Dan Smith Wins $100k Super High Roller at the Bellagio in Las Vegas
Smith claimed the first prize of $1,404,000 (£1,045,84) ahead of “Kid Poker” Daniel Negreanu in one of the final preliminary events before the start of the World Poker Tour Five Diamond World Poker Classic Main Event on Tuesday.
Dan Smith collecting his winnings ©WPT.com
Thirty-nine of the best poker players in the world stumped up the $100k buy-in fee knowing that only six people would be walking away with a prize. Smith’s win was his third biggest career cash and it takes his total winnings to over $19 million, becoming his third win at an event with an $100k buy-in.
Daniel Negreanu had to settle for $936,000 (£692,866) in second place, which was enough for the Canadian poker legend to return to the top of the all-time money list on $34,151,327 (£25,280,238). Smith moved into 14th place on the list after this, surely one of the greatest victories of his career.
Negreanu kept everyone who couldn’t attend the event on the edge of their seats with updates on his Twitter feed.
Holy moly!!! Dan Smith AA all in against Schillhabel JT flop JTT!!!!! TURN ACE!!!! Heads up now guaranteed $936k playing for the title and $1.4 mill! – Dan Negreanu, via Twitter
Smith won that hand to take 3.2 million chips into the heads-up play against Negreanu, who was on 2.6 million. Negreanu was eliminated after going all-in on a J-T-4 flop with Q-10, while Smith’s A-K beat him out when a queen hit the river, giving Smith the Broadway straight.
The final table was also contested by Stefan Schillhabel who received $624,000 (£461,910) for his third-place finish, while Isaac Haxton won $390,000 (£288,694) in fourth place. Spaniard Sergio Aido(£230,955) and perennial high-roller Bryn Kenney (£173,216) completed the line-up.
It became the 22nd final table finish of the year for Kenney, who has won five titles and $8,128,628 in the process. Kenney consolidated his place as the current leader in the 2017 Card Player of the Year race, while Smith moved into 12th place, having won three previous tournaments this year along with 13 final table finishes.
Dan Smith had already tasted success at Las Vegas’s Bellagio after winning his only WPT main tour victory there in 2013 at the WPT Five Diamond World Poker Classic $10,300 no-limit hold’em main event.
All eyes now turn to Tuesday’s WPT Five Diamond Main Event, which attracted 791 entries last year. The $10,000 buy-in event is the last WPT event of the 2017 calendar year and should be hotly contested with a similar number of entries expected. Last year’s winner James Romero walked away with a mammoth $1.9 million.
