WSOP
The $25,000 6-Max Event #52 brought us a final table of six that could never be described as “soft.” With Phil Galfond, Steve Sung, Dani Stern, Richard Lyndaker, Stepehn Chidwick and Max Lehmanski all making it, and all having WSOP final table experience, it looked like it was going to be a very interesting final table.
Phil Galfond went into the final table with a decent chip lead, but he was only partially involved in the first elimination of the final six.
Richard Lyndaker was down to under 10 big blinds, and shoved from the cuttoff position. Galffond made the call from the small blind, but then folded when Steve Sung shoved from the big blind behind him. Sung turned over
A
Q
to dominate Lyndaker’s A
8. The board ran out 94K37 to send Lyndaker to the rail with $178,261 to try and cushion the fall from grace.
Max Lehmanski was now the shorty, and raised all in over Galfond’s min raise in the cutoff. Galfond snapped off the raise, and tabled AA, which had Lehmanski’s 66 in real trouble. The flop was dealt, showed
44J to increase Galfond’s lead. The T on the turn left Max drawing to two outs, and unfortunately for him the 8 river wasn’t one of them. Lehmanski was busted in 5th for $249,291.
This bustout had split the four remaining players into two camps, with Galfond and Sung starting to pull away from the other two players.
The next exit was between these other two players. Dani Stern opened with a min plus bet, and Chidwick shoved his remaining 14.5 big blinds from the button. The action folded back round to Stern who immediately made the call.
Chidwick turned over 66
to be confidently in front of Stern’s 55. The flop wasn’t that dangerous, coming as it did 3AJ. The turn brought a sweat for the Englishman as it brought Stern more outs with the 4. Any 2 or 5 on the river would eliminate Chidwick in fourth. The 5 was dealt for the river, and a 13% chance came in fro stern, sending Stephen Chidwick to the rail in fourth for $353,780.
Stern had closed the gap on Sung, and was less than a big blind behind him in the chip counts, while Galfond was a clear leader. However, over the three handed battle, every player occupied every possible position as the chips flew about the table.
Third place was determined in a hand that escalated quickly. Stern called to 80k from the small blind, letting Galfond raise to 230k. Stern, not wanted to get pushed around slid the rest of his 2.5 million chips across the line, and was probably surprised when Galfond snap called.
His surprise probably turned to despair when he saw his A5 was in real trouble against Phil’s QQ. The board ran out 78578 to bust Stern out of the event in third. He won $509,473 for his efforts, and probably shouldn’t feel too bad about his shove running into Galfond’s Queens, as I can see Phil doing the same with a lot less.
Going into the heads up portion of the day, Galfond was just under 2 million chips behind, but he did close that to less than 1.2 million after the next break, and then took the lead after he got value from a pair of pocket sevens.
After this, it was all Sung, and he got Galfond almost at a 5:2 chip deficit before the final hand. Sung min raised, and Galfond shoved all in for his last 19 big blinds. Sung insta-called, and Galfond turned over KQ to be ahead of Sung’s JT. The flop hit both hands, but hit Sung’s a little better than Galfonds. The cards were KTJ, giving Sung two pair, and giving Galfond top pair with an open ended straight draw with a back door flush draw as well.
The turn removed the flush draw from the table as the card was the 6, and the river ended Galfond’s plans for the bracelet as the 5 eliminated him in 2nd place for $744,841.
This is Sung’s second bracelet, the first coming in 2009 in a $1,000 NLHE Event and is his biggest live cash to date.
The final table cashouts were confirmed as:
- Steve Sung – $1,205,324
- Phil Galfond – $744,841
- Dani Stern – $509,473
- Stephen Chidwick – $353,780
- Max Lehmanski – $249,291
- Richard Lyndaker – $178,261