 2 which was played in 2 stages. The first of these groups for day 2 saw some big names turn up, only to exit the tournament over the course of the day. Gus Hansen, Phil Laak, Mike Matusow, and Barry Greenstein all didn’t make it, and there were more big name casualties in the second group of day 2, as Scotty Nguyen and Howard Lederer made their exit.

Day three saw the field all grouped together as names such as Phil Hellmuth steadily increased their stack. It was Bertrand grospellier however, a Pokerstars pro, who ploughed past the 1 million chips mark to take the chip lead at the end of day 3. 789 of the initial 6,494 players remain as we approach day 4, and pros such as J.C Tran, Phil Hellmuth and Grospellier will be hoping to continue their great poker run thus far.

Every year, the 50k HORSE event attracts a field which is very pro heavy, and so you will always find some great poker being played during this event. The beauty of this World Series of Poker event is that it encompasses several different disciplines of poker, and so you really have to be an all round talented poker player to be able to excel.

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Each player will have games which are favoured over others, but when you consider the talent that is involved in such an event, you cannot simply fold up every hand through your weaker games if you want to win. Interesting starting hands will invariably drag players into playing pots in their weaker games eventually, and so as World Series of Poker events go, this one really does test the all round skill of the poker player to it’s fullest.

The fact that the buy in is a very large $50,000 adds a special something to this World Series of Poker event too and ensures a very healthy prize pool. Famous names such as Eli Elezra, Mike Matusow, Daniel Negreanu and Johnny Chan had all fallen by the end of the second day, and Gus Hansen took the chip lead in the tournament. Day 3 saw last years champion, Scotty Nguyen eliminated amongst others, as Vitaly Lunkin took over the chip lead by the end of the day.

Erik Seidel and Huck Seed were the most notable names to make the final table, finishing 8th and 5th respectively. It was the lesser known man David Bach who eventually triumphed after a 7 hour heads up battle, to lift the Chip Reese memorial trophy and over $1.2 million prize money.

Winning at the WSOP is no easy task, and even the best of players could go several years without winning win.

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Each World Series event holds it’s own challenges, as some will be low buy in events with vast fields of players, and some will have compact fields. The smaller field tournaments are usually in a slightly less popular discipline of the game, and attract the pros who know how to play every poker variant well. Many players have already completed the extremely difficult challenge of winning a bracelet this year, but there are still two of the most exciting events to be played at the time of writing this.

The $50k HORSE event is truly something special, as the very large buy in and mixed nature of the event, attracts small fields made up almost entirely of pros. This year the poker event has just got underway, with 95 players hoping to emulate Scotty Nguyens victory last year.

For many of these seasoned pros, what they win in side games or side bets will be more in monetary terms than they receive in poker tournament winnings this year, but for most players that isn’t the real point of being there. Of course players have to earn a living, but the most important aspect for many players, is how many titles and bracelets they win. This is what writes you into poker history, not the amount of cash you win in a side game. Young players tend to lean more towards making money at cash games I think, but there seems to be a trend of players hitting a certain age and beginning to understand just how important history is.