Oy Oy Oy?
Following in the footsteps of fellow countryman Joe Hachem (left), Mark Vos has become the second Australian to take down a 6 figure sum at this year's World Series, winning Event 6 and a rather satisfactory $803,274.
The event was the $2,000 No Limit Hold'Em Freezout and the young Aussie pro had to fend off an overwhelming 1919 players to win the coveted prize and don the much desired gold bracelet.
Yet, unlike Dutch Boyd (right) in the the previous Event, he didn't head into the final table as chip-leader. In fact, he lay in second, a rather disconcerting 600,000 behind chip leader Kevin Peterson. What was more eye-opening about this, however, was that Peterson, who, with 6 players remaining, still had just under half the chips in play, somehow managed to take 6th spot, a rather remarkable feat given the circumstances.
In his defence, he did lose a humonguous pot against eventual runner up Nam Le when his pocket Queens lost one of those imfamous coinflips against the Big Slick of Le. But then, in what can only be described as 'tilt', Peterson managed to push all his chips in with a rather meagre Q-T suited, a hand that failed to outdraw the pocket threes of initial raiser John Reiss on a K-9-5-K-2 board.
Two interesting additions to this final table were the first female finalist of this year's WSOP, Vanessa Selbst, and Spain's former Main Event winner Carlos Mortensen (left), making his second final table appearance of the week.
Although the former eliminated the latter in 9th place when her A-9 spiked an Ace first card against Mortensen's pocket sevens, Selbst's swan song wouldn't come too much later when she ran a preflop bluff with 5-2 into Peterson's Pocket Rockets. The $101,285 she earned for her 7th place finish should soften the blow though.
So with Mortensen, Wells, Selbst, Peterson, Chang, Thomas Hunt III (what happened to the other two Thomas Hunts I'm not sure), and Reiss taking 9th to 3rd respectively, it was down to Le and Vos to fight it out for the lion's share of the $3,492,580 prize pool.
And it was the Australian who finally came out on top when his fifth street all-in with rivered trips was suprisingly called by Le's pocket pair of sixes. The Australian was crowned champ becoming our first overseas bracelet winner of 2006.
Many onlookers may not recognise Vos, but, for someone so young, he has already accrued a rather impressive record of results. His 2006 cashes alone should intimidate many an opponent, as he has amassed over 150k from a runner up finish in the World Master's £1,000 Event, 2nd in the Paris WPT's €2,500 Event, not to mention his final table appearance in the Australian Poker Championships, a feat which netted him in excess of $60,000.
Also worthy of a mention is the appearance of Dave 'elblondie' Colclough's name on the casher's list. Although being forced to settle for 149th when his A-9 was cruelly outdrawn by Max Pescatori's A-4 (straight on the river), it's good to see the blonde one up where he belongs. Hopefully a bracelet and a stonking six figure cheque is on the horizon.
[Ed Note: To see the final result of this comp, please click here]