It’s Main Event time at the World Championship of Online Poker (WCOOP)! How do you win it? Ask these guys. How do you win a tournament the day before? Read today’s latest update below. There’s lots about what happened on Day 16…
TODAY’S HEADLINES
• Main Event starts today!
• $10 million guaranteed in $5,200 buy-in event
• $1.25 million guaranteed for $55 buy-in event
• “merla888” bags second win of the week
• Another ‘COOP for Jens “Fresh_oO_D” Lakemeier
• Jorryt “TheCleaner11” van Hoof cleans up hyper turbo
BEHIND THE HEADLINES
Cashers in the 8-Game High Roller
Only 12 players cashed from the 80-entry field in the $10K 8-Game tournament last night, but the line-up in the deep stages was utterly superb. By the time the final cards were dealt, only Rui “RuiNF” Ferreira and Belgium’s “merla888” were alive, having struck a heads-up deal to secure more than $170K for each of them. Both were going for their second title of this WCOOP, and “merla888” pipped Ferreira this time, in doing so completing a rare back-to-back double. “merla888” similarly won two titles during SCOOP back in May, and this time added HORSE triumph to a $1,050 Hold’em event earlier. (All of the following also cashed: Talal “raidalot” Shakerchi, Denis “aDrENalin710” Strebkov, Yuri “the NERDguy” Martins, Alexey “LuckyGump” Makarov, Niki “RealAndyBeal” Jedlicka, Konstantin “krakukra” Maslak, “hotmark777”, Shaun “shaundeeb” Deeb, Jussi “calvin7v” Nevanlinna and Filipe “Zagazaur” Oliveira.)
Jens Lakemeier in EPT action in Malta
Three of those players cashing in the 8-Game high roller also cashed in the $1,050 medium buy-in version at the same time. But Nevanlinna, Deeb and Oliveira were long gone by the time Germany’s Jens “Fresh_oO_D” Lakemeier beat Russia’s “WTFOMFGOAO” to secure himself another ‘COOP title and $47,520. Lakemeier won two titles in WCOOP 2017, and a Razz event in SCOOP the year before, and here he was again top of an exceptionally tough field and closing out the win.
Jorryt van Hoof: Marathon or a sprint
Jorryt “TheCleaner11” van Hoof is best known for his third-place finish in the 2014 World Series of Poker Main Event — a tournament that represents the ultimate poker marathon. Van Hoof won $3.8 million in that one, after about 10 days of play (and a three-month July to November break). But he took all of 2 hours 43 minutes to win the second ‘COOP title of his career in the $530 buy-in hyper-turbo. Van Hoof banked $70,860 for a quickfire defeat of an 834-entry field. He is also sitting 12th of 72 remaining in the $1,050 NLHE, which will wrap up today.
“MiracleQ“‘s list of tournament cashes on Pocket Fives shows a player going about his business with great success, and the Russian moved his career PokerStars total very close to $3 million with victory last night in WCOOP-67-M, the quickfire 6-Max hyper turbo. Despite 4,386 entries, the tournament was done in a minute less than three hours, with “MiracleQ” winning $32,777 and a second WCOOP title, four years after the first.
“CrazyLissy” is toying with the idea of becoming a Twitch streamer. There’s an account there set up and ready to play. Last night would have been a good time to flick the switch to the “On” position as the Russian player won his or her maiden WCOOP title, picking up $115,509 for besting a field of 309 to WCOOP-61-H, a $2,100 buy-in NLHE event. The final four featured two-time winner “rickv17”, two-time SCOOP main event champion Gianluca “Tankanza” Speranza and Ramiro “ramastar88” Petrone, but “CrazyLissy” outdid them all to win Russia’s 26th title. Maybe next time with the Twitch stream…
TODAY’S RESULTS
| Tournament | Entries | Prize pool | Winner | Country | Prize |
| WCOOP-61-L: $22 NLHE | 10,926 | $218,520 | Madu Ponte | Brazil | $22,718.60* |
| WCOOP-61-M: $215 NLHE | 2,297 | $459,400 | 2paac | Sweden | $61,708.07 |
| WCOOP-61-H: $2,100 NLHE | 307 | $614,000 | CrazyLissy | Russia | $115,509.35 |
| WCOOP-66-L: $109 8-Game | 836 | $83,600 | Danijelinho | Sweden | $83,600* |
| WCOOP-66-M: $1,050 8-Game | 216 | $216,000 | Fresh_oO_D | Germany | $47,520.00 |
| WCOOP-66-H: $10,300 8-Game High Roller | 80 | $800,000 | merla888 | Belgium | $190,495.39* |
| WCOOP-67-L: $5.50 NLHE 6-Max Hyper-Turbo | 11,825 | $59,716 | druss25 | Poland | $6,131.16* |
| WCOOP-67-M: $55 NLHE 6-Max Hyper-Turbo | 4,386 | $229,739 | MiracleQ | Russia | $32,777.10 |
| WCOOP-67-H: $530 NLHE 6-Max, Hyper-Turbo | 834 | $424,939 | TheCleaner11 | Netherlands | $70,860.30 |
*denotes deal
STAT TRACKER
Events completed: 193
Entries so far: 778,431
Prize pools so far: $74,101,447
First prizes so far: $11,737,131.84
In-the-money finishers so far: 122,865
Tournaments starting today: 17
(Note: completed events only)
INTERVIEWS! INTERVIEWS! INTERVIEWS!
Joris “BillLewinsky Ruijs
We’ve been catching up with a heap of winners from this year’s WCOOP, all of whom have been happy to share the secrets of their successes. Click through for first-person accounts of WCOOP triumph, from those who have been there many times before to newcomers sampling the limelight for the first time.
• Germany’s “Gaul4200”: “$44K is a lot of money for a 20-year-old student in Germany”
• Joris “BillLewinsky” Ruijs: Two-time winner says “It’s like when you jump out of a plane”
• Russia’s “myIT4”: A friend told him to “fight to the end!”. He did.
• Filipe “Zagazaur” Oliveira: The 2019 breakout star on winning three titles in a week
• Espen “_sennj_” Sandvik: “It’s my first win in an official tournament”
• Rodrigo “guinHuuh” Freire: Brazilian’s roller coaster ride turns $11 into $13K
• Patrick “prepstyle71” Serda: No more pizzas for the three-time winner
• Jeffrey “Jefffrr8” Reardon: He wanted a five-figure score. He got one.
• Maxime “Daghemuneguu” Chilaud: Malta-based Frenchman wins first WCOOP of the series
• Norway’s “19_Kumite_79”: First two-day event, biggest field, biggest cash
• Viktor “TsiTool” Kovács: Puts Hungary on the WCOOP map
• Italo “sep_itl1914” Carandinas: Brazilian chooses his own adventure
• Naoya “nkeyno” Kihara: Woken up by a kick from his 3-year-old, plays Razz and wins!
• “snovalshik1”: first-timer, who turned $5.50 into $3,408
• Rinat “Zapahzamazki” Lyapin: Won PLO while streaming live
• Alex “dynoalot” Difelice: Second win, but “I feel I have a ways to go.”
• Pedro “PaDiLhA SP” Padilha: Akkari’s acolyte, who sets the record straight
• Shaun “shaundeeb” Deeb: Seventh title, surely not the last
TWITCH WATCH
“Was ist das!?!” In an occasional series on PokerStars Blog, we’ve been insisting to avowed monoglots that they actually can already speak German, they just didn’t know it. Here’s a clip from Felix “xflixx” Schneiders’ Twitch stream yesterday. You might think you can’t speak German, but I’m guessing you’ll understand every word of this:
TOP TWEETS
Christine Do is on a big Spin & Go spin-up in today’s Main Event:
Excited for tomorrow’s last day of WCOOP @PokerStars Won my main event seat through a $75 Spin&Go 😬, day 2 of all the phase events and my fave the PKO’s 🥊🤑 Wish me luck. Need some run good!🤞🏼🙏🏻#poker #sundayfunday pic.twitter.com/EZG8j2Tniq
— Christine Do (@Chri57ined) September 22, 2019
Meanwhile here’s a shoutout to Support Small Streamers!
Excited for tomorrow’s last day of WCOOP @PokerStars Won my main event seat through a $75 Spin&Go 😬, day 2 of all the phase events and my fave the PKO’s 🥊🤑 Wish me luck. Need some run good!🤞🏼🙏🏻#poker #sundayfunday pic.twitter.com/EZG8j2Tniq
— Christine Do (@Chri57ined) September 22, 2019
LEADER BOARD UPDATE
It’s been a couple of days since we last dropped in on the Player of the Series race in this year’s WCOOP. But suffice to say, it’s business as usual. That means a lead in both the High and Overall races for the series’ only three-time winner (so far), Filipe “zagazaur” Oliveira, while Dzmitry “Colisea” Urbanovich remains streets ahead in the medium buy-in race.
Their opponents are now running out of chances to overhaul them, but it’s not done yet. Here’s how they stand entering the final stages of this long race:
Overall:
1 – Zagazaur Netherlands 1,245
2 – calvin7v Finland 1,215
3 – TruthBeTold7 Canada 1,135
4 – RuiNF Netherlands 1,095
5 – shaundeeb Mexico 995
6 – Colisea Latvia 950
7 – krakukra Russia 945
8 – goleafsgoeh Canada 880
9 – aDrENalin710 Russia 805
10 – WTFOMFGOAO Russia 805
Low buy-in:
1 – FONBET_RULIT Russia 530
2 – -Rebus1980- Russia 410
=3 – krakukra Russia 405
=3 – Voziyanov15 Russia 405
5 – TruthBeTold7 Canada 360
Medium buy-in:
1 – Colisea Latvia 535
2 – shaundeeb Mexico 395
3 – pantri Paraguay 365
4 – Zagazaur Netherlands 355
5 – calvin7v Finland 345
High buy-in:
1 – Zagazaur Netherlands 655
2 – calvin7v Finland 605
3 – RuiNF Netherlands 600
4 – theNERDguy Brazil 485
5 – Naza114 UK 460
COUNTRIES LEADER BOARD
It’s tempting at this point to call off the race and declare Russia the winners of this year’s countries leader board. But that would be premature. Technically, even China, Argentina or Bulgaria can still win, or Moldova or Armenia. That’s because there are still 29 titles up for grabs during WCOOP’s final few days. It’s difficult to look beyond the Russians, who have been brilliantly consistent. But stranger things have happened in poker.
27 titles – Russia
22 – UK
21 – Brazil
12 – Canada, Germany
10 – Netherlands
9 – Finland
7 – Austria
5 – Ukraine, Romania, Lithuania, Norway, Mexico, Sweden
4 – Malta, Poland
3 – Hungary, Belgium
2 – China, Argentina, Lebanon, Denmark, Ireland, Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Japan, Croatia
1 – Thailand, Uruguay, Georgia, Latvia, Moldova, Serbia, Chile, Macau, Taiwan, Greece, Armenia.
ONGOING TOURNAMENTS
Only six tournaments are at their half-way stage as the virtual poker room clears space for WCOOP’s final Sunday. But there’s a prize pool of $1.02 million up for grabs in WCOOP-65-H PKO, currently being led by Stefan “mindgamer” Jedlicka, with Joao “Naza114” Vieira and Adrian “Amadi_017” Mateos in the top eight. Meanwhile Philippe “takechip” D’Auteuil in in front of the 40 left in the high buy-in “Afternoon Deep Stack”, which will award $65K to its winner.
WCOOP-64: NLHE Afternoon Deep Stack – Buy-ins: $5, $55, $530
WCOOP-65: NLHE 8-Max PKO – Buy-ins: $11, $109, $1,050
STARTING TODAY
Main Event! Main Event! Main Event!
Without question the highlight of the annual online poker tournament calendar, the $5,200 WCOOP Main Event kicks off tonight at 6pm WET. There’s a $10 million guarantee in the “High” buy-in version, and even the $55 “Low” offers a certain $1.25 million prize pool.
Not only that, but it’s the PLO Main Event, with the $10,300 buy-in “High” buy-in offering $1 million guaranteed. In all, there are 17 tournaments starting today, on the final Sunday of this WCOOP, including Phase 2 of WCOOP-1, which has been running since the festival began. There’s a $2 million guarantee in the high buy-in there too.
WCOOP-01: NLHE Phased – Buy-ins: $2.20, $22, $215
WCOOP-68: NLHE Sunday Kick-Off – Buy-ins: $5.50, $55, $530
WCOOP-69: NLHE PKO Sunday Warm-Up- Buy-ins: $11, $109, $1,050
WCOOP-70: WCOOP Main Event – Buy-ins: $55, $5,200
WCOOP-71: PLO Main Event – Buy-ins: $109, $1,050, $10,300
WCOOP-72: NLHE Sunday Cool Down – Buy-ins: $11, $109, $1,050
PREVIOUS ROUND-UPS
DAY 1 | DAY 2 | DAY 3 | DAY 4 | DAY 5 | DAY 6 | DAY 7 | DAY 8 | DAY 9 | DAY 10 | DAY 11 | DAY 12 | DAY 13 | DAY 14 | DAY 15 | DAY 16