The poker festival which is currently in progress at the Crown in Melbourne continues to deliver a great experience to its participants and giving out generous payouts. The most recent lucky player who emerged victorious from a poker tournament was Eugene Portlen who claimed the throne at the Aussie Millions Event #8: A$1,150 No Limit Hold’em Accumulator. After he managed to outplay as many as 687 players in the event he bagged a generous first-place prize amounting to some A$154,925 (US$123,728) and the special ANTON ring.
Portlen is a poker player from Melbourne who began his live poker career back in 2009 when he first participated in the 2009 Joe Hachem Deep Stack Series where he finished third in the A$340 No-Limit Hold’em Flight One. For his deep run in the tournament, he received a cash prize estimating to A$11,700 (US$7,490). It could be recalled that he also participated in the Aussie However, his total live earnings remained relatively low for all this time, up to the 24th January, when he entered the Accumulator Event which brought him his largest earning so far. The Aussie player claimed his best prize after he had to defeat the Belgium poker pro Cheng-Wei Yin in a heads-up duel.
Progression of the Poker Tournament
Starting last Wednesday, the poker tournament took several days to be finished and tons of ups and downs for the players demonstrating their skills on the felt. The task for the final day of action was to reduce the surviving poker players down to ten so that they can participate in the final table fight.
Victor Teng from Australia was the chip leader at the beginning of the day, but Portlen was following closely at the fourth place on the temporary leader board. The first player to leave the final table was Luke Martinelli from Australia, who received his fourth prize from the Aussie Millions amounting to A$11,970 (US$9,560).
After he had to leave the run there were three other Australian poker players who could not make it further in the run and those were James Broom left on the 9th place for A$14,085 (US$11,249), Michael O’Grady who claimed the eighth position and a total of A$16,900 (US$13,497). For the former, this is the fourth cash from the poker festival in his career, while the latter was happy to receive his 11th career prize from Aussie Millions. The third local player to go was Joshua McCully finishing 7th and marking a sweet payday estimated to A$20,075 (US$$16,033). For Samuel Butters, the sixth position on the leader board bringing him A$24,645 (US$19,682) meant that this is the second time he has seen his name on one of Aussie Millions’ boards.
The top three places were reserved for the best, but as it turned out the chip leader at the start of the day Teng had to bow out on the third place receiving only A$59,855 (US$47,802). Even though he has about $800,000 in tournament cashes he could not make it to the throne. The runner-up position was then taken by Belgium player Cheng-Wei Yin who marked his first cash from the festival amounting to A$96,825 (US$77,328).
