Players with bankrolls of all sizes are hitting the online poker tables hard this week, as the Mini Full Tilt Online Poker Series is now well underway. It’s been over a month since the beginning of FTOPS XIX which was an enormous success. Mini FTOPS XIX looks to follow in its footsteps, offering great tournaments, awesome guaranteed prize pools and exceptional buy-ins. The fourth event wrapped up early in the week, with GetSome2512 left standing as the ultimate victor.
The Full Tilt Online Poker Series is hosted at Bovada Poker about once every three months, and is a series of tournaments with guaranteed prize pools which attract players from all corners of the globe. There are a wide range of events in different games and formats, and the one complaint is that the tournament entry fees can be a little bit steep for those on a low budget. Enter Mini FTOPS, a tournament series which takes place one month after each FTOPS and offers exactly the same array of tournaments but at one tenth the buy-in! Since these tournaments attract even more players, the guarantees and prize pools themselves are still massive.
Although there’s a huge range of different and exciting events in this current Mini FTOPS Series, Event Four was fairly standard, with the only distinguishing feature being that play was six-handed. Six-max tournaments tend to have more action, as the blinds come around a lot faster meaning players can’t just sit and wait for premium hands before making their move. 3,954 players turned up for the event which was enough to more than cover the $350,000 guarantee, with the final figure being an impressive $395,400. That prize pool was split between the best 432 players, with first place having over $77,000 reserved.
FTOPS and Mini FTOPS events are hosted by a Full Tilt Poker celebrity, and in the case of Mini FTOPS XIX Event Four, Huseyin Yilmaz was the man in charge. The Turkish pro has over $300,000 in career tournament earnings and plays online at Bovada Poker. He had a run of bad luck in this tournament and was eliminated in 2717th place. Team Full Tilt member Andy Bloch, famous for being a member of the MIT Blackjack Team and boasting over $4.1 Million in tournament earnings, picked up the slack and made an impressive 23rd place finish, earning himself just under $2,000.
With over $150,000 in prize money to be shared amongst the top three place getters, it is very easy to understand why, when action on the final table became three handed, the remaining players decided on a chop. Full Tilt rules requires that a certain amount of money be set aside for first place and that one winner is determined, but beyond that players can chop in a way that they all agree on. GetSome2512, imdurrrrman and Crooklyn75 finished in first, second and third respectively. Crooklyn walked away with the second-most money for his finish at $48,311.45, but second-place getter imdurrrrman was also not far behind with $46,199.52. Chip leader and ultimate winner GetSome2512 got the biggest piece of the pie and takes home $63,272.40 for his win.