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Poker News Round-up: Week #25 PoY leader Ville Wahlbeck It’s really all been happening at the Rio these past few days. Last week we saw how Ville Wahlbeck was left needing another big result to reclaim top spot in the player of the year race after his first and third places were bettered by the two victories of Brock Parker. Well it didn’t take him long to post another big one when the $10,000 no limit deuce to seven lowball offered a decent chance of another final table due to having just 96 people enter. Roland de Wolfe led the pack in this event after day one but couldn’t get much going on day two to eventually finish in tenth place for a relatively small cash. With Ville Wahlbeck though plenty seems to be going right for him at the business end of tournaments, and he found himself in contention for a second bracelet when he squared off against Nick Shulman as the final two. A bluff by Wahlbeck for all his chips into a number one low ended any hopes he had of overturning Shulman’s chip lead though and the bracelet ended up with the New Yorker. For Wahlbeck the consolation is not only a pretty decent amount of money as the runner up prize, as he also moves into the lead again for the player of the year race. He has now collected first, second, third and thirteenth places (all in $10,000 events) to deservedly top the standings with more points than last year’s winner Erick Lindgren finished with. .jpg) Ivey captures no. 7 Hot on his heels however is someone else who seems like he can play a bit after picking up a seventh bracelet by the age of 33. Following on from last week’s lowball success, it was mixed Omaha/stud hi/lo which brought victory number seven for Phil Ivey as he brushed aside the likes of Carlos Mortensen and Jon Turner in the final stages. By WSOP standards it was a pretty small field at 375 runners but this was actually the largest event of all seven of his victories – game selection appears to have been the key to Ivey’s bracelet winning as he has beaten a combined total of 1272 players which is far less than the number of entrants we see in many individual tournaments these days. This result also catapults Ivey into second place in the player of the year race, overtaking poor old Brock Parker who a week ago was the star of the show at the Rio with his two bracelet wins. Now it’s all about the man who is referred to as the best player in the world more than anybody else, who hardly needed to convince anyone of his prowess but another couple of bracelets here and there doesn’t do any harm.  A patriotic Roland de Wolfe While Phil Ivey was winning number seven a whole host of others were hoping to fulfil their dreams of winning just one, including Roland de Wolfe who was guaranteed a fourth cash at this series when he made the final table of the $5,000 Omaha hi/lo. Very strong opposition included Scott Clements, Alexander Kravchenko and Andy Black but de Wolfe managed to outlast them all in a game he claims to have played very little. O8 specialist Scott Clements was many people’s favourite to win but when three handed Roland busted Clements’ for a huge pot he assumed a massive lead which was good enough to see off Brett Richey heads up. Many were talking of a triple crown of EPT, WPT and WSOP titles when several players held two out of the three titles, and whilst Gavin Griffin denied Roland the opportunity of being the first to take all three it’s still a pretty special achievement. Another $246,616 to de Wolfe’s name sees him edge closer to the Devilfish who currently sits atop the England all time money list. With two bracelets in the bag already for England, a third looked an excellent bet just a couple of days later when John Duthie made the final of the $10,000 heads up event whilst Ross Boatman and Jeff Kimber started the final table of the $2,500 pot limit Omaha as the two biggest stacks. The result of the heads up event should have already been known but an extra day had to be added when the tournament ran late, mostly due to Johnny Chan’s determination to grind out small pots in his quarter final. Eventually it came down to Duthie against Leo Wolpert in a best of three contest which went the distance after Duthie rivered a flush to beat top set in game one, and Wolpert struck back in just nine hands in game two. A much longer final match saw Wolpert on top for much of the game until finally Duthie saw a chance to double up with top pair and moved in. Unfortunately for him Wolpert had bottom two and with no further help from turn or river that finally settled matters in favour of the American.  Tournament monster JC Tran Meanwhile at the Omaha final table the chips all seemed to be heading one way as the always dangerous JC Tran set about eliminating numerous opponents, including Ross Boatman in fourth with a rivered flush. Jeff Kimber was able to resist the Tran onslaught longer than anyone but there was just no stopping the man who seems to record six figure cashes every couple of months these days. A second WSOP bracelet for him brings his lifetime tournament earnings up to $7.7 million which is not bad for someone who was playing $50 and $100 tournaments in his local casinos six years ago. As with last week, there has simply been too much happening at the WSOP to mention everybody’s achievements but some of the more noteworthy performances have included that of Michael Greco who finished third of 2506 entries in event 24’s no limit hold’em tournament. Meanwhile James van Alstyne proved his mixed game ability by following up on last week’s second place in the $3,000 HORSE with victory in the $1,500 version of the same variant, and Greg Mueller posted his first significant tournament win in the $10,000 championship limit hold’em event. This week also saw news from the EPT which announced the schedule for season six, or at least part of it. There will apparently be thirteen stops on the tour this year, although only seven have been confirmed so far. Of those seven Vilamoura in Portugal and Moscow are new stops on the tour, to fit in alongside previous venues Barcelona, London, Warsaw, Prague and Nassau for the Caribbean Adventure. The addition of a Moscow may pose one or two problems however as all 30 casinos in the Russian capital (along with numerous others all over the country) are set to be shut down by the government on July 1st. Russian officials have decided that they want gambling taken away from urban areas and instead want to set up four gambling resorts away from cities with the emphasis on generating tourism. The problem with that idea is that these resorts currently don’t exist due to development difficulties caused by a change in global economics. With the established casinos due to close in just a few days and currently nowhere else for regulated gambling, it is likely that the scene will be driven underground at least temporarily (and likely permanently in Moscow.) Just who is going to be running things until the new zones are built should be a major concern, but there appears to be no flexibility from Russian ministers who insist that the planned closure date of July 1st will be strictly adhered to. Presumably John Duthie isn’t unaware of this though and the decision to name Moscow as a venue rather than leave it on the unconfirmed list for now suggests that he knows something that hasn’t been officially released, or at least has a very good plan B lined up. So, with around a third of the World Series left to play we are getting a pretty good idea of who is on form but there is still plenty to play for with the $10,000 pot limit Omaha and $50,000 HORSE due soon. Can Phil Ivey score a third bracelet? Can Roland de Wolfe win another? Are Phil Hellmuth and Scotty Nguyen even playing this year? Simon Galloway will keep you posted on all this and more as he takes over this column for the next few weeks.
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