TCOOP 2012

The first ever PokerStars Turbo Championship of Online Poker has come to close and it is safe to say that it was a resounding success. Almost every event exceeded the guaranteed prize pool, and many players walked away from the tables with considerably larger bankrolls.

The biggest first place prize of the entire series was doled out just last night in the TCOOP Main Event, a $700 buy-in No Limit Hold’em turbo tournament. The guaranteed prize pool of $1.5 million was absolutely annihilated thanks to an impressive 3,667 people participating. This meant a total prize pool of $2,438,555 and a first place prize of $382,855.67.

There is no surprise that the game’s online elite came out for this tournament in spades. American tournament professionals made sure they were relocated on time to play the big event, and the number of big names in the field highlighted this fact. It turned out to be more than worth it for two in particular, as both first and second place ended up being American players.

It was to be expected that stacks would be shallow once the final table of this event got underway, but the actual stack sizes, once it became 9-handed, bordered on ridiculous. Betudontbet was the chip leader when the final table started, with 25,828,771 at blinds 500k/1m. He was the only player at the table with over 10 big blinds. Have you ever wanted to flip coins for hundreds of thousands of dollars? If so, this was your tournament!

TCOOP Main Event Final Table

With so many short stacks, it was obviously push and pray time for… well, everyone. The bust outs were fast and furious. Realizing that he probably didn’t have much time left, mmbittencour attempted to get a deal going with five players remaining. His chat requests went unheeded by at least one of the remaining players, however, so play continued. Fittingly, mmbittencour ended up busting in 5th place.

Betudontbet, one of the aforementioned relocated American pros, controlled a huge portion of the remaining chips in play for most of the final table. This fact was highlighted when, with three players left, play was stopped so that a deal could be discussed. Andre Coimbra, the final table host, delivered the chip chop numbers, and Betudontbet was calculated to receive $10,000 more than the scheduled first place prize!

Math can be a funny thing. Usually players aren’t happy with giving a player more than first place money, and this final table was no exception. The players opted to keep playing.

Betudontbet ended up getting heads-up with ImDaNuts, another relocated American pro. Both of these players have fantastic online poker resumes. Betudontbet goes by David Emmons in real life, and before this Main Event cash, he had almost $2 million in online tournament cashes. He currently ranks 19th on PocketFives. ImDaNuts, known as Chris Oliver in real life, has cashes that are even more impressive. Currently ranked 23rd on PocketFives, his cashes before this tournament amounted to just under $4 million.

Betudontbet had an over 6 to 1 chip lead over ImDaNuts when heads-up got started, so it almost seemed like Emmons’s victory was guaranteed. To say that heads-up was short is an understatement as it was all over in just one hand: Betudontbet shoved A5o and ImDaNuts called with K7o. ImDaNuts got teased by a K high flop, for an ace fell on the turn to take the pot away. He had to settle for 2nd place.

Congratulations to Betudontbet for winning the first ever TCOOP Main Event! He dominated the final table from the start and received a handsome $382,855.67 for his efforts. Let’s keep in mind that he did all this in just 5 hours and 14 minutes. I challenge you to find a better hourly rate than that!

Final table cashes:

1. Betudontbet – $382,855.67
2. ImDaNuts – $285,310.93
3. Didak04 – $201,180.78
4. Gala_Terry – $140,216.91
5. mmbittencour – $103,638.59
6. DimaDima13 – $79,253.03
7. swissman29 – $45,867.48
8. zyxel888 – $30,481.93
9. MON3Y$HOT – $19,508.44