Exactly how much goes into the prize pool depends on you. The earlier you register for the tournament, the bigger the bounties will be - $20 for each day. So, if you register on the day of the tournament, the cash prize for busting a Team PokerStars Pro will be $20. But if you register one day before** it's $40, two days before it's $60, and so on. If you register on the day the tournament appears in the PokerStars lobby, you could win more than $400 for eliminating a Team PokerStars Pro.

Below is how the pros fared this evening.

Henrique Pinho 3,405
Marcel Luske 3,749
Marcin Horecki 4,741
Ylon Schwartz 6,599
Humberto "Humberto B." Brenes 6,872
Hevad "RaiNKhaN" Khan 6,917
Tom McEvoy 8,206
Jason Mercier 8,825
Dario Minieri 10,132
Johnny Lodden 10,792
Alexandre "Allingomes" Gomes 12,022
Gavin Griffin 12,189
Barry "barryg1" Greenstein 15,045
Isabelle "NoMercy" Mercier 15,260
Vicky Coren 15,859
Andre aakkari Akkari 17,931
Katja Thater 19,382
Maridu Mayrinck 19,493
Raymond Rahme 19,697
Steve "stevejpa" Paul-Ambrose 21,588
Alexander Kravchenko 21,799
Leo Fernandez 21,638
Greg "FossilMan" Raymer 22,642

cyberpeogh sat holding only six big blinds trying to make something happen for a push to the final table. The short stack would push over the top of votin's raise to 600K with the blinds at 100K/200K ante 20K, not even able to double the chip leader's raise holding 1.1 million and [8h][6h]. Votin made the call with [Ks][Qs] and promptly hit the queen on the flop [3c] [5d] [Qc], and with top two on the turned king [Kd] cyberpeogh became a spectator in tenth place ($3,200.00) setting up the final table below.

Seat 1: badgergav (8041538 in chips)
Seat 2: Resolfen (7977397 in chips)
Seat 3: ch0ppy (10700057 in chips)
Seat 4: votin (20359222 in chips)
Seat 5: CheddaStackz (4459287 in chips)
Seat 6: saimon24 (3982022 in chips)
Seat 7: Ajtak (7023469 in chips)
Seat 8: ervinbet (3509281 in chips)
Seat 9: kejseranders (7282727 in chips)

Some people's tournament final tables last several hours, others, approximately 20 seconds. In the time it took for the auto message from Stars to congratulate our final table contestants tonight we had our ninth place finisher named. The only player over 10 million chips, votin, opened to 550K from middle position with blinds starting off tonight at 100K/200K ante 20K. CheddaStackz smelled something funky and pushed over the top for 4.4 million holding [As][Qh]. There was nothing stinky about the pocket tens [Td][Tc] held by the chip leader and the call was made creating a 9.3 million chip pot. Two pair would show up on the [7c] [Kh] [9s] [7s] [Kc] board matching neither of the players card's as votin's pocket tens held and CheddaStackz chips were eaten and downed perhaps with a nice chardonnay in ninth place ($4,000.00).

About ten minutes after votin successfully took care CheddaStackz, the chip leader took an early break and did not play a hand by sitting out as the blinds moved up to 150K/300K ante 30K. Twenty minutes later the "sitting out" spell was broken losing only two million chips in the process and promptly getting a third of those back taking down the blinds on the first hand back.

As the players went to the break before the blinds moved up to 200K/400K ante 40K badgergav and ch0ppy started to creep up on votin's mega stack as the remainder of the field needed some help quickly...

Seat 1: badgergav (15184015 in chips)
Seat 2: Resolfen (5692397 in chips)
Seat 3: ch0ppy (15961056 in chips)
Seat 4: votin (20691599 in chips)
Seat 6: saimon24 (3431268 in chips)
Seat 7: Ajtak (4218376 in chips)
Seat 8: ervinbet (4218562 in chips)
Seat 9: kejseranders (3937727 in chips)

... and right out of the gate ervinbet attempted to make that something happen on the first hand returning from the break. While UTG, badgergav stuck with raising in increments ending in 9 with a raise to 999,999 with [Ah][Qs]. Folded around to ervinbet who saw pocket eights [8d][8s] as a great opportunity to double up and shoved as badgergav made the quick call. The flop [Ks][Js][Jh] was "safe" for ervinbet but the dreaded counterfeit came with the turned king [Kh] meaning ervinbet needed a eight for a boat as badgergav's ace now played for a higher kicker. The [5c] did not full up ervinbet as our eighth place finisher left with $5,000.00 in free money tonight.

The very next hand saimon24 tried to swim upstream with pocket eights [8c][8d] as well after pushing over the top for 3.3 million of votin's 1.2 million chip raise. votin made the call turning over [Qd][Kc] to race off the 7.5 million chip pot. Once again the flop [7d] [6c] [Tc] was safe, and like déjà vu the turn was not safe as a queen fell [Qc] with the river [3s] ending saimon24's dive for cash in seventh place ($6,020.00).

kejseranders would finally win one for the little guys out racing ch0ppy with [Qc][Kc] and hitting queens full for a 7.2 million chip pot on the third consecutive all-in preflop hand. Luck would help on kejseranders next all-in attempt as this time the dreaded pocket eights, responsible for the first two eliminations, would crack votin's pocket aces with a turned set awarding a 12 million chip pot to kejseranders.

One hand before kejseranders trimmed those chips off votin, ch0ppy and short stacked Ajtak tangled preflop. Check out the coin flip for Ajtak's tournament life below:

Both flopped a pair but ch0ppy's queens bested the pair of tens held by Ajtak and sixth place money ($8,000.00) was coming to Elztal-Dallau for Ajtak.

Action would cool off a bit until the blinds rose to 225K/450K ante 45K when votin raised to 1.35 million from UTG as both Resolfen and ch0ppy called out of the blinds. With the flop of [2c] [2h] [5d] both the blinds checked as votin followed through with a 900K bet. Resolfen tried to bump votin off those pocket fours [4d][4h] with a check-raise all-in to 5.2 million total holding just queen high [Td][Qd]. votin caught wind of the bluff and made the call as the remainder of the board produced an unnecessary straight for votin. Resolfen earned the first five-figure payday of the night in fifth place ($12,000.00).

votin's downward spiral from massive chip leader to out in fourth place started with ch0ppy knocking the big stack for a 14 million chip pot when votin could not answer an eleven million chip check-raise with the board reading [5c] [2h] [Qs] [3s]. Then, an unfortunate river card gave kejseranders a straight over the two pair of votin sent a 21 million chip pot out of the previous chip leader's stack. Seven hands later the bottom came out as votin limped from the cutoff with badgergav completing from the small blind and ch0ppy check the option. A flop of [2d] [9h] [Js] was checked thru the blind as votin bet 1.35 million. badgergav check-raised to 4.5 million total and votin went for broke holding [Tc][8h] and shoved for 14.2 million. badgergav paused just for a moment then called holding two pair [2h][Jc] creating a 30 million chip pot. The board couldn't find votin's straight as the [6s] and [3s] rained down to send votin home with $16,000.00 in fourth place.

badgergav was the next big stack to go down hard as ch0ppy put on a clinic for value betting and got badgergav to call down all bets on a [Kd] [4c] [Kh] [Ts] [9s] board after turning the nuts with [Tc][Kc]. The 17 million chip pot might have set the tone for the overshove by badgergav on the hand below again kejseranders:

Pocket kings [Kh][Ks] for kejseranders finished off badgergav's [Ac][9s] as the 32 million chip pot slid to kejseranders and $20,000.00 third place money found its way to badgergav's den setting up heads-up play.

ch0ppy wasn't feeling choppy tonight as the chat box went vacant the throughout heads-up play that started with the following chip counts:

Seat 3: ch0ppy (38736703 in chips)
Seat 9: kejseranders (34598297 in chips)

First blood would go to kejseranders who would win seven straight hands including one for 21 million after ch0ppy fired two barrels with queen-high and both checked the river to see kejseranders' turned pair of jacks on a [9h] [Tc] [4d] [Jd] [5d] board.

Several hands later ch0ppy's chip stack found the middle with just [6c][Qs] after a preflop raising war broke out but kejseranders called ch0ppy's bluff shove on the end holding big slick [Ac][Ks]. Six on the flop, and well we'll let the tape show you the rest:

The rivered six overcame the turned king as ch0ppy took the pot with trip sixes as the chip counts returned to counts at the beginning of heads-up play.

Twenty or so hands later ch0ppy would go on a tear winning nine of ten pots, ending with getting kejseranders to commit the remainder of a depleted stack holding [Td][Ks] after the [Qh][7d][Kc] started raises between the final two. This time it was ch0ppy holding big slick and the [6c] on the turn nor [2h] turned the tide for kejseranders as ch0ppy took home the whole $40,000.00 after winning tonight's $1 Million Turbo Takedown Team Pro Edition!

This wasn't ch0ppy's first success with turbo tournaments as Waterloo native notched a sixth place showing in the $1,575 buy-in Event #4 SCOOP 6th place for $53,167.50 which was a 2X Turbo format (check out the SCOOP write up here).

kejseranders was one card away from victory tonight but will have to settle for the runner-up check worth $24,000.00 after the near 10 hour tournament completed.

Congrats to all of our winners this evening and to those who trimmed the bounties off the Team PokerStars Pros that participated tonight.

$1 Million Turbo Takedown - Team Pro Edition (07-26-09)
1. ch0ppy (Waterloo) $40,000.00
2. kejseranders (Ølstykke) $24,000.00
3. badgergav (Essex) $20,000.00
4. votin (Odintsovo) $16,000.00
5. Resolfen (Germany) $12,000.00
6. Ajtak (Elztal-Dallau) $8,000.00
7. saimon24 (Minden) $6,020.00
8. ervinbet (Oradea) $5,000.00
9. CheddaStackz (Fort Collins) $4,000.00

While there's not an extra addition the already free prize pool tonight, a massive 21,143 players lined up their FPPs via satellites, cash play, SnGs, and MTTs for a shot at the $40,000.00 first prize. Nearly HALF of the players who entered went home with at least $35.00 for their points, but all eyes were on the final table where placing at least ninth tonight would net you $4,000.00 in this "freeroll".

After eight hours of play kinkonk88, the massive chip leader, would collect the last pelt on the way to the final table. In the blinds kinkonk88 would put clickandwin to a decision preflop for the small stack of just 851,950 chips with blinds at 125K/250K ante 25K. [Jd][Ad] for kinkonk88 and clickandwin held [2d][Ac] and found the [Kd] [9c] [6c] [Jh] [Td] board to be absent of the deuce necessary to turn the tide, and clickandwin, clicked but had to settle for 10th place ($3,200.00) as kinkonk88 set up the final table below:

Seat 1: Armageddon98 (7977350 in chips)
Seat 2: aleksandras (8449754 in chips)
Seat 3: Pitbull24 (5799558 in chips)
Seat 4: xoxol73 (4325306 in chips)
Seat 5: Bo$$playa425 (6921892 in chips)
Seat 6: moe86 (1858981 in chips)
Seat 7: JohnnyPorn (1119907 in chips)
Seat 8: stepi80 (8548924 in chips)
Seat 9: kinkonk88 (18427328 in chips)

Blinds were still at 125K/250K ante 25K when severe short stack JohnnyPorn pushed 644,907 into the middle hoping to release the middle position limping aleksandras' chips. But, aleksandras made the easy call for 394,907 more with pocket eights [8s][8h]. [Qd][As] for JohnnyPorn set up the race to finish, but the board trickled down [Js] [9d] [4h] [5c] [8c] sending JohnnyPorn behind the table in ninth place ($4,000.00).

With the blinds increasing to 150K/300K ante 30K moe86 small stack of less than four big blinds went into the middle on the button with [Th][Kh] hoping to steal the blinds. Fortunately stepi80 was there in the small blind to provide some action and called with [Qh][8d]. A safe flop of [6c][9c][As] had moe86's king high ruling the day. The turned [5c] changed nothing, but the [Qs] river did as the stepi80 walked over moe86's king with a pair of queens. moe was, well, 86'd after the river and will enjoy the $5,000.00 earned in eighth place.

After taking a hit from Bo$$playa425 when pocket kings [Kc][Kd] could not hold up against the [Ac][Qh] of Bo$$playa425 for a 14 million chip pot, kinkonk88 went right back to work three hands later in another 14 million chip with tournament life on the line against aleksandras in the hand below:

kinkonk88's quad nines snuck past the big slick of aleksandras and the dominate chip leader was back and aleksandras was left with scraps that would be fed to stepi80 a few hands later to exit in seventh place ($6,020.00).

Shortly afterwards the final six settled in to take a well deserved five minute break with 200K/400K ante 40K blinds on the horizon. Here's how they shaped up with kinkonk88 still leading the way:

Seat 1: Armageddon98 (9552350 in chips)
Seat 3: Pitbull24 (2394558 in chips)
Seat 4: xoxol73 (7510306 in chips)
Seat 5: Bo$$playa425 (11158784 in chips)
Seat 8: stepi80 (13117130 in chips)
Seat 9: kinkonk88 (19695872 in chips)

kinkonk88 would continue to pressure the other players with bets putting them all-in or contesting their raises with three-bets preflop getting the leading stack up to 26 million without showing cards as the blinds rose again to 225K/450K ante 45K. The constant blind steals and raises got to Armageddon98. After raising to 1.35 million from UTG, stepi80 would re-raise putting Armageddon98 in deep thought for the remaining stack. Armageddon98 called showing [Ad][3d] but stepi80 wasn't being a bully and turned over the dominating [Ac][Qd]. The [8d] [8h] [9c] [4d] [Tc] board ran out with nary a trey and Armageddon98 blew up in sixth place earning $8,000.00 in the process.

Seven hands later began a succession of kinkonk88's big stack clubbing the table into submission. Starting with taking out xoxol73's in fifth place when xoxol73 call a 8.1 million chip button raise from kinkonk88 while holding just 5.8 million in chips left with [Ah][8h]. Once again kinkonk88 showed the goods and flipped up big slick [Ad][Kh]. Both would flop a pair of aces, but xoxol73 couldn't catch the kicker on the [As] [2h] [5s] [Td] [Qc] board to kiss those chips goodbye in fifth place ($12,000.00).

The very next hand kinkonk88 would hand other place their walking papers in fourth place. Watch the hand play out below:

With the boat of nines full of kings, kinkonk88 would show Bo$$playa425 who's the boss of the final table sending Bo$$playa425 home with $16,000.00 in fourth place.

Blinds remained the same at 225K/450K ante 45K when the small stacked Pitbull24 pushed again with two million in chips left after paying the blinds. [As][5s] was the choice of weapon for Pitbull24, but the big slick [Ah][Kd] of stepi80 in the big blind took the teeth out of Pitbull24's ace. No love for the short stack here as the board ran dry of a five and couldn't quite catch a six on the river to stay out of the dog pound. Pitbull24 instead will have to chew on the $20,000.00 received in third place.

Going into heads up play kinkonk88 would hold a nearly 5:1 chip lead over stepi80 in the all-European final:

Seat 8: stepi80 (13346466 in chips)
Seat 9: kinkonk88 (50082534 in chips)

stepi80 would manage a double up and pull within 26 million to 36 million chips but kinkonk88 would pull away the victory with the hand shown below:

After treading lightly around the heart flush draw, kinkonk88's king kicker with [Kd][9d] grabbed the pot when stepi80's [9h][Qh] failed to find a third heart or second queen on the [8h] [9s] [5h] [6c] [2s] board to become this month's $1 Million Turbo Takedown champion earning $40,000.00 in the process!

Despite having the aggressive kinkonk88 on the left the entire final table, stepi80 persevered for a $24,000.00 payday as the runner-up.

10,000 players cashed, 36 went home with more than $1,000.00 and five earned five-figures all for a couple of FPPs. Congratulations to all of our cashers tonight.

$1 Million Turbo Takedown Results (06-28-09)
1. kinkonk88 (salzburg) $40,000.00
2. stepi80 (Stuttgart) $24,000.00
3. Pitbull24 (medford) $20,000.00
4. Bo$$playa425 (Las Vegas) $16,000.00
5. xoxol73 (Moskow) $12,000.00
6. Armageddon98 (Richmond Hill) $8,000.00
7. aleksandras (Kaunas) $6,020.00
8. moe86 (Milton) $5,000.00
9. JohnnyPorn (Winnipeg) $4,000.00

Yes, a packed house of 30,000 players brought their reduced buy-in of 2,000 Frequent Players Points (FPPs) to play in the 1-year anniversary edition of the $1 Million Turbo Takedown. Normally set at 5,000 FPPs both the buy-in was reduced while the cap on the participants was raised to allow even more players trade in a handful of FPPs for a shot at some big cash...

... and tonight a car

As mentioned above the winner walked drove away with a brand new Porsche Cayman S, the tenth one given away by PokerStars via FPPs. Just like Team PokerStars Pro Dario Minieri got his Porsche back in 2007 the winner tonight received the $40,000 in cash plus a brand new ride. One-third of the total field walked away with at least $35.00, and the final table will be fighting it out for these amounts below:

1. Porsche Cayman S + $40,000.00
2. $24,000.00
3. $20,000.00
4. $16,000.00
5. $12,000.00
6. $8,000.00
7. $6,020.00
8. $5,000.00
9. $4,000.00

Aegis877 got the ball rolling for the final table tonight with blinds at 150K/300K ante 30K after min-raising from the button got Judith_SF to push all-in with pocket fours [4c][4d]. Covering and sitting with pocket aces [Ac][As] Aegis877 made the easy call and watched the [2d] [9c] [6h] [Th] [Qs] rain down a winner for those aces and set up the final table below:

Seat 1: bigjbecker (8461710 in chips)
Seat 2: Luckyb555 (7855308 in chips)
Seat 3: pairsetboat (6435296 in chips)
Seat 4: tason1101 (6862180 in chips)
Seat 5: rageniv (11770647 in chips)
Seat 6: Aegis877 (8815359 in chips)
Seat 7: jabariwoki (7769166 in chips)
Seat 8: 1 REALDEAL 1 (20390125 in chips)
Seat 9: mas_da_masta (11640209 in chips)

1 REALDEAL 1 comes in tonight with a huge chip lead, nearly double the amounts of bigjbecker and rageniv. The blinds will start off at 175K/350K ante 35K and Luckyb555 was the first to make significant moves. On the second hand of the final table Luckyb555 would nearly trim nearly four million chips off tason1101 after 3-betting and pushing all-in off an all-heart flop of [Jh] [3h] [4h] for a 7.6 million chip pot. Nine hands later Luckyb555 would get all those 8.4 million chips into the middle preflop against rageniv who covered by only 579K holding pocket kings [Ks][Kc]. rageniv produced [Ad][Qd] and the [9c] [2s] [6h] [3h] [Tc] board failed to provide diamonds or an ace as Luckyb555 raked in the 17.4 million chip pot and rageniv was down to just over one big blind. Two hands later mas_da_masta would use pocket fours to show rageniv the door in the ninth place ($4,000.00) when the [Ts][2s] could not find a flush on the [Qc] [3s] [5s] [Jc] [7c].

Four hands later pairsetboat got lined up in Luckyb555's sights after 3-betting Luckyb555's UTG raise for a 6.6 million chip stack. Luckyb555 made the call and covered with [9d] [Ad]. pairsetboat did not have a pair but in this situation big slick [Ac][Kh] looked a lot better. The [4h] [6d] [5d] flop loaded up some flush outs for Luckyb555, and on the [9c] turn Luckyb555 got lucky and hit leaving pairsetboat with two outs. No black kings on the river and pairsetboat sailed away with $5,000.00 for eighth place.

The very next hand Luckyb555 was all-in AGAIN, this time against jabariwoki preflop while holding pocket jacks [Js][Jh]. jabariwoki turned over [Qc][Ac] for the coin flip as [9s][Th][5d] came down on the flop. The [Jc] on the turn gave Luckyb555 a set leaving just the four kings left on the river. River [Kd]. A straight and 19.4 million chips for jabariwoki as Luckyb555's run was briefly stopped, but still held 15 million chips good for third place in the chip count.

YES! NO! YES! A run through the hold em' board can make you more jittery then a five year old on his third grande cappuccino. With the blinds at 225K/450K ante 45K tason1101's near four million chip stack needed to make a stand. Watch below the fun play out below after bigjbecker make the call of tason1101's push in the small blind:

With the rivered set of tens bigjbecker picked up the 8.5 million chip pot and tason1101 will not be driving home that Porsche but received $6,020.00 in seventh place.

Another eight hands later, 1 REALDEAL 1 who started as the big chip leader got ground over to 6.4 million and made a move for the blinds from UTG+2 by shoving all-in with [7s][9d]. Awaiting in the big blind was similarly stacked Aegis877 who made the call with [Td][As] leaving just 842K behind. The flop [Kc] [2h] [Qs] heavily favored Aegis877, and the [5s] on the turn helped no one. But, the [9s] river delivered yet another crushing blow to a favored hand tonight as 1 REALDEAL 1 collected the 13.3 million chip pot. The next hand jabariwoki would collect Aegis877's scraps as pocket aces [Ad][Ah] were more than enough to beat Aegis877's [9s][Js] on the [7h] [2h] [6d] [7c] [6s] board to send another car contender out of the dealership in sixth place ($8,000.00).

In a hand that may raise a few eyebrows, we'll let the video sort out the biggest pot to this point, 31.5 million chips between bigjbecker and mas_da_masta:

The reoccurring theme continued, the rivered wheel straight for bigjbecker holding just [2d][5h] snagged the huge pot and sent mas_da_masta off with a probable headache in fifth place ($12,000.00).

With the rising blinds to the final 250K/500K ante 50K level play got very fast, very quickly playing four-handed. Preflop play contained many hands there was a raise and folds around, or raise-shove-fold sequence. 1 REALDEAL 1's stack was worked back up to 21 million from the aggression, but eventually aggression gets called. Holding [Ts][Ks] after winning 4 out of the last 5 pots, 1REALDEAL 1 shoved again from the cutoff, but this time was called by jabariwoki in the big blinds with [Js][As]. Since the players were hogging the spades, only one made its way to the [4c] [3c] [6d] [Qc] [5s] board and the big starting chip leader was no more, out in fourth place ($16,000.00).

Eight hands later Luckyb555 pulled the handle on the slot machine one more time holding pocket sevens [7c][7h] and 3-bet shoved 10.7 million chips on bigjbecker's small blind raise. bigjbecker had a decent [Ac][Th] and made the call covering by 18 million. The [2d] [Jh] [6h] flop helped no one and kept Luckyb555 in the lead. But, the [As] hit the turn leaving Luckyb555 to root for a jackpot triple seven on the river, instead the final reel came up a lemon. [3d] on the river and Luckyb555 had $20,000.00 for the third place finish as we headed into the biggest prize differential of the tournament.

First place receives $40,000 plus the frequently mentioned Porsche Cayman S.

Second place will get to smell the fumes from the exhaust, but will still be $24,000.00 richer.

Here's how the two finalists stacked up to start heads up play:

bigjbecker (40018222 in chips)
jabariwoki (49981778 in chips)

jabariwoki would enjoy a near 10 million chip lead but that would quickly change as GoldStar bigjbecker carved out a couple of 14 million chip pots including getting a flopped boat with pocket eights [8d][8s] paid off on a million chip turn bet and five million chip river bet to haul in 14.6 million chips.

jabariwoki wasn't done by a long shot, getting near the ten hour mark of the tournament and fighting back to nearly even after taking 27.1 million chip pot when an all-in bet on a flop of [5c] [Qd] [Jd] was not called by bigjbecker. At the break the players merely switched chip positions from when they started:

bigjbecker (49818222 in chips)
jabariwoki (40181778 in chips)

The two would spar again for nearly 15 minutes with bigjbecker getting enough jabs to knockdown jabariwoki into a 3:1 deficit leading up to this big finish. Watch the video below:

Flopped quad kings for bigjbecker and the Porsche Cayman S will be primed for delivery as jabariwoki could do nothing after drawing dead on the flop but will walk away tonight turning 2,000 FPPs into $24,000.00 cash as the runner-up.

bigjbecker picked the right month to win the $1 Million Turbo Takedown as $40,000.00 in cash along with the title to a brand new Porsche Cayman S will be signed over for defeating 29,999 players tonight!

May 2009 $1 Million Turbo Takedown (05-31-09)

1. bigjbecker (Barbourville) $40,000.00 + Porsche Cayman S
2. jabariwoki (Guimaraes) $24,000.00
3. Luckyb555 (Győr) $20,000.00
4. 1 REALDEAL 1 (UKPB poker forum) $16,000.00
5. mas_da_masta (Diamond Bar) $12,000.00
6. Aegis877 (Englishtown) $8,000.00
7. tason1101 (fort collins) $6,020.00
8. pairsetboat (singapore) $5,000.00
9. rageniv (Roma) $4,000.00

Imagine us with that look right now.

Not only did ElkY win WPT Player of the Year honors, not only is Europe's first Ante Up for Africa event starting today, and not only is the EPT Grand Final starting tomorrow, but we had a ton of big finishes in this Sunday's majors.

So, let's just do this.

After beating ot nearly 7,600 players, antesvante picked up more than $200,000 for a big Sunday Million win. For a full report, see the 4-26-09 Sunday Million final table report.

Just a bit earlier in the day, confused28 managed to avoid any serious discombobulation and navigated a field of more than 4,000 players to win more than $128,000. We have the story at our 4-26-09 Sunday Warm-Up final table report.

Normally, that would be where we called it a day. Yesterday, however, was the last Sunday of the month. So we also had two other big events going on.

New York's PrettayGood took down the April Battle of the Planets Triple Shootout for $12,000. Then, toward the end of the night JustFriendsF managed a big win in the April Turbo Takedown

For a complete look at all the Sunday major results, see our PokerStars Sunday tournament results for 4-26-09 page.

Now, on with the week.

Nothing wrong with a stress ball, but personally I'd rather be squeezing bricks of cash while playing here at PokerStars. 4,000 players made it into the cash but only the below nine would be left standing after eight hours of play with a shot at that hundred grand.

Seat 1: wtfichigo (4147048 in chips)
Seat 2: Judius (472740 in chips)
Seat 3: willempy (358584 in chips)
Seat 4: 1488311 (2024959 in chips)
Seat 5: UHave_3_Outs (1790360 in chips)
Seat 6: JustFriendsF (6945987 in chips)
Seat 7: Soitanai (773458 in chips)
Seat 8: heelman247 (984804 in chips)
Seat 9: gwaag (9349060 in chips)

willempy came into the final table holding just three big blinds but managed to get some play in before succumbing to the pressure of the blinds. With just 183K in chips left willempy would make another open push and calls from UHave3_Outs and JustFriendsF. The [4d] [4h] [2d] [Tc] [3c] must not have helped willempy's cause as those cards were mucked after UHave3_Outs tabled [Kd] [Th] for the winning hand. $5,500.00 in ninth place for willempy is far from going away empty handed.

Big three way hand had the numerically fun 1488831's tournament life on the line against JustFriendsF and gwaag for a 3.4 million chip pot. Watch the fun below:

The flopped set of fours was more than plenty to see off 1488311 in eighth place ($10,000.00).

Judius took a nasty beat before the final table when tabled pocket jacks to gwaag's ace-seven, and the river delivered a straight for gwaag crippling Judius from the tournament chip lead down to just a few blinds. Judius would recover enough to place seventh tonight, sitting with 835K in chips with blinds at 70,000/140,000 ante 14,000 facing a 330K raise from Soitanai, Judius would push the small stack into the middle with [Kc] [Js]. Soitanai would call with [Qh] [Ah] creating a 1.8 million chip pot. Judius would never catch up as the board ran out [6h] [9s] [9c] [Qd] [8h], tough night for the seventh place finisher but $15,000.00 for a bunch of FPPs is a well-spent investment.

After repeated attempts to make a six handed deal broke down, we lost heelman247. JustFriendsF had been running over the table with nearly nine million more chips than 2nd place wtfchigo. Unfortunately, heelman247 stuck out a virtual foot to trip up the chip leader with pocket kings [Kd] [Kc] against JustFriendsF's [8s] [As]. After the ace flopped on the [4c] [Ah] [Ts] [2c] [9c] board, JustFriendsF took in another 4.8 million in chips as heelman247 walked towards the door in sixth place ($20,000.00).

Five-handed attempt at a deal got some nods and the mods to offer a chip chop count, but too many nays as they played on.

Just eleven hands later JustFriendsF would strike again this time after raising from UTG into UHave_3_Outs' big blind, the shorter stack push 1.7 million into the middle with [6c] [Ac]. It was JustFriendsF's turn to hold the commanding pocket pair, jacks to be exact [Jd] [Js]. True to the name UHave_3_Outs had only three outs, but picked up two outs on the [Ks] [Qs] [Th] flop. UHave_3_Outs couldn't connect with the [7c] turn and [Kh] river, and with zero outs left UHave_3_Outs collected $25,000 for fifth place tonight.

Next, it was Soitanai's super short beginning stack getting healthier throughout the night and with this hand knocking wtfchigo down to 339K which would go to chip vacuum JustFriendsF on the very next hand ending wtfchigo's night in fourth place ($32,500.00):

Once a severe short stack, now up to 7.1 million chips as Soitani lept in front of gwaag in chip count but still held half as many chips as JustFriendsF.

Three handed play would see the chip lead and possibly the remaining player's sanity take a turn for the worse as the short stack would always find a way to double up for almost a half hour.

But, with blinds at 125,000/250,000 ante 25,000 gwaag would finally succumb. After gwaag raised from the button to 510K with [3s][4s], Soitanai would call from the big blind with [Ac][5c] to see a [2c] [3c] [6s] flop. Soitanai would check the straight flush draw as gwaag followed-through with a 500K bet. No hesitation was made on the all-in check raise that coverage gwaag. But, gwaag made the call with middle pair and an inside straight draw as well. [As] on the turn gave the official lead to Soitanai but also gave gwaag a flush draw to go with a straight draw. [2h] on the river ended gwaag's roller-coaster ride to the final table as well as at the final table in third place ($40,000.00).

Nearly a three to one margin lead for Soitanai going into heads up play:

Seat 6: JustFriendsF (6722076 in chips)
Seat 7: Soitanai (20124924 in chips)

Soitanai wouldn't hold that lead long as JustFriendsF would strike for a double up seven hands into the heads-up match when both players hit trips on this board [2h] [Kc] [Tc] [6s] [Ts], but JustFriendsF's [Td] [9s] outpiped Soitanai's [5s][Th] to scoop up the 13.2 million chip pot and even out the match.

After trading the blinds back and forth with the chips nearly even, the players got the mods back online for an very quick negotiation of an even split of $70,000.00 and $20,000.00 left on the table to play for.

No sooner than JustFriendsF offering a "gl man" after the chop agreement in the chat box, both of them got their chips into the middle preflop. Watch the winner rake in the chips below:

Pocket kings of Soitanai no match for the nut flush of JustFriendsF. This win all but wrapped up the tourney for JustFriendsF leaving Soitanai with just 18K in chips. He would manage a double up, but the scraps would eaten on the second hand as JustFriendF shook his big stack for all its worth in claiming this month's $1 Million Turbo Takedown tournament and $90,000.00 after the chop agreement. Adding $10K to the runner-up check, Soitanai's never give up attitude took that beginning short stack and turned it into a big payday.

April $1 Million Turbo Takedown Results
(*based on two-way chop)
1. JustFriendsF (Nashville) *$90,000.00
2. Soitanai (Cph) *$70,000.00
3. gwaag (einsiedeln) $40,000.00
4. wtfchigo (Voitsberg) $32,500.00
5. UHave_3_Outs (Phoenix) $25,000.00
6. heelman247 (Pierre) $20,000.00
7. Judius (Columbus) $15,000.00
8. 1488311 (Moscow) $10,000.00
9. willempy (weert) $5,500.00

First, you must overcome the massive field of 10,614 players who "paid" the 5,000 Frequent Players Point (FPPs) buy-in.

Second, this is a turbo tournament meaning less time to wait for those premium hands.

Third, after level 18 the blinds still change after every ten minutes, but the blinds do not increase at the rate they have before reaching this deep into the tournament. The pace of the blind change makes adjusting back to slower play a key to winning the tournament.

Fourth, do you like $100,000 enough to play for nearly ten hours (I think most people could put up with a $10,000 per hour job rate unless you play professional football for a living)?

4,000 players tonight walked away with at least $90.00 in exchange for their FPPs or satellite wins, 45 players got at least $1,000, and eight players once again will take home a fat, five-figure score upon reaching the final table.

KNIEM7 rubbed his four-leaf clover for all its worth and while he was low on chips like eleventh place biggels41, KNIEM7 raised from UTG, and called biggels41's three-bet only to be facing [Ac] [Ah]. KNIEM7's [Tc] [Qd] was actually in better shape after biggels41 hit a set on the [8d] [Ad] [5d] flop. The [4d] turn smacked KNIEM7's flush draw and he dodged pairing the board with the [7c] river. Then, four hands later KNIEM7 would find himself behind only to go ahead when he open shoved from the cutoff with [Td] [Qc] and was called by similarly stacked RonIrishMofo holding [Ks][As]. Another quick turn of luck in KNIEM7's favor as he would grab two pair on the [5d] [5c] [Tc] [Qd] [9s] board and RonIrishMofo would have to settle for the $4,000.00 he received as the final table bubble boy in tenth place.

Here's your final nine for the March $1 Million Turbo Takedown:

Seat 1: KNIEM7 (2803282 in chips)
Seat 2: fcfarfan04 (1942507 in chips)
Seat 3: hoops886 (1783333 in chips)
Seat 4: AL-AL66 (2463954 in chips)
Seat 5: pateenno1 (7134496 in chips)
Seat 6: licyeus (5979452 in chips)
Seat 7: Callisto 5 (3557688 in chips)
Seat 8: elcheapo23 (2963172 in chips)
Seat 9: Electricute (3214116 in chips)

The first big pot of the final table went to Callisto 5 as she would double up off the chip leader licyeus. Pocket kings [Kc][Kh] for licyeus and pocket aces [Ah][Ad] in a hand that played itself out with the blinds starting at 50,000/100,000 ante 10,000. The flop gave both players sets, but they weren't necessary as the remainder of the [Jh] [As] [Ks] [8d] [3c] board failed to produce the last king in the deck and Callisto 5 took home the 7.1 million chip pot, and licyeus remained healthy with 5.4 million chips.

Someone has to be the first out and get the bottom money at the final table, and that person tonight was hoops886. From UTG he went for a blind steal with [8c] [Jh] but fell well short of the goal as AL-AL66 picked up pocket kings [Kh] [Ks] on his immediate left and called his one million chip bet. The rest of the table got out of the way although hoops886 made the first free throw by pairing his eight, but couldn't sink the second on the [8h] [Th] [Ts] [5h] [2c] board and hoops886 was benched in ninth place ($5,500.00).

pateenno1 commented in the chat box that he didn't know if they were playing for FPPs or real money. Gamesmanship perhaps, but there were $10,000.00 real dollars going out to fcfarfan04 after his eighth place finish when pateenno1 knocked him out of the tournament. fcfarfan04 started the betting by raising to 480,000 with the blinds at 60,000/120,000 ante 12,000 and was re-raised by pateenno1 on the button all-in as pateenno1 covered. fcfarfan04 would make the call with [Ad] [Jh] and saw the bad news as pateenno1 turned over pocket kings [Ks][Kh]. panteenno1's kings were never threatened as they made kings full of fives on the [Td] [5s] [4h] [5h] [Kc] board. No matter what pateenno1 might be thinking, PokerStars will be awarding real dollars to fcfarfan04 tonight for his eighth place finish.

The very next hand the roller coaster of KNIEM7's chip stack would come to abrupt halt when he shoved his 1.8 million chips from UTG+2 into the middle with [Qh][Qd] as the blinds remained at 60,000/120,000 ante 12,000. Unfortunately, pateenno1 shipped his kings over to AL-AL66 who quickly called with [Kh][Ks] on KNIEM7's left. There would be no clover, rabbit foot, or any other strokes of luck as the board ran off [Jd] [5s] [5c] [Tc] [2c] as neither player improved, KNIEM7 would have $15,000.00 added to his bankroll in seventh place.

About five minutes later the players tried to get together for a deal but everyone's eyes seemed a little bigger than their chip stack as they could not come to terms and the tournament started back up with the blinds at 70,000/140,000 ante 14,000 and chip stacks looking like this:

Seat 4: AL-AL66 (7051062 in chips)
Seat 5: pateenno1 (7032510 in chips)
Seat 6: licyeus (3496764 in chips)
Seat 7: Callisto 5 (7852366 in chips)
Seat 8: elcheapo23 (3405172 in chips)
Seat 9: Electricute (3004126 in chips)

13 million chips. A pot this big meant big hands which could be found in the hands of AL-AL66 and pateenno1 as the hand replayer will show you below:

With AL-AL66's big slick out running the pocket kings of pateenno1, he would gather up those 13 million chips and assume the chip lead with 14.2 million chips, twice the amount of second place Callisto 5 as the blinds were moving up to 90,000/180,000 ante 18,000 very shortly.

licyeus and elcheapo23 would exchange places on the leaderboard as elcheapo23 caught a four flush on the river after getting his [Qs][Ah] outflopped by licyeus' [Ac][Jd] on the [2c] [Jh] [Kh] [8h] [2h] board for a 5.2 million chip pot that left licyeus with just 1.6 million. licyeus would push his way back to 2.4 million after a few steals, but as the blinds went up to 100,000/200,000 ante 20,000 he locked horns with elcheapo23 again. A push from UTG with [Qs][Ts] was met by a call on the button by elcheapo23 who thought the price was right with pocket nines [9c][9d]. By the turn licyeus had plenty of outs but ultimately could not connect on the [Jd] [5d] [8c] [As] [3c] board and the once big stack had to settle for fifth place ($25,000.00).

Fizzled out. Shocked by AL-AL66. Gone in a flash.

Pick a headline for Electricute as he was card dead with a short stack and got blinded down to under one million when he chose to take his [3d][Ad] up against the preflop raise of the chip leader AL-AL66's pocket fours [4s][4h]. A flopped set of fours for AL-AL66 would end up as a full house as Electricute would miss his gutshot straight draw on the [Jc] [5s] [4c] [9c] [5h] board. 2.4 million chips for AL-AL66 and $32,500.00 for Electricute as he was short circuited in fourth place. Ok, that last punny headline was bad but I couldn't resist.

As we dropped into three handed play and the blinds at 150,000/300,000 ante 30,000, it was Callisto 5 looking for chips and AL-AL66 still with a commanding lead:

Seat 4: AL-AL66 (18137698 in chips)
Seat 7: Callisto 5 (3782496 in chips)
Seat 8: elcheapo23 (9921806 in chips)

Callisto 5 would gain some breathing room as she caught a pair of kings [Kh][Kc] in the big blind as AL-AL66's [Ah][Jd] fell short on the [9s] [5s] [8s] [9c] [3c] board when both shoved pre-flop. With the 7.5 million chip pot going to Callisto 5, and the players having evened out the chip stacks, they attempted some chop dialog again that never caught any fire as the blinds moved up to 175,000/350,000 ante 35,000.

One bet, two bet, three bet, four! Callisto and elcheapo23 would take their stacks into the middle preflop for the biggest pot of the tournament, and only one would face AL-AL66 heads up. Watch the hand play out below to see who:

With the coin flip win, elcheapo23 would take the chip lead into heads up play against AL-AL66 while Callisto 5 would get to enjoy the $40,000.00 earned in fourth place.

At the start of heads up play the chip counts looked like this:

Seat 4: AL-AL66 (13846197 in chips)
Seat 8: elcheapo23 (17995803 in chips)

But, elcheapo23 would win the first game of chip chicken as he bet out 5,555,555 chips on the river of an 8.4 million chip pot with the board showing [Kh] [5d] [Ac] [Ts] [Ks]. AL-AL66 couldn't find a call or a raise as elcheapo23 opened up a 21 million to 10 million chip lead.

The chip lead would flip around when both players put their stacks in the middle preflop:

AL-AL66: [Ah] [Jh]
elcheapo23: [8c] [8h]

The all-club flop [2c] [4c] [7c] cut off a bunch of outs for AL-AL66 but the turn came through with the [As] and the [6h] sealed the win. The 22.8 million chip pot slid AL-AL66's way while elcheapo23's stack sat a little below nine million chips.

Eleven hands later they would get it all in preflop again, but there would be no race this time as elcheapo23's [Ah][2c] was a big underdog to AL-AL66's [As][9d]. AL-AL66 would flop top two, as elcheapo was left looking for one of two fives left in the deck on the river for a chop. It did not come as the board read [9s] [Ac] [5d] [5h] [8d] to favor AL-AL66 as this month's $1 million Turbo Takedown champion and winner of the $100,000.00 first place prize. elcheapo23 also collected a monsterous ROI with his $60,000.00 won as the runner-up for that 5,000 FPP buy-in.

March $1 Million Turbo Takedown Results (03-29-09)
1. AL-AL66 $100,000.00
2. elcheapo23 $60,000.00
3. Callisto 5 $40,000.00
4. Electricute $32,500.00
5. licyeus $25,000.00
6. pateenno1 $20,000.00
7. KNIEM7 $15,000.00
8. fcfarfan04 $10,000.00
9. hoops886 $5,500.00

After Mao2007's pocket tens shanghai'd the remaining chips of kev_unlimit, who was holding [AC]-[5D] and hit nothing on the board, with an unnecessary set of tens everyone was welcomed to the final table and assured at least $5,500.00 for getting through over 11,000 players over the past seven hours.

Seat 1: Feydrauter (4,372,571 in chips)
Seat 2: BulldogsBrad (1,614,708 in chips)
Seat 3: ImCheckin (8,838,190 in chips)
Seat 4: Mao2007 (3,300,286 in chips)
Seat 5: annanoplay (3,731,233 in chips)
Seat 6: Schorsch15 (2,203,020 in chips)
Seat 7: xmrstyle (1,821,833 in chips)
Seat 8: RaineTech (1,324,996 in chips)
Seat 9: Pass_72 (6,408,163 in chips)

First blood of the final table belonged to Pass_72 who's hammerific name may imply lesser holdings, but had the cards when it counted. With blinds at 50,000/100,000 ante 10,000 Pass_72 raised to 258,000 from middle position and was met by a shove by Schorsch15 in the big blind for 1.9 million total. Pass_72 made the snap call and did not turn over seven-deuce off, but rather pocket kings, which dominated the [AH]-[QC] of Schorsch15. Flop of [QD]-[4C]-[10S], gave Schorsch15 some additional outs, but the [KD] on the turn took those outs away giving Pass_72 a set of kings, but opened up the four jacks in the deck for a straight. Unfortunately the river was not a jack, but another queen. Kings full was enough to take ownership of the 3.9 million chip pot and send Schorsch15 off with $5,500.00 and a ninth place finish.

They look cute-ish, but bulldogs are not to be trifled with especially at a poker table. xmrstyle found out this the hard way when he attempted to snag the blinds from UTG with a shove for 1.4 million with [AD]-[7S]. With blinds at 60,000/120,000 ante 12,000 a loud bark of "all-in" came from BulldogsBrad sitting in the cutoff with pocket jacks. The board [5C]-[5D]-[QC]-[8S]-10S] played out to no excitement and a large bone of $10,000.00 was thrown in xmrstyle's direction however to soothe his eight place finish tonight.

Rain, rain, go away come back another day sang Feydrauter after seeing off the short stacked RaineTech with his pocket eights. A shove for the blinds for RaineTech's last 933,000 with [AH]-[3H], RaineTech could not squeak by Feydrauter's pocket pair in the small blind as he made the call with those snowmen, and the pair held over the [4C]-[KD]-[2S]-[7C]-[JS] board. $15,000.00 in waterproof money was sent to RaineTech for his seventh place finish.

As we hit the break with blinds climbing up to 80,000/160,000 ante 16,000 its Mao2007 holding on to the chip lead with ImCheckin and Pass_72 close on his heels.

Feydrauter (4,187,567 in chips)
BulldogsBrad (3,243,999 in chips)
ImCheckin (7,216,556 in chips)
Mao2007 (8,114,212 in chips)
annanoplay (3,046,883 in chips)
Pass_72 (7,805,783 in chips)

Shortly after the break, BulldogsBrad would stave off elimination with a rivered flush and doubling up off ImCheckin but nary a font about possible deals. annanoplay also changed chips positions, as he outraced Pass_72 with pocket jacks to the big slick of Pass_72 that could not find a pair on the board of [10D]-[6S]-[7S]-[7C]-[8S] and the 8.9 million chip pot gave annanoplay the chip lead.

After some fairly quick "nh" and "ty" chatting throughout the final table, the chat box exploded about 30 minutes after the break as the hexagon of players got their minds together. After trying to smooth out their jagged edges into a circle of friendship they came to the below deal (leaving $20,000 to be played out for the champion):

Annanoplay $50,457.26
BullsdogsBrad $46,739.68
Mao2007 $45,539.21
ImCheckin $39,896.22
Feydrauter $39,867.63
Pass_72 $35,000.00

Feydrauter put it perfectly: "that's a lot of cash for a 15FPP buy in".

Indeed it is, enjoy the cash.

Feydrauter was responsible for knocking out the first player post-deal as Pass_72 tried to shove the small blind on Feydrauter's big blind with [10S]-[5S] and Feydrauter made the call with [AH]-[8H]. No aces, no fives, no tens, and only one spade on the [7H]-[2C]-[7D]-[6S]-[KD] board and Pass_72 took home the $35,000.00 he received in the deal as the sixth place finisher.

Five hands later, the smile Feydrauter got from knocking out Pass_72 would fade quickly as he attempted a button raise of 600,000 and was met by a call by BulldogsBrad and a push by ImCheckin in the big blind with a stack that covered. Feydrauter took a gamble with [KH]-[JH] and called as ImCheckin turned over [AD]-[QH] for a virtual race. The [10]-[KC]-[JD] flop smacked both players as ImCheckin hit his broadway straight and FeyDrauter had top two pair but he was left with four outs to a boat. {7S] and [AH] on the turn and river did not improve Feydrauter's two pair and the 13.1 million chip pot went to ImCheckin. Feydrauter checked out in fifth place with the $39,867.63 he dealt for.

ImCheckin had a commanding 13 million chip lead over Mao2007 and the rest of the field, but over the course of several hands saw that lead diminish to dust. Mao2007 dealt the biggest blow in a 15.4 million chip pot as ImCheckin raised to 900,000 from the button to see Mao2007 re-raise to 2.4 million. Both players had similar stacks at this point, ImCheckin elected to shove with [AH]--[7C] and Mao2007 made the call with big slick. Dominated and bleeding is no way to go through a tournament, and unfortunately for ImCheckin no suckout came down the [8D]-[10S]-[AD]-[4H]-[KC] board and the once mighty chip leader was left with a scant 1.2 million. Three hands later with blinds still at 150,000/300,000 ante 30,000 ImCheckin would choose [AS]-[5S] as his Waterloo against annanoplay's pocket nines. The nines held up and ImCheckin signed off with the dealt $39,896.22 in fourth place.

Despite annanoplay and Mao2007 having similar 15 million chip stacks, BulldogsBrad was tenacious enough to hang around for several three-handed hands due to a double up with big slick against Mao2007's [AC]-[10S]. But, the escalating blinds finally caught up to him, as he looked good to double up again against annanoplay. Blinds moving up to 175,000/350,000 ante 35,000, annanoplay shoved from the small blind into BulldogsBrad's big blind and got a call from the resistant-one. Pocket nines for the canine lover and [AS]-[7H] for annanoplay. The ace and the seven would "get there" on the board of [AH]-[5H]-[7S]-[5C]-[6S] and BulldogsBrad would have to take the settlement money of $46,739.68 in third place.

A virtual dead heat as we started heads up play with blinds still at 175,000/350,000 ante 35,000:

Mao2007 (16,104,016 in chips)
annanoplay (17,510,984 in chips)

Much like the recently finished Sunday Warm-up, this heads-up battle would end quickly. After five hands of heads-up play annanoplay was up 17.8 million to Mao2007's 15.8 million as Mao2007 opened the pot for a min raise to 700,000. annanoplay would 3-bet to 2.145 million and get a call from Mao2007 to see the mono-suited flop of [8H]-[9H]-[6H] which annanoplay led out for 3.4 million. Mao2007 responded with a quick "all-in" for his remaining 13.6 million. With middle set and this not being Omaha, annanoplay made the call with his pocket eights as Mao2007 saw the bad news as his top pair-good kicker was needing some kind of running nines, nine-six, or hearts for a split. The [4D] on the turn locked up the tournament win and extra $20,000 for annanoplay as a king cruelly hit the river for Mao2007's useless two pair. Mao2007's chunk of the deal pie was $45,539.21 as he came up just a bit short to annanoplay's winning set of eights and $70,457.26 payday as this month's $1 Million Turbo Takedown champion!

February $1 Million Turbo Takedown
(* part of a six-way deal)
1. annanoplay *$70,457.26
2. Mao2007 *$45,539.21
3. BulldogsBrad *$46,739.68
4. ImCheckin *$39,896.22
5. Feydrauter *$39,867.63
6. Pass_72 *$35,000.00
7. RaineTech $15,000.00
8. xmrstyle $10,000.00
9. Schorsch15 $5,500.00

"I decided to stay home and play the tourney instead," the young grandmother admitted.

Here's the thing. She doesn't put much money online, and when she does, she plays small single table tournaments. With those, she earns Frequent Player Points. Her online balance has never been that much and she is okay with that. After all, one hundred of those FPPs got her into a satellite in which she won her seat to the 5,000 FPP Turbo Takedown. Golf, obviously, was going to have to wait.

Now, just because vballbobbi doesn't put a ton of money online doesn't mean she is clueless at the tables. She's been playing for several years.

"I am tournament coordinator for a small league in my home town," she said. "My husband and I go to Vegas a few times a year and I play in cash games there as well. I don't do too badly!"

She didn't do too badly in January's Turbo Takedown either. And by that, we mean, on the day she was supposed to get in 18 under the Texas sun, she turned 100 FPPs into $100,000.

"My family and friends are amazed that a 'freeroll' has a prize pool as large as the Takedown, and absolutely shocked that I outlasted over 8800 people," she told us. "It was definitely a combination of patience and my favorite poker phrase: 'well timed aggression.' Decent cards at the right times surely didn't hurt!"

Funny thing about winning all that money. As of this moment, vballbobbi couldn't afford to buy into a $5.50 SNG.

"I didn't leave any money online," she said without embarassment. "I wanted to ensure that I took advantage of this windfall. I will go back to my original strategy. I will put in an occasional small deposit and try to turn it into something."

For now, she is paying off some bills, setting aside some money for taxes, helping her inlaws with expenses, and helping her son with student loans.

"If there is enough left, I would love to play in the WSOP Main Event," she said. Then, after a second thought, she added. "Although if PokerStars wants to sponsor me, I would be a great poster girl!"

Either way, we hope to see you at the World Series, vballbobbi, if not before at another final table.

Two big hands, one big winner, and one final table bubble boy. Unfortunately for fra73 his pocket queens could not hold up against the big slick of dark_check86 when the flop showed a king and showed fra73 the door when the board ran out 4d-Jh-Kd-4c-2c.

Here's your Turbo Takedown final table this evening:

Seat 1: Rugs6969 (1354414 in chips)
Seat 2: vballbobbi (5735684 in chips)
Seat 3: AR_GTAm (5344336 in chips)
Seat 4: mikiantimd (1055172 in chips)
Seat 5: dark_check86 (4199359 in chips)
Seat 6: jockel24 (2372603 in chips)
Seat 7: LFISBRTL (1440147 in chips)
Seat 8: jkopp984 (4056835 in chips)
Seat 9: a33bars (1039450 in chips)

mikiantimd would waste no time in double up, no time meaning some players were just readjusting their virtual stools to the new table when he open pushed from the small blind with Ah-6s to be called by dark_check86's Kh-Js. After neither player improved on the 7h-4s-Qh-2c-Qs board, mikiantimd took claim to the first pot of the final table and a healthy 2.1 million chips.

Under ten big blinds and holding a couple of red sevens while the action is folded to you in the cutoff is a great spot to push. a33bars found himself in that spot looking to snag the 216,000 chips in the middle without a fight, but fellow short stack Rugs6969 on the button held pocket nines and made the call while the blinds went to go look at crossword puzzles. No excitement for either player on the 6c-3c-Ks-8s-4h board and a33bars will have $5,500.00 in ninth place to spend, courtesy of his 5,000 FPPs spent this evening to enter.

With AR_GTAm sitting on the big stack at 7.6 million the others at the table got antsy for some action. dark_check86 made it 300,000 to go from UTG+2 with the blinds at 60,000/120,000 ante 12,000 and found a huge customer is jkopp984 who pushed from the button for his 1.4 million chips. The blinds folded back to dark_check86 who made the call with pocket jacks and still had 1.3 million behind. jkopp984 was left looking for some of Team PokerStars' Pro Greg Raymer's presto magic holding 5d-5s. The magic never got started on the board of 8d-7s-8h-Qs-2c and jkopp984's chip disappeared into dark_check86's stack. However $10,000 did magically appear in jkopp984's bankroll courtesy of PokerStars and his eighth place finish.

480,000 to go from Rugs6969 from the cutoff and mikiantimd responded quickly. "All-in". After putting in almost a third of his chips Rugs6969 followed thru with the call creating a 4.1 million chip pot with the blinds still at 60,000/120,000 ante 12,000. mikiantimd's Ac-9s was in the lead versus the Qc-Jd of Rugs6969 and solidified the lead on the 5c-5h-Ad flop. No running queens or jacks came and Rugs6969 was swept from the Turbo Takedown in seventh place earning $15,000 in the process.

After a slow beginning to the final table things heated up as the very next hand saw dark_check86 getting the wrong side of mikiantimd's aggression when mikiantimd pushed 6.1 million chips over the top of vballbobbi's 480,000 chip UTG+2 raise from the button. dark_check86 couldn't find a better spot to send his 4.2 million chips into the middle from small blind holding pocket kings. mikiantimd turned up the ill-timed bluff of Qc-7s, or was it ill-timed? The flop of Qd-7h-8c get mikiantimd the lead and a 2h and Ts later dark_check86 had a $20,000 sixth place bad beat story.

jockel24 would double up his small stack to 2.5 million on the next hand taking his pocket treys over the pocket deuces of mikiantimd.

Two hands later vballbobbi would put a deep hurt on LFISBRTL when he called LFISBRTL's button push from the small blind with Ac-Qs. The call left just $33,150 behind for LFISBRTL'S As-7h. The board stuck with the preflop favorite this time showing Jc-Kc-6c-Jd-2s to ship the 5.9 million chip pot to vballbobbi. A brief double-up the next hand, extended play for LFISBRTL until AR_GTAm took the scraps on the following hand. $25,000.000 was awarded for our fifth place finisher LFISBRTL.

Play finally slowed a bit with jockel24 getting another small double-up but retaining the bottom position until vballbobbi and AR_GTAm took shots at each other. Raising to 480,000 from the cutoff, AR_GTAm had a decision to make when vballbobbi three-bet to 1.2 million from the big blind with blinds at 80,000/160,000 ante 16,000. He chose to call and saw a flop of 2s-8d-9s and both started a raising war which ended up with both of their considerable stacks going into the middle. Pocket kings for vballbobbi and an open ended straight draw with Jh-Tc for AR_GTAm. No straight came from the 9h turn or Ah river and the 13.6 million chip pot was spiked to vballbobbi. AR_GTAm will drive off with $32,500.00 in fourth place.

In rapid succession we found our winner of the $100,000.00 first place prize. First jockel24's small stack found resistance as he shoved from the button for 2.3 million and vballbobbi was waiting for him in the small blind with an insta-call holding pocket jacks. Ah-8c for the hard fighting jockel24, but he ran out of gas in this brawl as the board played out Qs-Qh-Kc-8s-9c to add 4.8 million to vballbobbi's chip lead. For his persistence jockel24 was paid off to the tune of $40,000.00 in third place.

As we went to a very brief heads-up play here's how the stacks stood up (for two whole hands):

Seat 2: vballbobbi (16748186 in chips)
Seat 4: mikiantimd (9849814 in chips)

Vballbobbi took the blinds on the first hand, then with blinds at 80,000/160,000 ante 16,000 both players got really excited at the 7d-8h-6d flop after vballbobbi completed in the small blind. mikiantimd asked "we can't deal or what?" in the raising war while holding top pair (Jc-8s). vballbobbi wasn't having any talk as he shoved in a four bet push with a flopped straight (4s-5d) and got a call from mikiantimd. Drawing dead to a chop or running nine and ten, mikiantimd was the runner-up by the turned Ad and had $60,000.00 coming to him for the runner-up finish.

vballbobbi held the right cards at the right times tonight and walked away with a cool $100,000.00 from a simple buy-in of 5,000 FPPs as the $1 Million Turbo Takedown champion!

Turbo Takedown Results (01-25-09)

1. vballbobbi $100,000.00
2. mikiantimd $60,000.00
3. jockel24 $40,000.00
4. AR_GTAm $32,500.00
5. LFISBRTL $25,000.00
6. dark_check86 $20,000.00
7. Rugs6969 $15,000.00
8. jkopp984 $10,000.00
9. a33bars $5,500.00

Seat 1: pezi2000 (5,844,901 in chips)
Seat 2: BigDennys (2,745,539 in chips)
Seat 3: plattsburgh (1,939,168 in chips)
Seat 4: krissyb24 (3,374,825 in chips)
Seat 5: lexwilly (865,053 in chips)
Seat 6: Shogu (3,359,768 in chips)
Seat 7: joehenry (1,779,972 in chips)
Seat 8: perky264 (5,434,185 in chips)
Seat 9: GKnight00001 (3,252,589 in chips)

lexwilly had to make something happen early and often to get into the deep money at this final table. Something happened early that negated the often, as six hands into the final table with blinds at 60,000/120,000 ante 12,000 lexwilly found himself open pushing his remaining 1,051,053 from middle position with pocket sixes. He got action from perky264 in the cutoff with Ac-7c who called creating the nearly 2.4 million chip pot. Top two flopped for perky264 on the board of 7d-As-3c-Qc-5d leaving lexwilly hanging in ninth place for $5,500 from his 5,000 FPPs spent.

Three hands later plattsburgh, Shogu, and GKnight00001 got into a three-way hand that would leave one person in eighth place. All three checked the flop of 4s-Ks-Kh, and then on the turned 6s, GKnight00001 led out for 240,000 from the big blind. plattsburgh responded with a shove for 1.3 million and Shogu took some ninja cover as GKnight00001 made the call holding just As-3h for the nut flush draw. Seeing the flush draw and not a king made plattsburgh's pocket jacks (Js-Jd) very happy. But the river 3s turned that smile upside down as GKnight00001 held the larger flush and collected the 3.7 million chip pot while $10,000 real cash was shipped to plattsburgh for his eighth-place finish.

Short on chips with ever-growing blinds means you must push when you get a chance. joehenry took that chance when the table folded to his button while holding just 361,972 chips (only three big blinds). perky264 folded in the small blind while GKnight00001 could make a math call with any two, but actually held a decent Ac-Ts. Unfortunately for joehenry he did not have the live cards he was hoping for with Th-9c. A flush board for both players ran out 4c-Kc-Ah-6c-2c but GKnight00001's nut flush toppled the nine kicker flush for joehenry. Slaying another dragon, GKnight00001 knocked off his second opponent and joehenry received $15,000 for his seventh-place finish.

Shogu managed to increase his short-ish stack after netting a nut flush against GKnight00001, knocking him off his steed for once in a 5.1 million chip pot. BigDennys also tried to get out of the short stack hole by putting a squeeze play on perky264's 319,500 chip raise from the cut-off and a call by GKnight00001 on the button. A push of 2.4 million chips from the big blind with hopes to collect the 933,000 in the middle went south in a hurry for BigDennys' Ah-6h as perky264 had 6 million chips behind after making the call with As-Qh. Queen on the flop of 3h-Qs-4c left BigDennys gasping for some runner-runner skillet combo, but the Kc and Jh on the turn and river left BigDennys searching for a grand slam breakfast in sixth place but with an extra $20,000 to tip the third shift waitress with.

Chip deals sour quickly when we just can't all get along. While five-handed the remaining players got the chip-chop numbers but couldn't form a circle of friendship large enough to split up the remaining prize pool. So, onward they played until pezi2000 found himself calling the all-in push of GKnight00001. Both players formed a 5.4 million chip pot with GKnight00001 leaving only 341,523 chips behind with the blinds at 90,000/180,000 and ante of 18,000. Ac-Jh for GKnight00001 was well ahead of pezi2000's Ah-7s as a battle of the zeros was won by the gallant GKnight00001 when the board produced 6d-5s-6c-2h-6h and sent pezi2000 home with $25,000 in fifth place.

krissyb24 was the thorn in the side of the deal talks and that proved to be a costly decision as he got short-stacked with 3.4 million chips and blinds at 90,000/180,000 ante 18,000 decided to pushed those chips from the big blind eliciting calls from button perky264 and small blind GKnight00001. With 11 million chips in the middle both perky264 and GKnight00001 checked down the board of Kh-Qd-Ad-Jh-9d to reveal GKnight00001's pocket black jacks for the set. krissyb24 mucked his hand without showing and was awarded fourth place, good for $32,500.

Shogu would gain some chips for GKnight00001 with a Ac-Kc vs. Ad-6s showdown that chopped into GKnight00001's stack and gave Shogu 8.3 million chips with the blinds escalating to 100,000/200,000 ante 20,000. Three-handed poker would be played for over 30 hands until GKnight00001 took a couple of nicks to his armor and was blinded down to 2.3 million when perky264 raised to 489,500 from the button and GKnight00001 responded from the small blind with a three-bet to 1.4 million. perky264's final answer? Let's play. They formed a 7.7 million chip pot, Kd-Jh for perky264 and Ah-2h for GKnight00001. GKnight00001 looked well on his way back to the round table with the 6c-6h-5d flop, but was sent to the dungeon as the Jc fell on the turn and no ace 9c on the river. $40,000 to save a fair maiden was transferred to our third-place finisher GKnight00001.

perky264 would start heads up play with 19.5 million to Shogu's nine million as the two had some wiggle room to play for a while and still no deal in place. The two traded blinds for over 20 hands, but perky264 got the bigger pots as he sliced at the ninja's stack until he pushed all-in from the button with 4.7 million chips left. perky264 with 23.7 million had enough to safely cover and made the call with Kd-Qd. With As-3c for Shogu the race was short and sweet for this month's $1 Million Turbo Takedown champion. 5h-Kc-2c gave perky264 a big lead but three aces and four fours were out there for Shogu to collect the 9.7 million in the middle.

The ninja left in a cloud of smoke after the 6s and 9d fell on the turn and river handing the victory to perky264.

Here's the final money tally with no deals, perky264 snagged the entire $100,000!

December $1 Million Turbo Takedown

1. perky264 $100,000
2. Shogu $60,000
3. GKnight00001 $40,000
4. krissyb24 $32,500
5. pezi2000 $25,000
6. BigDennys $20,000
7. joehenry $15,000
8. plattsburgh $10,000
9. lexwilly $5,500

Most people would.

The $1,000,000 Turbo Takedown is a complete freeroll for those wanting a whole lotta something for nothing as those 5,000 FPPs can get turned into some serious cash as a total of 4,000 players took home at least $90.00 tonight. With 9,746 taking the starting line tonight, you only had to beat a little over half the field to cash! The nine remaining after the six hours of carnage were going home with no less then $5,500. Again, no buy-in, just playing your favorite SnGs, MTTs, and ring games could net you these potential bankroll changing amounts.

Here are those lucky nine for tonight’s Turbo Takedown which was set after cnew27 said “see you later” when his Ad-Td out ran Gameo’s pockets sixes to set the final table below:

Seat 1: RCT355spyder (2360680 in chips)
Seat 2: Buckyaw (3248891 in chips)
Seat 3: koolie222 (3950401 in chips)
Seat 4: rivermanl (3161454 in chips)
Seat 5: DJTACO (1922851 in chips)
Seat 6: Bulldogs2002 (3042670 in chips)
Seat 7: abschnitt (5067119 in chips)
Seat 8: Higote (3019153 in chips)
Seat 9: cnew27 (3464781 in chips)

The first big pot of the final table went to DJTACO who’s pocket sevens were too much for the big slick of Bulldogs2002 and the four million chip pot was shipped after the 9c-4c-5d-9s-Qh board ran out. Bulldogs2002 covered by 762,819 but with the blinds at 60,000/120,000 ante 12,000 he would need to make up some ground quickly. Just three hands later he tangled against DJTACO again, but this time there was no race as Bulldogs2002 held the pocket sevens but DJTACO held pocket kings which held up on the Td-6s-5d-Qs-Ad board. Its not the $100,000 he wanted but $5,500.00 will buy a bone or two for Bulldogs2002’s ninth place finish.

Action, action, action, six hands later koolie222 raised from the small blind to 420,000 and rivermanl in the big blind re-raised to 1.1 million. koolie222 responded with a 4-bet all-in and rivermanl found an easy call with pocket kings (Kd-Ks) but his tournament life was on the line as koolie222 flipped up Ah-3c and covered by 1.3 million. The all-club 2c-8c-Jc flop extended more outs to koolie222, the 6h turn was safe, but the 7c river sent the Supernova Elite rivermanl home for the holidays in eighth place. The $10,000.00 for rivermanl will help him recoup those 5,000 FPPs in about 15 minutes.

As stated, the action did not stop there as four hands later it was cnew27’s turn to make something happen when abschnitt limped on the button into his big blind. Higote in the small blind got out of the way and the flop came down 9d-5c-Qc. A bet of 320,000 by cnew27 was min-raised to 640,000 by abschnitt. “2.6 million chips” was the response by cnew27’s 3-bet and abschnitt made the call with slowplayed black aces. The bet by cnew27 was a value one, as he flipped up top two (9c-Qs). abschnitt would need a five or one of the last two aces to reclaim the lead, and he got it as the 5h fell on the turn. The rivered the boat with the Ad provided salt in cnew27’s wound. For the post flop bad beat, cnew27 took home $15,000.00 in seventh place.

Losing with the best hand when the chips go in is always tough to take. koolie222 found himself staring down an all diamond board of 9d-8d-Kd while facing a bet of 840,000 from Higote. With 2.8 million chips left and blinds at 70,000/140,000 ante 14,000 he shoved with his set of nines and Higote made the call with As-Qd leaving just 330,000 chips behind. The flush filled with the 7d on the turn, but koolie222’s boat did not. Right decision, wrong result nets $20,000 for koolie222 in sixth place.

Higote found himself sitting with a decision after completing the small blind and facing an all-in 2.4 million raise by RCT355spyder with the blinds at 80,000/160,000 ante 16,000. Calling was almost half his stack, but it was the right one as RCT355spyder flipped up 7d-Tc to Higote’s Qs-Th. The board 2h-5s-9h-Qh-Kc did not produce a suckout as RCT355spyder crawled out with $25,000 in fifth place money.

Call it ESP, call it poker savant, but call it a win for abschnitt as there was heavy betting between him and DJTACO as abschnitt 3-bet DJTACO from the small blind to one million and DJTACO made the call to see a flop of 2h-Qh-Qc. Bet 600,000 from DJTACO, min raise from abschnitt and another flat call. Turn brought the Js and two checks from the players. A 4s on the river prompted a 1.9 million chip shove from DJTACO, abschnitt sniffed out the rotten meat under the cheese, sour cream, salsa, and lettuce to find an ace high bluff, which made his pocket three good for the 8.3 million chip pot. DJTACO took $32,500.00 in fourth place for a new turntable with a side of tortilla shells.

The very next hand abschnitt found himself all-in as he shoved his newly acquired 8.2 million chips into the middle on the button with the blinds bumping up to 100,000/200,000 ante 20,000. Higote in the small blind also found two cards he liked, as he made the call leaving just 423,365 behind.

Higote: Ah-Ks
abschnitt: 6d-6s

They were racing for serious money as the difference between second and third was $20,000. The race mostly ended on the Tc-2s-Kd flop, leaving abschnitt with just two outs as Higote's pair of kings took a big lead. 4c and Jd on the turn and river left abschnitt to watch the 17.4 million chip pot ship to Higote and $40,000.00 in third place money came his way.

Heads-up play between Higote and Buckyaw started out with the following chip count:

Higote: 17,767,007
Buckyaw: 11,470,993

Buckyaw would get the first double-up as he raised from the button to 600,000 and got a call from Higote to see the flop of Jc-Ad-Ac. The 800,000 chip follow-through bet was also called by Higote as was the 1.2 million turn bet by Buckyaw. The 7.9 million chip river shove by Buckyaw was also called as Higote was left to look at Buckyaw’s flopped trip aces against his pair of three with the nut flush draw that didn’t get there. This swung the chip lead to Buckyaw 21 million to Higote’s eight million.

Higote would get those chips back when his pocket kings would survive Buckyaw’s flop push at a 5h-4s-3d board. Buckyaw flipped over 8d-5d for the top pair but got no further help from the 6h and Kd and Higote would take the lead 19.3 million to Buckyaw’s 9.8 million.

Over forty hands later Higote would end the back and forth heads up battle when Buckyaw took a swipe at a flop of 2s-3c-Js board with 8s-9s and his remaining six million chips. But, Higote was going nowhere with his two pair (2d-3d) as he made the call with the small suited connector that connected. 7c produced a few more out but 5h locked up the $100,000 and November Turbo Takedown win for Higote, as Buckyaw fought hard but came up a spade short in the end taking home $60,000 as the runner up.

Here are the results below:

November $1,000,000 Turbo Takedown Results
1. Higote $100,000.00
2. Buckyaw $60,000.00
3. abschnitt $40,000.00
4. DJTACO $32,500.00
5. RCT355spyder $25,000.00
6. koolie222 $20,000.00
7. cnew27 $15,000.00
8. rivermanl $10,000.00
9. Bulldogs2002 $5,500.00

The $1 Million Turbo Takedown once again is paying out big money for those FPPs from your hard work on the tables and after six and half hours these final nine players will be taking home the biggest slices of that $1,000,000 pie.

Here’s how the final table shaped up:

Seat 1: fatimato (566306 in chips)
Seat 2: Gefallener (4637248 in chips)
Seat 3: ukom777 (4996824 in chips)
Seat 4: elitesauce (1773932 in chips)
Seat 5: greener_tree (5842055 in chips)
Seat 6: el10delajuve (640128 in chips)
Seat 7: Hip O'Crazy (4047941 in chips)
Seat 8: Big Pig 63 (2123232 in chips)
Seat 9: MikeG5 (1274334 in chips)

el10delajuve wasted no time in finding a double up. With the blinds for the final table starting out at 35,000/70,000 ante 7,000 he took his black pocket jacks (Js-Jc) all-in pre flop against the big stack of ukom777 and managed to win the race and double up to 1.3 million in chips.

On a short stack and needing a double up, fatimato decided to min raise from UTG to get those juicy blinds while only holding 655,306 in chips with blinds at 40,000/80,000 ante 8,000. But, Big Pig 63 had big ideas and pumped it up to 400,000 in the small blind after it folded around to him. Faced with a decision for all his chips fatimato took the plunge with Jd-Qc and found himself behind Big Pig 63’s Ah-Th while creating a 1.4 million chip pot. The two pair on the board of 6d-5c-5s-6h-7c helped no one as Big Pig 63’s ace kicker won the hand and fatimato exited with $5,500.00 in ninth place.

elitesauce opened in middle position for 270,000 with blinds escalating to 45,000/90,000 ante 9,000 while holding nearly five million in chips and Big Pig 63 decided to give him some action by calling in the big blind. After flop a flop of 9h-6s-5d Big Pig 63 checked and elitesauce bet 360,000 as Big Pig 63 oinked back for a check-raise all-in for his remaining 1.5 million. Not fazed by the big bet, elitesauce calmly called with his red aces (Ah-Ad) as Big Pig 63 was left holding only a pair of fives with 4d-5s. The aggression backfired on the barnyard favorite as the board ran out Ts and 7c to give the 3.7 million chip pot to elitesauce and sent Big Pig 63 back to the holding pen with $10,000.00 for his eighth place finish.

el10delajuve found a pair of kings in his hand in the cutoff, perfect for the short stack with only 720,512 chip left and blinds at 50,000/100,000 ante 10,000. He correctly open-pushed while Hip O’Crazy found enough sanity to isolate him on the button with his pocket pair of fives (5h-5c). Leaving 4.3 million behind, Hip O’Crazy had enough to take the hit, but sometimes crazy works as the board ran to his advantage as a four flush hit the river on the board of Ah-Jd-4h-7h-Th. The bad beat story was worth $15,000.00 for el10delajuve in seventh place.

Big pair, meet bigger pair. Gefallener found himself on the wrong side of that equation after 3-betting greener_tree’s 875,000 chip UTG raise on the button as the blinds got out of the way. greener_tree responded with a shove for his remaining 5 million in chips. Gefallener made the call with his pocket jacks (Jh-Jd) only to see the bad news in the form of greener_tree’s pocket kings (Kc-Kh). The board ran out without any face cards 3h-8d-8s-9d-7s and Gefallener received $20,000.00 in sixth place.

After several hands which saw slices of greener_tree’s chip lead go to ukom777’s pocket aces and another slice for MikeG5 river four flush while dominated Ad-5c versus Ac-Qs The hand kept MikeG5 in the tournament long enough to be a part of the deal talks as the players checked with the PokerStars staff to discuss deal. The players decided to draft a new book on poker negotiations in the chat box for nearly ten minutes, but they still fell through as greener_tree was not willing to deal.

When greener_tree knocked out ukom777 in fifth place it looked like an even better decision to drop the chop talks. Picking up pocket kings (Kh-Ks) UTG again while raising to 485,000 with blinds at 90,000/180,000 ante 18,000 greener_tree was looking for action and found it with ukom777 who shoved for 5.5 million from the small blind with missus slick (Ah-Qh). The board 8d-Jd-6h-2d-4c put out a diamond flush possibility, right color, wrong suit for ukom777 as he earned $25,000 in fifth place.

Deal talks remained silent while MikeG5 got in his remaining 1.5 million chips in the middle from the small blind with blinds still at 90,000/180,000 ante 18,000 having only elitesauce in his way for the 342,000 sitting in the middle. After a slight pause, elitesauce took his Ad-7d to war making the call while leaving three million behind. MikeG5 found himself behind with Kd-5h and did not improve on the 8s-2d-2c-9c-8c board. Fourth place was worth $32,500.00 to MikeG5 as chop talk began again.

After several offers from greener_tree using his double stack chip lead on Hip O’Crazy and elitesauce as the bargaining weight, they came to an agreement:

greener_tree $84,000
Hip O’Crazy $48,000
elitesauce $48,000

As with all the big Sunday tournaments, an amount was set aside for the winner. So, after the deal was broken these three played on for the remaining $20,000 of the prize pool.

greener_tree had to be smiling wide after the deal was cut as he made nearly $44,000 when his lead was chopped into after several three-handed play. His final hand came with blinds at 125,000/250,000 ante 25,000 as Hip O’Crazy folded from the button and elitesauce came in for a 750,000 from the small blind. greener_tree pushed his remaining 5.7 million chips as elitesauce called and covered by 1.9 million.

greener_tree: Qh-Jc
elitesauce: Ad-Ks

The flop of 5c-Qd-7h turned the advantage to greener_tree for the 12 million chip pot, and the 3h on the turn left elitesauce looking for six outs. Team PokerStars pro Barry Greenstein’s book “Ace on the River” came in handy here, as the ace of spades hit on the river sending greener_tree to play with his newly minted $84,000 from the deal for his third place finish.

The final two would start the heads-up match for the remaining $20,000 nearly even with 14 million for elitesauce versus the 11 million for Hip O’Crazy with blinds at 125,000/250,000 ante 25,000.

The heads-up match would be a series of blinds steals by both players for nearly twenty hands then Hip O’Crazy snagged a seven million chip pot post flop to take 16 million to 8 million chip lead for five hands until the following big hand turned the tides towards the winner:

elitesauce completed the additional 150,000 chips from the button as Hip O’Crazy liked his cards enough to raise to 2.1 million. elitesauce then 3-bet all-in to 11.8 million and Hip O’Crazy made the call leaving two million behind.

Hip O'Crazy: Ac-Td
elitesauce: Th-Tc

The dominating lead pre-flop would not be overturned as the board ran out 6h-8d-Qc-Qh-Jd giving elitesauce the 23 million chip pot and a 11:1 chip heads-up clip lead with the blinds at 150,000/300,000 ante 30,000. After doubling up two hands later, Hip O’Crazy would succumb to elitesauce’s enormous chip lead as he called elitesauce’s button push with four million in chips with 8d-Qd and found himself dominated again against elitesauce’s Qh-Js. As the board turned, it made the river interesting by putting up two diamonds: Ks-9h-7d-Kd, but no diamond nor an eight on the river as the 6h fell and elitesauce showed who was the 1337 (that’s elite for those not up with geek lingo) player in taking home the extra $20,000 for being this month’s $1 Million Turbo Takedown winner!

Join us again next month and see if you too can turn 5,000 FPPs into a possible six-figure score!

October $1 Million Turbo Takedown Results
(based on three-way deal)

1. elitesauce $68,000
2. Hip O’Crazy $48,000
3. greener_tree $84,000
4. MikeG5 $32,500
5. ukom777 $25,000
6. Gefallener $20,000
7. el10delajuve $15,000
8. Big Pig 63 $10,000
9. fatimato $5,500

Eliminations came at a rapid clip. At the one-hour break, 6,452 players remained. Player sacc316 assumed the chip lead for a while during the second hour, and by the end of Level 9 the cash bubble burst. With 6,742 eliminations in 90 minutes, that meant more than 75 players hitting the rail per minute! It would take less than half an hour to lose another 2,000 players and reach the next pay jump. At the two-hour break, 1,690 players remained, with goleafsgo96 at the top of the leaderboard.

By Level 15, early chip leader sacc316 would be gone (in 1,250th) and the field shrunk to 1,000. At the four-hour break, goleafsgo96 was out (in 151st) and less than 100 remained. With 50 players left, Johnnina had built a large chip lead, moving up past 2.8 million, almost twice what second place toreyoops had. As the field whittled down to 30, Johnnina still had the lead, though WhooooKidd had started to gain ground. Just as he was about to take the chip lead, WhooooKidd took a big hit in a strange hand versus mirror99. Action had folded around to WhooooKidd who put in a standard-sized raise from the button. Then mirror99 shoved all in from the blinds for almost 1.4 million. WhooooKidd called, showing Ad-Jd, and was surprised to see mirror99 turn over Kd-2s. Surprise quickly turned to indignation, though, when a king flopped and WhooooKidd couldn’t catch up. With the help of that 2.8 million-chip pot, mirror99 would be chip leader with 27 left.

Johnnina would be back on top with 18 left, with mirror99 in second, and WhooooKidd sneaking back into contention in 5th. However Johnnina would lose most of that big stack when pocket sixes failed to outrun HooBangin’s Big Slick in an all in confrontation. Chip leader for much of the early evening, Johnnina would be eliminated short of the final table in 13th.

Not long afterwards, HooBangin would knocked out CockneyCall in 10th. CockneyCall had shoved all in from the small blind with pocket fours, but HooBangin was waiting for him in the big blind with Ks-Kh. The cowboys held up, and thanks to that hand HooBangin would take the chip lead to the final table:

Seat 1: moozzer22 -- 2,909,024
Seat 2: toreyoops -- 2,241,046
Seat 3: WhooooKidd -- 3,591,293
Seat 4: doucheburger -- 2,480,322
Seat 5: eldie2 -- 4,101,418
Seat 6: mirror99 -- 3,991,362
Seat 7: matkillers23 -- 5,298,821
Seat 8: HooBangin -- 5,876,650
Seat 9: QTgirlE3 -- 1,736,064

WhooooKidd looked like a possible contender here to perhaps take down the Takedown, but he’d end up being the first player eliminated from the final table. After about a dozen hands at the final table, players had reached Level 42 (blinds 70,000/140,000, antes 14,000). HooBangin raised to 325,000 from middle position and WhooooKidd called from the small blind. The flop came 7h-4h-As. WhooooKidd checked, HooBangin bet 560,000, then WhooooKidd check-raised all in for a bit more than 3.7 million. HooBangin snap-called, showing 7s-7c for the flopped set, well ahead of WhooooKidd’s Ah-Qh. The turn was the 8s and the river the 2d, and WhooooKidd was out in 9th.

About 15 hands later, HooBangin would claim another victim, this time the player on his left, QTgirlE3. The table had folded to HooBangin who raised to 340,000 in the cutoff, and QTgirlE3 reraised all in for 1,126,064 from the button. The blinds got out of the way, and HooBangin made the call, showing Js-Jh. QTgirlE3 had Ts-Td. The board ran out As-7d-6h-9c-2s, and in this, the last hand before the seven-hour break, QTgirlE3 was bounced in 8th.

When play resumed, HooBangin had a sizable chip lead, with his more than 11.6 million putting him well ahead of his nearest foes, mirror99 (5.2 million) and matkillers23 (5.0 million). About 20 minutes later, eldie2 open-raised to 720,000 from the button, and matkillers23 reraised all in for 2,526,821 from the big blind. eldie2 made the call, showing 9s-9c. matkillers23 turned over Kh-Ks. Looked like a good chance to double up for mattkillers23, until the flop came 7c-4s-9h. No king came to rescue him, and mattkillers23 was out in 7th.

HooBangin would resume the role of table assassin soon afterwards by knocking out toreyoops in 6th. A series of raises and reraises meant toreyoops had his entire stack of 1.34 million in the middle with Qs-Jd, not such a good spot to be in against HooBangin’s pocket rockets. The flop came Ts-Ah-9c, giving HooBangin a set but toreyoops a chance at a straight. But the 7h on the turn and the Qc on the river didn’t help, and we were five-handed. Six hands later, moozzer22 had slipped below the million-chip mark, and decided to push all in with pocket fives. eldie2 called with As-Kh, and won the race when the board came 9h-Ks-4c-Tc-Td.

With four players left, HooBangin began pushing his advantage, and soon had 17 million chips -- more than half of the chips in play. eldie2 was nearest with a little less than 8 million, with mirror99 and doucheburger sitting on the short stacks. doucheburger would double up once through HooBangin, spiking a trey on the river to with with pocket threes against HooBangin’s pocket fives.

At that point, eldie2 proposed the remaining four talk chop, and just as the players began to discuss it, eldie2 would suddenly lose most of her stack to mirror99 in most unfortunate fashion. On a flop of Js-7h-Qc, eldie2 bet 750,000, mirror99 check-raised to 2 million, and eldie2 called. When the turn came the 3s, mirror99 promptly shoved all in for 2,472,316 and eldie2 made the call. mirror99 showed Td-Tc, while eldie2 had Ah-Jd. But a ten came on the river, giving the 11.2 million pot to mirror99 and leaving eldie2 with just 830,947. mirror99 would finish the job a dozen hands later when his pocket sevens outran eldie2’s Ad-Th, knocking eldie2 out in 4th.

doucheburger would double up again through HooBangin, bringing the three remaining players’ stack sizes closer to one another. The subject of a deal was proposed anew, and negotiations began.

1. mirror99 -- 12,582,473
2. HooBangin -- 12,280,239
3. doucheburger -- 7,363,288

A “chip chop” was quickly agreed upon by all three players (see details below), with $20,000 left on the table for the eventual winner. Shortly afterwards, mirror99 began putting the pressure on both of his opponents with his frequent all in reraises forcing them to fold. By the time the eight-hour break rolled around, mirror99 had increased his lead with 17.74 million, to HooBangin’s 8.49 million and doucheburger’s 5.99 million.

During the break, mirror99 revealed that this was something of a momentous tournament for him, not just because of his success today.

mirror99: kinda funny - i made a commitment that this would be my last game of online poker - i have had the most outrageous luck - nice way to go!

Others lol’d, then two hands later, it was all over.

On the first hand back, mirror99 raised to 2 million from the button, HooBangin reraised all in from the small blind, and mirror99 called. HooBangin showed Ah-7h, while mirror99 held Ad-Qc. The board came 9d-3d-5c-2d-8c, and HooBangin was out in 3rd.

Then, on the very next hand -- the first of heads up -- doucheburger open-raised his last 5,508,801 from the small blind/button, and mirror99 called. doucheburger turned over Kh-7s, well behind mirror99’s Kd-9h. The flop of Jc-5h-7d was good for doucheburger, bringing him the needed seven. But the 9s gave the lead back to mirror99, and the Jd sealed it. Nice way to go, indeed!

Congratulations to mirror99 and all of those cashing in today’s $1 Million Turbo Takedown.

PokerStars $1 Million Turbo Takedown Final Table Results:
(amounts reflect three-way chop, leaving $20K for eventual winner)

1. mirror99 -- $83,426.69
2. doucheburger -- $53,709.34
3. HooBangin -- $62,863.97
4. eldie2 -- $32,500.00
5. moozzer22 -- $25,000.00
6. toreyoops -- $20,000.00
7. matkiller23 -- $15,000.00
8. QTgirlE3 -- $10,000.00
9. WhooooKidd -- $5,500.00

Seat 1: riffery (4893590 in chips)
Seat 2: HipsterDufes (1801996 in chips)
Seat 3: kipa58 (5752600 in chips)
Seat 4: roybaauw (4932239 in chips)
Seat 5: nsewell4 (7700895 in chips)
Seat 6: gambler2k4 (2240724 in chips)
Seat 7: jitterbug777 (1868552 in chips)
Seat 8: Badboy Orrie (3107026 in chips)
Seat 9: papa333 (3588378 in chips)

Riffery made the first big move of the final table after tabling pocket Kings to dominate nsewell4’s AKo. After a board of blandness, riffery’s newly acquired nine million chip stack was good enough for a solid lead over second place kipa58 early in the final table with blinds at $50,000/$100,000 ante $10,000. Almost like watching a well oiled hockey power play, the disks of money were moving swiftly across the felt for nearly the first hour of the final table the chips merely shifted from side to side as riffery’s stack was depleted a little, then roybaauw who got several chips from riffery placed those newly acquired chips in the stack of gambler2K4 and HipsterDufes on back-to-back all ins preflop.

Sometimes the best hand pre-flop does win but takes a little while longer to get there. Riffery’s under the gun raise was called by roybaauw while everyone else got out of the way. A flop of Qd 3s 6s got riffery to check to roybaauw who calmly put out a $600,000 chip bet leaving $2.8 million behind. Aggressive the entire final table riffery answered with all-in shove for his chip leading stack of $7.4 million. But, roybaauw saw thru the huge check raise and found his QcJs well ahead of riffery’s AcJc. The seven of diamonds on the turn left just three cards to dodge, but roybaauw’s agility to dance around those outs on the river wasn’t good enough as the Ace of the diamonds spiked and added to riffery’s chip lead. $5,500.00 for FPPs is points well-spent by our ninth place finisher roybaauw.

Gambler2K4 was slowly acquiring chips in the first hour as he called raise from kipa58 with KcQc. The 2s Kd 7s flop found no one’s attention as they both checked. The Queen of spades on the turn gave Gambler2K4 top two pair, and when kipa58 checked to him a $400,000 bet went into the middle. Kipa58 answered with a check-raise all-in which gambler2K4 quickly called only to see the one-outer on the turn hit for kipa58’s pocket queens. Still alive with two kings left in the deck, gambler2K4 watched the four of diamonds fall and left us with ten grand in his bankroll for poker, craps, roulette, or whatever gambler2K4 chooses to make his next wager on while finishing in eighth place.

The massive stacks of kipa58 and riffery pushed the other players to jockey for position among themselves. HipsterDufes tried to breach the solid wall of chips having riffery on his right and kipa58 on his left by push his remaining $1.8 million in chip with blinds at $80,000/$160,000 ante $16,000 into kipa58’s big blind. HipsterDufes’ Kh9h wasn’t thrilled to see the call sign flashing as kipa58 turned over pocket threes for a race. Two hearts on the flops looked great, but a closer look told a sad tale as the three of hearts gave kipa58 a set of threes and a commanding lead. No flush filled on the turn and river and HipsterDufes will have an extra $15,000 in seventh place to keep up with the latest fashion trends.

Out of the shorter stacks nsewell4 has made the biggest moves to challenge the big stacked players to his right. His efforts were helped after racing pocket Tens versus the all-in from Badboy Orrie (Boston Bruins fan in the Netherlands perhaps?) who held AKo. A coordinated flop of 6s 7h 8d helped no one, two of spades on the turn had nsewell4 looking further up the pay scale, and the Queen of clubs on the river sent Mr. Orr flying to the ice but alas no goal this time as in a highlight reel shot shown time and time again on Sportscenter. Badboy Orrie gets $20,000 for his efforts in sixth place tonight.

Dancing is not a forte of mine, but Jitterbug777 literally tap danced his up the pay ladder with steals and catching a few double ups with his short stack. All songs end eventually and the sweet footed Jitterbug777 had to face the music with big slick versus kipa58’s pocket twos all-in pre flop with his remaining $1.5 million in chips and blinds at $90,000/$180,000 ante $18,000. With a board of 9c Js Jh Qs, Jitterbug had several outs to counterfeit kipa58’s deuces but the 3d hit the river and his great short stack play earned him $25,000 in fifth place.

With less then ten big blinds papa333 found Ah6h in the small blind pushing his remaining $938,396 in chips with only riffery standing in his way of gathering some much needed chips pre-flop. But, the cagey riffery held pocket fours to make the easy call. Much like the previous bust-out hand the pocket pair withheld a minefield of outs as 5h 3h 8s was laid out on the flop. But, papa333 could not find any help to give the kids in his hand on the turn and river. $32,500 in fourth place money is good for a year or two of college for papa333’s kids at home, depending on the new dorm room costs of course.

Then the two big stacks became one. Several preflop raising wars broke out during three handed play with kipa58 coming over the top of riffery and visa versa. Finally riffery decided to stand up to the other chip bully and they played the biggest pot of the tournament after some preflop betting and all the money into the pot on the turn of 7c 8d 7d Th

Riffery: Qs Qc
Kipa58: Kh Td

Riffery dodged the trips and two pair outs on the river and banked the massive $21 million chip pot. Later they would tangle again, but this time the money went in preflop as kipa58 shoved his remaining $6.4 million in chips holding AJo and riffery made the call with pocket tens. It’s the night for pocket pairs as riffery’s hand held up and he would take a 6:1 chip advantage into heads-up play against nsewell4. The third place finisher, kipa58, will enjoy $40,000 for his play tonight.

With blinds at $150,000/$300,000 ante $30,000 nsewell4 managed to double up off riffery and chopped his large chip lead down to 2.5:1 but riffery’s constant button raises and re-raises have made this heads-up battle seemingly one-sided. One stretch saw the chip leader take down nearly ten hands in a row with only two of those even seeing a flop. Riffery’s aggression would gain all the chips lost during the double up, and then some while expanding his lead to a 10:1 margin.

Nsewell4 was down to his last $3 million in chips while finding big slick all ready to do battle as he shoved his remaining chips against riffery’s big blind. Riffery called with KsQc but the huge chip lead could take the wound. First aid was not needed as the flop showed 6s Qd Th turning nsewell4 into the player needing three outs. The inside broadway straight never filled and Nsewell4 will receive a sizable $60,000 as a consolation prize. Showing once again that aggression wins tournaments, riffery goes to valuetown and receives $100,000 for his PokerStars Million Dollar Turbo Takedown win!

PokerStars $1 Million Turbo Takedown Final Table Results

1. riffery (Netherlands) $100,000.00
2. nsewell4 (United States) $60,000.00
3. kipa58 (Latvia) $40,000.00
4. papa333 (United States) $32,500.00
5. jitterbug777 (United States) $25,000.00
6. Badboy Orrie (Netherlands) $20,000.00
7. HipsterDufes (Canada) $15,000.00
8. gambler2k4 (United States) $10,000.00
9. roybaauw (Netherlands) $5,500.00

With dav3477’s shortstack going down in tenth place, the final nine was set.

Seat 1: 2 irmaos (4174965 in chips)
Seat 2: dickson007 (5854383 in chips)
Seat 3: stortv (3686318 in chips)
Seat 4: iupeli (6372889 in chips)
Seat 5: cRRusher (2077120 in chips)
Seat 6: hustler730 (2307848 in chips)
Seat 7: Chaesi (4635706 in chips)
Seat 8: YWEplay (1597058 in chips)
Seat 9: Bratcat (1051713 in chips)

With blinds at $70000/$140000 ante $14000, the short stacked Bratcat was the first to seek a double up, and found it against 2 irmaos when Bratcat picked off the re-steal with A2o versus Q9o for 2 irmaos. The board brought a bunch of broadway cards but none that changed the preflop advantage and Bratcat was back in contention.

Bratcat wasn’t done there, with a few preflop steals he chipped up enough to be able to do some real damage. On two consecutive hands he sent players to the rail. The first victim was stortv who found AQo on the button and raced off his chips versus Bratcat’s pocket eights. With a 2d 8c 4h, stortv was down to a runner runner wheel to escape the flopped set. A king on the turn gave stortv $5,500.00 for his ninth place effort.

The very next hand YWEplay thought his pocket jacks would provide a much needed double up while one off under the gun, but found himself well behind the pocket queens of Bratcat. A set for both players by the turn left YWEplay hoping for the miracle jack on the river. Unfortunately the river card was not paint but $10,000 for YWEplay’s eighth place finish should boost his hourly poker earnings.

Starting dead last in chips meant Bratcat just had a little more work to do. By eliminating the eighth place finishers he wasn’t finished. Pocket nines are a favorite for certain 11 time World Series of Poker bracelet holder, and while making quads versus seventh place finisher iupeli, Bratcat might learn to like them as well. Another victim of AQo at the final table, iupeli quickly found himself behind a flopped set on a Kh 8c 9c board needing running cards for a straight, the turn brought no life and the fourth nine on the river just rubbed it in. The aussie iupeli can feel good about the $15,000.00 he gets to take home for his seventh place finish. Maybe he can join a fellow aussie and Team PokerStars Pro Joe Hachem in next year’s WSOP?

The extremely aggressive 2 irmaos found himself staring down a sizable call for his remaining three million in chips. A button raise from Bratcat, 2 irmaos called in the small blind, only to have dickson007 fire out a squeeze push from the big blind. Bratcat got out of the way and 2 irmaos made the call. His pockets eights would usually be a decent starting hand while down to six players, but dickson007’s pocket queens made a sizable mountain to overcome. With the board running out without changing the preflop advantage, 2 irmaos took in $20,000 for his 5,000 FPPs in sixth place.

After Bratcat cooled down a bit, it was Chaesi’s turn to take some chips and dash some dreams of the $100,000 payday. With blinds at $100,000/$200,000 antes $20,000 and only ten big blinds left hustler730 tried to steal Chaesi’s big blind from the small blind with KTo. Chaesi’s A4o was enough to make the call as hustler730 did not have an extra king or ten up his sleeve when the board ran out in Chaesi’s favor. $25,000 in fifth place will help hustler730 find a new car bring his ladies around in.

cRRusher only found a few spots to play at the final table, and with pocket tens on the button it looked like a great spot to take some chips off dickson007 raising behind. Pocket Aces are tough to get a person to fold preflop, and cRRusher’s preflop disadvantage versus dickson007’s rockets did not find a third ten on the board. Adding five figures ones bankroll is always nice, the $32,500.00 banked by CRRusher’s fourth place finish should help him enjoy a couple more MTT’s at PokerStars in the years to come.

All good things come to an end, bachelor parties, a cool drink poolside while in Vegas, and for Bratcat a run of cards at this final table. A board of 8h 3d 4c 3s and facing a three million chip raise of his 1.25 million chip bet from dickson007 while holding a third trey in his with Kc 3h dreams of a double up were probably dancing around, until after his shove and a call by dickson007 showed him the bad news. The fourth trey was sitting in dickson007’s hand with an ace kicker. No king on the river for Bratcat meant $40,000 for third place and a $34,500 improvement from his starting final table short stack.

Heads up play between Chaesi and dickson007 started fairly even in chips with dickson007 holding 17.7 million to Chaesi’s 14 million. Dickson007 initiated chop talks but Chaesi had no reply and the two traded chips for a while about ten hands. After the chip trades and another attempt at chop talks, dickson007 decided to use some tricks from Q’s laboratory and won the final five hands of the tournament. Taking two hands preflop, then another post flop, dickson007’s nut flush made on the river in a 17 million chip pot left Chaesi with 3.5 million in chip and mucking his cards as fast as the interface would allow.

Chaesi received QJo on the button the very next hand and with blinds at $150,000/$300,000 antes $30,000 he shoved his remaining chips into the pot. Dickson007 turned over A9o after quickly calling, and an ace on the flop quickly chilled the coin flip, but a ten on the turn would open up straight possibilities that were closed just a quickly by the 5 on the river. Chaesi will be able to take his $60,000 for second place back to his small town in Switzerland while dickson007 is this month’s Turbo Takedown champion!

While you could use those FPPs for the great merchandise from the PokerStars FPP store, I think dickson007 is glad he used 5,000 of them for a few hours of cards and the $100,000 that come with being the last one with chips.

Here are the final table payouts. Congrats to all 4,000 players who cashed!

1. dickson007 - $100,000.00
2. Chaesi - $60,000.00
3. Bratcat - $40,000.00
4. CRRusher - $32,500.00
5. hustler730 - $25,000.00
6. 2 irmaos - $20,000.00
7. iupeli - $15,000.00
8. YWEplay - $10,000.00
9. stortv - $5,500.00